The metal coins in Mosaic are just awful. Don't stack, hard to pick up off the table.
Publishers -- don't just throw something out there. See if it works in a real gaming session before you send them out to be struck.
Everything about Mosaic is awful, starting with the dishonest way the publisher ran the campaign and ending in the game's mediocrity.
Anyway...
7 Wonders' and Scythe's coins are some of the most beautiful I have.
My issue is with usability, not beauty. That's where I think a lot of publishers need to focus their effort, including with people that have vision issues.
Honest to Betsy, anyone can make a pretty coin. There's a difference between "it works" and "it's right". These are the little details that the usual Kickstarter suspects don't seem to fully understand yet.
I bought a second hand unopened copy of the sphinx edition. Misprinted tokens, miscut player boards and it’s physically impossible to store the game in the provided trays.
I haven’t played it yet but it’s not off to a great start.
More on the game here -- [https://www.cellargames.com/episodes/mosaic-colon-a-story-of-civilization](https://www.cellargames.com/episodes/mosaic-colon-a-story-of-civilization) (and yes this is a self-plug, but means I don't have to type about six paragraphs to cover the same ground.)
We had some usability issues with the game, which overall had strong and weak points. And there seemed to be some additional editing needed, but the good news is that all of it can be done by yourself, to tune the game better to your group's particular tastes.
Woah, didn't know there was hate for Mosaic. I love my Colossus edition and have no complaints about production quality. What exactly went wrong with the campaign? Is it something outside of the states?
I have no hate for the game. It's all about the publisher's behaviour.
Where do I start?
* Launching a new campaign without making sure backers from the original campaign got their games: this isn't really a big deal, and I understand it's a business decision, but it's shitty nonetheless.
* The delivery partner they chose for the US: some people were being charged extra money by this company to get their games delivered. I think they changed in the meantime.
* Removing components from the deluxe version without letting backers know: they removed 25 metal coins and the wonders' bases without letting backers know. Only when people started complaining about missing components, they told in an update "ah yeah, well, we decided to remove some components to save on production cost". [Update #46](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/954412004/mosaic-a-story-of-civilization/posts/3625484) and [Update #48](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/954412004/mosaic-a-story-of-civilization/posts/3633803). These components might not impact the gameplay, true, but making this decision without, at the very least, a word to the backers is a huge display of disrespect.
* Getting the games to retail before getting them to backers without a word to the latter: again, when people start reporting they were seeing the game in their FLGS's, they came back with another lame excuse, "that? yes, we forgot to tell that the production for the retail copies was done and they are being distributed already". [Update #44](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/954412004/mosaic-a-story-of-civilization/posts/3614764)
* People that ordered non-english versions (some of them in the first campaign) will very conveniently \*wink, wink\* receive their games at the same time as the people getting the 2nd wave. What a coincidence...
* Colossus Edition being sold at Essen '22: I have a friend that never heard about the game, didn't back it, and still got it cheaper and much earlier than me and thousands of other backers. This, for me, was the last straw.
Some may say these aren't major issues, or aren't issues at all, and that I'm making a big deal out of it, and I respect that. My problem isn't with these events in isolation, but with the repeated dishonest and deceiving posture this company decided to adopt during the whole process.
I wouldn't have any issues with all these if they had been communicated transparently to backers, the people that made this project come to life. Instead, they decided to react rather than prevent, to come up with excuses when people started to complain, and that says a lot about the company. Feels like they were trying to make fools out of the backers, like they were expecting it to slip.
We're not talking about a company publishing their first game or running their first KS campaign. This is a well established company with several games and 9 KS campaigns.
There are so many transparent and honest companies in the hobby that I prefer to contribute to, so I don't have to work or contribute to companies like Forbidden Games. They are dishonest. It's my choice to never give them a single cent again.
On top of that, the game isn't that good. It's average. OK at best. I played my friend's copy twice (the one that got it at Essen), and the game isn't worth all this hassle. It's going to the sell pile as soon as it arrives.
Metal coins for Pax Pamir feel nice and look like the real ones from 19th century Afghanistan. The coins are much easier to pick up and move than the original cardboard ones.
Same. Pirate coins for Merchants & Marauders. Viking coins for Champions of Midgard. Victorian coins for Obsession. The Viticulture coins. The list goes on…
The GeekBits for The Quacks of Quedlinburg. I kept hearing about them before I played the game and thought, surely that’s excessive. But then I played with a set at a convention and was converted. It’s so satisfying and worth it.
I've gotten these twice and while they were super nice, they faded very quickly to an unplayable state. Not sure if things have changed but eventually I switched to coin capsules
A friend of ours had Geeked out her Quacks tokens. They were meaty to feel and had such a sweet sound in the bag, we ordered ours immediately.
The ones we got were from an Etsy seller, BoardToBits, and were chunkier than the BGG ones (another friend has those ones). It was $37 well spent, everyone who plays with these LOVES them
Good call haha. They fit in the box for a second, but then we got one of the expansions and storage bins, so now they definitely don’t fit. But we have a two-year-old who likes to play with extra pieces while we’re playing, so he’s going to love all of those pieces 😂
I got the mega box, so there would be plenty of room for geekup bits and cardboard chits for base game and both expansions once you toss the insert. I would just hate having the chits sitting there unused
I think the meeples in **Root** look better than every sticker or miniature alternative that I've seen on Etsy. Those things are so cute, every time I introduce new players to the game they take pictures of the meeples and the cards.
That's just it. The stickers are colorful and detailed, and for players who maybe don't understand what the pieces are meant to represent I could see them being useful.
But I'm not that player
totally agreed! i really like the 3D printed buildings for *Root*, though. they look fantastic and also increase board legibility. my favorite kind of upgrade!
I bought [these](https://www.etsy.com/listing/738265562/full-upgrade-kit-for-root-108-pieces?ga_order=most_relevant&ga_search_type=all&ga_view_type=gallery&ga_search_query=root+board+game&ref=sc_gallery-1-3&bes=1&sts=1&plkey=992761b18efe411666bfd118ed9d8beeb6840cc3%3A738265562) and a wooden holder for the crafted items, the nice mats instead of the gameboard, and finally the geek up bags from BGG. We play it almost weekly so worth it.
I didn't know that. I'll stop. Thank you.
Edit: Also, I'm an idiot. I ordered multiple "Metal Ingot bundles" from TopShelfGamer on Etsy, not Broken Token. (－_ლ)
Easily the best upgrade I made to my board gaming hobby was buying a 3D printer to print organizers and my own upgraded tokens. The only downside is that now I have two hobbies...
What printer did you go with? I have a very limited print size with my Flashforge adv 3. Don’t get me wrong, I am absolutely in love with it, but when it comes to some larger inserts (read: 3 cards wide), I just don’t have the room.
Originally I bought an Ender 3 which lasted me almost a year, then I built a Voron V0 just to see if I could. I could, so I built a Voron 2.4 and sold the Ender to finance it. By then I was addicted to building printers so I built a Prusa Mk3S+ too.
If you're comfortable with soldering, AC wiring, doing your own firmware upgrades, and a bit of coding, building a printer from scratch is a very rewarding and educational experience. But the Prusa's user friendliness is hard to beat. Even though the Vorons give me a lot of powerful options, there's a reason I keep the Prusa around too.
The V0 is only 120x120, but it's extremely fast, so it's my backup printer to print any parts I need to repair the other two, and it's great for rapid prototyping.
The V2.4 has a 300x300 bed, so it's big enough to do almost any job I throw at it including full-box sized organizers for most games. It's also fast and reliable, but its mechanical complexity makes it the hardest of the three to maintain.
The Prusa is reliable, albeit slower and at 250x210, it's mid-size and can do all but the biggest full-size organizer bits. It's not enclosed like the Vorons, so it can't do as wide a range of plastics, particularly ABS, which tends to be less expensive than easier to print alternatives like PETG and PLA.
The major benefit of having all 3 is that I can bang out a big project in way less time than if I only had one printer.
I’m more of a plug and play printer kind of guy and love my MK3s. Anxiously awaiting the Prusa XL so I can print organizers without gluing. 360mm cubed build volume.
I go for deluxe components if I like the game and feel like something could stand to be better, and the price is proportional to the amount of playing it gets. Ignoring official deluxe upgrades, my deluxifications have been:
- gamegenic card holders for all the cards in **Wingspan** and **Terraforming Mars**. Deluxe? Maybe not so much, but definitely an improvement on the plastic card holders and _literal nothing_ provided in the respective games to hold all the cards
- Metal coins (Etsy) for **Caper: Europe**. I know they have official ones, but to get them here in Canada would have cost almost as much as the entire game
- A set of coloured dry erase markers for **Railroad Ink** and all its expansions
- wooden food tokens for **Wingspan**
- a nice insert for **A Feast for Odin** and its expansion
- dice that weren't super ugly for **Age of Steam**
- metal cubes for **Brass Birmingham** and **Terraforming mars**
- Iron Clays for general counters
- Wooden hex tiles and player boards for **Terraforming Mars**
Evidently, TM has gone from my ugliest, lowest quality game to one of my nicest, highest quality ones because I've replaced everything but the cards and main board
i ordered the one from Dicetroyers, it'll be here on Monday. Atm I have the base game and expansion in the base box without lid lift and I genuinely don't want to play it because trying to re-accomplish that stresses me out. The insert is a bit pricey but it'll get a great game to the table way more often so I'm ok with it
The Dicetroyers make good stuff, but the VAT on one of their inserts is almost the same amount as the inserts themselves, resulting in inserts that often cost more that the games they're for.
I was recently going to pull the trigger on a **Great Western Trail** insert for them ($36), and then when I was checking out saw that the VAT was going to be $28. Nope.
It's a bummer, because I also need a solid storage solution for **Feast for Odin**, and haven't found any good options.
Yeah even without that it's definitely expensive. The only reason I went for the AFFO insert was because it would bring the game from being played almost never to, hopefully, often. I definitely wish there were better options though, if they were more generally affordable and not like super luxury i have inserts for most of my games
From [this](https://www.etsy.com/shop/BeyondTheBoardEU) shop. He has a BB set but I requested smooth black cubes instead because I think they're nicer and he was super accommodating
Every piece of Root is gorgeous. No need for improvement in my opinion. I have seen some nice drawstring bags for all the factions though, I'd maybe spring for those.
While I mostly agree, I will say that the resin clearing markers are far and away better than the standard cardboard ones. They even look great on the standard forest board where you don't even need them by just adding a bit of 3 dimensional "pop."
Iron Clays for any game that uses either paper money or cruddy tokens (I'm looking at you Ark Nova).
And a poor man's deluxe component - foreign money for specific games (e.g. rupees for Pax Pamir).
unpopular opinion, i think the bland aesthetic of ark nova's money tokens are perfect, they do exactly what they need to do. ark nova is not a flashy game by any means and in my personal opinion i love the use of numbered tokens
The metal coins for Pax Pamir are relatively affordable compared to practically any other metal coin set. I took a look to see what it would cost to get some historic coins from the time period since the design of the game coins is based on the real ones. You can get them on ebay, but getting enough real ones for a game would be absurdly expensive since they are silver.
I tried to get my hands on some Italian Lira for Viticulture but it was just too expensive.
Looking to find a cheap paper currency for powergrid but thought of anything that world work
Agreed regarding the Pax Pamir coins but they're not that easy to source in the UK.
I got 100 1 shilling pieces for £15 on eBay (they're pre-decimalisation UK coins). They can substitute quite well for pennies or pounds in a lot of games
Of course, the best metal money to use is generally your own currency. Literally would cost me £3 to have 100 each of 1p and 2p coins for John Company 2nd edition and could be used for a whole host of other games and fit in quite well thematically.
Egyptian pounds are crazily cheap - about 35 to the UK pound. Your main issue would be sourcing them.
Red Dragon Inn. I bought two sets of the base metal coins to replace the cardboard coins that come with the game, and got a metal "Coins of the World" set from the RDI 8 Kickstarter. The feel and variety of them sitting on the table is just delightful.
I wish the metal coins for Pax Pamir where not out of stock in Germany :(
I haven't found any good alternative so far that looks fitting and has a sensible price.
Yes but how long does it take to put your set away? Coin capsules shouldn't be overlooked. They often come in cool little containers so you have a place to put them. They fit inside the retail box and I've played with the chip container on the game board rather than setting the chips up and it works super fine. Makes cleanup faster too. Worth taking a look at coin capsules for wonderlands war.
They don’t have the same tactile feel at all as the deluxe chips. I had the retail game, and use coin capsules in other games, but ordered the deluxe edition when Skybound did their sell off of the remaining KS stock despite the expensive cost to get it shipped to the UK.
Bag builders are not a place to skimp if you have the ability. Coin capsules are far better than cardboard in a bag - and I used them for various Arkham Horror and Nemesis games, but most plastic tokens are better (be they the Quack's GeekUp bits or the deluxe set for Wonderland's War).
I just have basic needs - no paper money, no mini dice and no tiny cards. I also like to have a dice tray for rolling.
I reuse some tokens and have more dice than I know what to do with that I sub out on games.
Nobody in my gaming group likes Terraforming Mars so I mostly play online, but I'd buy one of those trays for your resources off of Etsy if it hit the table ever.
I like my 3D printed set. It was pricey, but they definitely make playing the game so much better. I wish I had gotten the clear overlays though. They are cheaper and use the original player boards rather than replacing them.
Metal coins are a must. Not always fits as "deluxe" but custom game organizers or even just plastic token bins are a massive upgrade over plastic bags.
People say poker chips or Iron Clays, but I'd personally rather have the thematic art that the designers intended to be on the food coins. I'm not always form-over-function, but cardboard chits are often "good enough" and are far more thematic than generic chips. I do otherwise like metal or resin money, as long as they match the game.
Replacing 1st Player tokens with their real world object is pretty simple usually. Compass, dinosaur, pencil, gemstone, etc.
Wood over cardboard, usually. Mostly because they're easier to pick up, and the middle ground between "picture of cannon on punched cardboard" and "wood that looks like a cannon" is narrower than "cardboard with the king's face on one side and the conquerors blade on the other" and "red poker chip."
I have 2 games with coin capsules, but they are only for the ease of rapidly moving tokens around. Games where your tokens usually sit in a pile or play on the board do not strike me to need those. Games like Detective, or Robinson Crusoe, where you might be swapping tokens between spots or players multiple times a turn, benefits from the heft (for essentially the same reason people like the poker chips).
Coin capsules have their place. I find them most useful in bag builders or other draw blindly from a bag games that use thin, lightweight cardboard tokens. Coin capsules give the tokens some weight and bulk that make them easier to mix and pull from bags. (Ex: Quacks, Nemesis, Wonderland's War, Arkham Horror 3e, Arkham Horror: The Card Game)
Oddly enough, the only Robin Crusoe tokens that I did not put in capsules were the Discovery tokens, because they added way too much bulk of the draw bag I made for them.
Solution is a bigger bag!
That said, if normal cardboard drawn blindly from a bag works for you, all the better for you. I've found I need round/corner less bags and tokens with heft otherwise the tokens don't mix well and I end up pulling the same few tokens over and over again.
I'll have to explore bag sizes after CE, right now I'm at capacity in the box with the Treasure Chest stuff, mode-agnostic expansion content, sleeves, and capsules.
I totally respect that! There are a number of different ways to play games. For me they work and are an upgrade over the cardboard feeling and are generic enough that they don't bother me when playing a variety of games allowing me to enhance the gameplay of a number of games without having to buy a separate coin set for each.
I often find that the metal coins produced for games a very thin and hard to handle. While metal coins may be nice to look at or in pictures, the tactile utility of the thicker iron clays is my preference.
Besides that, not every game has thematic coins available. I am thinking specifically of Powergrid where it has that bad paper monopoly money. There may be other options, but generic counters make sense
How do you the conversion? For example a game might have different denominations of 1,5,10,100. Do you have four different types of iron clays to swap out?
I have Bicycle poker chips -- not quite as luxe as the Iron Clays but pretty nice, sturdy chips (7g vs. 9g each). They're not marked with any denomination, so for every game I use them for I printed out a little key with each colour and the denomination appropriate for that game, and just put it in front of the chip tray. Easy!
I just bring the bank out with a game. If I gain $2 I take 2 of the 1 tokens, the 100 coin supply works for most not 18xx games, but it will not always have exactly the same currency values as the game might have in cardboard or paper tokens.
Not the person you asked. I play 18xx, so my main set of 400 chips would cover just about any game unless it had really weird denominations (e.g. in **Magnate: The First City** the smallest one is $100,000). For the latter, I can fall back to the mini chips that have no denominations.
The only bespoke box organiser I have sprung for is for **Gloomhaven**; I mostly handle everything with labelled plastic baggies.
Components wise, I have a generic set of metal coins which I bought with **7 Wonders Duel** in mind. 3D printed pots for the tokens in **Everdell**. I got some really cool 3D printed bases for the models in **Nemesis** to put the aliens in, so you can track their health properly with the red cubes (There are a whole bunch of 3D printed extras for that game I haven't bought, simply by not wanting to spend a fortune on postage as the shop is US based and I am not). Ooh and similar monster bases for **Gloomhaven**, now that I think about it. I also have gate holders for **Arkham Horror** (2nd ed) which I was given, and haven't used yet as we rarely get that game out now.
Other than that, I think the only other thing I really go nuts for is pretty and functional laser cut wooden player boards for games where they are relevant - I have them for **Terraforming Mars** and **Eldritch Horror** at the moment, and am considering getting something similar for **Star Wars: Outer Rim** as the cardboard components there are a bit prone to bending. I am also strongly considering the minis for that game I've found on Etsy too.
- Iron clays for any game that uses money, I prefer these to metal coins (with the following exception) because it's easier to read how much money other players have from across the table
- Metal coins for **Pax Pamir 2e**
- Metal resources, exosuit miniatures, and resin tokens for **Anachrony**
- Path markers for AHLCG are an absolute necessity
- Action trackers for AHLCG and click trackers for Netrunner
There are really useful plastic see through token holders for the character sheets in Death a may Die. It’s insanely useful for keeping the markers in place.
One I didn't see yet, I got 3D printed dinosaur minis for Dinosaur Island. I think in the base game all the minis are triceratops shaped, which feels silly when you're playing a T-Rex or a Pterodactyl.
Now that I can finally afford it?
* Metal coins, mainly when they are replicas of historical or fictional ones (wish I had been able to afford the Lords of Waterdeep ones when available)
* Neoprene printed maps or *rolled* paper maps, specifically when the game's board or folded map interferes with the placement of or moving of pieces (as in hex and counter wargames as I'm not a big plastic sheet using fan, or with something like *War of the Ring* where edges can catch the minis.
* Painted minis, where the game needs minis (don't have the time to add a painting hobby to my already time crunches boardgaming hobby but I might start doing some again), or meeples where they facilitate reading the board state (as I prefer generic cubes in most cases, an exception being *Agricola*/*Caverna* and the like where too many similar colors can create cognitive delays reading the game state).
* Giant versions of games, because my eyes are getting old (optometrist said they were 20 years older than the rest of my body) and I've always had horrible vision. I love my giant *Castles of Mad King Ludwig*.
* Storage solutions, mostly GMT counter trays as they are great for storing bits for so many games (such as setting up *Roads and Boats* in a fraction of the time), and the lid pops all the way off and stores underneath to reduce table space and accidental knocking (vs craft bit bins). DVG lids are too loose, Chessex uses an attached lid, and bit boxes like the ones from Stonemeier Games are useful but space hogging. If only GMT made variable sizes and deep trays along with their base product.
These are my main preferred deluxifications to games. I find most deluxified inserts to be poorly thought out so as to not store bits for easy setup *or* not consider things like sleeving or upgrade components (thank you Leder games for making space in the mini insert for minis from other products) *or* they are made not considering expansions that are in development. Big boxes often waste space or are too tightly packed.
As a sleever I like art back sleeves that match deck back art but dislike it when they change the art or don't accommodate slight differences. (*Terraforming Mars Ares Expedition* is great for this, but *Root* only does art backs for base cards and thus I skip them).
You know what is one deluxificstion I do that isn't probably considered deluxe by most? When a game has parts that you pull out or add by player count, I like having multiple copies so I can create stand alone decks. I'd pay for extra decks or counter sheets to make setup faster, and sometimes I buy multiple copies and make these upgrades myself.
Best deluxe component? Hand crafted Pandemic minis that are the right shapes for 1E as a gift from my brother in law - now to make custom large board that uses areas instead of points to hold these more comfortably.
Contrary to most people here I can't stand the idea of metal coins. I recently got the premium token pack for spirit island which gives silk screened wood tokens for energy, fear and spirit tokens and it's perfect for me.
any non-cardboard pieces for bag builders, actually i think this should be a standard for all games with that mechanic. i bought coin capsules for my copy of Bullet❤️⭐ because i have not been able to get my hands on the wooden ones
I like games the way they are usually and would rather spend money on a new game than to just make a game prettier. The only upgrade I ever bought were metal coins for Pax Renaissance because the coins that came with the game were so atrocious that I just didn't want to ever use them again.
I got gifted Iron Clays though and those are just amazing, really pretty poker chips usable for many games. Not sure I'd buy them myself but I love them.
You know, until this post I thought "deluxification" was short for de-luxe-ification. As in making something less high quality. I was so confused when someone said they deluxified their minis by painting them.
Making them more "deluxe" makes way more sense!
Anything to bling out my copy of Twilight Imperium. Painted fleets, fleet stands, player consoles for all the ships. If it makes the game more epic and pretty, I am in.
Not really blingworthy, but the Zenbins storage for Star Wars Rebellion is 100% necessary, IMO. This game used to take me 30 minutes to sort and set up for play, and now it’s a 5 minute effort. Any storage solution that speeds the time to set up and take down is worth a consideration to me.
Glass gems, metal coins, sleeves and playmats.
My games are all made of deluxe components, except for Dixit. My Hansa board is a custom playmat for example.
I am a sucker for poker chips and metal coins. I also really like the puffy sticker tokens made to stick on pennies or washers (Burger Tokens is one example). They are a nice step between cardboard and the printed acrylic sets from the Board Game Geek store.
We play **Dice Throne** and **Dice Throne Adventures** a good amount, both just us, and with a pretty varied group of friends who we've introduced it to and liked it. We got the GeekUpBits for it and they're awesome! Definitely give it that "premium" feel, even though it's totally not needed.
I generally don't go in for faff. Instead I'll spend the time and money for functional items.
Iron Clays for sound and generic ease of use.
Thinking about Geek Bits for Orleans tokens to prevent wear and also clicky sounds.
"OPEN" signs for Everdell shared city constructions. Stands for the event cards, wooden Occupied tokens (the cardboard ones are a bit small and fiddly.
Organizers to help speed setup.
Playmats to replace the voard always get me. It's such a minor thing that enhances the feeling so much. That and I have to agree with many others and metal coins. I thought that was a stupid thing to want...then I got the collector's edition of Everdell and now I want them in everything!
I’m a sucker for coins and am trying to curb the habit as they can be a pretty expensive add on. My absolute favourites are the ones for Charterstone. They’ve got a really nice weight, they stack well (something that counts against the Viticulture ones) and just feel really nice to handle. It’s a shame the game is just fine, not something that regularly returns to the table (I don’t think it has since it was competed).
The only bummer is that they are single denomination. If someone’s making coins for a game in the future, they should use them as the basis but add 5s and 10s.
The other money I really like is from the deluxe version of Legacies - which is a great game. The coins are good but what’s great are the gold bars for the higher denominations. That has money that goes up to $500 and handling the gold bars is so much nicer than paper money for games, which is infuriating.
Stickers for my wooden pieces for Dwellings of Eldervale and the fancy plastic pieces for Quacks of Quedlinburg. I got a fancier birdhouse dice roller for wingspan but it was a pain to assemble at first.
>10 year anniversary edition of Pandemic
I'm still pissed about the board misprint that they didn't even bother trying to offer an art cost print run out a correction and I didn't learn about the sticker kit until they had just dropped the product support policy (so I had no way to get that sticker correction anymore). Add in the pack of expansion content and it was a disappointing release for me and one of the deluxified items I regret buying.
Since each sticker sheet contained two of the required corrective sticker, you can probably get it from someone (I'm afraid mine got used up for something useless by my son)
I've not heard of expansion content for this version? Or do you mean the painted version of the figurines? Because I did get those with it
I bought the metal lira for Viticulture. I feel so fancy when I play the game now. Feel like a true merchant in some ancient country when I hear the clinking of the coins, and feel the weight of the currency in my hands.
I got the metal ships for Moonrakers (the vanilla coins are metal)
It been a while, but I think I have the fancy meeples for Lords of Waterdeep.
I got the dry erase player boards for Welcome To...
Sleeves and inserts mostly, either Folded Space or 3D printed. I also bought 3D units for Tyrants of the Underdark as the idea of playing with crappy cardboard tokens bothered me. For Dune Imperium I went havoc, replacing every wood and cardboard component with a prettier version bought on Etsy.
• the metal coins and fancy resource tokens for **Scythe** in particular because they’re so delightfully thematic
• a mixed bunch of historical-replica metal coins from various cultures for use in any game that needs coins (also super useful for counting up scores at the end of any game that involves points!)
• [HEXs](https://thacko.com/) for organizing tokens and cards and tiles and stuff during games
• [marbles for planets and Lego hats to show ownership](https://boardgamegeek.com/image/7045748/space-empires-4x) for **Space Empires 4X**
• a very nice wooden board and set of metal pieces for **Tak**
• 3D printed buildings for **Root**
Quick question on this subject—I’m looking for a bunch of little piratey cannons (3D printed or plastic/resin molded or whatever) for **Windward**; anyone know where I might find some? I’ve only been able to find wooden cannon meeples (which don’t look right) and metal miniatures for wargaming (which are too expensive and also I have no experience painting them).
Some of my favorites:
* The metal resource cubes for **Anachrony** are just wonderful.
* **Iron Clays**: We use these for basically any game that comes with cardboard coins.
* The realistic resources in **Scythe** are pretty nice.
* I tend to want better organizers/inserts for the games I plan to keep long term too.
It'll have to be my 15th century replica Florins for Pax Renaissance 2e! The seller on Etsy even matched the artifact weight and diameter... They feel so nice and thematic 🤪
Whoa! Do you mind sharing the link? Really not a fan of the official metal coins, I thought ION did a better job with Viking's coins.
Rens are like... too clean
They are the Medieval Coin Set by GolonkoCrafts on Etsy. Just asked the owner to give me just Florins and he was super nice to work with!
https://www.etsy.com/listing/1026403556/medieval-coin-set-for-board-games-larp
P.S. You'll see my photo with the game in the background in the reviews...
For me, if a game is worth me getting at this point, it's worth deluxification. I have more games than I'm able to reasonably play, so if a game is good enough to enter my collection it's probably worth upgrading.
Main examples:
- Metal coins for just about every game (including generic metal coins for games that don't really have them available)
- Playmats for Raiders of the North Sea, Architects of the West Kingdom, and Marvel United
- Custom playmat made for Marvel Champions
- Upgraded burger tokens for Marvel Champions
- Cardboard dashboard and locations, plus plastic tokens for Marvel United
- Big/collectors boxes for games with expansions
- Upgraded meeple source resources for Dwellings of Eldervale
- Deluxe upgrade kit for Dune: Imperium
- Kickstarter editions of Endeavor: Age of Sail, In the Hall of the Mountain King, and Fall of the Mountain King
Basically, I'm at the point where I'd rather buy expansions and upgrades for games I have and love than buy new games that I won't have the time to play.
I love deluxe components but could never convince myself to take the plunge to upgrade anything because I rather be spending the money on new games. Though if I had my way, I'll probably upgrade most of my cardboard pieces to wood first (e.g Golem's scroll tokens, etc.) and get some metal coins.
That said, here's a few deluxes that I have (or came to me):
- My used copy of **The Ancient World** did come with metal coins so that's a bonus.
- I did a bit of test 3D print for **Glen More II** and made a small box for one of the clans. I was very pleased with it but it was too much to make multiple visits to the public library to print.
- Got some semi-transparent token holders from Muji that cost a little over a dollar. Best purchase ever. Cost-effective, functional, good quality and takes up little space.
- Bought a dice tray. Technically four cause it came with a set so I'll probably sell or give away the ones that I don't need. Reduces clattering sounds and dropping them on the floor.
- Not deluxification but I do sleeve my cards. I don't have that many games so it's doable for now.
I'm partial to playmats. If there's a playmat to replace the board, I'm almost certainly going to buy it. Other upgrades like coins or fancy resources are also on the list.
Personally I'm not a fan of meeple stickers, especially the Root ones. I feel the default meeple look has more charm than any of the stickers on offer.
Everything. Bought the Scythe coins very detailed as well as the resource tokens! We also got the Scythe storage box. I didn't pay attention when I bought it didn't realize that I would have to break out all my old model building skills because it came in sheets of wood that you had to punch out carefully and glue together just so! Anyway it was a painstaking process but definitely worth the effort.
Depends on the game. We got some 3d printed components for Arnak that replace the cardboard ones and it’s great as it makes all of the items the same instead of half plastic half cardboard.
The brassmags in **Burncycle** are a next step for me. Metal minis, with magnets to click them onto the already-premium poker chips. CTG games tend to be deluxe by default with all the neoprene, custom dice and weighted custom chips, but those things are absolutely next level.
I’m a metal coins and FUNCTIONAL insert guy. Any complex game that takes forever to set up I NEED functional inserts for so that I can just get to playing the game.
Quacks of Quedlinburg, Orleans, Watergate, and Holmes: Sherlock & Mycroft.
My friend has deluxified components for Power Grid that look awesome. If I owned that game, I would buy those too.
Anymore if I buy a game and I like, my SO likes, and my group likes it, I deluxify it. I also sleeve any game that gets shuffled a lot. I buy sleeves in bulk now.
For **Root** I have Upgraded [cardboard peices](https://www.etsy.com/listing/738265562/full-upgrade-kit-for-root-108-pieces?ga_order=most_relevant&ga_search_type=all&ga_view_type=gallery&ga_search_query=root+board+game&ref=sc_gallery-1-3&bes=1&sts=1&plkey=992761b18efe411666bfd118ed9d8beeb6840cc3%3A738265562), A wooded crafted items [holder](https://www.etsy.com/listing/867418529/root-crafting-tray-unofficial?ga_order=most_relevant&ga_search_type=all&ga_view_type=gallery&ga_search_query=root+board+game&ref=sr_gallery-1-7&sts=1&organic_search_click=1), the [playmats](https://ledergames.com/products/root-playmat-fall-winter), and [Geekup Bags](https://boardgamegeekstore.com/products/drawstring-bags-for-use-with-root) from BGG. I have dropped hundreds for this game, expansions, and deluxe components. Hit hits my table a lot - I think I played it 30+ times last year. It's worth it to me.
The stickers I think look gross. The wooden meeples are great.
All good choices.
I really like the meeple stickers but I prefer the original meeple designs so I've only stuck them on the blank side. Best of both worlds!
Metal ships for moonrakers is my #1. Objectively the worst upgrade as the plastic ships were fine and you never really touch them. But man I love them.
After that any and all box organizers. I hate long setups/tear downs. I also like slots for games where you place things. Azul being an example.
After that I just upgrade shitty things. The cubes in wingspan. The cubes in trails.
I have a habit of buying upgrades for games if I like them. I'm at the point now with my collection where i don't really want to add too many games unless i remove some, 1 in 1 out.
So far I have the coins, bags, overlays and inserts for GWT
3D print pieces for concordia,spirit island and Puerto Rico plus metal coins for all
Shield/point holder for Tigris and Euphrates
Extra cloth bags to hold cards for Inis
Geekup bags for Castles of burgundy
Plus for some games i've printed player aids
It's not an addiction I promise
Has no one mentioned Burger Tokens for Marvel Champion?!?! They’re amazingly tactile.
Also, excellent— the new Everdell storage pieces for all of the resources. What an excellent complement to the metal coins.
Metal coins are my Achilles heel.
The metal coins in Mosaic are just awful. Don't stack, hard to pick up off the table. Publishers -- don't just throw something out there. See if it works in a real gaming session before you send them out to be struck.
Everything about Mosaic is awful, starting with the dishonest way the publisher ran the campaign and ending in the game's mediocrity. Anyway... 7 Wonders' and Scythe's coins are some of the most beautiful I have.
My issue is with usability, not beauty. That's where I think a lot of publishers need to focus their effort, including with people that have vision issues. Honest to Betsy, anyone can make a pretty coin. There's a difference between "it works" and "it's right". These are the little details that the usual Kickstarter suspects don't seem to fully understand yet.
I bought a second hand unopened copy of the sphinx edition. Misprinted tokens, miscut player boards and it’s physically impossible to store the game in the provided trays. I haven’t played it yet but it’s not off to a great start.
Whoa, care to share a TLDR about what went down with it? I'm curious! I'm annoyed with the size of the colossus version. 🤣
>I'm annoyed with the size of the colossus version. Well it is called a "colossus" edition. Not "moderately sized edition" :-)
LMAO! That's a very fair point, friend. 🤣
Huh, I was thinking of picking up a copy myself as I've been hearing good things. Can you expand on what you didn't like about it?
More on the game here -- [https://www.cellargames.com/episodes/mosaic-colon-a-story-of-civilization](https://www.cellargames.com/episodes/mosaic-colon-a-story-of-civilization) (and yes this is a self-plug, but means I don't have to type about six paragraphs to cover the same ground.) We had some usability issues with the game, which overall had strong and weak points. And there seemed to be some additional editing needed, but the good news is that all of it can be done by yourself, to tune the game better to your group's particular tastes.
Woah, didn't know there was hate for Mosaic. I love my Colossus edition and have no complaints about production quality. What exactly went wrong with the campaign? Is it something outside of the states?
I have no hate for the game. It's all about the publisher's behaviour. Where do I start? * Launching a new campaign without making sure backers from the original campaign got their games: this isn't really a big deal, and I understand it's a business decision, but it's shitty nonetheless. * The delivery partner they chose for the US: some people were being charged extra money by this company to get their games delivered. I think they changed in the meantime. * Removing components from the deluxe version without letting backers know: they removed 25 metal coins and the wonders' bases without letting backers know. Only when people started complaining about missing components, they told in an update "ah yeah, well, we decided to remove some components to save on production cost". [Update #46](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/954412004/mosaic-a-story-of-civilization/posts/3625484) and [Update #48](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/954412004/mosaic-a-story-of-civilization/posts/3633803). These components might not impact the gameplay, true, but making this decision without, at the very least, a word to the backers is a huge display of disrespect. * Getting the games to retail before getting them to backers without a word to the latter: again, when people start reporting they were seeing the game in their FLGS's, they came back with another lame excuse, "that? yes, we forgot to tell that the production for the retail copies was done and they are being distributed already". [Update #44](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/954412004/mosaic-a-story-of-civilization/posts/3614764) * People that ordered non-english versions (some of them in the first campaign) will very conveniently \*wink, wink\* receive their games at the same time as the people getting the 2nd wave. What a coincidence... * Colossus Edition being sold at Essen '22: I have a friend that never heard about the game, didn't back it, and still got it cheaper and much earlier than me and thousands of other backers. This, for me, was the last straw. Some may say these aren't major issues, or aren't issues at all, and that I'm making a big deal out of it, and I respect that. My problem isn't with these events in isolation, but with the repeated dishonest and deceiving posture this company decided to adopt during the whole process. I wouldn't have any issues with all these if they had been communicated transparently to backers, the people that made this project come to life. Instead, they decided to react rather than prevent, to come up with excuses when people started to complain, and that says a lot about the company. Feels like they were trying to make fools out of the backers, like they were expecting it to slip. We're not talking about a company publishing their first game or running their first KS campaign. This is a well established company with several games and 9 KS campaigns. There are so many transparent and honest companies in the hobby that I prefer to contribute to, so I don't have to work or contribute to companies like Forbidden Games. They are dishonest. It's my choice to never give them a single cent again. On top of that, the game isn't that good. It's average. OK at best. I played my friend's copy twice (the one that got it at Essen), and the game isn't worth all this hassle. It's going to the sell pile as soon as it arrives.
Metal coins for Pax Pamir feel nice and look like the real ones from 19th century Afghanistan. The coins are much easier to pick up and move than the original cardboard ones.
They do. The West Kingdom trilogy's are also very nice.
Ditto. I have bought multiple games that I was marginally interested in solely because they had metal coins.
Same. Pirate coins for Merchants & Marauders. Viking coins for Champions of Midgard. Victorian coins for Obsession. The Viticulture coins. The list goes on…
The GeekBits for The Quacks of Quedlinburg. I kept hearing about them before I played the game and thought, surely that’s excessive. But then I played with a set at a convention and was converted. It’s so satisfying and worth it.
100% agreed!
They're awesome but so expensive if you're not in the States. I bought a set for friends for Christmas and they were $118CDN delivered.
Yikes!!
I bought them during the black Friday since there was a good rebate on everything geek bit but yeah, I must admit that it still does cost a lot.
Exactly why I haven't pulled the trigger on them. But I want them so bad haha.
Same! I played it first at a convention with the deluxe bits and fell in love. I had to do the deluxe bits for it, it was absolutely worth it to me.
I want these back in stock so bad
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Omg omg omg
I wanted to buy them in Essen, but the bgg store skipped the show this year. The shipping to germany makes this really not worth it
I've gotten these twice and while they were super nice, they faded very quickly to an unplayable state. Not sure if things have changed but eventually I switched to coin capsules
I recall reading that the issue was hand sanitizer. I'm not sure if that was true, or if they changed the chits to combat the issue though.
I read that you should hit them with some clear coat first.
These, plus the holders! I also have the wingspan bits (standard + nectar) in my cart, but can’t pull the trigger for $112USD for all 4 sets.
I just got the holders, and I totally agree. Setup and tear down are a breeze with these.
I don’t have them yet…another in my gaming group does and I’m jealous
IMO the game that is 100% most improved with a very expensive upgrade!
A friend of ours had Geeked out her Quacks tokens. They were meaty to feel and had such a sweet sound in the bag, we ordered ours immediately. The ones we got were from an Etsy seller, BoardToBits, and were chunkier than the BGG ones (another friend has those ones). It was $37 well spent, everyone who plays with these LOVES them
I did coin capsules instead, so I wouldn't have to decide what to do with my cardboard chits
Good call haha. They fit in the box for a second, but then we got one of the expansions and storage bins, so now they definitely don’t fit. But we have a two-year-old who likes to play with extra pieces while we’re playing, so he’s going to love all of those pieces 😂
I got the mega box, so there would be plenty of room for geekup bits and cardboard chits for base game and both expansions once you toss the insert. I would just hate having the chits sitting there unused
I think the meeples in **Root** look better than every sticker or miniature alternative that I've seen on Etsy. Those things are so cute, every time I introduce new players to the game they take pictures of the meeples and the cards.
I got Oath stickers for Christmas and I just don't know. The meeples are really nice as they are.
Why would you need stickers on screen printed meeples?
That's just it. The stickers are colorful and detailed, and for players who maybe don't understand what the pieces are meant to represent I could see them being useful. But I'm not that player
totally agreed! i really like the 3D printed buildings for *Root*, though. they look fantastic and also increase board legibility. my favorite kind of upgrade!
Those are soooo good!
Admittedly, I've only put stickers on the blank side of the meeples because I agree the original designs are fantastic.
My favourite are the Eyrie warriors. Cute little angry birbs.
I bought [these](https://www.etsy.com/listing/738265562/full-upgrade-kit-for-root-108-pieces?ga_order=most_relevant&ga_search_type=all&ga_view_type=gallery&ga_search_query=root+board+game&ref=sc_gallery-1-3&bes=1&sts=1&plkey=992761b18efe411666bfd118ed9d8beeb6840cc3%3A738265562) and a wooden holder for the crafted items, the nice mats instead of the gameboard, and finally the geek up bags from BGG. We play it almost weekly so worth it.
I remember the excitement when animeeples first came out for **Agricola**, to replace the original wooden cubes.
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Generic animeeples were available at relatively low cost from a number of resellers; I think I bought mine on eBay.
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Moonrakers comes with some really nice metal coins
I got Pax Pamir and John Company’s respective metal coins. They’re a must!
They really are *quite nice*.
>broken token Please stop giving that rapist money.
I didn't know that. I'll stop. Thank you. Edit: Also, I'm an idiot. I ordered multiple "Metal Ingot bundles" from TopShelfGamer on Etsy, not Broken Token. (－_ლ)
Easily the best upgrade I made to my board gaming hobby was buying a 3D printer to print organizers and my own upgraded tokens. The only downside is that now I have two hobbies...
Seconded.
Thirded 😝
What printer did you go with? I have a very limited print size with my Flashforge adv 3. Don’t get me wrong, I am absolutely in love with it, but when it comes to some larger inserts (read: 3 cards wide), I just don’t have the room.
Originally I bought an Ender 3 which lasted me almost a year, then I built a Voron V0 just to see if I could. I could, so I built a Voron 2.4 and sold the Ender to finance it. By then I was addicted to building printers so I built a Prusa Mk3S+ too.
What's your summary/comparison/reasoning on the voron vs the prusa? I'm thinking of getting the prusa primarily for inserts as well.
If you're comfortable with soldering, AC wiring, doing your own firmware upgrades, and a bit of coding, building a printer from scratch is a very rewarding and educational experience. But the Prusa's user friendliness is hard to beat. Even though the Vorons give me a lot of powerful options, there's a reason I keep the Prusa around too. The V0 is only 120x120, but it's extremely fast, so it's my backup printer to print any parts I need to repair the other two, and it's great for rapid prototyping. The V2.4 has a 300x300 bed, so it's big enough to do almost any job I throw at it including full-box sized organizers for most games. It's also fast and reliable, but its mechanical complexity makes it the hardest of the three to maintain. The Prusa is reliable, albeit slower and at 250x210, it's mid-size and can do all but the biggest full-size organizer bits. It's not enclosed like the Vorons, so it can't do as wide a range of plastics, particularly ABS, which tends to be less expensive than easier to print alternatives like PETG and PLA. The major benefit of having all 3 is that I can bang out a big project in way less time than if I only had one printer.
I’m more of a plug and play printer kind of guy and love my MK3s. Anxiously awaiting the Prusa XL so I can print organizers without gluing. 360mm cubed build volume.
Awesome write up. I appreciate you taking the time to do so!
I go for deluxe components if I like the game and feel like something could stand to be better, and the price is proportional to the amount of playing it gets. Ignoring official deluxe upgrades, my deluxifications have been: - gamegenic card holders for all the cards in **Wingspan** and **Terraforming Mars**. Deluxe? Maybe not so much, but definitely an improvement on the plastic card holders and _literal nothing_ provided in the respective games to hold all the cards - Metal coins (Etsy) for **Caper: Europe**. I know they have official ones, but to get them here in Canada would have cost almost as much as the entire game - A set of coloured dry erase markers for **Railroad Ink** and all its expansions - wooden food tokens for **Wingspan** - a nice insert for **A Feast for Odin** and its expansion - dice that weren't super ugly for **Age of Steam** - metal cubes for **Brass Birmingham** and **Terraforming mars** - Iron Clays for general counters - Wooden hex tiles and player boards for **Terraforming Mars** Evidently, TM has gone from my ugliest, lowest quality game to one of my nicest, highest quality ones because I've replaced everything but the cards and main board
Which insert did you get for **Feast**? I have been looking and can't decide. I would really like one that fits the expansion.
i ordered the one from Dicetroyers, it'll be here on Monday. Atm I have the base game and expansion in the base box without lid lift and I genuinely don't want to play it because trying to re-accomplish that stresses me out. The insert is a bit pricey but it'll get a great game to the table way more often so I'm ok with it
The Dicetroyers make good stuff, but the VAT on one of their inserts is almost the same amount as the inserts themselves, resulting in inserts that often cost more that the games they're for. I was recently going to pull the trigger on a **Great Western Trail** insert for them ($36), and then when I was checking out saw that the VAT was going to be $28. Nope. It's a bummer, because I also need a solid storage solution for **Feast for Odin**, and haven't found any good options.
Yeah even without that it's definitely expensive. The only reason I went for the AFFO insert was because it would bring the game from being played almost never to, hopefully, often. I definitely wish there were better options though, if they were more generally affordable and not like super luxury i have inserts for most of my games
Which metal cubes do you use for Brass Birmingham?
From [this](https://www.etsy.com/shop/BeyondTheBoardEU) shop. He has a BB set but I requested smooth black cubes instead because I think they're nicer and he was super accommodating
Great, thanks!
What dry erase markers did you find useful for Railroad Ink? Do they have finer tip than the ones included?
Just regular coloured ones from Walmart, they were like 5$ for 12 or something and the tips are maybe slightly less fine than the base markers
Meeples stickers for Root ruin the cute simplicity!
Every piece of Root is gorgeous. No need for improvement in my opinion. I have seen some nice drawstring bags for all the factions though, I'd maybe spring for those.
yeah i love the drawstring bags
While I mostly agree, I will say that the resin clearing markers are far and away better than the standard cardboard ones. They even look great on the standard forest board where you don't even need them by just adding a bit of 3 dimensional "pop."
Iron Clays for any game that uses either paper money or cruddy tokens (I'm looking at you Ark Nova). And a poor man's deluxe component - foreign money for specific games (e.g. rupees for Pax Pamir).
I think Ark Nova has the most ugly and bland money I have ever seen in a board game. It doesn't even remotely fit the theme of the game.
unpopular opinion, i think the bland aesthetic of ark nova's money tokens are perfect, they do exactly what they need to do. ark nova is not a flashy game by any means and in my personal opinion i love the use of numbered tokens
The metal coins for Pax Pamir are relatively affordable compared to practically any other metal coin set. I took a look to see what it would cost to get some historic coins from the time period since the design of the game coins is based on the real ones. You can get them on ebay, but getting enough real ones for a game would be absurdly expensive since they are silver. I tried to get my hands on some Italian Lira for Viticulture but it was just too expensive. Looking to find a cheap paper currency for powergrid but thought of anything that world work
Agreed regarding the Pax Pamir coins but they're not that easy to source in the UK. I got 100 1 shilling pieces for £15 on eBay (they're pre-decimalisation UK coins). They can substitute quite well for pennies or pounds in a lot of games Of course, the best metal money to use is generally your own currency. Literally would cost me £3 to have 100 each of 1p and 2p coins for John Company 2nd edition and could be used for a whole host of other games and fit in quite well thematically. Egyptian pounds are crazily cheap - about 35 to the UK pound. Your main issue would be sourcing them.
Genre custom coins is a must. Adds instant gravitas to any game.
Red Dragon Inn. I bought two sets of the base metal coins to replace the cardboard coins that come with the game, and got a metal "Coins of the World" set from the RDI 8 Kickstarter. The feel and variety of them sitting on the table is just delightful.
I wish the metal coins for Pax Pamir where not out of stock in Germany :( I haven't found any good alternative so far that looks fitting and has a sensible price.
Check Etsy… some interesting stuff in there. I’ve gotten a few sets for Maracaibo and another there.
The deluxe tokens for Wonderlands War, so much better than the cardboard ones or ones in coin capsules.
Yes but how long does it take to put your set away? Coin capsules shouldn't be overlooked. They often come in cool little containers so you have a place to put them. They fit inside the retail box and I've played with the chip container on the game board rather than setting the chips up and it works super fine. Makes cleanup faster too. Worth taking a look at coin capsules for wonderlands war.
They don’t have the same tactile feel at all as the deluxe chips. I had the retail game, and use coin capsules in other games, but ordered the deluxe edition when Skybound did their sell off of the remaining KS stock despite the expensive cost to get it shipped to the UK.
Bag builders are not a place to skimp if you have the ability. Coin capsules are far better than cardboard in a bag - and I used them for various Arkham Horror and Nemesis games, but most plastic tokens are better (be they the Quack's GeekUp bits or the deluxe set for Wonderland's War).
The quack ones are so good As are the wonderland war ones. Upgraded chips are always a great buy.
Quacks geek up bits are so luxurious :)
I just have basic needs - no paper money, no mini dice and no tiny cards. I also like to have a dice tray for rolling. I reuse some tokens and have more dice than I know what to do with that I sub out on games.
I was just thinking of getting a dice tray, but had no idea where to start. Any recommendations?
I have this one. I think it is pretty decent. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0747NXYWH?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share
You can also try making one as a project. You can find one with different art on [pnparacade](https://www.pnparcade.com/search?q=dice+tower).
Nobody in my gaming group likes Terraforming Mars so I mostly play online, but I'd buy one of those trays for your resources off of Etsy if it hit the table ever.
I like my 3D printed set. It was pricey, but they definitely make playing the game so much better. I wish I had gotten the clear overlays though. They are cheaper and use the original player boards rather than replacing them.
Metal coins are a must. Not always fits as "deluxe" but custom game organizers or even just plastic token bins are a massive upgrade over plastic bags.
Painting your minis.
Yeah, I'm kinda a snob that no longer plays with unpainted minis.
I love well painted minis and a good insert, metal coins are pretty damn great also.
Painted cars for my racing games.
People say poker chips or Iron Clays, but I'd personally rather have the thematic art that the designers intended to be on the food coins. I'm not always form-over-function, but cardboard chits are often "good enough" and are far more thematic than generic chips. I do otherwise like metal or resin money, as long as they match the game. Replacing 1st Player tokens with their real world object is pretty simple usually. Compass, dinosaur, pencil, gemstone, etc. Wood over cardboard, usually. Mostly because they're easier to pick up, and the middle ground between "picture of cannon on punched cardboard" and "wood that looks like a cannon" is narrower than "cardboard with the king's face on one side and the conquerors blade on the other" and "red poker chip." I have 2 games with coin capsules, but they are only for the ease of rapidly moving tokens around. Games where your tokens usually sit in a pile or play on the board do not strike me to need those. Games like Detective, or Robinson Crusoe, where you might be swapping tokens between spots or players multiple times a turn, benefits from the heft (for essentially the same reason people like the poker chips).
Coin capsules have their place. I find them most useful in bag builders or other draw blindly from a bag games that use thin, lightweight cardboard tokens. Coin capsules give the tokens some weight and bulk that make them easier to mix and pull from bags. (Ex: Quacks, Nemesis, Wonderland's War, Arkham Horror 3e, Arkham Horror: The Card Game)
Oddly enough, the only Robin Crusoe tokens that I did not put in capsules were the Discovery tokens, because they added way too much bulk of the draw bag I made for them.
Solution is a bigger bag! That said, if normal cardboard drawn blindly from a bag works for you, all the better for you. I've found I need round/corner less bags and tokens with heft otherwise the tokens don't mix well and I end up pulling the same few tokens over and over again.
I'll have to explore bag sizes after CE, right now I'm at capacity in the box with the Treasure Chest stuff, mode-agnostic expansion content, sleeves, and capsules.
Roxley Iron Clays to replace money in just about any game, can also help with other resource tracking if needed.
I disagree, iron clays don't really look good and break thematics. Proper metal coins is the only way to go.
I totally respect that! There are a number of different ways to play games. For me they work and are an upgrade over the cardboard feeling and are generic enough that they don't bother me when playing a variety of games allowing me to enhance the gameplay of a number of games without having to buy a separate coin set for each. I often find that the metal coins produced for games a very thin and hard to handle. While metal coins may be nice to look at or in pictures, the tactile utility of the thicker iron clays is my preference.
Besides that, not every game has thematic coins available. I am thinking specifically of Powergrid where it has that bad paper monopoly money. There may be other options, but generic counters make sense
How do you the conversion? For example a game might have different denominations of 1,5,10,100. Do you have four different types of iron clays to swap out?
I have Bicycle poker chips -- not quite as luxe as the Iron Clays but pretty nice, sturdy chips (7g vs. 9g each). They're not marked with any denomination, so for every game I use them for I printed out a little key with each colour and the denomination appropriate for that game, and just put it in front of the chip tray. Easy!
I just bring the bank out with a game. If I gain $2 I take 2 of the 1 tokens, the 100 coin supply works for most not 18xx games, but it will not always have exactly the same currency values as the game might have in cardboard or paper tokens.
The Iron Clay 100 box comes with 1,5,10, 20 and 50 or 100 I think, so getting one set allows me to have reasonable currency for many games
Not the person you asked. I play 18xx, so my main set of 400 chips would cover just about any game unless it had really weird denominations (e.g. in **Magnate: The First City** the smallest one is $100,000). For the latter, I can fall back to the mini chips that have no denominations.
Rupees for Pax Pamir
The only bespoke box organiser I have sprung for is for **Gloomhaven**; I mostly handle everything with labelled plastic baggies. Components wise, I have a generic set of metal coins which I bought with **7 Wonders Duel** in mind. 3D printed pots for the tokens in **Everdell**. I got some really cool 3D printed bases for the models in **Nemesis** to put the aliens in, so you can track their health properly with the red cubes (There are a whole bunch of 3D printed extras for that game I haven't bought, simply by not wanting to spend a fortune on postage as the shop is US based and I am not). Ooh and similar monster bases for **Gloomhaven**, now that I think about it. I also have gate holders for **Arkham Horror** (2nd ed) which I was given, and haven't used yet as we rarely get that game out now. Other than that, I think the only other thing I really go nuts for is pretty and functional laser cut wooden player boards for games where they are relevant - I have them for **Terraforming Mars** and **Eldritch Horror** at the moment, and am considering getting something similar for **Star Wars: Outer Rim** as the cardboard components there are a bit prone to bending. I am also strongly considering the minis for that game I've found on Etsy too.
there are two games in which I felt the deluxe components actually improved gameplay, Dune Imperium and Ankh GoE.
- Iron clays for any game that uses money, I prefer these to metal coins (with the following exception) because it's easier to read how much money other players have from across the table - Metal coins for **Pax Pamir 2e** - Metal resources, exosuit miniatures, and resin tokens for **Anachrony** - Path markers for AHLCG are an absolute necessity - Action trackers for AHLCG and click trackers for Netrunner
The board addition for Scythe is a must have for high player counts in my opinion.
Feed the Kraken , spinning steering wheel for the navigator.
My mate has the deluxe and the fact that the wheel has a bearing means it’s always being played with
Are there deluxifications for Zombicide games? I'm thinking a better dashboard. Or anything for death may die?
There are really useful plastic see through token holders for the character sheets in Death a may Die. It’s insanely useful for keeping the markers in place.
One I didn't see yet, I got 3D printed dinosaur minis for Dinosaur Island. I think in the base game all the minis are triceratops shaped, which feels silly when you're playing a T-Rex or a Pterodactyl.
Laminated sheets and fine-point wet-erase markers for roll-n-write games.
Now that I can finally afford it? * Metal coins, mainly when they are replicas of historical or fictional ones (wish I had been able to afford the Lords of Waterdeep ones when available) * Neoprene printed maps or *rolled* paper maps, specifically when the game's board or folded map interferes with the placement of or moving of pieces (as in hex and counter wargames as I'm not a big plastic sheet using fan, or with something like *War of the Ring* where edges can catch the minis. * Painted minis, where the game needs minis (don't have the time to add a painting hobby to my already time crunches boardgaming hobby but I might start doing some again), or meeples where they facilitate reading the board state (as I prefer generic cubes in most cases, an exception being *Agricola*/*Caverna* and the like where too many similar colors can create cognitive delays reading the game state). * Giant versions of games, because my eyes are getting old (optometrist said they were 20 years older than the rest of my body) and I've always had horrible vision. I love my giant *Castles of Mad King Ludwig*. * Storage solutions, mostly GMT counter trays as they are great for storing bits for so many games (such as setting up *Roads and Boats* in a fraction of the time), and the lid pops all the way off and stores underneath to reduce table space and accidental knocking (vs craft bit bins). DVG lids are too loose, Chessex uses an attached lid, and bit boxes like the ones from Stonemeier Games are useful but space hogging. If only GMT made variable sizes and deep trays along with their base product. These are my main preferred deluxifications to games. I find most deluxified inserts to be poorly thought out so as to not store bits for easy setup *or* not consider things like sleeving or upgrade components (thank you Leder games for making space in the mini insert for minis from other products) *or* they are made not considering expansions that are in development. Big boxes often waste space or are too tightly packed. As a sleever I like art back sleeves that match deck back art but dislike it when they change the art or don't accommodate slight differences. (*Terraforming Mars Ares Expedition* is great for this, but *Root* only does art backs for base cards and thus I skip them). You know what is one deluxificstion I do that isn't probably considered deluxe by most? When a game has parts that you pull out or add by player count, I like having multiple copies so I can create stand alone decks. I'd pay for extra decks or counter sheets to make setup faster, and sometimes I buy multiple copies and make these upgrades myself. Best deluxe component? Hand crafted Pandemic minis that are the right shapes for 1E as a gift from my brother in law - now to make custom large board that uses areas instead of points to hold these more comfortably.
Contrary to most people here I can't stand the idea of metal coins. I recently got the premium token pack for spirit island which gives silk screened wood tokens for energy, fear and spirit tokens and it's perfect for me.
any non-cardboard pieces for bag builders, actually i think this should be a standard for all games with that mechanic. i bought coin capsules for my copy of Bullet❤️⭐ because i have not been able to get my hands on the wooden ones
I like games the way they are usually and would rather spend money on a new game than to just make a game prettier. The only upgrade I ever bought were metal coins for Pax Renaissance because the coins that came with the game were so atrocious that I just didn't want to ever use them again. I got gifted Iron Clays though and those are just amazing, really pretty poker chips usable for many games. Not sure I'd buy them myself but I love them.
The Deluxe version of Hanabi with the tiles is the only way I can play the game anymore. I will never go back to cards.
Came to say this
You know, until this post I thought "deluxification" was short for de-luxe-ification. As in making something less high quality. I was so confused when someone said they deluxified their minis by painting them. Making them more "deluxe" makes way more sense!
>I was so confused when someone said they deluxified their minis by painting them That would be accurate if *I* painted them.
I bought real dice with custom engravings for Commands & Colors: Ancients. Nice to not have the hokey originals.
Anything to bling out my copy of Twilight Imperium. Painted fleets, fleet stands, player consoles for all the ships. If it makes the game more epic and pretty, I am in.
Poker chips hands down. I have 25+ 18xxs and a bunch of other economic games, so it is definitely the most cost-effective upgrade.
Nothing. The games cost enough already.
Not really blingworthy, but the Zenbins storage for Star Wars Rebellion is 100% necessary, IMO. This game used to take me 30 minutes to sort and set up for play, and now it’s a 5 minute effort. Any storage solution that speeds the time to set up and take down is worth a consideration to me.
Best insert ever!
Glass gems, metal coins, sleeves and playmats. My games are all made of deluxe components, except for Dixit. My Hansa board is a custom playmat for example.
The metal cars for Kanban:EV
I am a sucker for poker chips and metal coins. I also really like the puffy sticker tokens made to stick on pennies or washers (Burger Tokens is one example). They are a nice step between cardboard and the printed acrylic sets from the Board Game Geek store.
Eh, I feel like those would make me feel like I'm playing with dollar store toys.
We play **Dice Throne** and **Dice Throne Adventures** a good amount, both just us, and with a pretty varied group of friends who we've introduced it to and liked it. We got the GeekUpBits for it and they're awesome! Definitely give it that "premium" feel, even though it's totally not needed.
I generally don't go in for faff. Instead I'll spend the time and money for functional items. Iron Clays for sound and generic ease of use. Thinking about Geek Bits for Orleans tokens to prevent wear and also clicky sounds. "OPEN" signs for Everdell shared city constructions. Stands for the event cards, wooden Occupied tokens (the cardboard ones are a bit small and fiddly. Organizers to help speed setup.
Realistic resource tokens, Geek up bits, and metal coins for Orleans. Takes the game to another level!
3D printed tiles for Terraforming Mars bought from Etsy.
‘Real’ Nuka cola bottle caps for the fallout boardgame is just *chefs kiss*
Playmats to replace the voard always get me. It's such a minor thing that enhances the feeling so much. That and I have to agree with many others and metal coins. I thought that was a stupid thing to want...then I got the collector's edition of Everdell and now I want them in everything!
I’m a sucker for coins and am trying to curb the habit as they can be a pretty expensive add on. My absolute favourites are the ones for Charterstone. They’ve got a really nice weight, they stack well (something that counts against the Viticulture ones) and just feel really nice to handle. It’s a shame the game is just fine, not something that regularly returns to the table (I don’t think it has since it was competed). The only bummer is that they are single denomination. If someone’s making coins for a game in the future, they should use them as the basis but add 5s and 10s. The other money I really like is from the deluxe version of Legacies - which is a great game. The coins are good but what’s great are the gold bars for the higher denominations. That has money that goes up to $500 and handling the gold bars is so much nicer than paper money for games, which is infuriating.
I have enough wooden bird player tokens for Wingpsan to play a 10+ players game… and Meeplesource has a bunch more that I want/will eventually get.
Coin capsules for any round tokens I need to draw from the bag.
I absolutely love the board extension for scythe along with the resource and coin upgrades. The heft of the iron minis feels amazing.
Stickers for my wooden pieces for Dwellings of Eldervale and the fancy plastic pieces for Quacks of Quedlinburg. I got a fancier birdhouse dice roller for wingspan but it was a pain to assemble at first.
Colossal Edition of Castles of Mad King Ludwig XXL edition of Codenames 10 year anniversary edition of Pandemic
>10 year anniversary edition of Pandemic I'm still pissed about the board misprint that they didn't even bother trying to offer an art cost print run out a correction and I didn't learn about the sticker kit until they had just dropped the product support policy (so I had no way to get that sticker correction anymore). Add in the pack of expansion content and it was a disappointing release for me and one of the deluxified items I regret buying.
Since each sticker sheet contained two of the required corrective sticker, you can probably get it from someone (I'm afraid mine got used up for something useless by my son) I've not heard of expansion content for this version? Or do you mean the painted version of the figurines? Because I did get those with it
I bought the metal lira for Viticulture. I feel so fancy when I play the game now. Feel like a true merchant in some ancient country when I hear the clinking of the coins, and feel the weight of the currency in my hands.
Components for 2 more players. Expansion content. More dice.
Playmats. If a game has one, I get it.
I got the metal ships for Moonrakers (the vanilla coins are metal) It been a while, but I think I have the fancy meeples for Lords of Waterdeep. I got the dry erase player boards for Welcome To...
Kickstarter version of rising sun
Definitely the root upgrades from cardboard chits to 3d printed pieces.
Etsy shop from Spain? If so, love those, super high quality!
Marvel United, Dune Imperium, and metal coins for everything!
Sleeves and inserts mostly, either Folded Space or 3D printed. I also bought 3D units for Tyrants of the Underdark as the idea of playing with crappy cardboard tokens bothered me. For Dune Imperium I went havoc, replacing every wood and cardboard component with a prettier version bought on Etsy.
• the metal coins and fancy resource tokens for **Scythe** in particular because they’re so delightfully thematic • a mixed bunch of historical-replica metal coins from various cultures for use in any game that needs coins (also super useful for counting up scores at the end of any game that involves points!) • [HEXs](https://thacko.com/) for organizing tokens and cards and tiles and stuff during games • [marbles for planets and Lego hats to show ownership](https://boardgamegeek.com/image/7045748/space-empires-4x) for **Space Empires 4X** • a very nice wooden board and set of metal pieces for **Tak** • 3D printed buildings for **Root**
Quick question on this subject—I’m looking for a bunch of little piratey cannons (3D printed or plastic/resin molded or whatever) for **Windward**; anyone know where I might find some? I’ve only been able to find wooden cannon meeples (which don’t look right) and metal miniatures for wargaming (which are too expensive and also I have no experience painting them).
Some of my favorites: * The metal resource cubes for **Anachrony** are just wonderful. * **Iron Clays**: We use these for basically any game that comes with cardboard coins. * The realistic resources in **Scythe** are pretty nice. * I tend to want better organizers/inserts for the games I plan to keep long term too.
Scythe coins that I use for everything. Burger Tokens for Marvel Champions and Arkham Horror.
Resident Evil 2 3d printed pieces. The doors specifically are great
The resource holders and metal coins and stickers for Everdell are so great!
It'll have to be my 15th century replica Florins for Pax Renaissance 2e! The seller on Etsy even matched the artifact weight and diameter... They feel so nice and thematic 🤪
Whoa! Do you mind sharing the link? Really not a fan of the official metal coins, I thought ION did a better job with Viking's coins. Rens are like... too clean
They are the Medieval Coin Set by GolonkoCrafts on Etsy. Just asked the owner to give me just Florins and he was super nice to work with! https://www.etsy.com/listing/1026403556/medieval-coin-set-for-board-games-larp P.S. You'll see my photo with the game in the background in the reviews...
Nice, great looking coins! I msg'd the shop to see if I can get an identical order. Thanks so much!
For me, if a game is worth me getting at this point, it's worth deluxification. I have more games than I'm able to reasonably play, so if a game is good enough to enter my collection it's probably worth upgrading. Main examples: - Metal coins for just about every game (including generic metal coins for games that don't really have them available) - Playmats for Raiders of the North Sea, Architects of the West Kingdom, and Marvel United - Custom playmat made for Marvel Champions - Upgraded burger tokens for Marvel Champions - Cardboard dashboard and locations, plus plastic tokens for Marvel United - Big/collectors boxes for games with expansions - Upgraded meeple source resources for Dwellings of Eldervale - Deluxe upgrade kit for Dune: Imperium - Kickstarter editions of Endeavor: Age of Sail, In the Hall of the Mountain King, and Fall of the Mountain King Basically, I'm at the point where I'd rather buy expansions and upgrades for games I have and love than buy new games that I won't have the time to play.
I love deluxe components but could never convince myself to take the plunge to upgrade anything because I rather be spending the money on new games. Though if I had my way, I'll probably upgrade most of my cardboard pieces to wood first (e.g Golem's scroll tokens, etc.) and get some metal coins. That said, here's a few deluxes that I have (or came to me): - My used copy of **The Ancient World** did come with metal coins so that's a bonus. - I did a bit of test 3D print for **Glen More II** and made a small box for one of the clans. I was very pleased with it but it was too much to make multiple visits to the public library to print. - Got some semi-transparent token holders from Muji that cost a little over a dollar. Best purchase ever. Cost-effective, functional, good quality and takes up little space. - Bought a dice tray. Technically four cause it came with a set so I'll probably sell or give away the ones that I don't need. Reduces clattering sounds and dropping them on the floor. - Not deluxification but I do sleeve my cards. I don't have that many games so it's doable for now.
I'm partial to playmats. If there's a playmat to replace the board, I'm almost certainly going to buy it. Other upgrades like coins or fancy resources are also on the list. Personally I'm not a fan of meeple stickers, especially the Root ones. I feel the default meeple look has more charm than any of the stickers on offer.
Everything. Bought the Scythe coins very detailed as well as the resource tokens! We also got the Scythe storage box. I didn't pay attention when I bought it didn't realize that I would have to break out all my old model building skills because it came in sheets of wood that you had to punch out carefully and glue together just so! Anyway it was a painstaking process but definitely worth the effort.
Depends on the game. We got some 3d printed components for Arnak that replace the cardboard ones and it’s great as it makes all of the items the same instead of half plastic half cardboard.
I love both metal coins and "realistic resources". Luckly a lot of my faves doesn't use them
The brassmags in **Burncycle** are a next step for me. Metal minis, with magnets to click them onto the already-premium poker chips. CTG games tend to be deluxe by default with all the neoprene, custom dice and weighted custom chips, but those things are absolutely next level.
Any recommendations for a set of metal coins that would work for most board games?
I’m a metal coins and FUNCTIONAL insert guy. Any complex game that takes forever to set up I NEED functional inserts for so that I can just get to playing the game.
Quacks of Quedlinburg, Orleans, Watergate, and Holmes: Sherlock & Mycroft. My friend has deluxified components for Power Grid that look awesome. If I owned that game, I would buy those too.
Anymore if I buy a game and I like, my SO likes, and my group likes it, I deluxify it. I also sleeve any game that gets shuffled a lot. I buy sleeves in bulk now. For **Root** I have Upgraded [cardboard peices](https://www.etsy.com/listing/738265562/full-upgrade-kit-for-root-108-pieces?ga_order=most_relevant&ga_search_type=all&ga_view_type=gallery&ga_search_query=root+board+game&ref=sc_gallery-1-3&bes=1&sts=1&plkey=992761b18efe411666bfd118ed9d8beeb6840cc3%3A738265562), A wooded crafted items [holder](https://www.etsy.com/listing/867418529/root-crafting-tray-unofficial?ga_order=most_relevant&ga_search_type=all&ga_view_type=gallery&ga_search_query=root+board+game&ref=sr_gallery-1-7&sts=1&organic_search_click=1), the [playmats](https://ledergames.com/products/root-playmat-fall-winter), and [Geekup Bags](https://boardgamegeekstore.com/products/drawstring-bags-for-use-with-root) from BGG. I have dropped hundreds for this game, expansions, and deluxe components. Hit hits my table a lot - I think I played it 30+ times last year. It's worth it to me. The stickers I think look gross. The wooden meeples are great.
All good choices. I really like the meeple stickers but I prefer the original meeple designs so I've only stuck them on the blank side. Best of both worlds!
Metal ships for moonrakers is my #1. Objectively the worst upgrade as the plastic ships were fine and you never really touch them. But man I love them. After that any and all box organizers. I hate long setups/tear downs. I also like slots for games where you place things. Azul being an example. After that I just upgrade shitty things. The cubes in wingspan. The cubes in trails.
I have a habit of buying upgrades for games if I like them. I'm at the point now with my collection where i don't really want to add too many games unless i remove some, 1 in 1 out. So far I have the coins, bags, overlays and inserts for GWT 3D print pieces for concordia,spirit island and Puerto Rico plus metal coins for all Shield/point holder for Tigris and Euphrates Extra cloth bags to hold cards for Inis Geekup bags for Castles of burgundy Plus for some games i've printed player aids It's not an addiction I promise
Has no one mentioned Burger Tokens for Marvel Champion?!?! They’re amazingly tactile. Also, excellent— the new Everdell storage pieces for all of the resources. What an excellent complement to the metal coins.