Roads

[Jeremy]

I know they all lead to Rome, are invariably yellow bricked and paved with good intentions. But what I want to know is, how wide are they?

I’m about to start making both dirt and cobblestone roads for 28mm figures that will fit into a variety of periods, and I was wondering what a good width is? (Cue Purps)

I thought about calculating what they would be in real life, but decided I’d rather go with what looks good on table. Current roads I’m using are around 100mm wide.

Any suggestions?

[Buff Orpington]

100 mm sounds OK. Several rule sets have unit base widths of 60mm so they will fit. You'll be pushed to fit Warhammer units across a road but we never really pretend that they make sense.

[BaronVonWreckedoften]

I know they all lead to Rome, are invariably yellow bricked and paved with good intentions. But what I want to know is, how wide are they?

In the real world, a typical width of clearing through woods or farmland for a road in the 18th Century (at least in the English-speaking world) was supposed to be 100 feet, but this included the "grass verge" on either side. Practically, two wagons should be able to pass each other safely on the actual carriageway. I would imagine that Roman roads had a standard width, given how well laid out they were.

[Jeremy]

Thanks Baron. I thought about this, but then you have the added complexity of building size. In real life, a little cottage would be massive if you scaled it up. I want the roads to look ‘right’, both in terms of figure size and building size. My concern with scaling that road size up, I wouldn’t be able to get a tank down the Main Street of a little French village in my WW2 games. Or cavalry will all be charging single file down the street!

I was wondering how wide other the Loose Asses roads were, and if they were happy with the aesthetics

[levied troop]

You’re right about that elusive ‘right look’. I think it might depend on the scale of games you are considering - is it a Chain of Command ‘big skirmish’ individually based figures stylee or a Fire and Fury ‘many figures on big base’ game.

For the former, I think for Ayton Purps is working on 120mm width for main roads and 60mm width for side roads plus 30mm for pavements (which you could use for verges as well). This is with 1/56th - 1/48th scale buildings.

When I’ve woken up, I’ll venture to the lower basements and check the width on my current roads for the bigger F&F option.

[Jeremy]

LT, it’ll be mostly skirmish sized games. The odd ‘big’ game here and there

[BaronVonWreckedoften]

Yes, I appreciate your dilemma here, Jeremy - and I think that you can only go with what "looks right". On that basis, I would stick two biggish vehicles side-by-side and make that the road width for major roads, and something nearer half that size for minor roads. Worst case scenario, use the minor roads for your "big" games.

[Jeremy]

Hmmm... hadn’t given thought to both main and ancillary roads. Hmmm....

[Jeremy]

Linked into my Caulking thread, how long are the caulk roads all the Loose Ass members have? And how do you store them? Rolled or flat?

[levied troop]

My caulked roads are either on teddy bear fur backing or rubber and both get rolled up, not too tightly. The first type is fine, I’ll know if the second type work at SELWG as it will have been rolled up for 5 months by that time. Length is anything from 5 feet to 30 feet.

Have you seen this chaps approach:
https://nottherivercottage.blogspot.com