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The Gaming Table
The aesthetics of a wargame are very important to me. There are few things more satisfying, (In wargaming terms!!) than playing with well painted figures on an attractive, unique table. Angel Creek has grown out of my enthusiasm for building wargaming scenery. In the past my buildings have looked pretty good. (Check out the Warhammer Ahoy! site for examples) but they have all been solid obstacles which units and individual figures move around the outside of. Even though systems allow troops to enter buildings, it doesn't happen very often, for a variety of reasons. So I had a desire to build more interactive scenery. Ahoy! was a start, our games became focused around the ships and docks and scenery became more important, however most of the buildings were solid and were still underused. Blaze of Glory is a new departure for me, all of the scenery is designed to have figures put inside. I started with the Sheriff's office, just to see if the whole thing was possible. Then it just grew from there. Each building comes apart to allow access. In some cases the various floors come off as well as the roof. The interior of each building is partially detailed, counters and bars etc, but clear enough to get several figures in practically, and a players hand. One of the best things about Western buildings is the tar & paper roofs, which revolutionised my building making, it's no where near as painstaking as tiling a roof. Some of the buildings were inspired by Gary Chalk's article in Wargames Illustrated Magazine (Issue 160) Some from an earlier WI article in Issue 135. But most inspiration came from watching various modern Westerns: The Quick & the Dead, Unforgiven, Young Guns to name but a few. The first buildings I made were all heavily inspired by Crystal River in the film Maverick. A great set which really gives the impression as to how ramshackle these settlements originally were.
To view more pictures of buildings from Angel Creek go to the
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