Painting and Building the Stronghold-Terrain Tavern

Terrain brings your tabletop games to life, and as I had this Tavern building for a very long while lingering in my #PileOfShame it was time to use it as a palette cleanser from painting my Protectorate of Menoth Army. While it took me around 30 hours to paint and assemble this building, I absolutely fell in love with painting it as it was so much fun. I also would imagine how amazing it will look on my gaming table and make my games more visually appealing! Lets dive in =)

This Tavern Building from Stronghold Terrain I bought some 13 years ago, and back then Stronghold Terrain still produced their buildings from a very strong plaster. It came in separate parts which made painting it a breeze, and while there are some small gaps between the pieces after I assembled it, I didn’t mind as they’re so small that you won’t see them when the building is standing on the table and you view it from a meter away. Nowadays you still can find this building made from Resin at Elladan-Games and at 45€ it isn’t expensive either in my opinion.

The benefit of the Plaster however is that you don’t need to wash it like Resin, and it’s really nice to paint on. The grey plaster also works great for the stones, so I only coloured a few other stones in different shades of grey to break up the monotony. But from the start.

I airbrushed the white plaster sections of the building in P3 Menoth White Base, though any nice off-white you own also will be fine. I tried to work cleanly with the Airbrush but here and there some white came on the stones and windows, but as these will be painted later on in the process this isn’t a problem right now. The benefit of using the AB is speed – I had the four walls done in about 10 minutes with two layers each.

Next up was the roof. I used an old Vallejo Red as the base colour and again Airbrushed the three Roof sections. This was a very satisfying and quick procedure, taking a mere 10 minutes for two layers on all three pieces. After these were dry I gave them two genourous washes with Army Painter Strong Tone and then a light drybrush of an Army Painter Red.

Then I started on the wooden parts. I began with the wooden planks and beams of the roof as I still had it in front of me, and gave it two basecoats of P3 Umbral Umber, followed by a wash of P3 Brown Ink mixed with water. I gave it a light drybrush of P3 Bloodstone mixed with a little bit of Scale 75 Arctic Blue. This was also applied to all the wooden beams on the facades, the doors and window frames, as well as the small roof window.

Next I picked up three different colours of grey. I went with two old Vallejo greys and Bastion Grey from P3. Mixed with water I painted in a random fashion different stones in different shades of grey, and also fixed at the same time the bits where the Menoth White base was were it wasn’t supposed to be.

The crown glass windows in the basement floor got a basecoat of P3 Iosan Green, and then I painted small green dots with Vallejo Scorpy Green on the round window bits. After everything was dry I gave it a wash with Citadel Technical Waystone Green. The windows in the first and second floor got a few basecoats of black, and next I painted reflections with Scale 75 Arctic Blue in the top left corner. I also added a tiny dot of P3 Cygnar Blue and then mixed it in with the Scale 75 Arctic Blue to give a hint of a blue reflecting sky in the windows.

I gave the metal bits a black basecoat and then painted them with P3 Cold Steel, and gave them a little wash with P3 Armour wash. I used a P3 Bronze for the round window of the main entry, and then started on the most difficult bit of the whole project, the sign.

Now the sign above the main entry is made from pewter and the two pieces could just easily be glued together. I decided that this simple solution is nothing for me, and went to find a tiny chain in town. I found it at a jewellery store in the centre and 5€ later I owned a small metal chain. Next I drilled carefully holes into the beam and sign, cut the chain to the same length, and now I started to lose my sanity.

To glue the chain into the holes I had to cut and bend needles to the same length, put the needle through the chain, and then glue them into place. Yes, it is as fiddly as it sounds! Four times I had to do this, and it probably took me two hours and gave me a few grey hairs. However, now I had a fancy sign which was hanging from chains! I gave it a basecoat of black and then painted the separate parts exactly the same way as the wood and steel on the rest of the building. The monk is raised, as is the text, so with the side of the brush it was easy to pick out these details.

It was time to give the stones, wood and off-white plaster of the facades a final coat of colour. I took out the largest drybrush I own and gave every side of the building a careful drybrush with P3 Menoth White Highlight. This picked up the structures in the stones and plaster really nicely, and also accented the wooden beams a bit more. Finally I painted the vine at the back of the building in Umbral Umber and Iosan Green.

The base of the building got a basecoat of light brown and a drybrush with Vallejo Bonewhite. The different elements – the fire wood, stone path & rocks, rack for the barrels – got similar colours as the corresponding parts on the building, and now everything was ready for assembly!

I used wood glue to first glue the four sides of the building to the base. I put down a thin layer on the base, put the four sides carefully down, and then glued them together from the inside. Rubber bands kept everything in place over night, and the next morning it was super-solid. For the roof I put glue down on the top of the building, and then carefully put the roof down and kept it in place with rubber bands and my hand for a while. Listening to the lastest PATM Podcast made the time fly by, and soon after I was attaching the oriel window and chimney. After a few hours everything was glued solidly into place, and the final step of weathering could start!

I used Tamiya weathering powders for the mud and dirt on the stairs up to the doors, to show the foot traffic which goes in and out. I used Grass Tufts in 6 and 12 mm length from Green Stuff World, as well as their 3 mm yellow static grass. Especially the 6 mm Tufts are AMAZING and I will be using these for many more projects in the future.

On the roof I used Citadel Technical Typhus Corrosion as a base for mossy sections, which I highlighted lightly with Citadel Technical Nurgle’s Rot. This made for an easy and pretty looking moss, and while I tried how it’d look with static grass I wasn’t convinced. To round out the whole building and make it more realistic I added bird poop randomly on the red roof tiles and the chimney, for this I used an Army Painter White which I applied with a Size 00 brush and then I put my Size 1 Brush straight from the top down into it to make the dot less solid. I added a bit of poop on the stones in front of the building and the barrels behind the house, and then called it DONE!

This was an amazingly satisfying project and I am very proud and pleased how it turned out. It was very easy and convenient to paint the flat pieces of this building and then glue them together at the end, it made painting a breeze and it was easy to see progress – every other evening another side of the building was ready. Most importantly, it looks great on my table and will be the first of several terrain pieces which I will be working on during the rest of the year, and which hopefully will give me a pretty looking little village by the holidays!

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