Thatched Roofs and Toy Soldiers

Above: Sarge, the eponymous hero of Sarge’s War.

I haven’t played any Chainmail this week, I’ve been prepping more terrain and playing an old video game that still seems new to me.  I was able to fire up an old game console and play Army Men: Sarge’s War, the last and grittiest of the 3DO Army Men series. It was developed as 3DO went out of business and published by a different company that bought them out. It’s got bad controls and good hearty nostalgia for me.

I was drawn to playing it seeing all of the new Copplestone Castings figures in the MLS range. I’m working on setting up a game with my plastic army men to sate my appetite for those perfect little 30mm troopers. It’s hard to be frugal when there’s so many neat toys, but I’m still trying to get through my painting and gaming backlog. I want to finish up my 20mm 17th century figures (donated to the cause by the Tradgardmastare) to run some ECW skirmishes. There’s so much to be done!

On my current project, I’ve completed some thatch roofed huts made out of wooden blocks and some grass mat for a Christmas village. I purchased it on clearance at Walmart for around a dollar last year, and intended to use it for a small battlefield. Instead I’m finding it much more useful for crafting!

A bird’s eye view. I was able to complete 4 of these, and an A-frame hut as well!

Behold the A-frame! It’s my favorite of the lot. For the roofs to look more like dry thatch, I painted the grass with a mixture of yellow and brown, which, coincidentally, helped the grass to keep from shedding (which is exactly why I didn’t take it out for gaming this year).