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View Full Version : Where can I find a good dry erase board?



PMDM
2008-03-05, 09:23 PM
There aren't enough topics on this board about where to find some roleplaying supplies. I need to find a good dry erase board, so my group can have some better visualization of the battles. Where can I find some grid lined dry erase boards?

DraPrime
2008-03-05, 09:39 PM
You could simply buy a regular dry erase board at an office supply store, and then use a ruler to (carefully) make a grid using permanent markers. Should work.

CASTLEMIKE
2008-03-05, 09:39 PM
Check out Amazon, Office Depot, Office Max or Walmart.

Chronos
2008-03-05, 10:12 PM
You could also keep an eye out for schools doing renovations, and getting rid of their old boards. A few friends of mine picked up some that way. Of course, you can't guarantee availability, but you can't beat the price.

Farmer42
2008-03-05, 10:16 PM
There are also several different wet-erase mats with grids that come in numerous sizes from several different vendors.

Snadgeros
2008-03-05, 10:49 PM
Alternatively, rather than using permanent maker (thick lines, hard to draw walls, etc.), just get a regular dry erase board and LIGHTLY use a boxcutter to engrave the grid in.

Farmer42
2008-03-05, 10:53 PM
If you do that you can then take some in and put it in the lines, wiping away the excess on the non-engraved surface.

RTGoodman
2008-03-05, 11:28 PM
Depending on your location, there may be a teacher's supply store somewhere near you. They should probably have already-lined boards. I know they have 'em with the music staff and stuff on them, so surely someone has made a 1-inch grid board for geometry or something like that.


Alternatively, you could use my personal favorite method. Go buy yourself a couple of sheets of poster paper (more than one, in case you mess up), a yardstick (if you don't own one), and some permanent markers. Find a big flat surface, and using pencil and then permanent marker, make your own 1" grid system on the poster paper. Then, just take the lined poster paper to your local Staples, Office Depot, or whatever other office supply-type store, and have them laminate it for you (since almost all places like that have big industrial printers and laminators for signs, posters, banners, and whatnot). Once they give it back to you, voila! Just buy some wet-erase markers and maybe a spray bottle and go to town.

valadil
2008-03-06, 12:42 AM
I got mine from college. I was working in the CS department when one of the Ph.D. students graduated. I was told to clean out his desk. When I went to bring the whiteboard out of his office I somehow missed the dumpster and dropped the thing in the back of my car instead. Oops.

I spent a good hour with a sheet of cardboard drawing gridlines. The board was 3'x5', so even a yardstick wouldn't cut it. After some minor use I went to clean it with Expo board cleaner and learned that permanent marker isn't so permanent. Having wasted an hour of my own time I'm going to second the suggestion of carving lines into your board. Or just buying a battlemap. I think chessex makes them. They're roughly the same price, they come with lines, and they roll up for easy transport. Sometimes you can order misprints for even cheaper.

Farmer42
2008-03-06, 12:44 AM
Crystal Caste's battle mats are nice, too. Double sided hex/squares, and affordable. I picked up my table sized mat at GenCon for around $30 US.

Nohwl
2008-03-06, 01:17 AM
Check Walmart.

Zeful
2008-03-06, 01:28 AM
Get a sheet or two of glass or lucite (bullet proof plastic, but can be deceratvie) and just caulk a battle mat or some 1inch square paper in between.

TheThan
2008-03-06, 02:35 AM
I got lucky and inherited a chessex battle map from a former friend. I also have a board game called Decent: journey into the darkness. It comes with cardboard cutouts that “snap” together to make dungeon terrain. The game is sort of like runebound (least I think its runebound), only the players play against a DM and try to survive a dungeon to complete predetermined quests.

descent webpage (http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/descent.html) if anyone’s interested.

The terrain comes in several sized pieces

2x2 inch pieces
4x2 inch pieces
6x2 inch pieces

4x4 inch pieces
6x4 inch pieces
6x6 inch pieces

T shaped sections (4x4)
Cross shaped sections (4x4 also)
Right angel shaped pieces (again 4x4)


The pieces work great for dungeons as flooring is preprinted on it. I also use the terrain out of The Mines of Moria boxed set for the LOTR minis game. Also the minis themselves the box comes with (the fellowship, 24 moria goblins and a cave troll) are great for use as dnd minis. Anyway that’s what I have, I’d love to expand on it, but I can’t afford it right now. Though I would love some trees for forests.


Edit
I’m fortunate enough that the local gaming store is located down the street (two doors over) from a model train store. They have all sorts of terrain and other nifty stuff. I wish I could go nuts and built a super awesome game table for minis games and dnd.

kamikasei
2008-03-06, 02:46 AM
I’m fortunate enough that the local gaming store is located down the street (two doors over) from a model train store. They have all sorts of terrain and other nifty stuff. I wish I could go nuts and built a super awesome game table for minis games and dnd.

This (http://www.penpaperpixel.org/tutorials/tabletopprojection/) is what I would love to have the money, time, and space to do. *Drools*

Rad
2008-03-06, 03:05 AM
I've found that most battlemats are affordable and have the good advantage of it being possible to roll them up. Paizo had some Chessex mats with not-perfectly-straight lines at a very convenient price last time I looked; I am playing with one of those now and it works wonderfully.

AslanCross
2008-03-06, 03:11 AM
This (http://www.penpaperpixel.org/tutorials/tabletopprojection/) is what I would love to have the money, time, and space to do. *Drools*

Same here. Alas, LCD projectors here cost about as much as a car, which I would rather have.

Anyway, I recently put together my own mats. All I did was draw an inch grid in pencil on A3 paper, then had those laminated. It works pretty well with a dry-erase/whiteboard marker. I have two of those, and A3 is good enough for most of our battles.

TheThan
2008-03-06, 04:53 PM
This (http://www.penpaperpixel.org/tutorials/tabletopprojection/) is what I would love to have the money, time, and space to do. *Drools*

*joins the club*

gnomas
2008-03-06, 09:45 PM
This (http://www.penpaperpixel.org/tutorials/tabletopprojection/) is what I would love to have the money, time, and space to do. *Drools*

that is so cool! i doubt i will ever be able to do that though:smallfrown:

Ryver
2008-03-06, 09:52 PM
Another option you might try is to use a poster frame.

I went out and bought a large poster frame, 18"x24". Then I went to this site (http://incompetech.com/graphpaper/plain/) and got a PDF to fit the frame. Kinko's printed it off for me, and what I ended up with is an 18"x24" piece of clear plastic with a 1" grid under it.

I haven't tested it in action yet, but a word to the wise: pay attention to the hardware on the back, and make sure that the frame will lie flat on a table. Mine's kinda curvy, and the mounting brackets get in the way. Oh well. The whole thing cost me less than $20, so it's not a huge deal if I need to get another frame.

Hope this helps someone, even if it won't work for the OP.

Barring that, AslanCross has a good idea.

TheThan
2008-03-07, 03:21 PM
Barring an actual grid, what we’ve done is use what I call the Grid to inch conversion.

All it requires is minis and a tape measure. On the tape measure 1 inch equals 5 feet. So a human with 30-ft movement can move 6 inches on the table. A halfing with 20-ft movement can move 4 inches and so on. We use it on the LGS nice terrain tables. He’s got trees and buildings and all sorts of terrain. Makes for great immersion.

CASTLEMIKE
2008-03-07, 03:43 PM
Go to Amazon and type "white board grid" on page 3 the cheapest was a 24 W by 18 H magnetic 2 sided starter white board with a grid on one side and plain on the other for $55 -56.

Cheapest besides finding a white board is to tape some graph paper together (trim something printed by your computer (pdf graph paper link was pretty cooll allowing to change graph sizes)) and laminate it.

Rockphed
2008-03-08, 01:16 AM
I think I saw a 3' by 4' whiteboard with gridlines at a Teacher Supply store for 15 or 20 bucks, but my memory is foggy.