Illuminated Brethren of the Battlemat

[Ascalaphus]

So I like using the Battlemat. But there's one thing that's bugging me: how do you use light radii on it? Light sources are often carried around, so re-drawing them every round would be absurd.

Anyone have advice on how to make this more convenient?

[Ringtail]

Buy some of those cheap, multicolored, fuzzy pipe-cleaner things. Bend them into the shape of several common spells and have them at hand at game time. Place on the battle-mat, remove, and move as needed. Use several colors to represent several different spell effects at once. Quick, easy; no drawing/erasing.

[Hjolmaer]

Ringtail is a genius. Don't know why my group hasn't thought of this before.

[Lastoth]

paizo actually sells premade plastic pieces about as thick as pipe cleaners and much harder to lay down for radius effects.

[Ascalaphus]

Drawing spell effects on the map isn't so problematic, they're usually stationary. Light is more annoying because A) multiple light sources, B) extremely mobile C) Low-Light Vision and it's difficulties.

I'll check out the pipe cleaners, but I'm not entirely sure I know which ones you mean. Do you have brand names or pictures perhaps?

[Darksyde]

Ascalaphus wrote:

Drawing spell effects on the map isn't so problematic, they're usually stationary. Light is more annoying because A) multiple light sources, B) extremely mobile C) Low-Light Vision and it's difficulties.

I'll check out the pipe cleaners, but I'm not entirely sure I know which ones you mean. Do you have brand names or pictures perhaps?

Tada! Pipe Cleaners

[Hjolmaer]

Should be able to get them from most craft stores, or from places like Wal-mart.

Lastoth - That's cool. Didn't know Paizo had folks covered there already. But there are two advantages to pipe cleaners:

1.) Cheap.

2.) Player 1: "Crap! I lost the fireball template!"
Everyone else: "Meh? Make another."

[Abyssian]

Wow, pipecleaners. Clever, very clever.

[Ringtail]

I should note that larger AoE spells do take either longer pipe-cleaners or twisting 2 or 3 together at the ends, though those are usually instantaneous rather than ongoing (meaning we don't bother with the template) so it hasn't really been an issue for our group.

[Hjolmaer]

Knowing my group, we'd probably make templates anyway and just keep them with the mat.

"Lightning Gallery trap? Let's see how many it hits..."

[Ascalaphus]

Yeah, I remember those things from kindergarten... looks worth a try.