Fae Stones
Posted by
MortiS-the-Lost
–
MortiS-the-Lost
–
Dolmens, Menhirs, Cromlechs, Standing Stones are found in most fantasy settings (and of course our world too) so I thought I should really have some for my games. I've called this bunch I made recently 'Fae Stones' because I designed them to have a elven feel to them. In game they will be mostly found in ancient forest locations and have various magical properties tied to them, although some times I may just use them for decoration to give an area an 'Ancient Wood Elf' feel.
Construction was fairly simple, I found a few likely looking stones out and about, in gardens and so on (you can of course buy them if you insist on wasting your money) and mounted them on 30mm WarMachine style bases using super glue and baking powder and I filled the base out a little using plastic wood-filler. Then I mixed up some Milliput, smoothed a layer about 1mm or so thick down the flattest side of the stone and using a wet sculpting tool 'carved' the elven style … er … carvings into the Milliput before it set. It's quite important to know what kind of design you want to carve into the Milliput at this stage, so beforehand I looked at the designs of carved standing stones in various computer games including Kingdoms of Amalur, the Fable series, Oblivion and Two Worlds - I then took to my sketch pad and drew up a few designs for my own stones. Admittedly I could have looked at real standing stones for my inspiration (especially since I grew up in Cornwall and currently live in Wiltshire), but real Standing Stones rarely have such interesting carvings, they tend to be just that - stones, standing.
^ A page from my sketch pad, I think Kingdoms of Amalur influenced my designs the most.
Once the Milliput had set I went about cleaning it up a little using files and sand-paper to remove any finger prints and other unwanted marks. I used Green-stuff to add some extra detail to the backs of the stones in the form of some vines - this is quite easy to do; roll a small amount of Green-stuff into a sausage and then stick it to the surface in a vine-like arrangement, as it's setting add texture by scratching into it with an old craft knife in the direction of the vines (you can add some nice looking vines to pretty much anything using this method). Finally I finished off the bases with a little sand for texture.
^ The Stones just after the vines were added, waiting for the green stuff to set before adding the sand to bases
Painting was strait forward, boring and so obvious that I won't bother writing about it here, save to say I used a bunch of greys and browns. I would have had more to write about in terms of painting if I'd have gone ahead with my original idea of in-laying the carvings with a metallic blue to give them a more magical appearance - but I thought the stones looked pretty good in plain stone colours so I left them that way for now. I may well go back and add the metallic blue later and I also have plans to add a few clumps of static grass to the bases
This Fae stone's appearance was (as you can see) inspired directly by the Lore Stones in the computer game 'Kingdoms of Amalur'. Unlike the others I didn't use any real stone when making this particular Fae Stone, it's made from scraps of Foam Board cut roughly to shape and covered with Milliput to add all the texture and detail
^ The Lore Stone/Fae Stone before painting - yea, sorry I didn't get a picture of the back painted
The Fae Stones are fun and simple to make, so I'll probably be making a few more in future - plans include at least one with a hole thought it (if I can find a nice chunk of cork bark to work from) and perhaps some Stone Henge type pieces with top stones resting on 2 uprights.
For the bonus pictures this time here's a few more pictures of my Fae Stones (what else did you expect?)
^The Fae Stones being using in-game - the Heroes discover an Ancient cave dotted with mysterious carved stones
^The central stone glows with magical power ... or is it an LED light being held just out of shot?
^3 Fae Stones setup in a chamber with my vine covered walls, which they match up with rather nicely
Construction was fairly simple, I found a few likely looking stones out and about, in gardens and so on (you can of course buy them if you insist on wasting your money) and mounted them on 30mm WarMachine style bases using super glue and baking powder and I filled the base out a little using plastic wood-filler. Then I mixed up some Milliput, smoothed a layer about 1mm or so thick down the flattest side of the stone and using a wet sculpting tool 'carved' the elven style … er … carvings into the Milliput before it set. It's quite important to know what kind of design you want to carve into the Milliput at this stage, so beforehand I looked at the designs of carved standing stones in various computer games including Kingdoms of Amalur, the Fable series, Oblivion and Two Worlds - I then took to my sketch pad and drew up a few designs for my own stones. Admittedly I could have looked at real standing stones for my inspiration (especially since I grew up in Cornwall and currently live in Wiltshire), but real Standing Stones rarely have such interesting carvings, they tend to be just that - stones, standing.
^ A page from my sketch pad, I think Kingdoms of Amalur influenced my designs the most.
Once the Milliput had set I went about cleaning it up a little using files and sand-paper to remove any finger prints and other unwanted marks. I used Green-stuff to add some extra detail to the backs of the stones in the form of some vines - this is quite easy to do; roll a small amount of Green-stuff into a sausage and then stick it to the surface in a vine-like arrangement, as it's setting add texture by scratching into it with an old craft knife in the direction of the vines (you can add some nice looking vines to pretty much anything using this method). Finally I finished off the bases with a little sand for texture.
^ The Stones just after the vines were added, waiting for the green stuff to set before adding the sand to bases
Painting was strait forward, boring and so obvious that I won't bother writing about it here, save to say I used a bunch of greys and browns. I would have had more to write about in terms of painting if I'd have gone ahead with my original idea of in-laying the carvings with a metallic blue to give them a more magical appearance - but I thought the stones looked pretty good in plain stone colours so I left them that way for now. I may well go back and add the metallic blue later and I also have plans to add a few clumps of static grass to the bases
This Fae stone's appearance was (as you can see) inspired directly by the Lore Stones in the computer game 'Kingdoms of Amalur'. Unlike the others I didn't use any real stone when making this particular Fae Stone, it's made from scraps of Foam Board cut roughly to shape and covered with Milliput to add all the texture and detail
^ The Lore Stone/Fae Stone before painting - yea, sorry I didn't get a picture of the back painted
The Fae Stones are fun and simple to make, so I'll probably be making a few more in future - plans include at least one with a hole thought it (if I can find a nice chunk of cork bark to work from) and perhaps some Stone Henge type pieces with top stones resting on 2 uprights.
For the bonus pictures this time here's a few more pictures of my Fae Stones (what else did you expect?)
^The Fae Stones being using in-game - the Heroes discover an Ancient cave dotted with mysterious carved stones
^The central stone glows with magical power ... or is it an LED light being held just out of shot?
^3 Fae Stones setup in a chamber with my vine covered walls, which they match up with rather nicely
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