Armies on Parade - Board update

Yesterday I told about the snags I had while building the Armies on Parade (AoP) board, and that I felt it looked a bit like something a 10-year old kid would do for his home project.

I complained even more to my wife about it from the day I started working on the board and experience the snags, and while I was out leading a youth bigband yesterday she helped me a bit with the finish of the mine (the lower table).

For a long time she has been into scapbooking, and she know a thing or two (maybe even three or four) about washes, shading, and things like that as this is techniques that also is used in that hobby. So she made the mine come more to life with some shadows on the recessed areas and a bit more light where that could be expected. And also she added on some gold and silver areas in the mine, to show off that there are rich mineral ores down there. 

I am very grateful for her assistance, and I think the board increased its quality at once. There are still some work to do on the top table, but this is minor work compared to what needed to be done down in the mines.

My board will automatically look a little less shiny compared to other boards for many reasons. First mine is made of plywood and is thinner and flatter than a Games Workshop tile, second it is a mountain area, so it is mostly gray compared to other boards that can have more color on them.

I had hoped to use a Games Workshop tile for my top, but when I got to the store to see if they had tiles for sale, they were sold out on the Age of Sigmar tiles, and the 40K tiles were city tiles and they are way too futuristic for my purpose. So I ended up with plywood both on top and on the bottom.

And even though my tiles are Mechanicus Standard Gray (with some added shades and highlights) I plan to brighten them up a bit with the dwarfs I bring to the table.

The dwarfs uses many colors, and some of them are quite striking while others are more neutral. There are metal, silver, bronze, gold, greens, blues, yellows and other colors to help lighten the table up a bit. There are also quite a lot of figures that will go on the tables:

Down in the mine I will have 2 Grudge Ponies with carts, and a third on the ramp going either up or down.

20 Nightgoblins as one unit

15 Dwarf Miners working along one wall

1 Dwarf Prospector (old Miner) working as a sort of mini diorama, on a little hill down in the mine. He will have a wheelbarrow and dynamite around him.

10 Dwarf Ironbrakers (the old metal ones) marching to stop the Nightgoblins

and in a special cave I have the White Dwarf subscription Vampire hunter miniature with a coffin with a goblin in it.

On the top table there will be:

2 Grudge Ponies pulling carts loaded with equipment that the dwarfs will carry to war with them.

2 Dwarf Engineers

1 Dwarf Warden King

1 or 2 Dwarf Runelords (little uncertain if I have 1 or 2 of them)

10 Longbeards

10 Irondrakes

20 Dwarf Rangers with crossbows and axes

16 Dwarf Warriors with shields and hand weapons

16 Dwarf Warriors with long axes (the old type of plastic dwarfs)

3 Goblin Nasty skulkers 

2 Cannons with 3 Dwarf crew each (6 figures in total)

1 Dwarf Gyrobomber (helicopter)

This leaves me with 47 figures on the lower level, and 86 figures on the top level (if I get to place them all I will see how much space it actually takes when I set up the board). That is a grand total of 133 figures. 

As promised yesterday, pics will come. I will try to take some pictures on Friday while finishing the boards, and then I will take pictures as I set the board up on Saturday.