Medieval 2 Total War Hre Guide

[Serafin Sonnier]

To start off, i am going to briefly cover my technique for building houses in its simplest form. The more advanced additions and techniques will be covered as I build them through out the guide. So here is a little idea of how we will be tackling houses during the guide.

Note that the primary colour is light grey then dark grey followed by odd spots of brown then black. You can also add some sand green if you have them as it gives a nice 'moss' effect. Tan also works well added in.

Next we start on the next level. Notice that I use a double layer of brown plate as the base for the timber section. It looks more prominent then a single and looks more like the tile width, which we will build the rest with.

We do the corner of the wordwork with 4 black 1x1 bricks with stud(not the headlight piece). Between each brick we place 2 1x1 plates. You should end up with 2 bricks pointing one way and two pointing the other. This will allow us to clip on a height of 2 1x4 tiles to get the corner effect like so.

Here you can see some of the problems encounted with dark brown. As there is a limited amount of plates in this colour we have to make the best of what there is. The easiest and most widely availible is the 2x6 plate. The Troll Battle Wheel set was a great source for these. As you can see in the picture below, at some stages we will have to have the plates sticking inside. This isn't a problem with this section as you can build a floor anyway, but can be tricky in other areas. Of course, if you don't need an interior and just want a village that looks good then it doesn't matter anyway.

I have used white instead of tan here, as I think it works well with dark brown and makes a nice change from all the tan house around. Also note that the height of the 2 tiles is equal to 6 bricks and 2 plates. This is very handy, as instead of using 2 plates we can add a headlight brick on its back which will be used to attach the horizontal tiles as seen in the picture below.

Next we come to adding a window. First we need to use the height of one 1x2 tile. These are connected using a combination of a headlight brick on its back with a 1x1 with stud, on the top, like in the picture below.

Next we can place the window section top. This is made up of a 2x6 plate with a row of tiles and a 1x6 plate. The window then sits on the 1x6 plate and on either side we use a combination of 1x1 rounds and plate rounds with a clip on the top and bottom. On these clips we attach the pole/stick pieces which will hold the wooden shutters. Reddish brown is the most common colour of the pole/stick piece and works best along with black, but you can use what ever colour you wish. I like to add 2 plates/with handle or rail just above the window piece. All can be seen in the picture below.

Next we use some 1x1 bricks with stud on side again. Placing these on top of the window and attaching tiles horizontally will bring you exactly level with the top of the vertical corner tiles like so.

Now we have something like this. As you can see, unfortuantly 1x1 tiles in dark brown arn't yet availible, so I have just added a couple of rounds next to the window where the horizontal tiles would usually go. You can use any thing for this, a tooth plate looks good as well. This wont matter on bigger buildings of course, as we can make it wide enough to fit a 1x2 or 1x4 tile in.

You can then use any colour of your choice, but I find that earth tones like sand green, dark brown, brown, dark tan etc work best. You can also use them in combination with different colour window as well, like the examples below.

Note that i am not overhanging the roof bricks, as the step effect it produces can look very blocky. Instead we use a different technique. Using 2 clips with the new hinge plates attached we can create a nicer gable effect like in the 2 following pictures.

As you can see, i have added a jumper plate on the top roof section with a headlight brick that allows you to attach some rounds and a black tooth plate. This results in the finished effect seen below.

You can also add a different colour to the gable to match other parts of the house. for example, if you have dark green doors and shutters, you could add a few dark green plates to the gable to subtly tone it all in.

When it comes to laying out your base, a lot of people like to plan and lay the whole base out and build it all first. I don't do it this way. The reason is, that I always find you never really know how much space you are going to need when building something like this. Its far easy to build the base as you go along, that way, if you need that extra 16 stud width or depth, you can easily add it without having to take apart what you have already done.

So to start, I will lay some base plates down and start from the front right corner and build out. As you can see in the picture below, we build up the edges of the base with black bricks. You can use any colour but black looks best. the sides are built to a height of 2 bricks and one plate. This allows a bit of depth to lay the river through and will give a stronger structure.

As you can see I am using roof pieces to give the edges of the base a nicer look, and then I top them off with tiles. Dark brown looks best, but a lot will be used, so black is the best bet as they are cheaper to get hold of and come in 1x8 sizes.

Using large green base plates like these are helpful for covering large areas of green where normal green plates would take an age to do. Plus it will also save a lot of plates. So that is an example of how we will create most of our base/foundation. But for now, we shall start the all important stream/river.

So to start, we build a rough guide of where the stream will run. For this, we lay one level of bricks and then put plates on top, as we don't want it to be as high as the black base. It doesn't matter what colour you use, and the same goes for all the foundations. Its a good chance to use all those multicoloured bricks that you never usually use. If you want to make foundations even easier, a tip is to use Duplo. Big bulky Duplo bricks are compatible with normal Lego and are handy for bulking out your landscape quicker.

Now, there are lots of ways to make water, everyone has their own preference. Tiles work well, as does snot techniques, but they have a tendency to look very lifeless. I was always a fan of using different shades of blue tiles for water. It works well for calm mill ponds and slow rivers. But for if you want a bit more active look, then studs is the way to go.

Then on top of the tiles I lay some 8x8 trans medium blue plates. This is an effect I used back on a Boat House moc I made, but I have never tried it for a whole stream before. The effect of the tiles can be seen through the plates.

Then we add some lighter green tree pieces and a selection of other plant pieces. Don't worry about attaching the tree pieces firmly down, as they look better if they are sticking up in places. The same goes for the other plant pieces. You can wedge some in at different angles for a nicer effect.

Well, that is a small section of the stream, and will give you an idea of how it will all be built. Most of it will be built using the processes above, but there will also be a few parts like waterfalls, over hanging trees and high banks which I will cover latter in the guide. You don't have to build a stream using the 8x8 trans plates, it will work just as good with normal blue plates or just tiles and snot. Its up to you. Just remember to try and use darker colour's near the edge of the stream as these would be damp and muddy. The look we are going for is an overgrown natural look.

Plant pieces are a must for this type of build, if used well, they can really bring a whole area to life and act as the finishing touch before the mini-figs are applied. I found the best way to get large amounts of plant pieces is from a PAB wall at a Lego store. Most of the pieces they have in a PAB wall are usually pieces we never want to use, but they do stock a variety of plant pieces(well my nearest store does anyway). If you fill a large cup packed full of the small plant pieces, you will get a lot more for your money then if you were to order them from Bricklink. I have managed to cram thousands of the 3 pronged grass piece into a large cup, and even the larger tree pieces and be stacked and compacted to fit as many in as possible. Unfortunatly they have not got round to stocking the dark green tree pieces yet, but i've seen every other plant piece available, so its worth looking into.

Firstly, we continue on from where we left, building more of the stream. Note that I have now made a flat edge with the water on the right side, and laid a few 1x1 rounds as a marker of where the wall of the Water Mill will go.

Before I start the Mill, we need to make a small bridge. Now when it comes to making large bridges, 1x1's are good, as there's a lot of room for different techniques on a large bridge. Unfortunatly, trying to make a small bridge out of 1x1 flat rounds is not easy, as you can't float them in mid air to make a curved shape. So, some normal plates are going to be of use here as well.

Now, we will leave the bridge for a moment and concentrate on the foundations of the mill. In this picture you will see I have started laying down a few grey bricks as a marker of where the mill will be.

In this view, you can see a dark grey plate that marks where we will start the wall of 1x1 round plates. This means that we will need to build up the landscape to that level, but that will come latter.

Now, we can see from another angle that I have now marked out the full foundation of the mill, and I have also carried on with the outer wall by the steam. On the other side of the stream I have built a small section of wall. Between these sections of wall is where our water wheel will sit.

There are 3 main types of water mill designs. Under shot, Over shot and Breast shot. Under shot is where the water wheel sits partly submerged in the stream and is powered by the stream's flow. Over shot is where the water is channeled to drop on top of the water wheel, and Breast shot is where the water drops in half way on the wheel. The most common you will see in pictures is the Over shot design, under shot was more common in medieval times however, so this is the method we will use.

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