Metcalfe Models

Of late I have been busy making scenery and terrain for a forthcoming 'In Her Majesty's Name' campaign that Craig and I are running. I used to have quite a bit when I played a lot of 'Mordheim', but lack of space led to all of it being given away or sold off. As with 'Mordheim', scenery is pretty crucial to having a good game. Buildings have been covered with some purchases from Sarissa Precision (and lovely they are too) as well as some scratch built ones. Woods I already have and some flock glued to brillo pads has given me some serviceable hedges. Walls are currently a work-in-progress, but are not needed for the first few games (I hope).

Generic tarmac roads were easily sorted out by speckling some 3mm mdf in a variety of greys. However they are a bit too modern for my tastes as well as for use in general built up areas for the period covered. Some searching online last night came up with Metcalfe Models, a company that I knew of from their pre-printed card buildings. I vaguely knew that they offered block prints of various building materials, such as red brick etc. Some searching revealed that they also made road surfaces, with the paving and cobblestone sheets of particular interest. Fortunately my local modelshop had them in stock, so a quick trip at lunchtime allowed me to see them 'in the flesh'. 

I was very impressed with the quality looking through the pack and for the less than Princely sum of £5.80, you get 8 sheets printed on thick card. I thought the paving sheets fitted my immediate needs and bought these as a trial pack. They exceeded my expectations to be honest and although you can see the dot matrix of the print if you look closely enough, they are more than adequate for the wargames table.

When cut out I was left with around 4' of paving at just under 4" wide, with another few feet of narrower paving at around 2" wide. There were also four 8" x 8" squares that are prefect to combine together to make town squares or cut in half to give more 4" wide 'streets'. I was suprised at how much paving I got from the pack, way more than I was expecting to be honest. My plan initially was to use these just for town or village type scenarios, but having seen them laid out, they are prefect for sub-terranean scenarios or in a cathedral etc. Add in some extra scenic items as required and you have a very usable set of 'roads'. I may even go back at look at the cobblestones in light of the above.

The only slight draw back is that due to them being printed on card, they are rather light weight and would most likely move around the table fairly easily. Only time will tell but they could be stuck to thin mdf, plastic etc to give them some 'heft'. Pictures of them 'in action' will appear soon as our campaign starts in a few days time.