Sorry for the grainy pics, these couldn’t be taken under natural sunlight (was done at 3am!)… Er, I mean:
BEHOLD! The terrible depths of the underearth. Doom and peril await those weak and feeble adventurers who venture within. Soon these realms will fall to the might of the armies of the Dawi Zharr!
Couple of quick notes…
Third last pic is of the portcullis that replaces the paper one that’s forever falling out of the door during game play. The angle of the pic makes the portcullis look like it’s an odd fit, but it really is symmetrical and covers the whole doorway. It mounts over part of one side of the door on the little square ledges atop the pillars so that it won’t fall. Looks a lot more impressive than the cardboard one even though it’s wholly inaccurate to the original drawing… at least this one you can still see through which is useful for game play because missile weapons are still able to be fired through the portculls (see the rules for the Gao, for example).
We use beads from Michael’s craft store for various things in the game:
red = Wounds, and it’s easy to tell at a glance how badly off you and your allies are by looking at the big bloody pools that are on the table. Also saves time writing and erasing constantly. We keep our Wounds in small pottery ‘bowls’ that some friends made me before they sold their pottery business and retired… but I digress,
orange = Power, actually just reserve Power that you start the adventure with and for Power stored in artifacts, the Power that the Wizard gets on a turn-by-turn basis is just read off the die roll. Oh, and we have a specific Power Phase die that is used, and no other die, it’s a clear smoky gray die that’s unique on our table and everyone knows not to touch it except the Wizard who rolls it each turn.
blue = luck. There aren’t many of these floating around, even at high levels and everyone always holds on to their last one with a death grip until the shit hits the fan. The beads make for a way better feeling for the game than just a number on a page.
I’ve also created custom character reference sheets that we use. It’s got all the basic stuff on there, as well as a full to-hit chart with Weapon Skill references for attacker and defender from WS 1 through 10 and all the die rolls needed (a known issue with WHQ is that a lot of the original material in the game had errors in these tables, particularly the player hand-outs!). The sheets started out as a one-layout fits all, but I’ve since customized ones for the Dwarf (with a chart for axe runes and to keep track of how many of each he has and how many have been used each quest) and another one for the Wizard with some spell and Power specific stuff on there. The Barbarian and Elf just use the generic one I made up… maybe if I play as the Elf more I’ll decide I want a better one. The sheets aren’t flashy, but they get the job done.
Been a while since my last post. Wasn’t sure if it was kosher to resurrect the thread in this sort of instance as it’s an on-going thing or if I should start a new thread.
Anyway, here’s the current status of the custom doorways that are intended to match-up with the various Objective Rooms:
Fighting Pit
This was an easy one, but kind of cheaty… I just used a set of animosity orcs.
Tomb Chamber
Praying knight fig from Reaper. Starting to think it may need some banners or something hanging as well.
Quirrick’s Lab
This Objective Room is from a White Dwarf expansion (two views)
Lair of the Orc Warlord
Still need to put some GS on the spear pole to blend the plastic/metal join more smoothly. Not sure what else should go on here, but it seems to need something more.
Deamonic Portal
Doesn’t specifically go with any particular room, but I wanted it for some Chaos Dwarf scenarios.
Still needs stuff, maybe deamonic horns coming out of the skull over the door instead of the regular horns that are there… that and more GS, which will look like twisted deamon flesh-type stuff when it’s all done. Skulls maybe?
Firechasm
Felt very uninspired with this one. It’s supposed to be a lava room, but that’s about it. I decided it was going to have a Chaos theme to it. The Battlemasters mini is going to be painted as a statue, and one of the carved faces on the backside is going to have lava pouring from its mouth down onto the base of the door and into the opening in the floor (which I’m hoping is going to look like lava has eaten it away). Other than that I’m not excited about this one.
Still need ideas for the Idol Chamber, Fountain and the Furnace of Hashut.
For the Dread King’s Throne Room I’m going to have two skeletons with long spears standing guard on either side of the door with their spears crossed, some tomb stones, lots of bones and skulls and probably a skeleton coming up out of the ground on the opposite side of the doorway.
As for the Furnace of Hashut I’m thinking of having a Sorcerer who has turned to stone except half of his face and one eye standing on one side of the door, and then a statue of one of the Hellcannon Crewman who is pointing through the doorway. Probably a bull’s head over the door instead of the usual skull (Minotaur’s head, actually). No idea what else needs to be there yet though.
Amazing stuff. I’m sure playing in a table like yours is a real pleasure, a totally different experience. Looking forward to see more Dhawi Zharr stuff
Glad folks are still enjoying this thread! It’s only 3 years old… and I believe post #1 in this thread was my first ever post on CDO! :o
Anyway, we’re still playing Warhammer Quest and I’ve managed to rope in quite a few people locally. I also got enough people hooked that three of them have gone out and bought their own copies on eBay
I don’t know where I found all of the time to make this still 3 years ago. back then I was on parental leave from work with my first-born who was 1 year old. Now, almost exactly 3 years later I’m on parental leave again with a 1 year old and I can’t see to even find time to paint, let alone take on such a big project.
I have been thinking about new Warhammer Quest tiles lots though… what I really want to make are Chaos / Chaos Dwarf versions of all of the original tiles, but that may be a few years down the road at this rate.
I’ve started expanding the WHQ tiles again. I haven’t fully ventured into making 3D versions of the new versions, but I’ve started making variants of the classic WHQ Dungeon and Corridor tiles:
This one was shown over in my main blog recently - support columns for Undgrin Ankor, the Dawi-constructed Underway that stretches below the mountains of the Old World. This is one of the 2x6 Corridor sections
And a 4x4 Dungeon tile. I used dummy floor tiles to measure out placement of the primed and roughed-up tiles as I was gluing them down so that I would make sure I was placing them correctly.
Here’s some of the pieces so far primed and ready for painting. Because this is Dwarf construction and not some shoddy Skaven or human work I wanted the lines to still be in relatively good shape (except for a little bit of wear and tear, especially on the floor). In order to clean up the lines and seams I used plaster and carefully filled in all of the gaps and mis-shapen areas, then smoothed them down once dry. The effect works well and you can’t easily see where the seams are once it’s done.
… and a close-up of a 2x2 test section I had made up to try out the design of the support column
I use a 45x45mm square to represent the base tile size for my WHQ tiles, and over the last couple of years I have maintained this as my reference size for any stairs, pathways, etc. Even the Chaos Dwarf Mining Complex I’m making has this same tile dimension on the tops of both towers and will also be used for the interior as well - allowing all of the terrain pieces I’ve made to be used in WHQ campaigns. Even the base for the Airship I made used the same tile size, as well as a custom WHQ entrance door that leads to steps winding down. There’s also a dummy plug that can be used to replace the clear acrylic rod so that it can be used as just a terrain piece.
Oh, and that massive sheet of foam in the background is awaiting use as a life-size version of the WHQ doorway to frame my gaming room in the basement ;) :hat off
Finished the rest of the board sections for the Dawi Underway.
Not sure if I’ll make many more than these 3 in this style, not right now anyway. Making these has reminded me how quickly the WHQ dungeon tile creation was going by the time I finished off. This process has gotten me keen to finally start thinking about my Chaos Dwarf-themed WHQ boards. It’s rather ambitious at the moment, but not quite as much as making all of the original tiles.
Here’s the plan so far:
Chaos Dwarf-themed Warhammer Quest boards
4x4 Dungeon Rooms
Summoning Chamber - Center tiles of the room are smashed, with pieces of a blown-apart Hellcannon strewn around. Clearly something went horribly wrong in here. (I’ve got lots of Hellcannon bitz around from a mis-cast/Finecast Hellcannon body, to some mis-cast wheels I made a while back)
Treasure Vault - Gold, treasure chests, scrolls, etc.
The Heat Below - Most of the room, except for a narrow border around the outside, is all lava. It is covered over by a thick black grate with a carved Dawi Zharr image… but the lava is visible below
Hitching Post - A place to tie up slaves. Central column has many rings and chains dangling down
Objective Rooms
Firechasm - Largely unchanged, but with a sturdier Dawi Zharr-constructed bridge and bronze runed pillar instead of a dragon statue
Daemonsmith’s Diabolic Forge - Instead of the Fountain room there will be a central forge accessible from all around, with lava pouring down into troughs in the floor, encircling the room.
Temple of Hashut - Replacing the Idol Chamber, this will have a bronzed bull or some other representation of Hashut for worship
Slave Pit - Same layout as the Fighting Pit, but without a rope to climb up/down.
Tomb Chamber - Using the Dread King’s Chamber from the Catacomb’s of Terror (which is 8x5 instead of the usual 6x4 size of the Objective Rooms), the pillars flanking the entry ramp will have petrified Chaos Dwarf Sorcerers/Sorcerer-Prophets atop them, leading to an altar with a cracked anvil.
Corridors
Corridor 1 - 2x6, painted in a dark marble pattern
Corridor 2 - probably similar to the above, with symbols carved into the floor
T-junction - Chaos Dwarf symbols and the Chaos Star/Wheel combined to suggest it’s pointing along the 3 directions
Stairs - 2x6 stair section, probably with some decoration beneath the stairs, like buried slaves, pipes, etc.
Doorways (all custom, but very similar look to the original ones)
Doorway Design 1 - There will actually be 2-3 such doorways, which will use modified Minotaur heads above the archway instead of skulls.
Doorway Design 3 - Pillars with attached chains and the skeletal remains of a chained-up slave
Doorway Design 4 - Treasure vault entrance (similar look to design 1, but with coins and treasure spilling out a little)
Doorway Design 5 - Old style plastic Chaos Dwarf Warrior ‘statues’ guarding either side of the doorway
Doorway Design 6 - Entrance to the Temple of Hashut (using the classic Lammasu head over the doorway… I have several that I cast in resin from a few years ago)
Doorway Design 7 - Diabolic forge entrance with smoke stacks, pipes, a small forge at the side of the doorway, and forge tools strewn in the doorway.
This isn’t going to happen quickly… I’ll need to start compiling artwork and references material as well as lots of bitz before I can start :hat off
And lastly… my gaming room door is coming along. Here’s the inspiration again:
I cut a sheet of 2"-thick insulation foam into 6ft tall pieces to frame the doorway, and added a small border of 1"-thick foam to the edges of the backings. The 1" piece on the back is to allow the pieces to accommodate the door frame and sit flush over it.
Measuring the remaining height for the top archway piece and getting the skull to fit.
The large pieces at the sides of the door are ~9" wide. I made a cardboard template of a 9" diameter semi-circle so I could make the face of the columns. Here’s the initial placements of the semi-circle pieces to give the implied shape of the column.
To fill in all of the gaps between the semi-circle spacers I made another template which was only the outline of the semi-circle. I then used a hot wire cutter to cut the 2"-thick foam into pieces. I didn’t cut all of the pieces in this manner as I was worried that when I get to the sanding stage, or if someone ever leans on it, that the column pieces wouldn’t have enough support. To alleviate this I cut a couple full-sized semi-circle pieces to sit in the centre of each column so that the pieces are supported better. You can see the traced outline of the pieces I haven’t-yet cut in the foreground here and the semi-circle pieces sitting on top of the stacks:
Building the top of the archway. Just getting the rough shapes and placement of pieces for now…
Stacking everything up:
The columns and the top of the arch are not attached, but they are pretty sturdy once they’re in place as they’re cut to fit snugly up against the wall as well as fit exactly the space floor-to-ceiling. I did this by holding the top piece in place while I glued the top semi-circles for the columns in place that will hold it up.
Final step for tonight, filling the remaining gaps with expanding insulation foam:
I have been wanting this for YEARS!! Can’t wait until it’s done ;) Haha, unfortunately it completely covers the light switch, so I’m going to have to cut a space into one of the columns and re-do the wiring for a light switch inside the column, then replace the piece I cut out over top … and make it hinged or something. Not sure how I’m going to do that, as I need to be able to get to the switch but I don’t want it visible either.
