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Love the oxen and the squigoth. What the base model? I use alot of apple barrel myself. I like where you're going with the cave thing too!

Thanks kestral! I'm glad you're enjoying the stuff I'm making.

There isn't too much of a base model for the oxen. I bought the Battat Wild animal tube from Amazon to use in projects:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00TYO5UKI/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
I cut the lower parts of the legs off of a giraffe and the tail from a lion and glued them to some foamcore.

The rest was just some lumps of hot glue to flesh out the bulk a bit, followed by epoxie putty for the outer layer and details. I painted them to look like Jersey Oxen.

The base model for the squiggoths are stegosaurus from the dollar store (dollar tree)

I clipped all the plates, and sawed off the head and tail. Looking at a picture from an Imperial Armour book, I sculpted the new head and tail from apoxie putty.

I hope I answered your question, if not don't hesitate to ask for clarification. And thanks for stopping by

I've done a bit more work on the cave the adventure will be taking place in.


This is the simple cardboard base that I make stalagmites from.


Using layers of cheap hotglue, I bulked up the shape of the stalagmites. I then smoothed them into a more refined cone shape, and finally dragged the tip of the hot glue gun across the surface to texture them. They're still quite hard to see, but I'm happy with how the turned out, and once painted I hope they will be easier for all of you to see.


I also made one of the passageways between the rooms in the cave, still many still need to be made.

I've been doing a lot more work, and was able to dry fit the WIP goblin hideout in a cave complex. I give you Cragmaw Hideout:

I wish to be in your campaign.

That is spectacular. I am with Brian, wish I could join you. Fantastic effort.

That's class man. It really reminds me of Skyrim or Oblivion for some reason, it's giving me that same cavernous dungeon full of loot feel, which is great!

Thanks Brian, thanks Cam! I wish you could playing in this campaign too, that would be amazing!

Also thanks boundless, I'm glad you like it. It's very flattering to be compared to those two games.

Add me to the company of wanting to join in. Great progress, Syro!

Just one more warm week - and I'll be digging out my terrain!

Terrific gaming terrain!

If you need a Level 15 (old style DnD) Elven Ranger, let me know!

@Wirecat: Thanks for the kind words Wirecat, it would be fun if you and the others could join me. I'm looking forward to when you dig out your terrain, will you be posting it on your blog?

@Meer_Cat: Thanks Meer_Cat! It would be great if you, me, and other dakka members could easily hang out in person whenever we wanted.

Unfortunately I've been too tired and busy to do any crafting all week.

Loving the cave! I love that you've included the 3D elements of the design, it just looks awesome set up. Would love to see some more "actual play" shots of that cave system when you get to run it. Lost Mine is a really fun adventure, really looking forward to following along on your blog.

Thanks Da Boss! I'm glad you like it. It took a lot more to make than I expected, but I am happy how it's coming out. I'd like to do even more before I use it in the campaign, but I really don't think I'll have time. That's a really good idea you have of more pictures during the actual game, as long as I don't get too caught up, I'll try to remembered to do that

Wow, it's been close to three weeks since my last post, and close to a month since my last post about my projects. Works been pretty crazy, stressful, and busy. I was feeling really inspired on Saturday, and other than several hours of yard work I spent most of the day crafting and painting.


After about 4 years sitting as bare cardboard and dollar store trees for a Christmas village, I've finally finished my 3 spruce tree scatter terrain pieces. I crushed off or painted over all the fake snow stuck in the branches, painted the base brown, and added little tufts of grass and rocks to act as the corners of 2 inch x 2 inch squares to make measuring easier. I flocked lightly with my usual chamomile tee, plus some finely cut jute twine (also what the grass tufts are).


Same trees, taken without the flash.


Some dungeon tiles painted grey, with black for the outside. I'm not crazy about the grey, but it's only only one I have without mixing it up custom, and I want them to all match in color no matter how many I make. The black comes out a dark grey, any suggestions on a cheap good black acrylic? I'm thinking of trying out what Cam uses.


Water features. There is a central river/stream that flows through the center of the goblin hideout. The river pieces were very simple to make, just hot glue on top of the cardboard bases. I then dragged the hot tip of the glue gun back and forth through the glue to make the water pattern. Without priming I painted blue directly on top of the glue hoping some of the clear of the glue would show through. There are also two dammed up pools of water at the farthest upstream point of the river, that is the two little rock circle pieces at the top of the picture.

Nice! I dunno if it's the lighting but the grey has come out pretty white alright - maybe you could dirty it up with some wash like Earthshade or something? Scatter trees are always useful, too.

That lot is looking fantastic. Don't worry at the grey, as Da Boss say's a wash will do wonders for it.

Though I would say, try making up project batches of paint, a good jam jar full of a custom colour will do the trick, may one day you run out and need to try and match it, but look at the world it is not uniformly coloured, you are talking about stone flags here. If there is a subtle difference in colour it will not look out of place.

If I was you I would mix up a jam jar of a dark grey/brown wash. write the recipe down as you do it. It does not have to be deadly accurate. Add a tiny drop of dish soap in the wash and it will flow evenly over the surface and you will be really happy with the result.

To be honest though, it is all looking pretty fantastic as is bud.

I would also suggest keeping a physical reference for rock and sand, both texture and colour. Nature is amazing in its variety!

I also add my voice for the Camkierhi suggestion of heavy wash. That should work.

@Da Boss: The grey was very white, and the black was a dark grey, unfortunately it wasn't the lighting. Thanks for the kind words and advice. I'm planning to try some washes on these, but haven't gotten to that stage yet with the other changes I'm trying.

@Cam: Thanks as always for the encouragement, I took your advice, and after digging up an old empty paint bottle left over from college, I made a custom gray like you suggested. I added brown liek so many of you suggested, and it did help with the color. I also wrote down the recipe in my little D&D journal.

@Thanks for the advice Wirecat, I should keep some physical reference and pictures nearby, I always do better art when I do. I guess I've been doing too much old school Minecraft and want all of the under ground to be a uniform gray.


Here is a "before and after" shot with the custom paint I made at Cam's suggestion. The ones on the left I didn't paint yet to show the change. I'm much happier with the darker gray.


Some small rooms and passageways. I'm wondering if there's something up with the new primer I've been using. My paint wants to ball up rather than adhere. Only the left most piece in this pic was primed, plus the ones in the above pic. The rest were not and seem to take the paint much more smoothly. Any suggestions?


I've been experimenting with different ways to preserve the grids on these pieces. Most, I dragged a small bead of hot glue over the entire grid. In this pic I'm trying two other ideas. On the left, I traced the grid in PVA glue and used sand, i still need to paint it. The other two, I cut into the piece using a hobby knife following the grid. I think I'm more of a fan or the cut pieces, with less obvious grid, though I may still trying a ark wash on them along with the others. Thoughts, suggestions?

I've been working on some more minis for the D&D game too.


One of my players is crazy about cats and really wants to play a Tabaxi, so I've started making a Tabaxi figure to his basic specifications. I've already thought of how to introduce him to the party.


Farther on the tabaxi, with a piece of the dungeon in the background. Still very basic rough skeleton. Head is from a tiger I chopped off when making wolves. I sculpted a crossbow by hand, which I made a mold of and produced the crossbow in the picture. Left arm also comes from a mold, but I plan to sculpt a lot of details on top.


There is a grick (a weird beaked tentacle worm), that the characters can encounter in this campaign. They can also encounter a maximum of 4 later in the campaign as wondering monsters, so I decided to make 4. When I looked in the Monster Manual to learn a little more about them and get a good look at the picture, I found out there's a big version called a grick prime. I figured "what the heck" I'm already making the other gricks, I'll make a grick prime at the same time. Gricks are mostly made from aluminum foil, with a layer of hot glue for the skin. The unfinished tentacles are apoxie putty (more foil and glue for the prime). I'll be adding the suction cups with green stuff, and also making the beaks.

Those Grick are very nicely done. I should try your foil and hot glue technique - I used to to a lot with hot glue, back in the day.

Thanks kestral, I'm glad you like them. If you do make something out of foil and hot glue, let me know, I'd enjoy seeing it.

Tomorrow is the big day, we're finally having our second session of D&D. Everyone's schedules have finally aligned, and I've been working like a nut trying to finished the entire dungeon that they might get to. I think I did.

Hey, I just finished look through your blog, and your scratchbuilding has totally floored me. I particularly like your cardboard dungeon--I may have to try that myself.

I HONESTLY thought, at first glance, you had acquired some of the Reaper mins Gricks.

SpecTACular work!

@JoshInJapan: Thank you so much, I appreciate the visit and especially that you like my stuff. The cardboard dungeon takes a lot longer to make than I expected, but it is rewarding. I hope you do try it some time, and if you do please let me know. I hope to post a picture with the entire dungeon fully painted and set up soon.

@Brian: You don't know how much your comment means to me. I'm always trying to improve my sculpts and figures I make, so be mistaken for a commercial product is extremely flattering. Thanks so much. I hope they still look good, when they have enough paint on them to be seen clearly.

I just had my second session of D&D as a DM today. It went well, and my players got a lot more done than last session. I'm still surprised how long everything takes, with them constantly debating with each other what to do next. They managed to avoid all the traps, but got caught in every ambush they came upon. It was a busy session so I only remembered to take a single picture, but here it is. This is near the end of the session where they just finished following a trail that the goblins have been using, which led to a cave mouth. I'm glad you get to see my scatter trees in use. My players were surprised and impressed both by how they look, and that each rock and tuft of grass on them secretly follows a grid, so they can be eyeball measured during D&D but also look natural enough to use in gridless wargames.

Excellent sitrep- and I agree- there is no better feeling than to see one's creations (figures, vehicles, terrain) actually in use on the board.

Whilst stationed in Yorkshire, the locally gaming club asked to borrow some of my British Napoleonic battalions I'd painted, especially the Scottish battalions (42nd, 92nd, 77th) for a big wargaming event they were going to in Leeds. They brought me back a copy of the local paper that had carried an article on the vent afterwards, and in the big picture in the middle was all their stuff- to include all _my_ stuff- set up on the table ready to play. Great feeling.

Keep it up, man- you'll have me gaming again Rikki-tik!

Meer_Cat, that is so cool about your army in the paper! From the time I've spent on your blog, I can understand why they would want to borrow your stuff for a big display. I agree with what you said about it being a great feeling seeing the stuff you make in use, That's probably why my craft time has been leaning so heavily towards D&D, I haven't played 40k in over a year, and even before that not often. I still love it and the lore, but it's harder to feel motivated to finish projects.

I hope I do manage to get you gaming again. I'm try my best!

 Syro_ wrote:
... I'm still surprised how long everything takes, with them constantly debating with each other what to do next...

You can speed things along by assuming that players debating = PCs debating. A group of adventurers standing around, debating, making noise etc will attract something unpleasant. Use wandering monsters. This is one of the original reasons for wandering monsters. The other use was to deplete party resources.

Thanks for the suggestion Red Harvest. It's funny, I actually decided to create a wandering monsters chart after last session specifically for people/creatures hearing them arguing. I didn't realize this was already a common thing.

It was part of the original game, but I believe it fell out of favor with with the advent of 3e. Those of us who played the original game remember.

Nice blog! Lots of fun stuff in here. Always good to see inventive recycling.