The Mortalis Zone

 The Underhive is an unforgiving environment, even for the most hardened gangers.  When I picked up all the new stuff, I was concerned with the different... format of the game.  I'm used to the old 90's era 3D terrain with plastic bulkheads and cardboard rather than the board game style that the new version is.  You can reread my post about that here.   

  But the idea of playing in a 'zone mortalis' actually makes sense- there tons of complexes, tunnel networks, and huge buildings full of hallways and rooms under Hive Primus, so of course gangs are going to battle in these areas too!  But I wasn't as happy about it through a sheer sense of nostalgic tradition.  Then I found a video many months ago about how to build this Zone Mortalis terrain cheaply and easily.  Full credit to Eric's Hobby Workshop for this idea- it was awesome!  I highly encourage anyone interested in making great terrain to check out this channel.  

  I should note that we worked on this last year, but my work schedule really slowed down my posts, so this is a bit late.  Without further ado, let me show you the work:

  First, we had to gather the materials at each step.  This step includes a very sharp box-cutter (although a wire-cutter will work better), a pencil and yardstick to mark the foam, and 1" pink foam.  At this point, I marked and but a bunch of 2x2" squares (77) and 2x4" rectangles (12).  

  I was not very good and the pieces didn't come out square, so I tried to sand them down to make them as flat and flush as possible.  It really didn't work.  I wasn't dissatisfied, though, as it all still fits together well enough.  I laid it all out to match up with the game boards and already started to get fired up.  

  The next required material is glue, which I chose to use Liquid Nails as it is extremely strong.  The only risk is that it expands (though not as much as caulk or other construction glues), but a bit of time running my finger across the joints and corners actually made that a bonus. 

  Finally, it was time to finish it up and make it look good.  For this, we need gray paint, black paint, light gray paint, a couple of paintbrushes (I used 3" and a standard GW brush), and a black pen.  After letting the glue completely dry, we applied multiple (2-3) coats of gray craft paint.  Then we watered down the black paint and brushed it downward to represent concrete leakeage.  Then we drew cracks in the walls with the ball-point pen (useful for also applying that recess as long as you don't push too hard), and finally painted watered down light gray highlights around those cracks.  

  And with that, we were technically done!  We also added tons of pipes using straws and toy construction kits, primed black and attached using hot glue.  With a bit more paint (orange, brown, silver), we made all those pipes rusty.  It is the Underhive, after all.  Unfortunately, I forgot to take pictures of that in progress.  Luckily, the video I referenced above does show how he did that and the fantastic results.  

  My wife and I have played quite a few games, with her Escher being the victims of the tough Goliath more often than not (although she's won a lot of games herself).  Below will be pictures from our most recent game.  This terrain makes all the difference...

  We've done more work and built crumbled and ruined walls, as you can see in the pics above.  I am so happy with the results and this terrain really adds that element that the board game version needed- 3D.  And with the atmosphere being set and fully-painted models all ready to go, I guess it's time to get a campaign going!

  Thank you for checking out the blog and stay tuned for more from the Underhive!