LED Mushrooms and Crystals as Terrain for Wars of Ozz Games

A while back I received a nice gift of a couple of fully-painted LED-lit resin mushrooms from Buck Surdu. I have been using them on my tabletop set ups this year and they always add a nice touch for a Wars of Ozz game.

I have found that not all gaming halls are well-lit, so nicely-lighted terrain definitely brings a new visual element to the games. When I went to Historicon, I heard that a vendor was selling them, so I went down to the hall and bought three mushrooms as well as two crystals. All were unpainted (painted ones were available too but I preferred to paint mine). The nice thing with these is that the insertable lights and the batteries came with the mushrooms/crystals. In fact, they were nearly sold out by Saturday morning!

I have previously played with using little tea lights to make smoke/blast markers for What a Tanker games (see here). I am not a 3-D printer, and prefer metal stuff, but have used many things that have been 3-D printed before. In the vendor hall, I believe the seller was a 3-D printer and the booth there was for Bad Goblin Games.

After coming home, I did some digging on-line, but I could not find the products on their website. Looking further on the packaging, I saw a reference to Fat Dragon Games. There I found the links for the STL files available for purchase for both the mushrooms and the crystals – but as far as whether the lights and batteries came with the purchase – I think only the files do. I cannot find anywhere the little lights could come from that fit here, but if interested I’d contact the vendors on their websites.

The crystals were made of clear white resin, and their green and purple lights did give them a nice glow. But if you’ve ever read this blog before, you KNOW that I always try to add another level to a project. So I added some Secret Weapon Washes for effect – and they worked really well.

Here is a short video of the crystals:

I then moved on to washing, assembling, priming, and painting the mushrooms. I used a number of paints (see list at end) to achieve the look that I wanted. For flocking the bases, I went with a leaf-litter look.

Lastly, I made another brief video of these that I think you’ll enjoy.

This project also qualifies as my second entry for Dave Stone’s “Season of Scenery 2024” community painting challenge. Thanks Dave!

Now, back to more Ozz units!!!!

Miscellaneous details and references for those interested in that sort of thing:

For all of my earlier posts on Wars of Ozz games, figures, units, and other related projects – please see this page.

PAINTS, INKS, GLAZES, SHADES, WASHES, PIGMENTS, FLOCKING, GLUES AND MORE THAT I USED ON THESE LED CRYSTALS AND MUSHROOMS:

1. Secret Weapon Washes “Purple” (wash on crystal)
2. Secret Weapon Washes “Green” (wash on crystal)
3. Vallejo Surface Primer “Black”
4. Vallejo Model Color “Off White”
5. Citadel “Contrast Paint – Apothecary White”
6. Army Painter “Speed Paint – Fire Giant Orange 1.0”
7. Citadel “Contrast Paint – Contrast Medium”
8. Army Painter “Speed Paint – Shamrock Green 2.0”
9. Citadel “Contrast Paint – Talassar Blue”
10. Citadel “Contrast Paint – Bad Moon Yellow”
11. Citadel “Contrast Paint – Iyanden Yellow”
12. Army Painter “Speed Paint – Burnt Moss 2.0”
13. Elmer’s PVA Glue
14. Loose crushed leaves (oregano, basil? I don’t know! Got these flocking materials for free or in a raffle box at HUZZAH! in May. They gave good texture under the 4-Ground leaves.)
15. 4-Ground “TSM 123 Loose Foliage Brown Leaves”
16. 4-Ground “TSM 124 Loose Foliage Copper Leaves”
17. 4-Ground “TSM 124 Loose Foliage Green Leaves”

As you may want to check out the excellent Wars of Ozz figures’ range – there are two places to get them and to get the rules (and I make no money from this btw). The game rules and the figures are available from the next two places:

In the US Old Glory has a site – Wars of Ozz Miniatures.

In the UK go to Sally 4th.