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I want to do city streets for my tau. right now I just have 12 of my guys based with painted grey sand. i really would like to do some streets and curbs rather than just an asphalt gravel look. But I'm really not sure how to do it. Any ideas?

Cut up bits of sprue and stick them on (some of) the bases, to represent fallen masonry etc.

Google it. I think corrugated cardboard painting grey then drybrushed light grey with some yellow lines on looks great as road-like bases. Sprinkle a little sand on top, paint it like rubble and there you have it (if you use the carbord you may want to fill the sides in with Green Stuff)

Chopped up sprue to create a rough pavement on 1/3 of your base, topped with plasticard for a smooth finish. Score a line here and there to indicate paving slabs.
Touch up any imperfections with GS.If you're feeling really adventurous you can attempt to sculpt a drain.
Then paint the sand the colour of asphalt (or M41 equivalent), and Bob's your uncle.

Mix the asphalt look with something you can make look like curbing. A little bit of realistic water and some spackle could sell a gutter, too.

This is my take on street bases. They were made for my DV Chosen I picked up so I didnt want to make them too cluttered as the models were already very detailed to paint so the street bases were made to look very simple. Plasticard, some dirt, some chaos spikey spure bits and a few bits and pieces from the Warhammer and Warhammer 40k basing kit and at the moment have only been lightly drybrushed with greys at the moment to get a feel for them.

MWH - those look really good. Simple yet really effective.


Nafarious. You might try this tutorial. It could easily be adapted for standard 25mil bases. http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/516378.page
There are also a few companies that produce street bases and the like.

Hmm I like that idea, I can't buy them. So far I have just been doing cork with some plasticard, and sand as asphalt.

 Nafarious wrote:
Hmm I like that idea, I can't buy them. So far I have just been doing cork with some plasticard, and sand as asphalt.

That's actually not so bad for a basic sort of base. When you paint cork black and then drybrush with grey, it looks just like cracked asphault.
Put a white or yellow line on it, and that identifies it as a city street.
You can damage the cork, put cracks and craters into it to make it look even more damaged.

You might want to continue using cork along with the additions suggested by the other posts here, it's a pretty good material.