Dice Trays--Baroquely Embellished
In this post, dear readers, we venture into a different side of the hobby: graphics. Although painting is certainly "graphic," I'm talking about print stuff: bringing what board games do well to enhance the miniatures game experience. Anyone who has poked around and seen my game files on this blog might have noticed my tendency to indulge in this area. Choosing fonts, adding images, designing the layout of game documents, I very much find these to be an important part of my hobby experience. Miniatures gaming is tactile and three dimensional. I find that these touches help to expand on that. In other words, if you're going to put something on the table, it might as well look like a game component as opposed to something that came from the kitchen. To be fair, though, I'm not sure how much players have really noticed these things. They do, however, give me a great deal of satisfaction. In short, I do them for myself. At the very least they do no harm. As usual, in this post you may clix pix for Big Pix to get a closer look.
FORTUNA DICE TRAY
First up, we have some dice trays. A quite common tool, these both corral dice and provide a safe place to roll them. Having played many a game where these have been provided, I finally decided to employ them myself. Of course, I saw these as an opportunity to add another dimension to the game atmosphere, especially for games set in the 17th Century.
Fortuna Dice Trays in Use during my Loot the Baggage Train Huzzah! game.
A closer look at the final product.
For those interested, here is the graphic: it is also available as a pdf. Print this off on a large sheet label; laminate or spray with fixative, and cut it out and stick to the bottom of your tray: hey presto! you will have a Fortuna dice tray of your own!
BAROQUE DICE TOWER
The Fortuna dice tray graphic was derived from the side panels of an earlier production: my baroque dice tower (above). This was designed so that it could be used with or without dice tray. In use, the detachable dice tray makes it easier to fish out dice after a roll as well: you just pick up the whole thing and tip it into your hand.
The back panel
You will notice that the dice comes out of the creature's mouth...well, I notice and it makes me happy! (Clearly, I'm not well.)
For those interested in such whimsy, here are the graphics for the baroque dice tower. The Fortuna panel needs to be printed twice (for the sides), as do the side panels of the dice tray. These are also available in a pdf.
If for some reason the graphic files from this posting aren't workable, the stand alone jpgs are also available for download. Next up will be a battle report on a Nine Years War game.
Until then...
Excelsior!
Good ideas! I use dice trays to but mine are wood padded with felt. Still, dice are just as likely to be tossed on the table as within the tray. Old habits are hard to break even for me.
ReplyDeleteIndeed. If you look at the picture of the trays in use, you'll see that there are still dice on the table. I think there is something satisfying about tossing dice on a table, craps like.
DeleteHave a dice but have never used a dice tower , I do like your design though.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Svjek. The dice tower isn't very good for miniatures: not very handy unless you have several of them. So mine looks nice but only gets used the few times I may play something small or while playing a board game.
Delete"They do, however, give me a great deal of satisfaction"
ReplyDeleteIn a hobby context, there is no better reason to do something.
(I am almost embarrassed to admit that despite the lack of evidence to back up the feeling, I just don't trust dice towers!! )
ps Tray and tower are both incredibly attractive.
DeleteThanks, Ross. It is true that dropping dice in the tower deprives one of the familiar ritual of shaking the dice before a toss: I don't know about statistics, but there is no doubt that mojo would be impacted.
DeleteThose look very nice and do provide an Extra nice touch to the game table. Makes me want some dice trays, here I am rolling my dice on the table like a bloody heathen. 😀
ReplyDeleteThanks, Stew. Keep at it. The first step is admitting that you have a problem ;)
DeleteNice trays, lovely graphics,my brother is in to these but he's a backgammon player and they really want to make sure that the die are seen to be rolled,I think he's working on a clear collapsible tower at the moment,I think I prefer yours with the period visuals!
ReplyDeleteBest Iain
It hadn't occurred to me, but now makes perfect sense, that one purpose of a dice tower would be to ensure consistency in dice rolling. I'm reminded of dice in plastic cubes used for similar purposes among hard core board wargamers (of years ago). None of that applies here, happily :)
DeleteThis has made me stop and think. I use a pair of dice trays, but I can now see that my sides are too shallow, with the dice tending to jump out … a re-think is due.
ReplyDeleteHi Norm, the group I play with uses dice trays routinely. However, it's not unusual for dice to skip out or someone to misjudge the toss and for dice to wind up outside the tray. What is interesting is that everyone accepts that only dice that land in the tray count--so those that skip out are re-rolled in the tray.
DeleteNicely done Ed...
ReplyDeleteI assume that the dice gulag would have an illustration by Gustave Dore from the Divine Comedy...
All the best. Aly
Which circle of hell do they end up in? False advisers to be impaled and consumed by fire for an eternity?
DeleteBest Iain
This comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteAn interesting idea, Aly—Iain is spot on ☝️, too!
Delete