8 : Frozen City Floors

After completing my first model, it was time to make a start on the rest of the Frozen City Ruins models. It seemed like a good idea to begin with the foundations of the ruined city – or in this case, the floor pieces. The urban feel of the Frozen City is helped by a battle-board of floor slabs. I kept the basic floor tile module the usual size, five tiles square. I designed the floor tile pieces in a number of styles.

First up is a series of regular floor pieces. As well as the basic module, five tiles square, I designed a number of smaller sized pieces also with regular style tiles. I could see all these models being used in Dungeon Crawl games as well, as corridors and rooms.

The next type are more irregular. I designed more five-tile square modules but this time with broken floor slabs and holes in the floor. I also designed some floor lengths in the same broken style.

The last sort I designed is a series of floor fragments. These smaller floor pieces are great for filling gaps, scattering about, and breaking up a floor. They might even come in handy as a base for a piece of custom scenery.

I textured the floor pieces in the same way as I had the single column model, starting with a dusting of baking soda.

BAKING SODA
There seems to be some confusion around the difference between Baking Powder and Baking Soda. Very simply: baking powder has an agent added, usually starch. Using starch is like putting food on your models. First signs is that it will eventually turn yellow. All in all, it’s a much better idea to use baking soda as a texture material.

Cheap baking soda – such as the stuff designed to clean baking trays – is a very useful texture material because of its fine grains. It can be used on playing surfaces without any worry that lumps or bumps will upset the balance of the miniatures. It takes brushed on paint well and, although fine and low lying, it brings out highlights very well.

On the floor slabs that I didn’t mind being a bit more lumpy, I used a baking soda and PVA mix. Baking soda soaks up the glue but it creates a useful texture material which is easily pasted on with a toothpick. It’s important to plan ahead as the floor pieces can be used as a base for other models. This is, of course, symptomatic of modular scenery. It may be wise to restrict lumps and bumps on floors as they may very well upset future plans.

The floor pieces were painted in the same colour scheme as the single column model. I glued on some 4Ground snow flock as well.