05/31/2026
Happy Sunday, and welcome back to Tabletop Thoughts!
Since I was on vacation from my main job this past week, I had some extra time to spend at the crafting table working on a variety of hobby projects. While I would have liked to finish a few more things, I’m still quite happy with everything I managed to get completed. Between painting miniatures, working on terrain, and making progress on a few long-neglected projects, it felt good to take advantage of the extra hobby time and see some items finally move from the workbench to the tabletop.
One of the larger projects I completed this week was a brand-new swamp terrain UDT. The build started with a 16-inch circle of 1-inch XPS foam, which served as the base for the entire piece. Instead of carving or melting depressions into the foam like I did with my previous swamp terrain, I decided to take a different approach by adding foamcore “islands” to the top of the base to create the land sections. This gave the swamp a more defined layout and helped establish the different gameplay zones I wanted to use.
Once the basic structure was finished, I covered the surface with a mixture of PVA glue, brown paint, and sand to add texture and create a muddy swamp floor. After that dried, I applied more PVA glue to the land areas and covered them with my homemade flocking blend made from Italian seasoning and green tea leaves. It’s an inexpensive technique, but it creates a surprisingly natural-looking ground cover that works well for fantasy terrain.
For the water sections, I painted the base a dark green and then blended in a brighter, sickly green around the edges to represent algae and stagnant water. To finish off the swamp vegetation, I added several plastic plants and gave them a black wash to help tone down the bright plastic appearance and better match the overall look of the terrain. Once everything was painted, I sealed the piece with a matte clear coat before applying several coats of gloss Mod Podge to the water areas to create a wet, reflective surface.
Overall, I’m really pleased with how the project turned out. The finished piece has a great swampy atmosphere and provides a unique battlefield for fantasy skirmish games and roleplaying encounters. One thing I particularly like about the design is how well it works with Shadowdark’s abstract range bands. The large island in the center serves as the near range area, while the surrounding islands and swamp waters are considered far range. Anything beyond the edge of the terrain is treated as being outside the encounter and out of combat. It creates a battlefield that is easy to understand at a glance while still providing meaningful tactical choices as characters move through the swamp.
In fact, I used this terrain in the Play video for the May 2026 Print, Paint, and Play series, where the Ironmoor Troll and his Frogfolk minions looked right at home lurking among the murky waters and islands. The terrain helped set the scene perfectly and gave the encounter a distinct swampy feel that would have been difficult to achieve with a standard battle mat.
If you’d like to see the terrain in action and enter for a chance to win the Ironmoor Troll miniature, be sure to check out the video and leave a comment letting me know you’d like to win. The giveaway will remain open until June 9, 2026, and I’ll announce the winner during the June 2026 Print, Paint, and Play Print video. Good luck!
Next up is a miniature from the Reaper Bones 5 Kickstarter that has been sitting on my crafting table for far longer than it should have. We all have those models that somehow survive multiple cleanup sessions and hobby reorganizations, and this one was definitely one of mine. For whatever reason, I never really connected with the sculpt. It’s not a bad miniature, but it just never inspired me to move it to the top of the painting queue.
This week, I finally decided it was time to finish it once and for all. The main motivation was simply to get it painted, off the table, and out of my backlog. Now that it’s complete, I’m glad I took the time to finish it, even if it still isn’t one of my favorite models.
Since I don’t have any particular attachment to the miniature, I’ve decided to pass it along to someone else. The next order placed through my Etsy store or directly through Tabletop-Thoughts.com will receive this painted miniature as a free bonus. Hopefully, it finds a home with someone who appreciates it more than I did.
I also completed a set of cave platforms from The Printing Goes Ever On. Since the pieces were FDM printed in black filament, I was able to skip the priming stage and move straight into painting. To give the platforms a natural stone appearance, I started by layering a variety of reds, oranges, and browns across the surfaces to create depth and variation in the rock. Once those colors were in place, I applied a heavy drybrush of light gray to pick out the raised details and bring the texture to life. A generous coat of my homemade black wash tied everything together, darkening the recesses and giving the platforms a worn, weathered look. Finally, the entire set was sealed with a matte clear coat to protect the finish.
I’m really happy with how these turned out. They have a rugged, volcanic feel that should look fantastic on the tabletop, whether they’re used as elevated terrain, dangerous caverns, or ancient underground ruins. The platforms add a lot of verticality to an encounter and create interesting movement and line-of-sight challenges for players.
In fact, I enjoyed painting them so much that I immediately started printing a second set. This next batch is going to receive my blue Underdark color scheme, which should make them perfect for subterranean adventures and strange underground realms. I’m also considering building a few wooden rope bridges to span the gaps between the platforms. Not only would they look great, but they could also serve as hazardous crossing points that force characters to carefully consider their movement during encounters.
I also finished another stone cottage this week. The painting process was very similar to the cave platforms, using multiple earth tones to create a weathered stone appearance before bringing out the details with drybrushing and washes. For the wooden portions of the building, I used a brown India ink wash that settled nicely into the texture and gave the wood a natural aged look. The roof was finished with a blue-green India ink, which added some subtle color variation and helped it stand out from the stone walls without looking too bright.
The finished cottage is a simple but versatile piece of terrain that should fit nicely into almost any fantasy setting. Whether it’s serving as a peasant’s home, a roadside cottage, or a small village building, it’s the kind of terrain piece that sees frequent use in both tabletop RPGs and miniature wargames. Having a few buildings like this on hand can quickly make a battlefield or encounter area feel more lived-in and interesting.
Since I already have a couple of these cottages in my personal terrain collection, I’ve decided to make this one available through the online store here on Tabletop Thoughts. Rather than letting it sit on a shelf, I’d rather see it find a home on someone else’s gaming table and become part of their adventures.
I also painted up a few more ruined church terrain pieces this week. These are fantastic tabletop pieces because they add visual interest to the battlefield while also serving a practical purpose during play. The ruined walls provide excellent line-of-sight blockers, create natural choke points, and give players meaningful terrain to maneuver around during encounters. Of the two pieces shown, the one on the left will be heading to my Etsy store, while the one on the right is joining my personal terrain collection. It’s always nice to have a growing selection of ruins available for fantasy skirmishes and roleplaying games.
On the miniature side of things, I finished an elf from Brite Minis. She received a simple Slap Chop paint job, which helped bring out the details quickly while still producing a nice tabletop-ready result. Sometimes it’s satisfying to work through a miniature without overthinking the paint scheme and simply get it finished and ready for play. I also painted a HeroQuest Barbarian that I printed from the HeroQuest Deluxe Bundle on MyMiniFactory. The sculpt captures the classic HeroQuest look perfectly and will make a great addition to my growing collection of fantasy adventurers.
Finally, there’s the basilisk from earlier this month. While it wasn’t selected for the Print, Paint, and Play Paint video, I liked the miniature enough that I decided to paint it anyway. The sculpt is an excellent design from EC3D Design, with plenty of texture and detail that made it enjoyable to paint. Every fantasy collection needs a few monsters lurking on the shelf waiting to challenge unsuspecting adventurers, and this basilisk is more than ready to fill that role.
I also painted up two large elementals from the recent DM Essentials Humble Bundle. If I remember correctly, these miniatures are from Warp Miniatures, and both are impressive sculpts with plenty of detail and character. Large monsters like these always make great centerpiece models on the tabletop, and I was looking forward to seeing how they would turn out.
Of the two, the water elemental is definitely my favorite. The translucent, flowing design gave me a lot to work with, and I think the overall effect came together nicely. Looking back, I probably could have spent a little more time making the rocks stand out from the water so there was more contrast between the different elements of the sculpt, but overall I’m happy with the final result and think it will look great on the gaming table.
The fire elemental, on the other hand, didn’t quite turn out the way I had envisioned. I started with a yellow base coat and gradually built up the flames with drybrushed oranges and reds. At one point I planned to paint the hands and tongue black to create some contrast, but once I tried it, the effect just didn’t work for me. I ended up repainting those areas and sticking with the yellow-to-red flame transition instead. While it’s certainly not the worst miniature I’ve ever painted, the finished model feels a little disappointing compared to what I had in mind when I started. Still, not every paint job can be a winner, and sometimes a model teaches you what doesn’t work just as effectively as one that turns out perfectly.
Even so, both elementals are tabletop-ready and will make excellent encounters for future roleplaying games. Whether they’re summoned guardians, primal spirits, or powerful foes standing between the adventurers and their goal, they should look right at home on the battlefield.
Finally, my favorite miniatures of the week were the air and earth elementals. Both models are packed with personality and really stand out among everything else I painted. Sometimes a sculpt just has a certain charm that immediately grabs your attention, and these two definitely fall into that category.
The earth elemental is probably my favorite miniature of the entire batch. Once painted, he ended up looking less like a terrifying force of nature and more like the slow-witted but lovable brute who works for the villain in a Pixar movie. There’s something about his expression and posture that gives him an almost innocent quality despite his massive size. The small yellow flower growing from him only adds to that feeling, making him seem more endearing than threatening. It’s a tiny detail, but it completely changes the character of the model and gives it a surprising amount of charm.
The air elemental is equally impressive in a different way. The swirling sculpt creates a great sense of movement, making it feel as though the creature is constantly shifting and flowing across the battlefield. Together, the two elementals make an excellent pair and showcase just how much personality can be packed into fantasy monster miniatures.
Of all the projects I completed this week, these are the ones I’m happiest to add to my collection. The earth elemental in particular is a model that makes me smile every time I look at it, and that’s about the highest compliment I can give a miniature.
Keep on gaming!
2026 Goals Progress
- Minis Painted: 215/150 – COMPLETED
- Large Models / Terrain: 21/ 6 – COMPLETE
- YouTube Videos:12/ 24
- Game Reviews: 4 / 4 – COMPLETED
- Games Played (TTRPG + Board Games): 0 / 4
- Thursday Drop-Ins Created: 5 / 12
- New TTRPG Systems Tried: 0 / 3
- Shadowdark Mini-Campaign Sessions: 0 / 3
- Shadowdark Release on DriveThruRPG: 1/ 1 – COMPLETE
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