I've seen and been following a few build logs from users on here. Figured I'd get one going myself. I'll try to update progress as I go. I also have a ton more photos, so if you have any specific questions or suggestions, throw them my way!

The Idea: The volcanic and mountainous island world of Ord Mantell, specifically drawing influence from the location known as Mannett Point; an old smuggler and pirate fortress that seems to change ownership quite frequently.

The board: A 6x3 ft board broken into 6 sections. 3 boards will be 2x2 ft, and 3 boards will be 1x2 ft.

The materials: I work mainly with the pink insulation foam seen in most YouTube tutorials. There will eventually be water effects, custom trees, and a black sand beach.

Day 1. Chewbacca (Imperial Assault) helping me with scale.... although he's a bit short.

Day 14. The foam is taking shape. Just keep carving until it looks like obsidian rock.

Due to the severe elevation gains for the pirate installation, I'm working on the board in a weird order. But in the end, it should have tons of variation between buildings, landscape, open beach, lava pits, and black volcanic plateaus. Hope you all can be an inspiration for the board, and I hope it inspires you as well. Again, if anyone has any questions or suggestions, I'd love to hear them. -B

It reminds me of some of the Anoat levels in the now defunct Star Wars: Uprising. Looks awesome so far.

1 minute ago, ID X T said:

It reminds me of some of the Anoat levels in the now defunct Star Wars: Uprising. Looks awesome so far.

Oh definitely lol. The stairs and walkways look very close in my mind. I'll probably even use similar color schemes when painting.

Looks great so far! I can't wait to see more.

Looks absolutely brilliant so far.

My only reservation/question regards boards like this, while they look amazing, dosnt replay-ability after a few games suffer?

That is true but still this looks abso-f**king-lutely gorgeous. So if you have the space to have one of these I think its cool to have it and then another one more modular for replayability.
Also in this one you might need to limit it only some of the deployment cards and decide sides randomly to be fair.
Bottomline... great job! can't wait to see it finished and painted! keep it up!

I think I will also have one fully built board just for awesomeness, and two or three mats with modular terrain pieces for some randomness

This looks great so far. Your detail with the rounded ledges and your rock faces look so good. i too can not wait to see this finished table.

I see that you are putting several pieces of foam together. Is this so that you may be abke to rearrange the pieces and create a whole new table?

I am considering doing this with my Death Star build by making the rooms seperate pieces so that they can be rearranged and create a whole new interior or just another area of the Death Star. The only thing with doing this is that I really dont want "box style" rooms as the Death Star had lots of curved hall ways and rooms.

7 hours ago, VAYASAN said:

Looks absolutely brilliant so far.

My only reservation/question regards boards like this, while they look amazing, dosnt replay-ability after a few games suffer?

Oh that's definitely a fair point. Mats or even foam boards with movable terrain will give you absolutely endless replayability. There are multiple reasons I decided to go with a "static" board. But Legions' deployment rules allow for a unique game each time. From what I understand, players will have a point bid system (player with lowest squad points chooses Red or Blue, equal squad points are chosen randomly by die). Then players take turns eliminating cards from a grid of 9 cards that includes Deployment Zones, Terrain Conditions, and Mission Objectives. the remaining 3 cards (one of each) states the game conditions. That system alone allows static boards to have a higher level of replayability. But you are not mistaken. Modular boards and movable terrain boards will give you more bang for your buck. And I'm sure i'll have a few battle mats with that system as well in the end.

6 hours ago, Andreu said:

That is true but still this looks abso-f**king-lutely gorgeous. So if you have the space to have one of these I think its cool to have it and then another one more modular for replayability.
Also in this one you might need to limit it only some of the deployment cards and decide sides randomly to be fair.
Bottomline... great job! can't wait to see it finished and painted! keep it up!

Thanks man! And I totally agree. I'm sure i'll have some battle mats with scatter terrain as well. Yeah, I've been trying to plan the sides and corners according to the deployment cards we've seen so far. But at this point its basically guesswork. We'll know more soon, I hope.

1 hour ago, C3POFETT said:

This looks great so far. Your detail with the rounded ledges and your rock faces look so good. i too can not wait to see this finished table.

I see that you are putting several pieces of foam together. Is this so that you may be abke to rearrange the pieces and create a whole new table?

I am considering doing this with my Death Star build by making the rooms seperate pieces so that they can be rearranged and create a whole new interior or just another area of the Death Star. The only thing with doing this is that I really dont want "box style" rooms as the Death Star had lots of curved hall ways and rooms.

Thanks! I'm spending extra time making sure that the clean lines of the pirate base are contrasting from the rough lava rocks in the landscape.

I originally wanted to make the board so that I could rearrange the pieces. But the specific elements I wanted to include, like a broken bridge that will be on the next section to the left of the stairs... it made it nearly impossible to allow for the board to be rearranged. So, in conclusion, no, the board will be as-is when finished. I'm not attaching small terrain, like moisture vaporators, small generators, etc. That way, if I need them as "objective markers", I can move them around for individual games.

And the idea of modular boards is awesome. All I can say is plan, plan, plan. Draw small versions on graph paper, cut them out, and really play with how to do it. It's a great idea, and totally possible.

I also wanted to further state the reason behind making a "static" and highly detailed game board. This is actually a present for my friend. She's been in and out of the hospital for some time. And when she finally gets back to LA from her doctor, she's looking forward to spending her down time painting up some Legion minis. She'll probably do the Rebels, and I'll get my beloved Imps. But this board is a welcome home present... even though it may not be done in time...lol. I just wanted to do something special and a bit extra instead of the modular terrain pieces I usually create.

5 minutes ago, AldousSnow said:

And the idea of modular boards is awesome. All I can say is plan, plan, plan. Draw small versions on graph paper, cut them out, and really play with how to do it. It's a great idea, and totally possible.

Oh I have been planning this. I originally had this in mind for Imperial Assault. I honestly had just finished the last set of console designs when they announced Legion. I waited until there was a confirmation on the scale of the figures and I went back and resized entrances.

I have so many designs sketched out on graph paper I feel like I might need two tables.

Just now, C3POFETT said:

Oh I have been planning this. I originally had this in mind for Imperial Assault. I honestly had just finished the last set of console designs when they announced Legion. I waited until there was a confirmation on the scale of the figures and I went back and resized entrances.

I have so many designs sketched out on graph paper I feel like I might need two tables.

Haha thats perfect. I have a notebook filled with ideas. Maybe one day I'll get to the Kamino platform board.

Just so it doesn't seem like I am continually blowing smoke of a Death Star table here is a set of decals I have scaled to size.

Just now, C3POFETT said:

Just so it doesn't seem like I am continually blowing smoke of a Death Star table here is a set of decals I have scaled to size.

I actually just seen this in another thread. The detail is awesome. The idea of the Death Star game board is actually on of my favorites in the forums right now.

This looks great already, and it's not even finished building, let alone painting! Very cool, indeed. One question for you, are you planning on having more then one avenue from either long board edge? At the moment, it looks like any engagement would be funnelled through the central clearer section where the staircase is. That would further limit your replayability on the table, but you might want a table that forces you straight into the action! If you were planning some other way for models to get from one side to the other (you mentioned a broken bridge?) that would definitely open up more possibilities. Anyway, it looks amazing, and you're probably way ahead of me! Just thought I'd ask!

1 hour ago, General Zodd said:

This looks great already, and it's not even finished building, let alone painting! Very cool, indeed. One question for you, are you planning on having more then one avenue from either long board edge? At the moment, it looks like any engagement would be funnelled through the central clearer section where the staircase is. That would further limit your replayability on the table, but you might want a table that forces you straight into the action! If you were planning some other way for models to get from one side to the other (you mentioned a broken bridge?) that would definitely open up more possibilities. Anyway, it looks amazing, and you're probably way ahead of me! Just thought I'd ask!

Thanks so much. As far as the long edges are concerned, the middle board (the one with the staircase) will be the main entrance into the base. The right board follows a series of plateaus that would let the player on the ocean edge choose a more ambushy approach. Theres little purposeful carved paths through the rocks that lead into the rear sides of the pirate base. And on the far left board (not started yet), there will not only be a broken bridge, as you stated, but also some natural rock steps that lead to a possible entry point.

On the other hand if you get deployed on the far long side (away from the ocean edge) you'll have the more defensive start. But less choices if you wanted to exit, as the "secret" paths in mostly require figures to drop down. Beach deployment and base deployment will feel very different. However, with the various other deployment cards, like short side vs short side, it will give you the chance to start in or out of the base, and both if you wanted too.

Totally avoiding adulting today and wanted to work on my custom tree. It's a wire skeleton using the twist technique. The wire was covered in tin foil, which was then coated in air dry clay. It was sealed with PVA glue and painted. The foliage is steel wool coated in a mist of flock. It's my first tree, and though I still have some touch ups, I'm super happy with it so far. I've got photos of each step, so if anyone is interested, I can put them on here.

Don't ever be shy about posting pics of your work. We are a ravenous bunch.

@AldousSnow Loove me some custom trees,

I assume this is your primary reference picture?

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/File:Mannett_Point.png

(if so, your rendition looks very accurate so far)

On 9/26/2017 at 1:54 PM, AldousSnow said:

I also wanted to further state the reason behind making a "static" and highly detailed game board. This is actually a present for my girlfriend. She's been in and out of the hospital for some time. And when she finally gets back to LA from her doctor in Chicago, she's looking forward to spending her down time painting up some Legion minis. She'll probably do the Rebels, and I'll get my beloved Imps. But this board is a welcome home present... even though it may not be done in time...lol. I just wanted to do something special and a bit extra instead of the modular terrain pieces I usually create.

Hope your girlfriend gets well soon. You're making her a beautiful present.

Thanks for sharing

3 hours ago, gaerithe said:

Hope your girlfriend gets well soon. You're making her a beautiful present.

Thanks for sharing

Thank you so much. She knows im working on something, but has no idea the scale of it. I cant wait to see her face when she sees the battlefield she gets to whoop my *** on. Im just crazy happy that i have someone who not only tolerates this crazy hobby we all have, but is also a fan herself.

6 hours ago, ABXY said:

I assume this is your primary reference picture?

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/File:Mannett_Point.png

(if so, your rendition looks very accurate so far)

Precisely that. Good find. Im making a few tactical changes, alongside some aesthetic changes. But the overall build will be very close to that.