[Ronin] Terrain Board and Demo Scenario

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**Manchu**

This is my first attempt at making terrain from closed-cell foam. It has been a lot of fun so far. I am a bit nervous about pouring the resin for the stream ...

Ignore the shoota boy there ...

**Easy E**

Needs more bamboo! However, looks really good. Nice texture and color. For some reason it reminds me of the final duel in Yojimbo.

**Manchu**

I say it's for Ronin, which is why I built it, but I wanted to keep it as generic as possible. I will add movable bamboo stands and cherry blossom trees along with 4ground feudal Japanese houses. More pics to come!

**Easy E**

Cool.

Are you planning on doing mini-reviews of all the Osprey wargames?

**Manchu**

I own all of them except the second expansion to IHMN and the newest Age of Sail game. None of the others have really caught my fancy but I would be pleased to take requests.

**Easy E**

I am currently reading the rules for Dux Bellorum, and have the rules for A World Aflame; so I would love to see those two.

I will see if I can get one up for Fighting Sail for you as I do have that one. Perhaps I can compare and contrast it to GW's old Trafalgar?

**Manchu**

I avoid comparisons, as they only work to the extent that a person is familiar with the other game.

**Eilif**

Looks very nice. Personally I'm wary of boards with permanent features like water as it limits future arrangements. However, the execution is very well done and the choice not to add more permanent features is wise.

Best of luck with the stream, I'm sure it will look great.

**Manchu**

My rationale was, there are very few ways to arrange a road, hill, and stream in a 2x2 space. Buildings, trees, bamboo stands, etc., will create enough variation for any game of Ronin with low figure counts. We'll use a normal mat-based layout for anything large, if that ever comes to pass.

**Pacific**

Looking very good so far!

I'm thinking of doing a similar thing for Bushido at some point, so interested to see how this turns out..

**MrDwhitey**

I have a distinct issue with the blatant racism displayed by Manchu in posing a board set in Japan with an Ork. Not all Japanese people are Orks.

I like it, it looks good. Scatter terrain and rotation of the board (though take into account the river) will provide plenty of variation.

**Strombones**

Yeah looks good. Nice color on the road.

Even if you get bored with the variations you can always go buy another 2x2 tile for 12 bucks and start another one.

Edit: is it glued to a wood base?

**Manchu**

Yes, three layers of pink foam on a MDF base.

**durecellrabbit**

Nice board. I'd love to see it finished, I found setting up a Ronin game quite tricky to balance shooting and melee so it'll be fun to see what you do.

**Manchu**

Some progress:

Originally, I just painted black enamel over the raw foam edges after some sanding. But that looked pretty poor (the foam absorbed some of the paint and looked rough) and seemed too soft. So I coated the edges in spackle, sanded them down, and sealed them with PVA thinned with water. They have a nice hard candy finish now which I’m hoping will only feel stronger and smoother with another coat of black enamel. After that, I will pour the clear resin to create the water effect in the river.

**Easy E**

Looking good.

It kind of reminds me of where they have the final duel in Sanjiro, the sequel to Yojimbo.

I think that is my favorite Samurai duel of all-time!

**carlos13th**

Would love to see this when finished.

**Manchu**

I am going to demo Ronin on August 29 so it has to be done by then! TBH the surface of the board is pretty much done (minus the resin "water"). Other features will all be separate. I plan to do a few cherry trees and some bamboo. I'll put a 4ground house on there for good measure, too.

**Third_Age_of_Baggz**

Manchu wrote:
I am going to demo Ronin on August 29 so it has to be done by then! TBH the surface of the board is pretty much done (minus the resin "water"). Other features will all be separate. I plan to do a few cherry trees and some bamboo. I'll put a 4ground house on there for good measure, too.

Alright another fellow player! Got my group involved a year ago and we love it. Board is looking good and the water will make it that much better. Keep up the posts. Oh and as much as I love 4ground, you should really look into the Plastcraft terrain. It's nice, holds up well and paints easy. Did I mention cheap as well?

**carlos13th**

Third_Age_of_Baggz wrote:
Manchu wrote:
I am going to demo Ronin on August 29 so it has to be done by then! TBH the surface of the board is pretty much done (minus the resin "water"). Other features will all be separate. I plan to do a few cherry trees and some bamboo. I'll put a 4ground house on there for good measure, too.

Alright another fellow player! Got my group involved a year ago and we love it. Board is looking good and the water will make it that much better. Keep up the posts. Oh and as much as I love 4ground, you should really look into the Plastcraft terrain. It's nice, holds up well and paints easy. Did I mention cheap as well?

Keep in mind that as cheap as plasticraft is you have to texture it yourself otherwise its just shaped sheets of flat plastic.

**Manchu**

Third_Age_of_Baggz wrote:
you should really look into the Plastcraft terrain

The bridge in the pic is Plastcraft and TBH I really hate it (hence not bothering with railings).

carlos13th wrote:
Keep in mind that as cheap as plasticraft is you have to texture it yourself otherwise its just shaped sheets of flat plastic.

Yep, I used a dull dental tool to carve in wood grain and nail heads into the bridge planks.

**carlos13th**

Yeah I bought two pieces of the stuff and wouldn't buy it again personally. I struggled to carve wood texture on the bridge so just painted it streaky

**judgedoug**

Plastcraft's later stuff is pretty nice, though. re: the WW2 terrain.

**notprop**

Resin, Resin, RESIN!!

C'mon Manchu pour the resin on already!

You can't put it off any longer.

**durecellrabbit**

I think you need a little red Shinto shrine on top of the hill.

**Manchu**

Did not find the time to pour the resin, but here are some pics of the board with terrain elements as used for running demos at my LGS today:

Scenario

Tokugawa has triumphed. The monks of Mount Hiei seek the shogun's favor by executing an exiled official who has taken refuge at their temple. The official and his double fled with the fearsome monks at their heels. Across the stream, a former soldier (who did not fight for Tokugawa) turned dojo master spots the fleeing old men and decides to help.

The old men start at the base of the bridge on the narrow bank and move down the road to the torii at the beginning of each movement phase by d6 inches (rolled separately).

The sohei buntai deploys on the same side of the stream, ten inches away from the old men.

The koryu buntai deploy on the hill on the far side of the stream.

The official is worth 5 victory points and the double is worth 1 victory point to the sohei player, for slaying them. The sohei player secretly tells the referee who is who before the game begins. If either old man makes it to under the torii, the koryu player gains as many victory points as that figure is worth but does not find out how many until the end of the scenario.

Slaying opposing figures gains victory points equal to the slain figure's rank, per normal.

There are four end conditions: both old men are killed, both old men successfully flee, a combination of those two, or either side is wiped out.

Koryu Buntai 86 points

Sensei (Leader) - Bunjutsu (Kenjutsu), Commander, Fast, Tough

Senpai - Bunjutsu (Kenjutsu), Commander, Yojimbo

Kohai - Bunjutsu (Kenjutsu)

Sohei Buntai 84 points

Sohei (Leader) - Fearless, Powerful, Medium Armor

Sohei - Fearless, Intuition, Teppo

Initiate - Fearless

Initiate - Fearless

I refereed four games: koryu won three. The first koryu win should not count because I modified the scenario afterward, seeing that it favored koryu too much (koryu player controlled old men, including deployment). After changing the scenario, every game was very close and involved exciting turn-arounds.

**Easy E**

That turned out very nice.

**Manchu**

Thanks, I was very gratified by the response of the people who came into the LGS for the demo.

**Lithlandis Stormcrow**

Awesome board!

Mind if I poke you as to where you got the Torii?

**Manchu**

The torii was kindly lent to me by a friend - not sure where he picked it up but I think it might be an aquarium decoration. Will ask him and let you know.