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Hi all,

I'm planning on building a 40k city table but I live in France and I can only find certain materiels in metric measurements (notably extruded polysyrene, mdf can be cut to size).

Do those extra 4 cms of width really make a big difference to a table or am I being too obessive? The main difference I can think of is having to measure deployment zones from the middle to avoid turn 1 charges and therefore having a bit less space to deploy.

If it is a problem I can possibly find a way to add a bit of width to the polystrene (pipeline sunk into the tarmac for example) to bring it up to exactly 4 feet wide, but that will reduce the modulability (is that a real word?) of the table.

Thanks for reading!

I think the latest version of the rules doesn't actually specify a table size and they've switched to the distance between armies, rather than width of deployment zone being important, so you should be fine.

What are the dimensions of the extruded polystyrene you have available?...there's no option of 60cm x 60cm, or 120cm x 60cm?

...in any case, honestly, I doubt 4cm will have much of an impact on games, you should be ok really.

 master of asgard wrote:
Hi all,

I'm planning on building a 40k city table but I live in France and I can only find certain materiels in metric measurements (notably extruded polysyrene, mdf can be cut to size).

Do those extra 4 cms of width really make a big difference to a table or am I being too obessive? The main difference I can think of is having to measure deployment zones from the middle to avoid turn 1 charges and therefore having a bit less space to deploy.

If it is a problem I can possibly find a way to add a bit of width to the polystrene (pipeline sunk into the tarmac for example) to bring it up to exactly 4 feet wide, but that will reduce the modulability (is that a real word?) of the table.

Thanks for reading!

Just note that it could possibly affect gameplay in regards to deployment and 'first-turn-assaults' etc. If this was intended for the American "competitive" scene, which is entirely a joke to me, I'd say it wouldn't fly. But for your home game table I don't think you'll miss those 4cm.

4cm? Do you mean 4"?

4cm isn't anything you'd notice, 4" you might slightly notice but it's still only 2" off each side which isn't going to make a huge difference in the grand scheme of things. It'll be slightly easier to reach across the table when your troops are moving across I'd subtract it from the deployment zones to make sure the armies still start a decent distance away from each other.

The reason I ask if it's 4" not 4cm is most standard sheets over here are 1200mm, 4' = 1219mm, so the difference is more like 4" not 4cm.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

The reason I ask if it's 4" not 4cm is most standard sheets over here are 1200mm, 4' = 1219mm, so the difference is more like 4" not 4cm.

is my brain having a special moment, or does that make absolutely zero sense?

a board being 4' wide, 6' long, right?....so, you use the 1200mm sheets for the width, and they're 19mm short...that's not even 1", let alone 4cm, and definitely not 4"...how are you getting those numbers?

 ZoBo wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

The reason I ask if it's 4" not 4cm is most standard sheets over here are 1200mm, 4' = 1219mm, so the difference is more like 4" not 4cm.

is my brain having a special moment, or does that make absolutely zero sense?

a board being 4' wide, 6' long, right?....so, you use the 1200mm sheets for the width, and they're 19mm short...that's not even 1", let alone 4cm, and definitely not 4"...how are you getting those numbers?

The answer to that question is I worked 15 hours today and should now be in bed because my brain is clearly no longer functioning. 4" is a bit over 100mm, My brain probably just saw that he said 4cm and wondered how he got 4cm and automatically came to the conclusion it was 4" without actually thinking about it.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 ZoBo wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

The reason I ask if it's 4" not 4cm is most standard sheets over here are 1200mm, 4' = 1219mm, so the difference is more like 4" not 4cm.

is my brain having a special moment, or does that make absolutely zero sense?

a board being 4' wide, 6' long, right?....so, you use the 1200mm sheets for the width, and they're 19mm short...that's not even 1", let alone 4cm, and definitely not 4"...how are you getting those numbers?

The answer to that question is I worked 15 hours today and should now be in bed because my brain is clearly no longer functioning. 4" is a bit over 100mm, My brain probably just saw that he said 4cm and wondered how he got 4cm and automatically came to the conclusion it was 4" without actually thinking about it.

gotcha...yeah, I think you can get a fair pass on this one after being at work for 15 hours mate

yeah, I'm also curious as to what size sheets OP has available, to be coming up 4cm short...seems like an odd number

I can get sheets of foam 60cm wide. 2 feet is 62cm, so 2 widths makes 120cm, whereas 4 feet is 124cm. Sorry should have put that in the original post!

 master of asgard wrote:
I can get sheets of foam 60cm wide. 2 feet is 62cm, so 2 widths makes 120cm, whereas 4 feet is 124cm. Sorry should have put that in the original post!

ah ok...I think your conversion is off by about 5mm per foot...2 feet = 60.96cm, not 62cm...so 4 feet = 121.92cm...so, using 60cm sheets, your board would end up 1.92cm short of 4 feet wide - and if anyone is going to seriously have an issue with the board being less than 2cm short, are you really even going to want to play against them? ...I'm sure using the 60cm sheets would be perfectly fine man

just use metric for everything - 12 inch range melta will be 30cm, 48 inches 120 cm.

ZoBo wrote: ah ok...I think your conversion is off by about 5mm per foot...2 feet = 60.96cm, not 62cm...so 4 feet = 121.92cm...so, using 60cm sheets, your board would end up 1.92cm short of 4 feet wide - and if anyone is going to seriously have an issue with the board being less than 2cm short, are you really even going to want to play against them? ...I'm sure using the 60cm sheets would be perfectly fine man

Cool good to know. If it was someone else's board I would have no problem with it either, but I can be a perfectionist for my own projects!

RFHolloway wrote:just use metric for everything - 12 inch range melta will be 30cm, 48 inches 120 cm.

This is all I have to say in reply to that:

Here in Germany 1,2m x 1,8m is standard as MDF boards are usually sold in DIY stores with the size of 1,2m x 0,6m.

We just measure deployment from the middle line or 29cm from the edge.

Table size is really at the taste of the creator. While designed around the 4x6 foot table, bigger and smaller tables can be used. If it's not being used for the "competitive scene" where uniformity is necessary, then you have an open range to mess with.

For example my personal table is 5x8 feet because I like bigger games.

That said if your measurements are off a bit compared to 4x6, it's not a gigantic problem.

I'm with the rest of these good people. No one will notice the difference. You have already pointed out the only critical part that matters. As long as armies deploy far enough apart to avoid first turn charges, your golden. Weird suggestion but it worked for one of my tables. It got damaged (the terrain boards) so I trimmed each one 2 inches and then added a two inch rail around one table they fit inside. So deployment zones stayed the full width if it mattered, and I still saved a set of my modular terrain. Now I know this may not be perfect for you, my tables are in the garage and so have permanent bases we place the terrain on.