gnunn
Who around here uses paper-craft or other set elements at the gaming table? I have gradually been getting sucked into this little sub-hobby of D&D, ever since I downloaded the Gamers Help Haiti mega pack earlier this year. I printed out some of the dungeon tiles, mounted them to foam core, printed a few pages of 3D barrels and tables, folded and glued them up... and now I'm hooked.
My papercraft addiction has grown to the point that last night, when I should have been making notes on upcoming encounters for tonight's game session, I instead built a complete layout of the known portions of the dungeon my players are currently exploring. I justified this by telling myself, "They said they are going to backtrack and search the rest of the complex for loot, so rather than drawing it room by room, it's best to just set it up!"... right!? besides, I have a great big table that can fit the whole thing at my new place.
Anyway, I am not a rich man, which is why I go with "folded paper":http://www.fatdragongames.com/ rather than "sculpted plastic":http://www.dwarvenforge.com/ for my dungeon sets. As such, I have also made a couple discoveries that help me keep my cost down when creating mounted dungeon tiles & set pieces.
* empty grocery store pizza & cereal boxes make excellent backing for overlays. I mount most blank floor tiles on foam core, but usually put furniture, rubble, doors and other accessories on the free leavings of my breakfast habits. Unfortunately, while mounting the dungeon images to the obnoxious, printed side of said boxes produces a nice, neutral backing for your finished tiles, the printed surface does not like to hold glue. When it dries, it will often warp, causing your carefully applied binding to crack, popping the dungeon tile off of it's backing and unleashing the horrible eye of Capn' Crunch from its eternal bondage. I am currently experimenting to see if mounting on the unlaminated inside of a box will produce more permanent adhesion.
* 2 inch binder clips make excellent supports for raised platforms! I have a few papercraft columns I built from a Fat Dragon set, but last night I needed more. I have been unsuccessfully scouring art and craft stores for 2" spools or dowels to use for this purpose. Then, last night I realized a bag of large binder clips of dubious origins came with us in the move. I popped the little flippy-doohickeys out of their sockets, stood the clips on end and stuck loops of painters tape to the top... Voila! sturdy supports for that upper level balcony!
So, do any of you utilize nerdly origami in your game sessions? If so, for what purpose? What are your best practices for making dungeon sets on a budget?
...dang this post is long!
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I wish I had some pictures to show of how the dungeon turned out, but currently my digital camera is broken. I might try to borrow a camera and take some shots of the dungeon though if anyone is curious to see how it turned out.
And as long as I'm posting pictures... "here's a wider shot":http://cdn.obsidianportal.com/assets/14267/30924_401151137137_554117137_4093751_6729184_n.jpg. For those that follow my campaign, they are (from left to right) the players of "Teagan,":http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaigns/world-of-crucible/characters/teagan "Althea,":http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaigns/world-of-crucible/characters/althea me, "Hovan,":http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaigns/world-of-crucible/characters/hovan "Korgul,":http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaigns/world-of-crucible/characters/korgul and "Brigga (center bottom)":http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaigns/world-of-crucible/characters/brigga. "Hope":http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaigns/world-of-crucible/characters/hope is behind the camera.
Gaaran, yeah you can do some pretty amazing things with Hirst Arts, provided you have the time, money and inclination. However, after seeing Hardhead's spread, I think that if you want something that looks good, is portable and won't cost you an arm and a leg, your best bet is to go the paper route.
Arsheeh: Thanks. That's my garage, obviously. As for the table, I made it myself (well, several of us did) because our existing one was too small. Did it for less than $60 at Lowe's.
Hardhead has it right as far as the time commitment involved. It's really front-loaded while you get your technique nailed down and your supply of items built up. I use a lot of foam core mounted floor tiles. Foam core can be purchased in big sheets from art or craft stores. I lay out the tiles I plan to mount and then glue them all down. Wait a day for the glue to dry and then start cutting. Slicing foam core is the most time consuming portion of the creation process IMHO. You need to make sure your razor is sharp, and even then each cut should be done in 3 passes to ensure a clean result. (1 = top layer, 2 = foam, 3 = bottom layer) A large sheet can take an evening to cut out.
Mounting to pizza boxes is easier, because you can just cut the tiles with scissors, but the cardboard likes to warp, even after it dries, so the end result is a little less polished.
3D models can actually be pretty easy once you get the technique down. I have a growing collection of paper-craft tables, chairs, barrels, pillars and even trees. I actually wound up having to put my constructions on hiatus, because my laser printer ran out of toner. (This will probably be your biggest cost for DIY paper-craft)
I have attached some pics of the set I built for last night's session. These were taken at the end of the night.
* "Pic1":http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/_9p3Hx4i40WLb-FTOOJwGw?feat=directlink
* "Pic2":http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/MRDaU1hsDx4OdL9cMjDeHQ?feat=directlink
* "Pic3":http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/NlFfLT-AlIHJZb31u25qkA?feat=directlink
* "Pic4":http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/Sxq5Ln-OZ4xPf683TeOGgg?feat=directlink
I also have several pics of my first paper-craft endeavor embedded into the "recap":http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaign/the-westerlands/wikis/session-35 of the session in question.
Also, check out FDG's "beginner's guide.":http://www.fatdragongames.com/images/IntroCardModV3.pdf This is the document I use for my technique.
I've used MapTools in the past to make custom battle map printouts, and even some graphics for my wiki, but I've never tried the online management feature, though I've recently been bugging my gf to take it for a spin with me. The one problem I found with MapTool is that it gets really resource intensive if you use realistic images like those on from the dundjinni forums.
I could see it being an issue in my game with players trying to tell me where they want to move.
Unexpected changes are also a bit of an issue with dungeon tiles because, unlike on a battle mat, you can't just draw on the tiles. I have thought about adding a laminated surface to the tile tops so I could draw temporary effects like walls of flame or acid clouds or globes of darkness onto the board. I've also considered making tokens that could be dropped onto affected squares, though both methods require additional money and time resources.
The way I usually run is if I'm looking for a dungeon crawl type session(s), I find a pre-built and just tweak it to fit in my game, and then take the maps from the pre-built and import them into maptools. I also made tokens of all the monsters in the 4e monster manual, plus downloaded a ton, so I have stuff to work with there. When I'm running my story sessions, they tend to be role-playing heavy and very combat light so i don't find TOO much need of pre-prepared maps (you don't need one for a bar fight, although it would look cool). I have a few that I've made from scratch, but the wizards maps look so much better.
As far as where the players want to move, they either describe it like a chess move (down two, left three) or they just stand and point to the square on the screen, it's only about 4 feet away :).
My gaming buddies and I are hopefully going to be all renting a house together (we have a core group of 4) and we're trying to get a place with an extra room we can set up as a gaming room. Once we get THAT set up, I'll definitely post pics, should be pretty epic.
1. "Basic Set":http://i843.photobucket.com/albums/zz351/arsheesh2/Age%20of%20Legends/Hirst%20Arts%20Dungeons/Basic%20Duneon%20Set%201/015.jpg
2. "Before the Altar of Genocron":http://i843.photobucket.com/albums/zz351/arsheesh2/Age%20of%20Legends/Hirst%20Arts%20Dungeons/Basic%20Duneon%20Set%201/Before%20Genocrons%20Altar/020.jpg
3. "The Ancient Sentinel":http://i843.photobucket.com/albums/zz351/arsheesh2/Age%20of%20Legends/Hirst%20Arts%20Dungeons/Basic%20Dungeon%20Set%202/Exterior%20Ruins%20Set/067.jpg
4. "The Pools of Amath Grall":http://i843.photobucket.com/albums/zz351/arsheesh2/Age%20of%20Legends/Hirst%20Arts%20Dungeons/Cisterns%20Dungeon%20Set/096.jpg
5. "The Crypt of Kings":http://i843.photobucket.com/albums/zz351/arsheesh2/Age%20of%20Legends/Hirst%20Arts%20Dungeons/Basic%20Dungeon%20Set%202/The%20Crypt%20of%20Kings/119.jpg
6. "Random Dungeon set up":http://i843.photobucket.com/albums/zz351/arsheesh2/Age%20of%20Legends/Hirst%20Arts%20Dungeons/Dungeon%20Set%20Ups/126.jpg
And there are LOTS more: for more pics, visit the "Homemade Dungeons":http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaign/age-of-legends/wikis/homemade-dungeons page on my AOL site.
Cheers,
-Arsheesh
I must say that I don't know about the resource hog of it, as my computer's built for intense programs, but when it works boy does it work! I'd love to use it for the built-in LAN tabletop ability, or even in conjunction with a projector onto the table, but right now I build in it and print it out. Then I use the tried and true method of scissors, glue, cardboard and foam to give it that realistic terrain feel.
@gnunn I use the same sprites I use in the map built from MapTools as "sprites" on the table. Print out a jet of steam or acid, cut it out and place on the tiles. Same with flames and pit-trap holes, (love those, just print out the faded black 2x2 square and apply with double-sided tape when triggered.)
We just got out of Keep on the Shadowfell, so I don't have any pics yet, but I'll post when I snap some next session.
I look forward to seeing your in-game pics.
Arsheesh, WOW! I love the frost worm! Also, I do believe I will be buying trees from you, good sir!
I often use the Heroscape tiles in my game. They are big hexes, so it's not a perfect solution, but I've invested about $100 or so in a couple of different sets, got a ton of cool minis and wall pieces in the deal, and because they are modular I never have a problem building a rough approximation of what I want. Also, the pieces come apart and stack easily. I rubber band about 20 of any given tile size together and shove them all in big rubbermaid containers for easy access the next time I need a cool dungeon set-up or battlefield scenario.
I am jealous of how those molded plaster pieces look, though, They seem so authentic. I've always wanted to play on a Dwarven Forge set, but the cost of entry is way too high for me.
Of course, with a home projector, a glass-surface table with one of those tinted films on one side, a wiimote and a computer you could probaby make one ala http://johnnylee.net/projects/wii/
Once again though, quite an endeavor. This time expensive in time, not money.
I mean I agree with him whole heartedly, but I think I'd add the specification that I could get it for less than two arms, a leg and a firstborn child...