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So not sure if this is the right section or not for this. Just really curious. I play mostly on here in PBP fashion, but have a RL con coming up. How does everyone handle minis? Being on here I don't have to worry about it since I have an avatar anyway, but in RL that wont work. I have many characters (20-odd) that don't have physical representations of. Buying and painting minis on the off chance that I will need one for each of them is one option but I am curious about other options and how people handle this. Do I do paper minis? Do I get Lego and interchange accessories? Do I try to find something close-ish in a prepainted mini? How do you handle this?
When I'm playing something like PFS or 5e's AL I typically try to bring a suitable miniature for characters I'm likely to play. That can range from HeroForge custom printed miniatures for characters I really like to random prepainted miniatures that are close enough or for Starfinder I often use lego minifigs because it's pretty easy to find suitable scifi themed minifigs. Honestly though, just bring something, exactly what doesn't matter. I've seen people use everything from spare change to dice to heroclix (a good way to get your character referred to as "Batman" for the entire game), the point is to have something on the board that's recognizably yours, even if it doesn't resemble your character that much.
That said, even if you bring nothing at all you can probably work something out. When I GM I typically bring a bunch of random prepainted miniatures covering a wide variety of character types, and that's not terribly uncommon in my experience.
Venture-Agent, Australia—QLD—Gold Coast
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i am a horrible painter but for my minis i tend to find something in the prepainted range of Battles minis or other prepainted mini ranges and retouch with a bit of paint ie change the hair/cloak/weapon colour with a little paint
example i have a "Warpriest of Razmir" PC, i took one of the new razmir cultists from the lastwall set and cut off the staff and glued on an appropriate weapon i snipped off another mini
Venture-Lieutenant, Finland—Turku
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Depends a lot.
I've used print-and-play minis before (customized in Paint with correct colors/changing weapons), but often I/other local players just use "close enough" minis. Ready-painted minis are rarely perfect so it's usually a choice between "This one's a mage like mine, but it's an orc while I'm a halfling" or "This one's a halfling but quite roguish one and not like my brightly colored mage." "This one is small and brightly coloured, but not quite mage and definitely not a halfling".
I think most people choose their minis to easily identify what you might be doing on the battle field - a mini with a ranged weapon to tell everyone melee isn't your thing, or a mini with heavy armor and shield if you're in the front lines.
Couple of times I've actually made the character based on the figure I had, like a kobold trapper mini that has a beartrap in his hand, and I made a kobold that uses beartraps to smack people around. The mini is practically 100% accurate.
Another one is a heroclix miniature of Rescue (pepper pots in an iron man suit), that's pretty accurate representation of my sorcerer.
... And then there's the custom mini territory. I have one mini that was ordered from hero forge, and then modified with greenstuff to look more like the kitsune she was. Another mini was modified from a pre-painted kenku into a tengu, by cutting off the weapons and re-painting the robes, or my Tiefling Musket Master, modified with greenstuff and parts from couple different wargame miniatures.
Custom minis can get pretty pricey though, if you don't do the modding/painting yourself. My SFS mini is a large pit-fiend, modified with greenstuff and repainted.
Anyway, I think the most important aspect of a mini is, that it should
1. be easily identifieable and
2. give a representation of what your character looks like in the field, TACTICALLY.
I'd say that you'd do just fine with a print and play character, just color it in paint to match your attire, check that it has somewhat similar weapons (tanky looking/big or multiple melee weapons/Ranged weapon / magicky stuff) and that's probably "better" than most others have. Tape a small coin on the bottom of the print and play paper mini to give it some balance.
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I've been using a chess pawn for years, only switching it out for a knight when playing my cavalier. It doesn't matter what you use, as long as everyone knows its yours.
It goes a lot better if there's SOMETHING about the mini to remind people about your character.
Sculpy is cheap and easy way to make a custom mini if nothing else fits.
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I've been using primarily LEGO minifigures for tabletop RPGs for many years now. I do have a small collection of HeroQuest boardgame minis, prepainted D&D minis, and one PF pawn set (Summon Monster), but for the most part, I build the PCs, NPCs, and monsters in LEGO if I have the time and inspiration.
For PFS, I have a small tackle box of minis for my own PCs, a box of minis for the iconic character pregens (I've added the OA classes since that blog post), and if I'm GMing, yet another box of NPCs and monsters for the scenario I'm running.
The iconics are useful when someone is playing a pregen, obviously, but they also see use when a player lacks a mini for their own PC ("You're playing a fighter? OK, you can borrow Valeros."), or when my wife or I don't want to bother building a new mini for a one-time NPC in the scenario we're GMing. (My wife also sometimes raids her own PCs' minis for adversaries, when she lacks the extra time for minis prep.)
If you're interested in using LEGO for minis, I have a "Building the Bestiary" series on my blog that shows examples of the models I build. The first few installments cover basic stuff like humanoids, giants, and undead, with later columns showing how to build other creature types and body shapes.
If that's too much work, then I also have a post on "Makeshift Minis" as well. :)
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What a tyro can do with sculpy
Just use a quarter or a nickle as a base and keep the mini within it: that'll keep it to an inch square. It will fit on the map, even if i do get the occasional giant ysoki comment...
