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Marvel Crisis Protocol by Lawnor

Marvel Crisis Protocol by Lawnor

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More Papercraft Terrain

Tutoring 1
Skill 1
Idea 1
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So all my characters are done and I’ve got a load of size 1-3 terrain, maybe even 1 4 or two. I don’t have any size 5’s though. I do have a Tymeagain/4Ground voucher I received in march which I was going to use to order a building or two. However it’s not working and they’re not answering their emails. I’m choosing to believe they are busy hands on types who don’t sit at a computer all day and I’m giving them time.

In the mean time though I want some buildings on my table so I scoured the internet and found some ready to print 30mm scale buildings for a game called “Z War One”. I’ve printed out a couple on to regular A3 paper (I upscaled to 110% because MCP is around 40mm scale, but it’ll be helpful if these buildings will work for 40mm and fit for 30mm too).

The files can be found HERE.  There are 3 different files.  One seems to make rooms etc for on the deck of a ship.  Another has mostly the front halves of council flats, but if you could mirror the images and print out a second set that would probably make whole buildings.

Once printed out, I trimmed most of the excess paper off, leaving a healthy margin.  You want to glue beyond the lines to reduce the chances of peeling later and extra paper lets you do that.  otherwise you likely won’t glue all the way up to the edge.  I then glued them on to the backs of pizza and cereal boxes using a pritt stick. They didn’t all fit, so I had to cut along the corners of buildings and make my own tabs to rebuild later.

More Papercraft Terrain

I left them longer than perhaps they needed to dry.  I had other things to be doing, so why chance it?  I then cut them out, remembering to leave extra tabs where I’d had to cut two walls apart.  I also made every tab larger than was drawn.  It’s handy to have extra surface area for glue.  you can always trim excess off later, but you can’t really add more on once it’s cut.

More Papercraft Terrain

I used a metal ruler and the edge of a screwdriver to score along the folds.  I didn’t want to use anything too sharp in case I cut too deep.  I discovered that using a blunt tool means the paper tears though, so I switched back to my hobby knife and was careful with the pressure I applied.

More Papercraft Terrain

I then used superglue and care to put everything together.  I wouldn’t trust Pritt Stick to hold, and PVA would take far too long to dry without clamps holding everything together.

Be careful at this stage.  It’s easy to accidentally glue your fingers to the models and damage the printouts.  Look at the back of the newsagents near that bin.  I can live with it though.

I’d been putting off making more papercraft terrain because my Pritt Stick had dried up.  You know how they are.  Two minutes after first use, they’ve lost their stickiness.  I don’t know how many of mine went in the bin as a kid.  They’re great, but have a very short lifespan and you never get the full use out of them.

Did you know they can be easily restored, no matter how long they’ve been dry?  I didn’t, but I googled and it turns out it’s super simple.  Before bed one night I ran mine under the tap and gently filled it up.  I put the lid back on and left it standing in the sink (I forgot to flip it.  I’ve only just remembered I was supposed to do that).  Next morning it was moist and possibly useable, but I feared it had drained overnight so I topped it off before going to work, but this time left it standing in water in a cup, filled just above the twisty bit.  That evening I used to to make these building.  It worked a treat.  Pretty sure my Pritt Stick had dried up long before anyone knew the word Covid.

Never waste a glue stick again!  Amazing!  Something I could have done with knowing 40 years ago.

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