Battle Grids

[Tyrael]

What do you guys use? The standard ones packaged in the miniatures boxes? Whiteboard? Etc, etc. I've heard that whiteboard is the best to go with, but wouldn't you need to re-draw the grid every time you erased something?

[Falconsflight]

Actually, someone, Not sure who the makers are, created a mat that wet or dry erase can be put on and it already has a grid and everything. Hexes and squares.

[Arlanthe]

I too use the dry erase mat. The make it in several sizes, with hexes and squares. We have a medium and large one.

These are awesome, and you can place terrain over it and such.

[squishycube]

Same as Arlanthe in my group; we have a large dry erase mat with hexes on one side and squares on the other.

[Accersitus]

We bought a cheap whiteboard, and used a knife to make a grid. It works great

[the_tick_rules]

dry erase board. some of our pc's have mini's, some use dice. for bad guys we use those glass die counters. our dm cut good 5 foot square into the dry erase board , good stuff.

[Sulecrist]

Actually, someone, Not sure who the makers are, created a mat that wet or dry erase can be put on and it already has a grid and everything. Hexes and squares.

Steel Sqwire?

(Steel Sqwire has several really nice mats with both wet and dry-erase. Reverse sides have scenes on them or hexes. They're excellent.)

[NotCC]

The same people who make most of your dice also make mats of all sizes.

http://www.chessex.com/

[BrokenButterfly]

Never gotten around to buying a dry-wipe map, but I've always meant to, they'd make life soo much easier. I tend to use whiteboard for large encounters that would be impractical to hand-draw, and I try to hand-draw on to paper if it's one room, or a small area we're going to be fighting in. I just try and prepare stuff ahead of time. I enjoy using all of my D&D Minis though, especially on the rare occassion that you actually have the correct one...

[Mr the Geoff]

Yeah we use a chessex mat too. Not only does it wipe clean but it also doesn't matter if yo spill drinks etc on it - a big plus in our games

[TheOOB]

I took the grid paper in the D&D mini starter pack and had it laminated. I still plan on getting a nice vinyl mat sometimes, but these work for now.

[Morgan_Scott82]

I found a whiteboard that came pre-made with a grid in place at a local warehouse store, its worked great.

[Fhaolan]

We use a variety of methods, depending on which house we are at. I have a Chessex battlemap. At another house, we have a large whiteboard. At the third house the player managed to rescue a large blackboard from an old school that was being torn down. At the final place, and possibly the most interesting, the player uses a large sheet of plexiglass/lexan. He had access to a large-format plotter at one point, so he printed out a bunch of square and hex grids of different sizes. He just puts the grid paper under the plexiglass and we can use wet or dry erase markers on it.

As a note, some brands of red erase markers (both dry and wet) are tricky to erase as they seem to stain the surface somewhat. I'm not sure which brand it is anymore, as we've avoided the red ones for quite some time now.

[LoopyZebra]

Here's my quick, dirty solution:

Go to Home Depot, or your local home improvement store. Buy a sheet of Plexiglass. Mine was 3x5, I think, and around $10. It erases dry-erase markers pretty well, although if you leave it to set too long, you'll have to use water to get it off. You can put mats/grids under the board, or draw/tape a grid onto the board and put background scenery under it. The plexiglass is also relatively easy to cut to the size you need, so it can fit over your table/counter/whatever.

Easy, and cheap.

[Matthew]

The backs of Cereal Packets have served me well over the years...

[El Jaspero, the Pirate King]

I use a wet-erase battlemat when DMing; my friend John, who also DMs, prefers to project his maps onto whiteboard sheets we put on the table. It's sure sexier, but even if you're doing something prepackaged you have to do a bunch of prep work and, meh...I'm lazy I guess.

My friend Tom is a HUGE fan of Tact-Tiles, and there are definite reasons to use them, but man a stack of those things is heavy and I hear they're pretty easy to scratch, and once that happens they're done.

[BardicDuelist]

Both of our primary DM's (my friend and myself) have wet erase mats. They cost about $20. If we don't have them, I typically use graph paper. We prefer mini's, but use basically anything depending on the situation. My one friend was very often a simple "W" which we erased as he moved. It could make for difficulties, but it worked.

[Arbitrarity]

I drew a 40x30 grid.

On paper.

With marker.

Actually, 2 grids.

Sadly, non-erasable. I need to get something eraseable.

[El Jaspero, the Pirate King]

I have also seen con DMs who just draw out the entire dungeon on a giant piece of graph paper before the game, instead of drawing it while the players are waiting. It sorta gives away what's behind some of the doors and such, but saves a ton of time.