Building a frigate for Krotitelé draků

Martin Holouš is a long-time fan of board games, roleplaying games, and wargaming. He isn't afraid to get his hands dirty, either. He runs the RPG Forge studio project, where he shares tutorials and tips for fellow enthusiasts. In this article, he presents the construction of the Srdcová dáma (Queen of Hearts) frigate for the Krotitelé draků project, a fun internet show featuring the iconic Dungeons and Dragons RPG.

I've been making models for Krotitelé draků since the very beginning of their show, which is about three years now. Game boards, conversions, brainstorming the look and design of every model—I collaborate on all of this with their Dungeon Master, Láďa “Láca” Karpianus. I'd say Láca is an expert at coming up with very specific requirements and briefs for his models. No joke. Making these models for him has been quite a challenge from the start, and the Srdcová dáma ship was no exception.

The original design and reference for the ship model was a blue-and-red wooden frigate. But as time went on and the campaign progressed, Láca tweaked the look of the graphic reference. Unfortunately, he forgot to mention it to me, only casually remarking once: “I already showed you what the ship looks like, right?” To which I replied: “It looks different than what we agreed on a month ago?” Then he sent me the picture, and that was that. He didn't actually want me to redo the Srdcová dáma, but I just couldn't let it go. I didn't want a completely different ship hitting the gaming table than the one that was supposed to be in the fantasy world… And so, the work began again, and the ship got a brand-new coat.

First, I needed to get everything into a uniform shade of green to partially cover the ship's original colors. I achieved this using an airbrush, spraying the entire ship, including the rigging, with several shades of green. I didn't try to cover everything—the original colors intentionally peek through in places. I wanted to convey the fact that the ship visually changed throughout the campaign.

After the base toning, it was time for the vegetation. While mushroom hunting in the forest with my family, we also looked for lichen, which became the foundation for the ship's overgrowth. I glued the lichen all over the hull and then fixed it a bit with spray varnish. Finally, all that remained was to bring this complicated spectacle back to a uniform color to tie it all together.

So, the airbrush came out again, and the ship received a solid series of coats in various tones of green. I think the final result turned out great, and now this gaming prop graces the table on the Krotitelé draků Twitch channel.

author Martin Holouš