D&D Dungeon Tiles (Pt. 6): The Desert Temple and Oasis Tiles

 Now for the fancy desert tiles . . .

First up was the Ancient Temple. I wanted the temple to have an open feel, somewhere between the Greek Acropolis and the Egyptian Temple of Karnak with pillars, an altar and sandstone floors. Elroy liked the idea of this particular tile potentially showing up in hidden rooms as part of a secret cult in future games, so maybe in the future I’ll add some sort of sigil or pictograph (or he can place a statue) so that all the temples are connected. But for the moment, I decided to keep it neutral.

 

(Not sure what I’m talking about? 

Check out my D&D Tile series from the beginning . I’ll wait.)

 

I started by cutting my foam dais (it ended up being about 2” by not quite 2 ½”) and using my craft knife to create a deep bevel on the edges. The altar was a foam rectangle about 1 ¾” long by about 1” wide. I wanted to keep the edges crisp on the altar (as though it was a stone table resting on the dais), so it was one of the few pieces of foam that I didn’t end up beveling. I placed it in the upper third of the tile, but with space behind it so that characters could move around the entire altar.

I made the corner pillar bases by centering hexagonal foam pieces (I used the base of a glue stick for scale) on top of 1” squares. Again, the bases were beveled but the pillars were not, and all the foam pieces were textured using rolled up foil. Had I wanted to go for a ruined temple, I would probably have added some cracks, rubble and other textures, but since this temple was supposed to work for a variety of storylines, I kept things fairly simple.

I also added small piles of sand mixed with Mod Podge, making sure to limit it to one side of the dais and pillar bases as though a small amount had blown into the altar room over time. Once everything had dried, 

I gave it a seal coat to make sure all the sand stayed in place.

 

The Oasis Tile was a bit more challenging. I had originally planned to simply create a pool (similar to the Water Pool from the Castle Set), but Elroy asked for an island or playable area for more game options. I sketched a rough outline of where the edges of the pool and the island would be on the tile (again in the upper third) as well as a few steppingstones so that characters could get to the island. I cut out the rough island shape and steppingstones from single layers of foam but didn’t bother beveling any of the edges.

Then I tried something I wasn’t sure would work . . . I moistened the top layer of the cake board with a little bit of water, cut along the outline of the water and carefully peeled up the top few layers to give myself a reservoir for the water. I was very careful not to go down more than about a third of the way so that it wouldn’t affect the structural integrity of the tile. 

I glued down the island and steppingstones.  

Then I mixed up more of the sand with Matte Mod Podge and built up the edge of the pool. I also covered the island (including all the foam edges) and the rest of the desert around the oasis. Just like on the Desert Frame and Tile, I added small outcroppings of the small quartz rock scatter wherever there was too much open sand (and put an extra drop of Mod Podge on to keep them in place). I used the foil on the steppingstones so that they looked like large boulders instead of sandbars and set the whole thing aside to dry overnight. 

I added the sealing coat the next day.

 

Once the Temple and Oasis tiles were sealed, I painted them the same way I had for the rest of the Desert Set: I painted a base coat of camel craft paint and used a combination of overbrushing and dry brushing in a selection of khaki and cream tones to get a sun-beaten sand look. I also used a light grey to pick out some of the larger rocks and the top of the steppingstones and black on the temple altar stone (I only lightly dry brushed the altar with a light dusting of cream to pick out a few details).   

 

 

I used the same brown wash that I made for the rest of my Desert pieces. While it was primarily a burnt umber, I added a few shades of chocolate brown, red and camel to enhance the color of the wash. I weighted down the corners as the wash dried, to help correct any warping from the moisture in the Mod Podge and wash. The Temple didn’t have tons of texture for the wash to stick to, so it turned out noticeably lighter than the other Desert pieces, but I kinda like how the contrast defines the edges so I don’t plan to repaint it. 

Now that all the pieces were painted, I put on 2 to 3 coats of the 

Spray Polyurethane (specifically the Minwax Fast Dry, because it 

doesn’t melt foam) to protect the finish.

But what about the water, you ask . . . I used another large tube of clear 5 minute epoxy. I had learned from my previous attempts at water and only added one small drop of blue acrylic paint to the epoxy resin and carefully poured it into the reservoir I had created around the island. 

I used a toothpick to spread the resin between the stones and up to the edges of the sand. I took perhaps longer than I should have, as the resin was thickening enough to create some dips and swells along the sides. These don’t detract from the overall look and I’m very happy with how this tile came out. If you look closely at the shoreline, you can see the texture in the bottom of the pool because the acrylic paint starts to fall out of suspension as the resin sets.

 

While the resin cured, I decided that the temple was too plain and needed some accents. I had picked up a package of spider confetti around Halloween, but I didn’t like how flat the spiders looked on the tile. So, I grabbed my fabric paint and gave the spiders some depth. I wasn’t really happy with how blobby the spiders ended up either but then it hit me. 

Not spiders; scarab beetles. 

After looking at a ridiculous number of scarab beetle pictures (I swear, someone at Google is very confused by my search history), I cut off the first set of legs and trimmed the carapace to more of a point on a few of the confetti spiders. Then, I covered them with black fabric paint and used a toothpick to press in wing details once they were mostly dry. 

The bodies flattened a little more than I liked, so I carefully added a second layer of fabric paint just along the carapace, leaving a small gap between and above the wings. Once that layer had dried, I used some iridescent nail polish (specifically Peace & Love & OPI) on everything but the head and legs 

and glued them on once they dried.

Now, I will let you bask in the loveliness of these tiles in the desert Frame. Bask, I tell you. Bask!

And that’s the Desert Set finished. Elroy really wants a pyramid topper for this set, so that has been added to my list of Topper ideas for future projects.
 The final set ended up going in an entirely different direction than 

I had planned, but it came out so pretty.
 

 

Next up: I thought we were doing a Dirt road . . .