Last models of 2025 - The barren woods of Badlanding

 Just sneaking in one day before the end of the year, I finished some simple barren woods area terrain. 

The larger piece. There is a lot of open space for models. 

The smaller piece. 

A Xhroik patrol passes through the cover of the woods.

The trees are magnetized to be stable while in place, but easily removable.

Inspired by the snowy tree forests we used during the 32nd Millenium campaign, I decided more simple area terrain would be a nice addition for our next campaign, the Rynn's World Incident. The simple and slightly abstract terrain rules of 4th Edition really lend themselves well to this type of piece: clear boundaries, easy to place models on, and representative of what they are supposed to be, without having to worry about providing enough "true" line of sight blocking obstacles that would make it unusable as a gaming piece. Too many great looking pieces of terrain are just not very usable in gaming terms because there is not enough usable space to place models, especially for a melee when they can get packed in there. 

I magnetized the trees so they are stable while in place and won't get constantly tipped over by players moving their models. But they can also easily be removed to make room to place a large unit or to fight a melee and then returned once the models are out of the way. I really like that the snowy trees are easy to move when needed, but they are fairly easy to tip over (and these would be much worse since they are top heavy instead of bottom heavy) so I added magnets. 

I could have made two forests of the same size, but figured two different sizes would give more flexibility for setting up tables and look more natural. One is about 8 inches square and the other is probably about 11 inches square. Thus, even the smaller one would completely block line of sight to models at the far edge (LoS through area terrain in 4th Edition is limited to 6 inches).

I wanted to keep the ground very flat and clear to make gaming easy. I only added a few small stones and some gravel. But it leaves the base looking a bit too plain. I think a few dead shrubs or grass would help and I may keep a look out for something suitable. I also think some sort of brownish hanging moss on the tree branches would be perfect. I need to look for that, too.

They look pretty decent, but I spent a lot more time on them then what it looks like. I experimented with a few failed paint recipes for the trees. When the trees and ground are both brown, you need to differentiate the colors a bit or it all blends together. Hence, I ended up with a warmer, yellower tree color and a muddy greyer taupe for the ground. 

I made these pieces specifically to represent Badlanding in our upcoming Rynn's World Incident campaign. The planet is described as an Agri-World in the fluff so I figure it should have ample plant life, yet making it green and verdant just doesn't fit well with the name Badlanding. Plus, I want to differentiate the setting from the greenery of Rynn's World (also an Agri-World). Whether the forest is dead or just barren for winter is open to interpretation, but it sure feels like a place called Badlanding to me.