More Real Estate On the Game Table

 

Hey look, Old Fritz has added some new ground to our battlefield. I dare say that it is good ground.
54mm Americana plastic figures.

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Yesterday I created more table top space on my game table in order to accommodate my ever-growing collection of 54mm American Civil War regiments. My main table measures 6ft wide by 13ft long and then I have a back table that measures 5ft wide by 12ft long. The back table had some of my 54mm Roman encampment on it and it was chewing up about 6ft of table length. So I put all of the Roman terrain away (took nearly an hour) and then set up some rudimentary ACW terrain on the back table.

I was putting this exercise off until my order for some new Cigar Box Battle mats arrived, and when they did arrive a couple of days ago, I knew that it was time to redecorate the back table.

The view from the main table looking towards the back table.

There it is: the Full Cleveland!
Main table is in the foreground and the back table is in the,well, background.

Once I have the terrain set up on my table I usually tinker around with the layout over the course of several days. For example, the first layout had two parallel roads running from the back table and going on to the front table. However, something just didn't look right, so I pulled up one of the roads and repositioned it so that it was running at an angle rather than in a straight line to the main table. Diagonal roads look better on a game table than do straight and parallel roads.

Straight road running across the width of the back table.

The improved road now runs diagonally across the table and looks more interesting.

Panorama view of the back table.

Here are some other pictures that I clicked this evening:

Meade's headquarters at Gettysburg

HQ and the nearby Union encampment.

A view of the main game table.

Union camp ground

Watching the troops marching off to the battle.

Union observation tower

I finished painting my third Confederate regiment of 30 figures yesterday and another 30 figures will be completed within the next day or two. That will give me 4 CSA regiments for a total of 120 figures. I will need 15 regiments for my Pickett's Charge game. The Union army has 8 regiments of 30 figures for a total of 240 figures. Thus I have 360 of the required 1,000 total figures that I will need for my game.

One thing stands out to my eye: I'm going to need a whole lot of trees. Much more than I already have, and believe you me, I have lots of trees. Both of the tables shown in these pictures are approximately 12ft long, but I will be using 24ft long tables. So in theory, I will need double the number of trees that you see on my tables at the present time. I will also need to make about 36ft worth of turnpike fencing for both sides of the Emmitsburg Road. Yikes!

Yes, I have some work to do.