Pimp my (board) game

March 2, 2009 1:40 PM

Geeky? Crafty? Got some time on your hands? Make your own boardgame pieces! Tutorials for making custom 3-d Settlers of Catan tiles (and gorgeous custom sets here, and here, although with no instructions,alas). Agricola more your style? Grab some polymer clay and get making resources, more resources, food, sheep, more sheep, boars, cattle, and (of course) farmers, farmers, farmers, farmers, farmers, and farmers. Don't forget fences, tiles, and a starting player piece. Lots more in the image gallery at BoardGameGeek.
posted by arcticwoman (15 comments total)

Very cool, I love the custom Settlers pieces. I also give props to this set of custom Carcassonne pieces made from gingerbread.
posted by AndrewStephens at 1:53 PM on March 2, 2009 [3 favorites]

A couple of weeks ago, I went to a wedding where there were Carcassonne meeples on top of the wedding cake.
posted by litlnemo at 1:58 PM on March 2, 2009 [3 favorites]

This is cool.
posted by JHarris at 1:58 PM on March 2, 2009

AndrewStephens:
Opponent: "I finished the city with 11 tiles, WITH a Cathedral* for triple points... hey, where's my Cathedral?!"
Me: "Om-nom-nom...."

We play the expansion with Cathedrals, which helps make the game a little more interesting for us. By "interesting," I mean rage-inducing.

litlnemo: Man, if we had known we'd have crashed it. We loves us some Carcassonne.
posted by JHarris at 2:03 PM on March 2, 2009

My particular flavor of geeky runs more towards D&D and miniatures wargames, the crafty angles of which are well covered by Hirst Arts blocks. Using rubber molds to cast blocks, you can glue them together in a style similar to (MetaFilter favorite) Lego blocks.

The results can be very impressive.
posted by Parasite Unseen at 2:18 PM on March 2, 2009 [1 favorite]

We're putting meeples on our wedding cake as well! We've opted for a cupcake cake, and it will be topped with a chocolate/chocolate cupcake with a mahongany meeple (groom) and a sugar cookie/vanialla cupcake with a pale oak meeple (bride). March 21!
posted by Shepherd at 2:37 PM on March 2, 2009

p.s. JHarris the wedding is in Atlanta so I can totally set you up with a cupcake, dude.
posted by Shepherd at 2:39 PM on March 2, 2009

Man this is cool.

I wish I knew people who played boardgames.
posted by codswallop at 2:39 PM on March 2, 2009

I wish I knew people who played boardgames.
Boardgamegeek.com has a game group finder forum.
posted by aeschenkarnos at 2:46 PM on March 2, 2009

If anyone out there is a fan of Arkham Horror, you should check out Strange Eons, a little program that lets you make custom everything for the game. I had a lot of fun with it over the Christmas holiday, before grad school took my life away again.
posted by Caduceus at 2:49 PM on March 2, 2009 [2 favorites]

I wish I knew people who played boardgames.

I don't know about your city, but meetup.com (I know, I know) has a pretty large board game meetup group in my city. You might look around for your area.

On preview, what aeschenkarnos said, too.
posted by Caduceus at 2:50 PM on March 2, 2009

This is cool. I've been thinking lately about how to make a custom Advanced Civilization set and Scrabble set.

There's a game studio, Cheapass Games, that basically specializes in component-added games.
posted by aeschenkarnos at 2:56 PM on March 2, 2009

I have (Fimo) wood for (Fimo) sheep!
posted by Faint of Butt at 5:44 PM on March 2, 2009

I almost wish I hadn't hand-made a chess set once as a gift. And I definitely wish I could avoid posting the strange, trippy results here.
posted by tapesonthefloor at 6:09 PM on March 2, 2009

Cool. I'm in the midst of making a custom Clue for a wedding present, actually. Although the couple loves Carcassonne, too, so maybe I'll make them an expansion in the future.
posted by marginaliana at 7:39 AM on March 3, 2009