Time for another installment of The Morchauser Files …

FLAT TERRAIN

by
Joe Morschauser

The War Game Digest, Book V Volume III, September 1961

Have you developed an over-stuffed war game table? Are all those little houses, trees, rocks etc. getting in the way of your battle? Sure, you have spent hours and hours building that little house! Sure, you have spent days and days constructing that clump of forest! But can you move? Aren’t your soldiers accessory-bound? Don’t you find it tough to make that dashing flank attack? Naturally you do! And its time you realised that your accessories have taken over your battleground. However, be of good hearth There’s something you can do about it… something which does not involve the rental of a warehouse to fight your war games in.

For several hundred years European war gamers have used little “flat” soldiers. (Don’t say “UGH” you ’round’ men… read on.) Now “flatters” may insist the main reason for their sticking to “flats” is the wide nange of types available, the cost, the weight or a dozen other excusese I know different. The real reason “flatters” stick to “flats” is that they take a fraction of the space occupied by a round of any type.

I have no particular desire to convert you to flats. I myself in my own war gaming use mainly the old—fashioned 54mm round. For a big battle I need a big table which I fortunately have, but even on a big table I found that accessories have been gradually pushing me off. As a result I have done the only sensible thing — I am converting my terrain accessories to “flats”.

These “flat” accessories are strips of cardboard, plyboard etc. cut to the desired.shape. On my table I use the grid system of 4 inch x 4 inch squares. Any “round” house eight inches long would occupy two valuable squares. But the “flat” house is placed along the grid line between the squares thus leaving these squares open for movement of troops. This uses no space at all but gives the desired effect.

You may question how such “flat” houses look when viewed from the end. my answer is “quite good” for after some experiments I have designed my houses in an L-shape. This means that though the house still rests on its narrow edge along the grid lines, its L·shape keeps it upright without any base. At the same time it also means that one can view the house either from the side or end of the table and still get the effect of a solid object.

The best material for “flat” accessories is quite naturally thin plyboard or composition board. But heavy cardboard will do quite nicely. If possible the L—shaped design should be used but if this is just not possible for some reason you can slot a cross-piece of board at either end to provide a solid base. The whole of course should be fastened down to the table with tape, staples or tacks when in use.

Even those completely lacking in artistic talent should have no trouble in designing a house, some trees or a whole forest, low stone walls or groups of rocks. If your imagination is dry at this moment, go to a picture magazine. They are loaded with shots of just the sort of thing you can trace and transfer to your board. Your tools are simple of course, consisting of tape, board, a sharp knife for cutting out your accessory, a pencil and some poster paints for finishing touches. If you wish to get quite fancy you can cut out windows in houses, substituting coloured celophane for glass. Or maybe you wish to leave them open for snipers to shoot through.

You can even make hills or mountains of the “flat” type. In the case of impassable hills or mountains there is no problem. But if you wish to make passable hills you should mark off moves up in the form of lines. Actually troops will never move “up” for this will be impossible. what you do is to draw your move lines on the hills in such a way as to indicate on what turn after the troops reach the base of the hill they are where. Thus, one unit reaching base of hill on turn five, say, gets to the top of the hill on turn seven. Enemy on other side reached base on turn six and is below turn five troops by one move line. Or if you want to get really fancy and make your hills or mountains of plyboard you can put steps of board sticking out on each side of the hill like shelves for troops to actually climb. In this case though you must be sure your mountain has a secure cross base and that this is securely fastened down to the table. (Shelf—steps are of course actually directly above each other not stepped out as in normal war—game hills) I might add here that there’s little to stop you from making a two or three foot high hill with such shelves. So long as you can reach the shelves in comfort your ”flat” mountain or hill can be as high as you like and still take up no more space than a half-inch high wall or fence.

The same type of shelf—steps may be used if one is building a castle wall. The platform on top of the wall can be directly above an area below which is free for troop use. Towers might have several shelf levels and still have open space at their base for movement of men on the table itself. I think I need to go no further with this for I’m sure your imagination is working like mad already…..or you are laughing your head off! But if you are laughing, remember, you may be doing it out of the other side of your face when your war gate table gets so crowded you can’t move troops.

The “flat” technique of terrain and terrain accessories leaves a lot to be desired. It has its limitations to be sure. Those who like pure realism won’t care for it at all. But remember, you scoffers, you can get so real with a war game table you can‘t play war games on it. You won’t be able to fight an “open” battle because there isn‘t room enough. All you will have is a beautiful diorama. And you don’t need a diorama, no matter how beautiful. You need SPACE and “flat” terrain can give it to you like nothing else.

Now lets see, where did those soldiers fall when that mountain turned over??? …

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It has been far too long since our last post of an article by Joe Morschauser. Since I still have several in hand, I thought this one would make a nice break from my recent batch of articles by Tony Bath.

As for Flat Terrain. I have played many a game where the houses, fences, rock walls and the like have been just the type Mr. Morschauser writes about. While I have none of these in my collection of terrain, I may well revisit the idea for my next batch of house, and rock walls. Can’t say that I’ve ever used this type of hill, but I can at least picture how these might work out. We do hope you enjoyed this posting. Look for more soon.