Tactical Markers: What's Your Preference?

[Uder]

I use a combination. For the map, I use wet-erase battlemats (some pre-drawn), printed maps, fully-modeled terrain, and paper terrain. For figures I use miniatures and fold-up paper minis, along with tokens for swarms. I use print-out templates for most spell effects (I have multiples for those that stay in place, like fogs or wall spells). For markers I use my pad of paper 1.0 to write notes or a simple d20 next to the fig for damage done.

 

[Jack Daniel]

Odd. Moldvay Basic D&D page B61 suggests a 1" = 5' scale.

<snip>

Which Basic/Expert set says that only one man can occupy a 10' square. Wouldn't that make melee combat require pikes?

Huh. You're right about Moldvay suggesting a five-foot scale on page B61, but it contradicts itself on page B19 ("If miniature figures are used, the actual movement of characters can be represented on a scale of one inch equals ten feet. A movement rate of 60' per turn would mean that a miniature figure would move 6 inches in that turn.") This text is reproduced almost verbatim in the Mentzer Basic Set ("Scale Movement," bottom of page 57 in the Player's Manual), and it's even more explicit in the Rules Cyclopedia that the ten-foot scale applies to combat as well as dungeon exploration (page 87, "When you use miniatures to conduct combat, 1" on the table surface represents 10' of distance.")

All the versions of Basic D&D are consistent in stating that characters must be within 5' of each other to conduct melee, but these days, I just read that to mean that meleed characters are standing in the same 10' square, dueling and wrestling and whatever else one might do in a foggy, chaotic scrap. And as more and more combatants enter the melee, it actually helps to clarify why Basic D&D is so insistent on distinguishing Fighting Withdrawal vs. Full Retreat for characters trying to disengage from hand-to-hand combat. (Personally, I find this much easier to adjudicate and keep track of than threatened squares and attacks of opportunity.)

I like the ten-foot scale for many practical reasons. I can put lots of battlefield or dungeon on my tabletop all at once; it doesn't seem like the monsters and characters can cross said encounter area as quickly as if I were using a five-foot scale, so it feels like there's more room to maneuver tactically; and one ten-foot square is such a large area in terms of "game space" that there's plenty of room for abstracting the combat action, and for imagining what's really going on in melee situations. That said, I just can't conceive of using regular-sized miniatures on that scale, hence my oddball quest for alternatives.

 

[ExploderWizard]

(Personally, I find this much easier to adjudicate and keep track of than threatened squares and attacks of opportunity.)

I'm so with you on this one!

I like the ten-foot scale for many practical reasons. I can put lots of battlefield or dungeon on my tabletop all at once; it doesn't seem like the monsters and characters can cross said encounter area as quickly as if I were using a five-foot scale, so it feels like there's more room to maneuver tactically; and one ten-foot square is such a large area in terms of "game space" that there's plenty of room for abstracting the combat action, and for imagining what's really going on in melee situations. That said, I just can't conceive of using regular-sized miniatures on that scale, hence my oddball quest for alternatives.

I enjoy painting,modeling, and using my toys in play too much to give them up. I just need a bigger table.

 

[karlindel]

Play Surface/Terrain - Chessex Mondomat and dry erase markers. We also sometimes use maps predrawn on Gaming Paper. I tried using D&D minis tiles and Dungeon Tiles, but it always took too much prep to find the ones I wanted, and they didn't always represent what I wanted them to. I have considered picking up a few of the paizo flip-mats, and will probably try picking a couple up to see how I like them.

Miniatures - D&D Miniatures. I have a large collection, and it is nice to have something that looks like what I want it to represent.

Status Effects - Alea Tools Magnets. These are very handy for indicating effects, and the magnetic attraction makes them easy to stack.

 

[Holy Bovine]

I use a combination of a battlemat, dungeon tiles and the newest addition the paizo flip-mats. I am really liking the flip mats (for those who don't know they have a really nice map of a location on one side then a blank side with just grass or wood flooring or stonework on the other - this gives a lot of variety in backgrounds and outdoor encounters feel like their outdoors with a grass coloured mat). The flip mats can also have dry or wet erase markers used on them with no colour bleed (a HUGE benefit as most of the players use dry erase markers to track power use, hps etc on their character folders dry erase and battlemat do NOT mix).

For keeping track of conditions we are currently just using small coloured elastic bands but I think we will move to something like the Penny Arcade guys use - round stickers with the condition they grant marked right on them.

 

[Festivus]

Play surface - Typically I use my flip mats, but whenever possible I will use printed maps as I have a lot of them that I have collected over the years. I find those really fun to use in game.

Miniatures - I have a lot of them, and usually will use those. In a pinch I will use tokens and pogs that I have from both the Fiery Dragon collection and generic ones WoTC has provided with some of the gameday material, but my preference is actual minis. If I am travelling far I'll use the token/pogs.

Status Effects - For monsters and badguys, I have a 3x5 index card that I track effects on them... but I am probably going to switch to a notebook or use some software to track that stuff because at higher tiers it gets rather silly how many effects and when they end can get. As a note, I put the onus on the players to remind me if I miss a status effect. It's to their benefit and it helps them to pay attention to things going on.

For players, I hand them an index card with the effect placed on them and if it's a save I say hand it back when you save, if it's till monster X turn, it says Monster X turn on it.

 

[Jack Daniel]

You know, I just picked up the basic Paizo flipmat a couple of days ago, and I have to say, I'm head over heels in love with it. As if the dry erase surface weren't enough of a selling point, it both folds up (MUCH easier to transport than a roll-up battlemat) and manages to unfold and lay flat with a minimum of fussing. And the price was right. A wonderful thing Paizo put out there.

 

[Verdande]

I dislike battle-mats, and miniatures in my role-playing game. Anything more than a dry-erase board for complex fights is far too much "fiddly bits" for me.

This comes from a man who loves Descent: JitD (the reigning champion of fiddly-bit-having games), so it's not just me being codgy.

 

[Krensky]

I have a few flip mats, a one foot by two foot wet/dry whiteboard, some homemade pressboard tokens for the PCs and the typical bad guys and NPCs, and a bag of 1", 2" and 3" wooden disks from a craft store with numbers scrawled on them in black sharpie. The tokens are a mix of images, many of them from Fiery Dragon's Counter Collection. The big one of JPGs. Color laser to a full page label, label stuck to pressboard, and some time with a matte cutter.

Combat typically doesn't involve any of that, although I make it a point to pull it out semi-regularly since one of my players really likes grid combat. Most combat is purely descriptive, or with a quick not to scale map to provide relative location.

Or, with vehicles, it's so abstracted maps wouldn't be possible anyway.

 

[samursus]

Characters: We use DDM minis... I have a few hundred or so... so they can usually find one close enough to represent their PC.

Monsters: I kinda a try to use DDM minis, but most of the time I resort to 1" mini poker chips I bought online a few years ago.. I have 20 each of about 12 colours. The nice thing about them is being able to write numbers on them with dry-erase.

Conditions: I use my collection of plastic pop-bottle rings I have accumulated after someone on ENWorld mentioned the idea when 4e first came out.

Maps: Pretty much use my Paizo flip-mat exclusively now. I had/have 2 other laminated grids (one hand-drawn, one from a 3.5 rulebook) but I LOVE the easy portability of the flip-mat. I am thinking of using regular graph paper for exploring as some have previously mentioned, using the flip-mat for combat only. If I have the time and inclination I will pre-draw the battle scene using the 12-colour dry-erase set I just bought, to occasionally make a vibrant map. Also planning on getting into the Dungeon Tiles: Master Sets, just to try out.