Matt: Greetings, Forces of Darkness!

Tools

Hobby knife Small hobby hand saw Pin vice drill Needle-nose pliers Rubber mallet or hammer Clothes pins

Supplies

8 board feet (four 2' lengths) of 1/4"x3/16" balsa or basswood (basswood is a bit more expensive than balsa but much sturdier, so I recommend it) 3/32"x4"x3' sheet of balsa wood A 6" length of 5/8"-thick wooden dowel Two cereal boxes About 4" of 18-gauge wire Wood glue

Believe it or not, all of the design and fabrication for our Minas Tirith table happened before the movie of The Return of The King came out! The designs of the walls, interiors, and siege towers all derived from whatever sketchy stills we could scrape together from the previews. Just before we started painting the table, I got a chance to see the movie. My stomach was in knots as I waited to see whether we had gotten things right. Seeing the real thing was a jaw-dropping experience to say the least, but I was overjoyed to find out that our miniature Battle of Pelennor Fields would reflect the one in the movie quite well.

I'd like to share one of these designs, that of the siege tower, and help you build a few of your own. The towers are made mostly of wood and cardboard and have been scaled to fit the Games Workshop Minas Tirith set. So, raid the pantry for cereal boxes. It's time for the world of Men to fall!

To build the siege towers, you'll need the tools and supplies shown to the right.

The plans for the siege towers can be found in a PDF file here [Download PDF - 381 Kb]. After downloading and printing the PDF, you'll have everything you need to get started.

In order to download this document you will need Acrobat Reader. Download it for free from the Adobe site.

Introduction | Building the Tower 1 | Building the Tower 2 Armouring the Tower | Painting the Tower | The Tower in Action!