Treasure!

We last saw our pirate bases in need of a few more touches.  While there are many possibilities, such as rope coils, barrels, wooden pins, skulls and sea shells, I will focus on one simple addition.

That is gold coins!  And even a few spikes for the masts.

I have a variety of polystyrene tubes, which are perfect for this!  Of course, you could also use coils of green stuff which have cured as well.  I have done that when I didn't have any tubing on hand.

The tubes are cut into coins with a very sharp exacto blade.  This can be tricky, as he pieces sometimes want to jump away!  You will probably lose a few in the process.  Also, it is not always easy to keep the blade straight as you cut it.

The narrower the gauge of the coil, the easier it will be.

I like to have a large collection of coins on hand, so that I can make some nice piles!

I put down a splotch of super glue (it was a thicker, gel style glue), and began placing the coins.  I tried to stack them up on each other, attempting to keep the piles as random as possible!

It's always a good idea to have a few piles.  One should be larger than the other... or at least have a few stray coins rolling away from the main pile.

Like this.  However, always keep in mind the footprint of the figure that will be standing on this!

They certainly make a nice touch around the base of the mast!

Two more piles of coins strategically placed.  There should be no problem getting a mini on here!

Last but not least, you can see that I used some of the coins as spikes for the metal rings on the masts.  You could use different gauges of tubing for those, and even for some nails on the planks.

Again, these are more for an army style project, so keeping things simple was a major factor.

You can go as crazy as you want!

Now that they are complete, the painting process is well under way.  Stay tuned for some step by step articles on those as well.