Hmmm... Another question: do you guys gaming mats on your tables? I looked up some gaming mats, but they seem expensive, around $25 - $50...
Okay. Do not get OSB. It will be a splintery mess, sooner or later. MDF, 6mm, will do if you want that. Do not get styrofoam, also called expanded polystyrene or EPS. It is too soft and easily damaged without a lot of additional work. Easiest is to get 2 sheets at 60cm x 120cm of 5cm thick rigid insulation foam. It is also called extruded polystyrene, XPS. It will be pink, or blue. Duct tape the pieces together in such a way that the duct tape forms a hinge. Paint and surface if you want, or just put a game mat on it, or a piece of felt on it. It will set just fine on most tables, but a no slip material between it and the tabletop would wise. It folds up and hides aways nicely enough when you are done playing. You may need to refresh the duct tape from time to time. Just a little maintenance.
The mousepad material (cloth topped neoprene) mats are worth every penny. They're non-slip on both sides, soft enough that if a model is knocked over the paint won't chip, they lay flat right away and don't wrinkle or crease, but still fold/roll up nicely for storage. There are companies doing all sorts designs in all sizes as well. I have the Micro Art Studios Ariadna mat and it's one of my best hobby purchases IMO.
You've obviously never played 40K. If you are looking for cheaper alternatives you can just paint it, of get some felt. It works ok for games like wm/h but not too much for infinity. But all think considered it's not too expensive. It cost less than a tag and will probably see more use. I'm not a huge fan of foam as it takes dents if not stored properly.
I don't have any stuff for Infinity terrain wise (no room at my place and budget blown on a second faction...). I do have a mousepad gaming mat for another game system and we use them a lot for Infinity at the local clubs. These things are amazing and I wish they made them 20 years ago! They hold up well and are easy to store. Worth the cash and look lovely.
Hmmmm. Any experience with Antenocitis Workshop's mats? They seem to be a bit cheaper than the ones by MAS...
No personal experience with the Antenociti's mats but everything else I've seen or got from them has been excellent so I imagine the mats are good. My one bugbear with urban mats is printed roads as it offers you less flexibility in terrain placement (unless you ignore the design, but why buy a mat with roads that you'll ignore), especially as I'm a die-hard diagonally placed buildings man and most roads on mats are oriented wrong for that. Though MAS do a diagonal city mat and their warehouse mat has some diagonal roads built in.
Yeah, my problem with both AW and MAS mats is that they have printed roads. Unfortunately, they don't offer any neutral "ground" designs of appropriate size... BTW. You guys sure that such mats have non-slip surfaces? I tried moving one of my minis over my mousepad and it's actually pretty slippery...
I find I don't notice the roads on most of the urban mats once buildings are placed on them anyway so don't really concern myself with them when setting up a table. They are mousepad like but not exactly mousepads. Just comparing my mat to my mousepad and find the mouse pad top to be much harder and slippery when compared to my mat. Never seen a model slide on a gaming mat yet (they also are really nice to roll dice on).
The cloth top on my MAS mat is less slippery than bare MDF, a vinyl, or poster mat. It is slippier than a felt mat but they have their own issues! The fact that rolling dice on them is much quieter than on bare wood is a nice bonus I'd forgotten about. I got the Ariadna one specifically for the lack of roads, and just by chance the next global campaign is set there!
PSA: There's some misinformation here that I have to correct. It's hard enough getting stuff to make terrain from without getting the names wrong. The white expanded foam crap is NOT and never has been called "styrofoam(tm)" except by the clueless. It's that sort of idiocy that gets you any soft drink ("pop" or "soda" for the US) as a "coke." It is open-cell expanded polystyrene. Styrofoam Is NOT expanded polystyrene. Styrofoam(tm) is a trademark of Dow chemical and is their name for their blue EXTRUDED foam insulation board. Styrofoam is not used for packing material or disposable coffee cups, despite popular and wrong usage. Styrofoam is fine for using on terrain. It's also available under other names from other makers. Foamex make FoamularXPS(tm) for example - similar product, different colour, identical properties - makes brilliant rock-faces with a little work (and was used to build the miniature sets for the lava planet (Mustafar) in Star Wars ep3.
Hmmm... So, any further advice for a game board? Right now, I'd prefer to buy one made PVC, as it seems to be that it's durable and rigid, but still relatively light. But what thickness of the board would be rigid enough? With my kitchen table's size, it seems to be that there would be about 30 - 40cm of the board hanging in the air on each end. How thick should a PVC board be not to be under all the minis, buildings etc. that might end up on one of its sides (come to think about it, how much would all that stuff weigh?)? The problem with PVC is that it's not cheap. Laminated MDF is way cheaper (I could buy a 10mm board with no trouble), but it's a lot heavier, I think... And I won't be able to store it out on my apartment's balcony...
If I had to build and store a 4'x4' table in my condo right now this is what I would do. Get a boring fold out white plastic pick-nick table from Canadian Tire. Then go across the road to Home Depot and get a 4'x4' sheet of 1/2" thick wood cut for me. From there I would order a 4'x4' gaming mat with mousepad like surface. For terrain I would use the buildings and boxes available from CB in the starter sets as well as the stand alone terrain packs ($10Cdn for 4 Buildings and 6 boxes). If I felt really insecure about the table shifting I would also get a couple 2'x1" pieces of wood cut from Home Depot to screw or glue in as anchors for the 4'x4' table top to fit onto the plastic folding table. Now I'm not sure where you live or what your local equivalents will be. That said, including the gaming mat I would probably spend less than $200.00 Canadian to get that table and decent terrain up and running with only a little effort with glue or a screw driver (borrowed power tools would make it a quick job).
I found 2 layers of 2x4ft 3mm MDF glued together will support itself OK Pic is of 3 sections of 2x4, easy to store, not weather proof!
Oh, that looks really nice! Thanks! One question: what would the dimensions for the picnic table be, more or less?
Incidentally, my new urban board will have the top layer much like this ... I haven't cut it out yet.
Yes, it is a trademarked term. It is also a commonly used term for EPS throughout North America. As a matter of fact, it is probably the most used term for EPS. That's the thing, usage defines the meaning of a word in US-English. And a word's meanings can change over time. We don't have a language academy like the French or the Spaniards. Words mean just what we chose them to mean —neither more nor less. Dow, Monsanto and the rest of those conglomerates can go piss off.
My picnic table at home is just under 2' by 4'. I would suggest one slight larger than that, our club ones are 2.5' by 6' I think.
@gorkij - I searched for "RSL Studios" and a music production company came up. Do you have any details on that table?