Counters trump miniatures, baby!

[Cowpie Zombie]

One subject I almost never hear anyone talk about is cardboard counters. But man, do I love them. For $20 or so you get a pack of hundreds of counters of every conceivable character, monster, style, etc. For the budget conscious these are an invaluable resource; for those who use miniatures these are a superb supplement.

Check this out, d20 Modernites:

http://www.fierydragon.com/Products/prod-cc3.htm

 

[Desdichado]

For a lot less than that. Ever heard of printing them yourself? I don't need fancy images, just something distinctive -- like numbers.

 

[Dana_Jorgensen]

As a former wargamer, allow me to clue you in on the failings of counters...

Sure, they're cheap and easy to amass, but have you ever tried to keep track of hundreds or thousands of them AND keep them organized when you're not playing? It isn't easy, and the most reliable method, zip-lock bags, isn't exactly known for its resilience...

And before anyone says it can't be that hard because it wasn't hard to keep MtG cards organized, you get it easy with the cards because they're designed in a fashion that allows easy, systematic sorting...

If you don't believe me, just let me mix up the 7,000 counters that came with Next War (an old cold war WW3 simulation wargame), and you can sort them.

At least with minis, you have to take your time putting them away to begin with, so it isn't that difficult to keep them organized.

So each has its own advantages and disadvantages.

 

[twistnack]

For my current game I've been making my own counters from card stock. Dana's right about organized even my small collection has started to become a pain to go through.

 

[jaerdaph]

I love counters, especially the great ones from Fiery Dragon - they're cheap but as Dana pointed out, a pain to organize easily.

I make my own counters too. I made a template in MS Publisher to get exact 1 inch squares, and I add JPGs and GIFs of people and monsters I find on the Internet doing Google image searches. I shrink the pics down to fit the counters, make a PDF from the Publisher file, and print them out on cardstock on a color inkjet. You have to remember to turn off the "shrink to fit page" options in Acrobat before you print though to keep the counters at 1" (or whatever the proper size of the particular counter is).

BTW, Fiery Dragon will be releasing digital versions of their counters soon so you can print out as many as you need.

 

[jaerdaph]

Edit: Sorry - I can't remote link files from freeservers.

 

[jaerdaph]

Here are some counters I made - I make no claims to ownership of any of the photos, most of which come from various horror movies.

 

[Desdichado]

Sure, they're cheap and easy to amass, but have you ever tried to keep track of hundreds or thousands of them AND keep them organized when you're not playing? It isn't easy, and the most reliable method, zip-lock bags, isn't exactly known for its resilience...

Nope. This is a roleplaying game. I have 3-5 PCs, and no more than 20 tops of enemies. Since "No. 1" can be an orc, a zombie, or a demon, or anything else equally well, I have no interest in making hundreds or thousands of counters.

 

[Staffan]

Sure, they're cheap and easy to amass, but have you ever tried to keep track of hundreds or thousands of them AND keep them organized when you're not playing? It isn't easy, and the most reliable method, zip-lock bags, isn't exactly known for its resilience...

I got myself a small book-like thingy designed to keep track of business cards in order to keep track of my counters. Keep counters of the same type together with paper clips, and put them in the plastic pockets.

I imagine that stamp collecting albums could work too.

 

[jaerdaph]

I imagine that stamp collecting albums could work too.

That's not a bad idea...