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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Richards" data-source="post: 8294036" data-attributes="member: 508">I've picked up quite a few of the Toobs line at Michael's craft stores.  Sometimes they can be used as-is (monstrous scorpions, spiders, centipedes, etc.), sometimes they make fairly close substitutes (dinosaurs can be used for dinosaurs but an ankylosaur also makes a decent rust monster and a velociraptor makes an okay digester...plus green caterpillars from the bug Toob make fine carrion crawler stand-ins).I've also purchased several dragons from Michael's, as well as few others that have been used for my D&D games: the cyclops, four-headed hydra, chimera (although its size forced me to create "dire chimera" stats), and griffin (likewise, I made "dire griffin" stats for my cyclops as a riding mount).  And I've picked up several large plastic "bugs" at Target for a buck each: two spiders, two scorpions, and a bee.  (They also had a grasshopper and an ant; I regret not having picked up an ant when I had the opportunity.)I've used a Tars Tarkas action figure (from the "John Carter of Mars" series) as an animated statue of Hextor, as each has six limbs.I still use the plastic minis that came with my HeroQuest board game: skeletons, zombies, mummies, orcs, goblins, the gargoyle, and chaos warriors can be used as is, the chaos mage makes a fine lich, and in a pinch the fimirs can be used for lizardfolk.  Plus the stand-up doors and some of the dungeon dressing (table, throne, bookcase, etc.) come in handy on occasion.And then I've made some homemade "minis" of the larger creatures using cardboard and craft paper: a wood colossus (basically a house that took human form), a stone colossus (same deal but with a small castle keep), a walking brain (more or less actual-sized human brain with bent soda-straw "tentacle legs" resulting in a 14"-tall "mini" for a creature standing 70 feet tall, and a zygomind (twisting, coral-like structures grown into a giant egg shape, with a ring of pink tentacles along the bottom).  I also built a "costume" around one of my Target spiders to turn it into a mechanical retriever.But quantity-wise, the most "non-standard" minis I've used are stand-up tokens using images I've found on-line and scaled down to the appropriate size.  Those are basically rectangles with triangles at each side, so I can bend them along the seams and they'll stand up.  (I've found it helps to trim a slight angle along the bottom the triangles, so the whole thing leans back a bit - otherwise, they tend to tip over.)  I have probably hundreds of those I've made over the years, to the point it's sometimes easier to print out a new batch than hunt up the old ones I used several years ago and are somewhere in my "homemade tokens" drawer....Johnathan</blockquote>

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