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Hi everyone,

Not sure if this is in the right place...

With all the expensive gaming boards out there (Realm of Battle...), I would like to offer affordable custom gaming board to people. I will make the gaming boards in 2x2 squares that have inserts to hold together so they don't slip around while gaming and so you can easily change table sizes and store them.

The pieces will come flocked and painted to your choosing.

I have attached some pictures of the a 2x2 section I did, as this was the first one, there will be improvements. Eventually I will do more grass, urban, and even lava tables.

Since I need money to kick-start this idea, I will offer the first person who wants to do a pre-order at 25% off my already low price. Price for an interlocking 6x4 sanded and painted will be $180. A 4x4 table will cost a low $120. You can always add simple things like grass flocking, low rocks or bushes for only a little more. For the first few tables, I'd like to keep it simple.
Estimated time is one week for completion of a table. Buy pays shipping, I will ship anywhere as long as you pay for it.

This fully finished table is over $100 cheaper than a Realm of Battle board that hasn't even been painted!

What are your thoughts? Price to high? Too Low? Is anyone interested?

I also run a model painting service here:
www.wix.com/lazulipainting/home

I can be contacted through:
Private Message or
So_Rice@ymail.com

Thanks for looking!

Looks good!

I bought a similar product a few years ago from a site called Battlescapes.com (no longer in business) and your prices are a bit lower than theirs were. Their boards were high quality durable foam that are still quite functional after five years of use.

What kind of life span would you give your boards? Your prices seem reasonable at $30 a board considering the boards come painted.

I know you stated you wanted to keep things simple at first, but offering boards with some dug in features like trenches, craters, or rivers, would be nice options for customers.

I bookmarked your commission painting website and look forward to following the progress of your game boards. Do you plan on offering your boards through your painting site?

Hi DarkTraveler 777,

I will make trench, lava, and river board after I make one or two first. Those will be cut from Pink Insulation Foam and mounted on hardwood (?)

I guess I forgot to mention what it's mounted on. The board itself is 1/2 inch wood, these things will probably last forever. I will either sell them through my website or make a new one (still combining painting and boards).

Thanks for your interest.

EDIT: The foam boards and take damage over time which is why I'm using a thick piece of wood that will never warp or break due to weight.

Sounds great (though heavy!). The wood should add some nice durability.

Price seems reasonable, well depending on shipping costs.

Looking forward to seeing more, especially the urban and trench boards

Prices are good, and that board you have, while simple, looks nice. I can't imagine how shipping them will be though. It will definitely be expensive, and I'm not sure what you can do to keep them safe in transit. I wish you the best of luck regardless!

Shipping should be just $20 or $3 to the USA. I will look for a cheaper option to ship the boards too. They will be wrapped in bubble wrap and have peanuts to they shouldn't get damaged too much. I'm going to put more sample boards up next week with city and grass.

Just to chime in again, the boards I bought a few years back from Battlescapes.com were packaged in a large box with bubble wrap on the inner sides of the box, and a layer of bubble wrap sandwiched between the stacked boards. It worked very well, but shipping was pricy. They were shipped via FedEx which ran between $40-60 depending on how many boards were ordered.

Since [So]Rice's boards look very similar to Battlescapes' boards a similar packing method might work out. I still use the shipping boxes to store my game boards as they are a perfect fit and have kept the boards dust and clutter free in my garage for the last five years.

Even if [So]Rice's price to ship is doubled, the final price of a completed 6X4' set of game boards is damn reasonable considering they will show up ready to use right out of the box.

I'm actually considering buying one. From you.

So...yeah! Good job!

1.) Although it does look OK, it seems awfully plain. Is it just a 2x2 sheet of MDF that's been texture painted and drybrushed? Will the other tiles look the same? Because, not trying to be all negative, but expensive as the ROBB is, it definitely offers more skulls skulls skulls variety. I might have a hard time justifying a premium price on something I can get off the shelf at Home Depot and have ready to go in an afternoon. I think you might need to start off the bat with at least some textured surface of pink foam.

2.) One idea for locking them might be, assuming the board is half an inch thick, using 1/4" dowels that are carefully drilled in the same place on every tile. I don't know how your clips will work - could be better.

3.) I think shipping is probably going to murder your profits. I do wish you luck, however - this is an area with little competition and could use some.

DarkTraveler777 wrote:Just to chime in again, the boards I bought a few years back from Battlescapes.com were packaged in a large box with bubble wrap on the inner sides of the box, and a layer of bubble wrap sandwiched between the stacked boards. It worked very well, but shipping was pricy. They were shipped via FedEx which ran between $40-60 depending on how many boards were ordered.

Since [So]Rice's boards look very similar to Battlescapes' boards a similar packing method might work out. I still use the shipping boxes to store my game boards as they are a perfect fit and have kept the boards dust and clutter free in my garage for the last five years.

Even if [So]Rice's price to ship is doubled, the final price of a completed 6X4' set of game boards is damn reasonable considering they will show up ready to use right out of the box.

That's exactly how I was planning to pack them ^_^ Bubble in between the individual boards too.

Goddard wrote:I'm actually considering buying one. From you.

So...yeah! Good job!

Thanks, like I said, I'll have more samples up this week.

Ouze wrote:1.) Although it does look OK, it seems awfully plain. Is it just a 2x2 sheet of MDF that's been texture painted and drybrushed? Will the other tiles look the same? Because, not trying to be all negative, but expensive as the ROBB is, it definitely offers more skulls skulls skulls variety. I might have a hard time justifying a premium price on something I can get off the shelf at Home Depot and have ready to go in an afternoon. I think you might need to start off the bat with at least some textured surface of pink foam.

2.) One idea for locking them might be, assuming the board is half an inch thick, using 1/4" dowels that are carefully drilled in the same place on every tile. I don't know how your clips will work - could be better.

3.) I think shipping is probably going to murder your profits. I do wish you luck, however - this is an area with little competition and could use some.

This one was just a test, but there will be more variety with grasses and not be as boring. Yes the dowel rods were exactly what I was thinking, I think it would work better than clips that could snap. There was a shipping option that if I recall correctly was $20-$30, I could be able to sell a few locally since there's a pretty big gaming community here.

Craigslist might be a possibility, as well - it's not just for pedophiles and meth addicts, you know!*

*just mostly

Nice idea. I have some issues with it though.

1: I dont like rough flock boards, if a metal mini falls over its game over for the paintjob and I spend hours and hours on every mini.
Can there be an alternative for rough sand flock like a fabric canvas?
I made my own table using watered down wood glue on the surface and just putting on soft fabric on it and applying watered down colour to the fabric as it was wet and waited for the glue to cure.

2: Sturdiness. Many people only have small/smaller tables to set up the pretty big 48X72 gaming table on. If you take the average table and apply the TT squares on it will the interlocking mechanism be of such quality that the pieces wont wobble or fall of a smaller surface?

Pyriel- wrote:Nice idea. I have some issues with it though.

1: I dont like rough flock boards, if a metal mini falls over its game over for the paintjob and I spend hours and hours on every mini.
Can there be an alternative for rough sand flock like a fabric canvas?
I made my own table using watered down wood glue on the surface and just putting on soft fabric on it and applying watered down colour to the fabric as it was wet and waited for the glue to cure.

2: Sturdiness. Many people only have small/smaller tables to set up the pretty big 48X72 gaming table on. If you take the average table and apply the TT squares on it will the interlocking mechanism be of such quality that the pieces wont wobble or fall of a smaller surface?

Hi Pyriel,

You bring up a very good points about the rough flock and the locking mechanism. I flock I am going to use, isn't going to be super rough, but if a miniature falls on a normal table it's going to be damaged just the same, even if the hard table has cloth on it. The individual table parts with be done with dowel rod inserts which should hold the table together well, but its is something I am going to have to test first.




Automatically Appended Next Post:
Update,

Went to the store to buy the wood, none of it was sold in 2ft. x 2ft, only 2ft. x 4ft. I asked the guy to cut the board into 2ft. x 2ft, but that didn't end up well. He cut them as much as 3 inches off (probably didn't even bother to measure the wood in the first place) so I refused to pay for them and ended up just getting 4ft. x 2ft boards.

The shipping price shouldn't be affected too much, still estimating around $30 to get them shipped. Anyways, will have the first board done and posted up here for sale in a few days.

Thanks to everyone who showed interest. If I can get a reliable place to cut my boards, I will revert to doing them in 6 2x2 pieces instead of 3 2x4's.