Greathelm Game Board – Part 2 – Painting and Texture

This is Part 2 of a series of posts documenting my Greathelm board build. If you missed the initial construction phase, you can catch up on Part 1-Assembling The DIY Board

With the air-dry clay tiles set and the layout sorted, it was time to bring this battlefield to life with some paint and texture.

The Painting Process

The great thing about this build is I get stuck in straight away as I already had most of what I needed already in my hobby box (a collective term for all the stuff I’ve collected over the years that would fit in many, many boxes).

• The Base Board: This was undercoated with the can of brown spray paint I had laying around (see Part 1).
• The Tiles: These were undercoated with a white primer by hand.
• The Wash: Trusty old Nuln Oil was applied heavily to the tiles to darken them down and create dark shadows in the recesses.
• The Highlights: Next, I drybrushed the tiles, gradually working my way up from a dark grey, to a light grey, and finally a pure white. I wasn’t too precious about being perfectly neat here—a heavier hand in some spots just added to the natural variation.
• The Finish: Because Nuln Oil tends to dry with a bit of a sheen, I sealed the tiles with a matte varnish. This killed the gloss and gave the stone a much more realistically weathered, flat appearance.
  

Ground Texture and Foliage

Once the stone tiles were finished, it was time to tackle the surrounding canvas sections:

• Overgrowth: To create the theme of a ruin or derelict area and to break up some of the straight lines, I packed static grass flock into the gaps between the stone tiles using slightly watered down PVA glue and placed a few random grass tufts across the dirt sections.
• Soil: The remaining open canvas areas got a heavy dose of AK Dark Earth Diorama texture paste.
• Soil Highlights: Once dry, the earth got a light drybrush of sand yellow, followed by a very slight touch of white on the highest points.

The Final Verdict

With the last tuft glued down, I called it done!

While I have built plenty of display bases for individual miniatures before, this was my very first time tackling a full game board. The compact size of the Greathelm layout was the perfect canvas to build my confidence. By deliberately keeping the construction simple—relying mostly on air-dry clay and a bit of texture paste—the project stayed fun and stress-free.

The best part? Aside from the stretched canvas itself, which only cost me $4 AUD, I managed to build the entire thing using stuff I already had.

A game board is great and all, but it feels a little empty without its warriors. To populate the board, I’ve decided to go with the Baron’s War Foot Knights from Wargames Atlantic. I love it when a plan comes together!

Make sure to keep an eye out for Part 3 as I build the two forces to do battle on my creation!

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