Dungeonalia – There’s Something Amiss at the Abbey

The resin printer has been slaving away printing out smaller detail pieces and the filament printer has been adding dungeon pieces into the mix. Painting has been progressing and all the buildings have a respectable start to them. Details are starting to be picked out and things are feeling closer to game ready. Unfortunately, for the project, I’ll be on a 2 week break as I take the family on vacation to a warmer location. The negative 20 degrees (ferinheight) have made undercoating difficult with a rattle can. I’ll still be hunting for materials, tools and other fun stuff on the trip so I may be still making updates on the project because after all, purchases count as progress. I’m pretty sure OTT Warren used to say that?

Interior detail to the second floor of the scriptorium.

Abbot’s house

Crypt wall adds.

Garden and furniture.

As time allows I have been working on getting all the base colors for the buildings down. More PLA filament arrived and the printers were put back to work pumping out tiles and furniture…well furniture never stopped as I had plenty of resin. I’ve started to weather and build up layers to break up any large spaces.

With paint drying and printers printing a trip to the hardware store was next to start building out the base board. I already had picked up a couple plywood sheets in 2×4 foot flavor. Nice and light, also inexpensive. I had initially been wanting to top edge the plywood with 2 inch blue board to support the top “ground” level, but at a price of $70 a board I decided on a different course of action. With a couple small 2×2 foot, one inch, foam boards, only $7 each, I started cutting 2 foot long, 2 inch tall, strips. I decided to strengthen the bottom of the plywood with some precut pine hobby boards, at $3 each. To add to its strength and portability I also attached the two plywood boards with hinges. After some rather “impressive” carpentry work, the board…actually worked.

I mocked up the layers and everything seemed to be working out. Next up I’ll need to decide how I want to flock the top foam boards. I’ll be continuing to paint the last of the exterior of the buildings, paint interior details, start painting furniture and get after the central Abbey garden.

The board coming together. Have to love the precut lumber…never quite the same measurements. 2 foot wide plywood sheet with a 2 foot long board. At least they were consistent.

Mockup of how things will line up. A little off but I’ll measure everything out for the final layout.

Well with basic paint on most of the exterior of the buildings and walls it was time to turn my attention to the interiors, add/painting details and basic dungeon planning. Furniture started being pumped out from the resin printer and the filament printers started making specific dungeon tiles. I had picked up my Printable Scenery rampage tiles from the high school gaming club and started playing with ideas for the three main dungeon locations.

The resin 3d printer was also being used to print out vegetable rows for the Abbot’s garden, which may feature a special little “cabbage” I had sitting around from a Reapers Bones Kickstarter. A side note on resin 3D printing: Personally, I recommend always wearing gloves when working with the resin. This includes handling the resin bottle and the prints even after curing. The resin reacts pretty much instantly on skin contact and can cause painful drying and irritation. I personal try not to handle any of my resin prints with bare hands until after undercoating. Also, I recommend using a water washable resin, so you don’t have to use rubbing alcohol which is also toxic and a skin irritant.

The initial plans for the dungeon sections was to have a small chamber under the Abbey, which connects to a slightly larger crypt under the Abbot’s house and the much larger main dungeon under the scriptorium.  As I was printing out new dungeon tiles, I discovered I had committed a cardinal sin…I ran out of filament. A quick amazon order later and we’ll be back in printing business next week. Until then resin printing and paint will be the main objective. Now it’s off to the hardware store to pick up materials for the base of the project and dungeon.

More paint on the Abbey and the gatehouse was being readdressed from a years old start to painting it. I had two old wire trees I had started years ago and this seemed to be the perfect project to leaf them out…I feel like there’s a pun in there. Perfect project and I can’t not leaf them out? Needs work. Some grass mats were put down to get an idea of layout and look even though the mats will likely not be used in the final build. Plus, photos are fun.

I had started printing out and had the Infinite Dimensions Wightwood Abbey just sitting around for years. It was time to make something of it. I have a friend who is a school resource officer at a local high school and a few years ago he had helped start a gaming club, which now has a waiting list for kids to join. Last year the kids put on their own gaming convention. This year I’m going to help out by running a one-shot event for them, or at least that’s the plan. I just happens  Dungeonalia is running at the same time, so after years of watching the Weekender I decided to use the project as motivation to push along with a shorter timeline since the student’s convention is a month after the Dungeonalia project ends.