So I'm just curious on how some of you guys get a lot of these miniature battles going without spending hundreds of dollars on the whole thing. I mean I'm even willing to put in the effort to make my own miniatures and terrains or even just print out 1" square graph paper and laminate it. I'm just trying to get everyone's opinion on the best way to go about it.
Dark, check out my gaming blog, it's all about cheap minis, terrain, etc.
I make generic game battlemats by printing 1" grids on standard paper, then cutting and pasting them to whatever size I want, then covering them with clear contact shelf paper. Works great. You can use dry or wet erase markers for them.
I also have cut foam core into 12"x12" gridded sheets and cover that with the clear shelf paper. They work really well for quick maps that can be placed down, moved around, etc.
Also, check out eBay for MageKnight miniatures in bulk. You can buy animal, dinosaur and mythological creature minis at toy stores.
On my blog you may have to scroll through several pages to see all the ideas I've posted on. Lately I have been focused on casting plaster blocks to build terrain, which is probably not what you want to see. Its there though.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I use a chessex gaming mat (about $20), and though I've used minis in the past that I've collected over the years, these days, I far prefer tokens. What I do is this:
Using Photoshop (or Gimp, or whatever program you have for editing), I create a new document that is the same size as a photograph (4"x6" is the size I prefer). I turn on the gridlines on the program, so that I can see the document in 1" squares. I set the resolution to 150dpi, which I find is high enough for making tokens.
Next, I find a cool image of whatever I want the token to be - for my players, I let them find an image I like. Then I use the circle marquee tool in Photoshop to get a perfect circle selection. I copy this, then paste it in to my document. I resize it so that the circle fits perfectly within one of the 1" squares. If I am making a bunch of duplicate tokens (for example, a bunch of goblins) I add a number to the bottom of the image, so each one is labeled and easier to track)
I do this for every token I want to make, filling the squares. Then, so as not to waste ink, I take the image to Walgreens and have them print it as a glossy photo. It costs like 20 cents a sheet, depending on your area. I then take this home, carefully cut out the images, and glue them to 1" metal washers - you can get a box of washer at lowes for like $10, for 100 washers or so. You can use standard white paste or spray adhesive.
All total, each token costs me about 15 cents. If I get bored of them or they get too worn, I can toss them in a tub of warm soapy water, and after an hour or so, the image peels right off, and you can use the washers again!
|
If you enjoy handicrafts, you can make both outdoor and dungeon terrain relatively cheaply and use a range ruler instead of a grid.
Outdoor terrain: green cloth for ground cover, model railroad trees or else twigs and lichen glued onto cardboard bases for trees and bushes, strips of brown cloth for roads, squares of old corduroy fabric for fields, pebbles for rocks, etc
Dungeon Terrain: Grey cloth for ground cover, Dungeon Walls made of cardboard of foam-board, cave walls made from carved or torn up bits of styrofoam.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Well, for maps, I use flip mats for quick maps. $13 is a good investment for the mats they sell. Get a basic mat blank on both sides and that should handle most anything, except for really big battles.
Now, if that's too much for you, consider gaming paper. It's $4 a roll, and one roll will be all you need if you combine it with a piece of glass or plexi-glass to cover it. We used something similar for years and it worked quite well.
At a con this weekend one of the GM's I played under used bottle caps for minis. At first I was like WTH, but after a while, it wasn't too bad. As long as we knew who was what, it worked.
I'll admit I have hundreds of dollars worth of miniatures, but the key is I've only spend $10 here, $20 there, buying online and cheap when I bought pre-painted minis. If you'd like PPMs, toss your pocket change in a jar for a year or two, you'll be amazed at how much you can save that way. A dollar here, a five there, doesn't seem like much at the time, but after a few months, it can be quite a bit. That's how we afforded our con trip last weekend.
Dollar stores are also great places to find unexpected treasures. Dinosaurs, animals, insects. I've got a bunch that i've gotten from dime stores/dollar stores and no one cares that they aren't on bases. ;)
If you've got access to a printer, paper minis are quite inexpensive as well. the ones that Paizo has put out for the APs when printed on cardstock, come out quite well. One of my dms has started using them for all his games, and it didn't cost him very much to put them together. Heck, print out some pictures of monsters, cut them out, and paste them to a bottle cap. :)
Well, for maps, I use flip mats for quick maps. $13 is a good investment for the mats they sell. Get a basic mat blank on both sides and that should handle most anything, except for really big battles.
Now, if that's too much for you, consider gaming paper. It's $4 a roll, and one roll will be all you need if you combine it with a piece of glass or plexi-glass to cover it. We used something similar for years and it worked quite well.
The only thing I'm worried about dry erase or markers in general is staining the plexi-glass.
I use a chessex gaming mat (about $20), and though I've used minis in the past that I've collected over the years, these days, I far prefer tokens. What I do is this:
Using Photoshop (or Gimp, or whatever program you have for editing), I create a new document that is the same size as a photograph (4"x6" is the size I prefer). I turn on the gridlines on the program, so that I can see the document in 1" squares. I set the resolution to 150dpi, which I find is high enough for making tokens.
Next, I find a cool image of whatever I want the token to be - for my players, I let them find an image I like. Then I use the circle marquee tool in Photoshop to get a perfect circle selection. I copy this, then paste it in to my document. I resize it so that the circle fits perfectly within one of the 1" squares. If I am making a bunch of duplicate tokens (for example, a bunch of goblins) I add a number to the bottom of the image, so each one is labeled and easier to track)
I do this for every token I want to make, filling the squares. Then, so as not to waste ink, I take the image to Walgreens and have them print it as a glossy photo. It costs like 20 cents a sheet, depending on your area. I then take this home, carefully cut out the images, and glue them to 1" metal washers - you can get a box of washer at lowes for like $10, for 100 washers or so. You can use standard white paste or spray adhesive.
All total, each token costs me about 15 cents. If I get bored of them or they get too worn, I can toss them in a tub of warm soapy water, and after an hour or so, the image peels right off, and you can use the washers again!
I really like this idea. Tokens seem like the easiest way to go. Miniatures are nice and collectable. But I think for right now I'm just looking for something simple to represent character battles.
|
I bought several "cast-off" battle mats from my Local gaming store...they are slightly irregular and not finished with rounded corners and such but they were really cheap and serve very well. I have a total of 2 irregulars, a 24X30 good mat and a large 36x48ish good mat. our group keeps the large one down and uses the smaller one for predrawn stuff or to switch from one campaign one night to the other on a different night if we don't want to erase....
I believe my store got them from Chessex as irregulars...I paid about 1/4 or less of what i would've for a similarly sized mat.
|
|
I really like this idea. Tokens seem like the easiest way to go. Miniatures are nice and collectable. But I think for right now I'm just looking for something simple to represent character battles.I use a chessex gaming mat (about $20), and though I've used minis in the past that I've collected over the years, these days, I far prefer tokens. What I do is this:
Using Photoshop (or Gimp, or whatever program you have for editing), I create a new document that is the same size as a photograph (4"x6" is the size I prefer). I turn on the gridlines on the program, so that I can see the document in 1" squares. I set the resolution to 150dpi, which I find is high enough for making tokens.
Next, I find a cool image of whatever I want the token to be - for my players, I let them find an image I like. Then I use the circle marquee tool in Photoshop to get a perfect circle selection. I copy this, then paste it in to my document. I resize it so that the circle fits perfectly within one of the 1" squares. If I am making a bunch of duplicate tokens (for example, a bunch of goblins) I add a number to the bottom of the image, so each one is labeled and easier to track)
I do this for every token I want to make, filling the squares. Then, so as not to waste ink, I take the image to Walgreens and have them print it as a glossy photo. It costs like 20 cents a sheet, depending on your area. I then take this home, carefully cut out the images, and glue them to 1" metal washers - you can get a box of washer at lowes for like $10, for 100 washers or so. You can use standard white paste or spray adhesive.
All total, each token costs me about 15 cents. If I get bored of them or they get too worn, I can toss them in a tub of warm soapy water, and after an hour or so, the image peels right off, and you can use the washers again!
Hmmm....that's a cool idea...also would be neat if you had a magnetic board....you could set the mat up on the wall behind the DM....and save table space..
I will have to report back on some experiments I am running right now. There a many many free battle mat, dungeon tile and so forth online. This even includes 3d variety. I currently do not have a color printer right now. But I have printed a few black and white. I have glued them to card stock (or old cerial boxes). My last step will be to coat them with dacopage glue. Which is kinda like a clear coat that will make them very durrable. My hope is that it will be a surface that works well with the dry and or wet erase.