When I was a wee lad, I used to work with laser-cutting. My dad had a company doing neon signs and they had an industrial laser for cutting the parts. This was very much cutting edge back then, the machine was big, extremely expensive and required an even more expensive computer system to run it. As something of a perk, we had laser-cut woodwork on the dining room floor -- but this wasn't something you could buy off the shelf even if you had the money.
Recently, I bought some strawberries at the supermarket. They came in a disposable box built of laser-cut bits of MDF board. Laser equipment has definitely become cheaper and more commonplace.
For us wargamers, this is a good thing. Traditionally, the commercial option for wargames buildings was pretty much resin, which is expensive, heavy, fragile and typically solid turning buildings into impassable LOS blockers. If you wanted buildings you could place miniatures in, you were pretty much left with scratch-building them out of foamcore or similar.
Precision-cut MDF offers several advantages. It is a cheap and relatively light material. The kits can be flat-packed saving on postage. The precision allowed by lasers makes it possible to do jigsaw joints, which make the buildings much easier to assemble without crooked corners. Lasers can also be used to engrave some surface texture, though this is somewhat limited.
Lately companies offering laser-cut MDF building kits seem to be popping up left and right and Warbases is one of them. I ordered a bunch of MDF buildings from them to see what the fuzz was all about. The kits I was mostly interested in were the modular buildings, but I also ordered some 15mm barns and a small mansard roof house.
First Impressions
The kits come flat packed in ziploc bags without assembly instructions or example pictures. They're not that hard to figure out, but maybe there could be a little more pictures on the web site. All the kits come with walls, floor and roof pieces plus separate doors and windows. Depending on the kit, the walls may have engraved detailing or they might be plain. Wall corner joints are jigsaw type. All the roofs are plain.
The modular houses are very plain. They're basically boxes. You're supposed to stick the doors and windows directly onto the walls. While this allows more freedom in placing them, they will stick out a bit unless you do something about the plain wall texture. They are also moderately small, you're really meant to glue 2-3 or them together to compose a larger building. However, I doggedly tried to preserve the modularity and built them as singles. With some planning it is possible to build them so they can be placed next to each other to dynamically compose larger buildings without the gaps being too horrible. As each module is 'half a house', the roofs are just simple slabs. Unless you glue them on permanently, you'll need to add some interior support to prevent them sliding off the building. You really need to do something about the walls, otherwise the jigsaw joints in the corners will be visible and look pretty stupid.
The mansard roof house is substantially more expensive and I was intrigued to see what you get for the extra money. First of all, it is substantially bigger than any of the modular pieces. It also comes with cut out doors and windows, brickwork texture on the exterior wall, full roof with sturdy supports and two chimneys (I ended up using just one). And additional benefit of the brickwork design is that it hides the corners joints.
What is missing though, is an interior floor piece. I understand this is useless for people who are going to build the house as a solid piece and it is easy enough to add. Still, maybe an optional extra would be nice?
The 15mm barns are something between these two. They have full roofs and cut out doors, but no engraved detail.
In Use
Despite my long hobby experience, I'm the guy who always seems to have one hand too few when assembling things. These buildings were really easy to assemble. I especially appreciate the floor pieces, which make it easy to keep the corners straight. MDF takes white glue really well and if you really need to, it's easy to carve with a sharp knife.
Painting the buildings is also pretty simple. The one thing you have to watch out for is the engraved detail. It's easy to clog it if you lay thick paint on too heavily.
There is some extra work doing the finishing details (at the very least the roof), but nothing even a moderately experienced modeller couldn't handle.
Verdict
These are kits meant to be built and finished. If you're looking for something to plop directly onto your gaming table or something you can assemble/disassemble at will, look elsewhere. That said, I really like these. Some makers of MDF buildings IMHO take the stuff too far. MDF can't do everything and desperately trying to ends up with buildings that look like card buildings, just from a sturdier material.
I think Warbases has struck a pretty good balance. They do what MDF does well and let you do the rest with materials that suit it better. Yeah, the roof pieces could have engraved tile design, but it would just look flat. If you want the simplest solution, buy some embossed plasticard.
The modular buildings are extremely inexpensive. They need a bit more work, but covering large board sections won't break the piggy bank. In the old days, you were lucky to get card buildings for this price.
The mansard roof house is a bigger and more complete kit. It is more expensive, but I think you get something for your money. At the end of the day, the price per square inch of table covered is pretty close.
The 15mm barns work well with a certain popular WWII game. I just wish they did a farmhouse to go with the barns.
maxxon
Sucks!
