image detail from Dwarven Forge Wildlands Kickstarter (copyright Dwarven Forge)
Dwarven Forge makes great, super-sturdy terrain. It’s the best combination of aesthetics and durability out there. It will last, so it’s a good investment as a gamemaster who wants to liven up their play table (whether in person or when playing remotely), but it isn’t cheap.
If you are a person with good self-control who is willing to wait a long time for the goods to arrive, backing their Kickstarters is a great way to get pieces at a better price. Backers pay less than they would later in the store.
Their current Kickstarter, Wildlands, closes on September 2, 2020. I will use it to illustrate some general things that you may want to consider when deciding where to invest your gaming money. Dwarven Forge is fortunately so experienced at this that the big question to ask before backing any Kickstarter projectâ”Will they deliver on their promises?”âis a firm Yes. (There’s a good overview of their history in the campaign video.) What else should you be considering?
Quick and dirty tips time. Tons going on at our house (minor bathroom remodel, yay!) so, though this would be better as a video walkthrough Ă la Nate, since I do not have a video setup or time to quickly fake one, weâll be one half step better than the Theater of the Mind: a Medium post with some snaps from my phone. Dwarven Forge and other 3D terrain lovers, get yourselves the little paper organizer set from Ikea known as TJENA. Itâs just the right size to work with Dwarven Forge terrain!
The five pieces from the TJENA set provide a rising landscape well-suited to Dwarven Forge terrain.
Piece 1: The Tray
The tray is about 2.5 floors high, so it works well in combo with stairs (search for âstair jackâ to find sets with these little step pieces) or where a raised area with a railing is desired.Flipped, the tray is good for lowered areas, but doesnât exactly match the grid. To hide any awkward fits, use terrain trays or bank pieces or ledges to create an overhang.
Piece 2: Low Square
Nice for a one story building where the roof is what youâre interested in. (Iâm using an old 2″ elevation block to hold up the hidden back end of the stone terrain tray for this shot.)
Piece 3: Medium Square
These work great with small terrain trays on their sides to provide wall texture.
Piece 4: High Square
Anyone who tries to get all the way up here sure better like arrows. (Also, yay for the variety of stairs Dwarven Forge has offered over time. Keep âem cominâ.)
Piece 5: The Big Tjena
A super handy piece. Youâd want to reinforce it inside if you were sticking heavy stuff on top, but it takes this big floor on top just fine. Again, works great with a small terrain tray for wall texture. For stair variety, Iâve used whiskey stones for one of their few legitimate purposes: terrain. Useful to keep in your DM âmixed bitsâ kit; I use âem all the time to support things, indicate pillars, etc. If you donât already own some that taste like the inside of your freezer (and bring that sad flavor to your drinks), I bet you know someone who does.On its edge the big Tjena piece is very tall. With a floor piece on top itâs 35′ in game terms.Unfortunately the narrowest side doesnât match our grid as well, so this should be used on the edge of a build or in a forgiving location in the overall grid.When the big Tjena is on its side, the short edge is a bit easier to work into a grid.
Okay, dungeonmasters, hie thee hence to ye olde Ikea and start blowing your players minds with more multi-level builds!
p.s. I bet the GRĂ SIDAN set from Ikea would work even better, all being 2″ tall, but I havenât gotten one to play with yet. â â â As of late August 2019 I have gotten to try the GRĂ SIDAN pieces and theyâre great!
âBut, Dinah,â I hear you cry, âwhere will I store all these pieces?â
đ Thatâs the life changing magic of tidying up⌠Flip them over and Konmari your drawers!
Now doesnât a stealth roll like that spark joy?
~
(The original version of this post was published on Medium in July 2019 as part of âD DMs D&Dâ)
Iâm not pure theater-of-the-mind; I still do like to use miniatures and grid maps to help understand lines of sight, spell effects, etc. I find these help me create more complex situations in which the players can get immersed.
I worried at first using 3D terrain would reduce their engagement, but photos by my players like this let me know theyâre being transported.
(photo by Lance Arthur)
Now that Iâve made the investment, Iâm often using elaborate miniature setups like that pictured above, and in a less character-centric perspective here:
(photo by Terrance Graven)
However, I donât always use the 3D terrain. In the photo below you can see how Iâm combining 2D and 3D pieces to amplify the feeling of a cave environment.
I want the organic intricacy of the cave space to come through, so Iâm using a great set of paper map tiles from Paizo. But I also want the players to feel the closed-in solidity, so Iâve built the entrance and exit with Dwarvenforge terrain.
(photo by Dinah Sanders)
Notice above how Iâve placed a couple 3D stalagmites on top of those drawn on the 2D map. This really helps to give the immediate sense of the ratman peeking out at them from partial cover.
Though this was intended as a non-combat encounter, I was ready for it to become a fight. Thatâs part of why I built out the exit from the room to show where reinforcing ratfolk would enter and take cover in corners.
I hope that picture also illustrates how investing in even a few 3D terrain pieces can make a big difference.
You can use them in combo with your 2D maps or even without a map to help clarify a complex combat or visibility situation. âI donât understand. Why canât I peek around the corner, across the hall, and into that other doorway?â
The pedestal blocks shown below are also super helpful to illustrate vertical situations.
(photo by Fred von Lohmann)
Here is the party in a small room (which I drew on a dungeon tile grid just before the players got to my house and set aside until we got to this puzzle).
I told them, âThe room has a 20′ ceiling, but on one wall the top 5′ are open.â Their challenge was how to get somebody up those 15′ to get into a treasure room once hidden behind a long-gone tapestry.
3D terrain is all from Dwarven Forge https://dwarvenforge.com/ (as is the ratman mini). Be sure youâre buying painted; they do a fantastic job.
The paper map tiles are from Paizo (who also make really great big maps with tons of detail, which Iâve used a lot in the past and will be using again): https://paizo.com/
The dry erase dungeon tiles are made by Role 4 Initiative and I think I bought them at our lovely local game store, Gamescape. You should buy local whenever possible to help keep gaming alive; local shops are where many people first play. When I visit a shop and donât find anything else I want, I try to buy a set of dice or something small and useful like that to help keep the business going.
The other minis are from various sources. I am always visiting game shops in cities I travel to and checking for painted plastic minis. Alas, so many are sold in random packs now that for monsters I often buy used to be sure Iâm getting exactly what I need. Cool Stuff, Inc. is a good source: https://www.coolstuffinc.com
The big vinyl mat under all this I probably also bought at a game shop. It has 1″ grid on one side and hex map on the other (thoâ I never use that side). I wish someone would make a vinyl mat that was greenish-tan on one side and stone gray on the other, to be a better place setting for wilderness and city/dungeon adventuring.
The nice wooden dice tower, dice tray, and storage box you can see in the background is from Wyrmwood, who make absolutely beautiful stuff. https://wyrmwoodgaming.com/
In the background of the last shot you can see the top of my little wheeled cabinet of drawers. This fits in our back room most of the time, but on D&D night I roll it out next to my chair. Itâs a huge boon for a DM as you can keep everything youâll need handy in it and it provides a space for you to put your drink out of the danger zone of your dice rolling and gesticulating. The top drawer has stuff I use almost every game like our initiative order tracker, condition markers, some of the players minis, my pencil and eraser, small paper cards for passing notes to players, etc. The drawers below that I keep empty and set up before each game with the NPC/monster minis and terrain I expect to need. The bottom drawers have my miniatures sorted into broad categories like âNPC/hero/villager typesâ, undead, goblinoids, beasts, etc. [You can buy the same cabinet here: https://amzn.to/2LpbFFK but as of August 2020 I no longer recommend it. If you put anything at all heavy in it, including a drawer full of papers and softcover rulebooks, the sides bow outward eventually and then the drawers start falling out of their tracks. Cheap turned out to be too cheap. It’d be fine for underwear or lightweight crafts or something though. I recommend also getting some lining for the drawers so minis donât get chipped as you roll the cabinet https://amzn.to/2Ezuvtw (I didnât stick it down, just cut it into pieces to drape across the inside of each drawer) The caster wheels that come with the cabinet are cheap plastic and will break within six months if my experience rolling over carpet is typical. Assemble it with sturdy ones instead. I got my ball caster wheels at the local hardware store (shop local when you can!) and they look a little like these: https://amzn.to/2Br5KM4 ]
(The original version of this post was published on Medium in December 2018 as part of “D DMs D&D”)