You have seen all the pictures and read all the articles but you still are wondering is it possible. Can I build my own game board? What kind of materials will I need? How long will it take to complete? How much is it going to cost me? Lets try and answer those questions.

Question 1: Can I build my own game board?
Answer: Yes. Building a game board can be as simple as wrapping a plank of wood in green felt or as complex as building a small city including power lines. The biggest thing to remember is it only has to be as complex as you want it to be. Most boards are fairly simple with generic layouts that give you the freedom to change the board and place things where you want them.

Question 2: What kind of materials will I need?
Answer: You will need some wood for the base, polystyrene foam for creating features, paint, sand, small rocks and glue. Other things you may need are flock or static grass and wood filler.

Question 3: How long will it take to complete?
Answer: In this case it took 1 week from start to finish. It may seem long but most of the time was waiting for things to dry and I only worked on it for a couple of hours a day. If you wanted to you could complete this project in 1 weekend.

Question 4: How much is it going to cost me?
Answer: The total bill for this board was less that $75. The biggest expenses were glue ($12), flock ($9) and a hot wire cutter ($25). The hot wire cutter was an extra that wasn't really needed for the project but it makes some things easier.

PLANNING
As with any project you need to have an idea of what you are wanting the final results to be. You need a plan. The plan for this board was to build a small board that would be portable, easily stored and easily changed to support a variety of games.

Since the board had to be portable and I don't own a truck the board size was set to 4' x 2'. This size would easily fit in the trunk of my car or on the back seat and still leave room for other stuff. This size was later confirmed when I found out the largest size I could fit in the car easily was 3' x 4'.

Next I decided to have a few permanent hills and rocks on the board, a small river and a road. These features are generic enough for fantasy, modern and future settings without being too difficult and time consuming.

Now all that was left was to put the ideas on paper.

BASELINE CONSTRUCTION
Now with plan in hand I went to the hardware store for supplies. The board is based on a 4'x2'x3/4" piece of MDF. I could have used plywood for the base but the MDF was on sale. If you do use plywood you could possibly get away with 1/2" material but you will need to frame the board with either 1"x2" or 2"x2" lumber to keep it from warping. Next I picked up a bag of expanded polystyrene insulation (the white stuff coffee cups were made of). I chose the 1" thick stuff. I could have gone with extruded polystyrene insulation (the pink or blue stuff) but it only comes in 4'x8' sheets. Try fitting one of those in a normal car. The white stuff is not as dense but it is more than adequate for this purpose. The bag was only $2 for 10 4'x16" pieces and only 2 would be used for the board. Final things I picked up while at the store were yellow wood glue and a bag of playground sand.

The first thing I did was to get a wet rag and soak one side of the MDF with water. This will cause the board to warp slightly and that is exactly what we want. Next apply a healthy layer of wood glue to the other (dry) side of the MDF. Then place 2 pieces of the insulation on the boards covering the glue. Don't worry if the insulation hangs off the edges, we will go back and cut it off later. Now place the whole board on a table or other flat surface to dry. The water from the glue should counter the water you placed on the back of the board and keep the board from warping. You can also place some heavy books or bricks on the board are it dries to further eliminate any warping. If you use framed plywood you can minimize warping further.

Once the glue is dry use a sharp knife or hot wire cutter to trim off the excess insulation. The base is done and you can skip the next section and go to TEXTURING and PAINTING if you are building a basic board, or you can begin adding a few details.

ADDING DETAILS
From our plan you can see a few hills along the edges, the roads and a river. Now is the time to transfer them from our plan to the board. I used a heavy black marker to do this. Draw the rough outline of where you want things to be. Next take some of the scraps of insulation and place them in the positions of the hills and transfer the lines you just drew on the base to the tops of the insulation scraps. Now use a sharp knife of hot wire cutter to cut out the rough shape of the hills. Don't worry about matching your lines exactly you just want a good basic shape. Once you have the basic shape it is time to bevel the edges of the hill. You can bevel the edges at any angle you want that will fit your style of play. For example if you want the maximum amount of top space on the hill you want to use a fairly steep angle say 45 to 60 degrees. For a more natural looking hill you can use an angle around 30 degrees. For this one I decided to go with the more natural 30 degree slopes.

There are additional types of features you can add at this state. By cutting hill faces at extreme angles, 80 to 90 degrees, you can create cliff faces. You can create multi layer hills or terraces by stacking smaller hills on top of larger ones. Just remember to check you spacing on how wide you want the steps to be with a couple of minis. Caves can be created by cutting holes in the side of a hill just remember to avoid using straight lines when cutting cave opening or they will look out of place.

Glue the hill to the board and either place something heavy in them or use pins to hold them in place while the glue dries. Once the glue is dry it time to smooth out the transition from the board to the hills. Place some drywall compound at the base of the hills and feather it until you have a smooth transition. Allow the compound a few hours to set then use sandpaper to further smooth out the hill. When you are sanding you are just trying to remove any large ridges. Small imperfections will be filled in when the board is textured.

At this stage you can add additional items to the board to better fit you final goal. In the case of the board in the pictures I have added 2 plaster rocks from Woodland Scenics. The rocks are just glued to the surface of the board. If you decide to use real rocks use your knife to recess the rocks into the board so only half of the rock is exposed. You may also want to choose rocks with a flat surface to make it easier to place minis on top of them. Other things you can try are rivers and streams, beaches, trees and caves. Making these kinds of items will be covered in a future article.

TEXTURING and PAINTING
Adding texture to the board helps to strengthen the foam base and adds details that can be bought out in the painting stage. Begin the texturing process by spreading glue over the path of any roads or rough areas you do not want to flock. You will want to cover theses areas heavily with sand so you don't see any of the foam. to make sure you have enough coverage it is ok to press the sand into the glue or go over it with a second coat of glue and sand. To represent heavily traveled roads you can run a bead of glue on either side of the road and cover this with a courser sand. The courser sand will have larger pieces and look like rocks swept to the edges of the road by traffic.

Now mix a 1 to 1 mix of glue and water in a jar or pale. Using a large brush spread the mixture over a the board in sections. Cover the sections lightly with sand. The sand does not have to completely cover the foam. The goal is to add enough texture to give you something to drybrush latter to represent dirt in places you don't cover with flock.

For painting the board you are going to want to use a color suitable to the type of board you are doing. For a basic summer field board you will want dark and medium or light browns. For a desert sand board you will need tans and yellows. For an arctic board you will need greys and possibly light blues. Once you have found your colors take them to a hardware store and have them mix some custom latex paint to match. A small can of paint should be good for at least a 4x8 foot board.

To begin painting you will need to thin the latex paint so as not to cover over all texture you glued to the board. Using the darkest color mix about 2 parts paint to 1 part water, you may have to vary this depending on the brand of paint you use. You just want to thin the paint enough to get it to flow cleanly and not obscure any details. Use a large brush to cover the entire board with this color. Don't worry if you get runs or grips they can easily be hidden later in the process. Let the paint dry them go back over it with a second coat to make sure you covered everything.

Allow enough time for the second coat to fully dry and if possible leave it over night just to be sure. Take your next darkest color and begin heavily dry brushing features like roads, cliff faces and rocks. These areas will not be covered with flock so you want to have an even color progression from dark to light colors. Follow this by dry brushing the rest of the board. Once the first color is dry switch to the next using the same techniques as before.

Flocking
The final steps in completing the board are flocking and sealing. To flock the board begin spreading thinned glue on the board in patches. Sprinkle the glue with flock and allow it to dry. Try to avoid gluing flock to the tops of rocks or slopes greater the 60 degrees. If you decided to add permanent trees to your board you may not want to flock all the way up to the base of the tree. Leaving the area around the trunk without flock will look like the tree is shading the grass stopping it from growing. Allow the glue to dry completely and remove the excess flock. The easiest way is to use a shop vacuum as this will collect the extra flock to be used again. Continue gluing and flocking the board until you have covered all the areas you want covered. Once the glue has completely dried use the brush attachment for the shop vacuum to sweep up any remaining loose flock. Seal the board with 2 to 3 coats of matte sealer and that is it. You now have a completed game board ready for your next gaming session.