Barks' Gameboard - Wow!

Every so often I go through the list of people following this blog and see what blogs they have and follow. There are some really good blogs out there. In fact, most of the blogs I follow come from that list of readers' blogs or blogs they follow.

I looked at Barks profile and found his Wargaming with Barks blog and was immediately struck by the appearance of his gameboard. (By the way, Barks has an interesting series of articles on painting the Battlefront river terrain pieces, making them look even better. You should check them out, especially if you have those terrain pieces.)

Back to the gameboard. It really has a good look to it. So I started searching for an article to see how he made it. I was shocked to learn that it was a Citadel (GW) Realm of Battle Gameboard, which I had never heard of. Barks' article on how he did his gameboard is really interesting. Even though Citadel's gameboard is $300, for what essentially looks like a 6' by 4' injection molded plastic model, it looks very tempting, especially when you see the results Barks obtained.

Which brings me to my point. We tend to spend quite a bit of money and time on our figures, and even to some extent on basing those figures, but it is the rare person that spends that time and money on really good terrain. In the end, is $300 really that expensive for the 'ground covering' of a 6' x 4' table? (You can extend the table size by getting two 2' x 2' squares for an additional $100.) Granted, you still need to get woods, buildings, rivers, and roads, plus some extra hills might be nice.

This also hearkens me back to an old What Would Patton Do (WWPD) podcast with Shawn Morris (The Terrain Guy) where they discussed the idea of gaming on static gameboards. (By the way, the Realm of Battle Gameboard is not exactly static. As shown on the web page, it can be rearranged a number of ways to add some variety.) Although Shawn made a compelling argument about using static gameboards, other than Jon Baber's Arnhem gameboard, it does not sound like the WWPD really took to the idea, in the long run.

I've seen a number of your blogs, and battle reports for those that do them, and I see most people do it like I do. Lay down a game cloth or mat (I have an old US Army blanket, some grass green micro-fleeces from Wal-Mart, and a Citadel Game Mat that I switch between), plop some terrain down, and then game. The conclusion is that terrain variety seems to be more important than, say, a cohesive set of terrain pieces that actually look like they go together. (That is more a comment on my terrain, dear readers, and not on yours! In my AWI games you can unfortunately see tank tread marks in the muddy roads!)

So, is that true? Do you favor terrain configurations and variety over a cohesive, but static or semi-static vision? Has anyone every played a fair number of games over the same terrain, but with different scenarios, goals, and objectives? Can you shed any light on what it is really like?