Flying over the battlemat

[Morrow]

Last week in the Against the Elves game we had a battle which involved a flying opponent, flying monsters summoned by the party sorceror, a rogue with slippers of spider climb, and a paladin with an airwalking mount. Needless to say, we had a hard time tracking all the vertical movement on a battlemat. Any suggestions how I can simplify this process?

Morrow

 

[IceBear]

Piece of paper with the current altitude under the figure to track it?

IceBear

 

[Zad]

Typically we put a big fat d6 under flying characters. You can use the number to help indicate altitude. A die with more numbers would be nice but harder to get a miniature to stay on them (a big d12 maybe?)

 

[AuraSeer]

If we have only one character off the ground, we stand it on a big die. One of our players has a huge d6 that's about one inch on a side, which is perfect for a platform.

In cases where altitude is important, we place d12's next to the flying characters, and use the number to indicate height. The d12 is the die of choice because it has a wide range, and because most characters almost never need to roll it.

 

[AuraSeer]

Oh, and speaking of slippers of spider climbing...
Is our ranger the only guy who has actually used those things to climb a spider?

 

[Silver Griffon]

Hmmm...
I never used an actual battlemat. Can you wipe off dry-erase markers on them? We actually use a dry-erase presentation board from an office supply store. I found one with a one inch grid already on it. It's about 3 feet by 4 feet and covers most of the gaming table. We write the altitude of the character right on the board with a dry-erase marker next to the mini. It's a bit more expensive than a battlemat but we've used it for over a year now, and I think I've gotten my money's worth out of it.

 

[IceBear]

Hmmm...
I never used an actual battlemat. Can you wipe off dry-erase markers on them? We actually use a dry-erase presentation board from an office supply store. I found one with a one inch grid already on it. It's about 3 feet by 4 feet and covers most of the gaming table. We write the altitude of the character right on the board with a dry-erase marker next to the mini. It's a bit more expensive than a battlemat but we've used it for over a year now, and I think I've gotten my money's worth out of it.

I draw on mine all the time with dry erase pens. It's easier to carry around as it can roll up quite nice.

IceBear

 

[AuraSeer]

IceBear, what manufacturer did you get your mat from? All the ones I've seen don't deal well with dry erase markers; they end up permanently dyed unless you erase them almost immediately.

I've always had to use wet-erase markers, like overhead projector pens, that you erase with a damp towel. With those, I've left a dungeon drawn on the map for weeks at a time, and had it wipe off with no trouble.

[Edit: That's a damp towel. Not a damn towel.]

 

[boxstop7]

I've used separate parts of my megamat for each situation. One part tracks movement on the X/Y axes, and we'll use a separate section of the mat to track movement on the Z axis. Minis for the X/Y part, then we just pick a die or a glass bead to represent our character to keep track of the Z axis.

~Box

 

[Sixchan]

I had a friend who had a thing for making Dice towers. I'd guess that if He's still playing, he probably has the Mini on a d6, and then if he goes higher, he'll go on 2 d6s, and so on...
Fun to do until someone reaches for the bottle of Coke and knocks everything over.