Terrain: Cathedral de la Pegasus

Here's the most recent project that's been keeping me from finishing my Necromunda Van Saar: a church made from Pegasus Gothic Building parts, equally at home on medieval fantasy or far future battlefields.

I acquired a big pile of mismatched Pegasus kits some time ago, and and they've been boxed up in my workshop ever since. I don't know the exact makeup, but it appears that I have the entirety of #4592 Gothic City Buildings Small Set #1, one wall section from the #4390 Gothic City Ruins and additional wall sections, probably from the #4923 Gothic City Buildings Large Set.

You can see the entire line of kits here, though they are available for less elsewhere. In this article I will discuss how I assembled this church from several different Pegasus kits.

If you're not familiar with Pegasus, these are really sturdy, well-made kits, suitably Gothic enough to be used anytime from the 11th century AD, all the way into the grim darkness of the 400th century, while not being overburdened with the skulls and iconography of the later years.

They could just as easily be liturgical buildings, government offices or institutional edifices. The assembly is easy, but you'll need a good pair of clippers and a file.

However, except for the ruins set, these are not complete kits. They do not have roofs, parapet walls or floors. All three of these omissions are fairly important when building a structure for wargaming terrain. All three are present in my model,  and I'll get into how I addressed these later. For now, on to the building. 

The entryway pieces are nice enough: a pair of doors with a nice block pattern on them. The walls come in single and double sections with a pillar at one end. The regular windowed walls have a different pattern on the inside and outside, such that a given floor will always have the same pattern on the outward side. There are also solid walls without windows with similar differing patterns.

I made the parapet walls by cutting away the upper part of the walls and the pillar from each wall section. For the parapet above the bell tower, I left part of the pillars in place. For this I used my Dremel and my trust #543 cutting/shaping bit. It took quite a bit of time, but it would literally take hours of cutting and sanding if done by hand. For this project, I ended up cutting 9 parapet walls for the right and left side of the cruciform-shaped building.

The floors are just sand sprinkled over gesso primer, with a second layer of gesso on top. I was trying for the gravel and tar roof look that is so common here in the city, but I probably should have added more sand. 

The roof support pieces are 2 walls wide. I didn't have the pieces to make the building any wider, so I cut the pillar out of the middle of the roof support halves and ended up with an overhanging roof. The roof structure is 2 pieces of fairly thick plasticard, and the cladding is vinyl cabinet lining material upside down, which has a nice double-ridge pattern. Vinyl doesn't take paint well, so I used Krylon Fusion spray paint to prime it. After painting, I gave it a couple of heavy coats of varnish. 

Every pillar section has two sets of holes on each face. These are for attaching to the wall sections, but can also be filled with blank blocks, gargoyles and lights that are supplied with the kit. The incomplete kit that I had, while lacking floors, did contain floor supports that also attach to these holes. 

The gargoyles are a nice mix of dogs, lions and bats. I used the lamps, but not the torches. I used various hobby tools to add the various chips in the pillars and walls.

The roof is removable, revealing an interior. I left the interior empty for easy access, but did put in a plasticard floor with tiling made from patterned paper from the craft shop.

The interior isn't visible close up anyway, so I just cut the paper to approximately the right size and then used permanent marker to blacken the edges where the white plasticard would show. I glued the paper down and then gave it a light brown wash. The paper buckled up during the wash, but then dried flat.

The top of the belltower is also removable (maybe I'll add a bell someday) revealing an interior floor made from balsa scored in a plank pattern, given a brown wash and glued to a piece of plasticard. 

You may notice that the bell tower is about one-third shorter than the other wall sections. It's made from the sections of wall that I cut away to make my parapet walls. I also cut away the inner window subdivisions and details to make the large open windows.

I started the paintjob with Krylon Camo dark brown spray paint, followed by a heavy drybrush of Delta Ceramcoat Terra Cotta, then a light drybrush of Spice Tan. I didn't use any washes on this particular piece of terrain.

I can't speak highly enough about Delta Ceramcoat paints. The pigmentation is better than any other craft paint brand, and the value is quite unmatched. I even use them on my miniatures.

The verdgris details start with the same brown base, but I dropped in a heavy drybrush of Reaper Turf Green before the final tan drybrush. 

I hope this inspires you to get the most out of any incomplete or partial kits you might have sitting around in your workshop. I'm looking forward to getting this on the table soon. This piece is ideal since it has enough space for squad-based games, plus enough interesting nooks for skirmishes. And perhaps most importantly for me, it's tall enough to conceal a 28mm battle mech!

-- Karl, Chicago Skirmish Wargames club member