15mm Terrain Unboxing Review: Battlefield in a Box – European Village Walls (Gale Force Nine BB168) + Lightly Weathered

15mm Terrain Review: Battlefield in a Box - European Village Walls, Gale Force Nine BB168, Flames of War, Team Yankee

It’s been quite awhile since I did any of these, and I do have a few to catch up on – so today we’re looking at the Battlefield in a Box European Village Walls – a set I had been keeping an eye out for severla months before I finally found them for sale. BIAB’s supply is pretty spotty in general here in Australia, with things coming into and going out of stock in waves. As you can see, my walls came in highly attractive retail packaging, very reiminscent of GW’s “direct” white box packaging.

15mm Terrain Review: Battlefield in a Box - European Village Walls, Gale Force Nine BB168, Flames of War, Team Yankee

Inside, we’re back to the bubble wrap that I’ve seen so often with these sets.

15mm Terrain Review: Battlefield in a Box - European Village Walls, Gale Force Nine BB168, Flames of War, Team Yankee

After the initial bubble wrap, we find the individual components bundled by type in further rolls of bubble wrap. It may not be attractive, and may not be super-reusable for storage, but it certainly works to keep the terrain pieces safe up to the point of consumer unboxing.

15mm Terrain Review: Battlefield in a Box - European Village Walls, Gale Force Nine BB168, Flames of War, Team Yankee

And this is what you get in a set. Once again, it doesn’t look like a lot of money compared to what you can do with a 3D printer in 2024, but it does come painted and finished (and with clear resin in the fountain) and ready to simply drop onto the tabletop – so a lot of the value is right there – and that’s the value proposition that you as a consumer would need to decide on (depending on their price where you are).

15mm Terrain Review: Battlefield in a Box - European Village Walls, Gale Force Nine BB168, Flames of War, Team Yankee

Here’s the set of walls alongside a couple of Flames of War 15mm models for scale. You’re not getting any use out of these on a 40k table unless it’s just adding a bit more detail for the visual aesthetics.

15mm Terrain Review: Battlefield in a Box - European Village Walls, Gale Force Nine BB168, Flames of War, Team Yankee, Fat Frank's Roads, Cigar Box Battle Mats

I picked up two sets of these to give myself more tabletop flexibility. Purely by coincidence I found the container where they resided recently and added a little dusty/dirty weathering along the ground line of the pieces – a very low effort bit of work that nonetheless makes these walls look a little better. As I already had a mat out on the table, I staged a couple of photos, showing the two sets of walls in a slightly more realistic gaming environment than on the white table.

15mm Terrain Review: Battlefield in a Box - European Village Walls, Gale Force Nine BB168, Flames of War, Team Yankee, Fat Frank's Roads, Cigar Box Battle Mats

Destroyed Houses also from Battlefield in a Box, New Europe Just Fields Mat by Cigar Box Battle Mats, Flexible Dirt Roads by Fat Frank via eBay. I really need to write reviews of both of those when I get time. As per usual, all products in this review (including the mat and roads) were purchased by myself through normal retail channels.

15mm Terrain Review: Battlefield in a Box - European Village Walls, Gale Force Nine BB168, Flames of War, Team Yankee

Just for fun, here’s a 15mm mini’s-eye view of the walls, minis and terrain! And with that, I’ve completed another 20 pieces of not-very-significant terrain during Dave Stone’s annual Season of Scenery challenge.

D&D ̶M̶o̶n̶s̶t̶e̶r̶ Hero Manual 89: GF9 D&D Collectors Series – Drizzt Do’Urden, Drow Ranger & Regis, Halfling Rogue

Dungeons & Dragons Heroes Gale Force Nine GF9 D&D Collectors Series - Drizzt Do'Urden, Drow Ranger & Regis, Halfling Rogue

Today’s post features a pair of “upgrade” player character models for use in The Legend of Drizzt Dungeons and Dragons Adventure Boardgame. This time it’s Drizzt (again) and Regis (also, again) but this time the sculpts come from a Gale Force Nine box of on-sprue HIPS models of the characters, the box being called “Drizzt & the Companions of the Hall”.

Dungeons & Dragons Heroes Gale Force Nine GF9 D&D Collectors Series - Drizzt Do'Urden, Drow Ranger & Regis, Halfling Rogue

Once again, I went with the dark sea green armour for Drizzt, since the brown look does nothing for me. I did obviously paint in some of the larger flaps of armour in a reddish brown, though.

Dungeons & Dragons Heroes Gale Force Nine GF9 D&D Collectors Series - Drizzt Do'Urden, Drow Ranger & Regis, Halfling Rogue

Similarly, I painted Regis in much the same was as the PVC model from the board game. The official base has Regis standing on top of a (treasure) chest, which I get is thematic for a Rogue/Thief, especially for a display model, but it’s a bit too far down the “mobile tactical rock” road for a gameplay model for me.

Dungeons & Dragons Heroes Gale Force Nine GF9 D&D Collectors Series - Drizzt Do'Urden, Drow Ranger & Regis, Halfling Rogue

With that in mind, the big(!) change for Regis was basing him on a sculpted base from the Archon villagers box from their kickstarter instead of the base that he came with. I was lucky enough to find a base with a little sculpted trapdoor, some lockpicks and an open padlock. Perfect!

Dungeons & Dragons Heroes Gale Force Nine GF9 D&D Collectors Series - Drizzt Do'Urden, Drow Ranger

And here’s the GF9 Drizzt alongside his WotC counterpart. Obviously the new HIPS figure is a lot nicer, the WotC figure is at least one of the better ones from the set, so the contrast isn’t as large as it will be with some others – for example, once I get to Cattie-Brie(!)

Dungeons & Dragons Heroes Gale Force Nine GF9 D&D Collectors Series - Regis, Halfling Rogue

Finally, Regis. Looks like he grew a little and fixed his hair. Again, not the worst of the Wizards’ sculpts, but the GF9 is clearly superior. It’ll be a little while before I get any of the others from this set painted, but I will eventually get the more egregiously bad models replaced with these nicer versions of the characters.