Hi,

after I started painting a lot of Marlburian Miniatures from Pendraken, I´m thinking of building my own Star Fortress for them.
One Inspiration was the Vauban Table at the Hamburg Tactica, where I played a game.

The fantastic Table


In fact we played only on the right half of the table....



The concentrated Guy on the right is me...



View from the other side....

Another Inspiration are two fortresses Nearby in North Germany and the Netherlands.

First the Fortress of Dömitz, south of Hamburg



It was build between 1559 - 1565 and was in Military use until 1894. It saw action in the 30 Years War and in the Liberation Wars 1813-1814.


and second the Fortress of Bourtange



In 1580 William of Orange gave the order to build a fort on the sand ridge in the Bourtanger moor, on the border of modern Germany. On the order of William Louis of Nassau the fortress was raised in 1593.* Between 1593 and 1851 Bourtange was an important fortress.


Some Mathematic:

I learned from Wikipedia, that the Fortresses of this time were build to give the attacker no Blind spot  where he could bring ladders on the Wall without being shot. The Bastions overtake the role of the Towers in a Medieval Castle, and the distance between two Bastions was, at this time, the effective Range of Muskets and Cannon grapeshot, roughly 200 meters.

As I will play with Maurice rules, there the Range for Muskets and Grapeshots are 4 Base-width, the range will be in my case 12 cm, as I based my Miniatures on 3 cm wide Bases.

First I made a Master Plate from 0,5 cm Polystyrene, what you also need for it, is a set square, a pencil, a long Spacer. You can see on the picture how i made it, starting with a point in the Middle, drawing a line upwards and then using the set Square for the other 4 lines, the Wall, the Bastions, etc....



will be continued...

Those are inspirational photos; I look forward to your efforts.

Conan, you might like to look at Tilbury Fort - originally built in the fifteen hundreds to protect London from the Spanish Armada.http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/daysout/properties/tilbury-fort/

Quote from: Hertsblue on 16 July 2012, 10:15:47 AM
Conan, you might like to look at Tilbury Fort - originally built in the fifteen hundreds to protect London from the Spanish Armada.http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/daysout/properties/tilbury-fort/

Yes, this one looks also Great. To be honest, I was surprised to find an intact Fortress in northern Germany, because nearly all were dismantled in the previous 200 Years.

The French and British had a much better understanding of history and the necessity of the preservation of historical Buildings than we Germany did and do. 

Excellent - really looking forward to seeing how this one progresses 

[Tourist information mode on]

Yes, Boutange is nice, very well preserved, and worth a visit if you're ever in the area. Also once a year (or more often?) reenactors home in and do a mock storming of the fortress.

[Mode off]

For us lazy people there should be one from Baggage Train

IanS

I have a feeling im going to have to make one of these when your finished 

So, some more Additions.

I take two plates of  2cm thick Styrodur


and used the master plate to cut out the right dimensions with a Cutter knife. I glued the two Cutouts together
with Wood Glue, so I have a High of 4cm, and will add a 6mm parapet.
The Fortress in Dömitz has up to 9 meter high walls,my will have with
4,6 cm * 150 nearly 7 meter.

For the slope on the outer site I use a tool from Proxxon:



I will add some own Pictures later this day.

Hi,

I now cut everything with the Thermal Cutter and bring on a Structure Paste, because i didn´t worked good as I Wanted.
Two more Pics, sorry for the Quality...

Here the Cutout without the Paste, no clean work...


With the Structure Paste added


I large view...


I promise I will make better Pictures for the next Posts...

I imagine you're going to face the outer slopes of the ramparts with a layer of a harder substance (either plaster filler or possibly marine plywood)? Expanded polystyrene chips very, very easily.