Status Markers for Miniatures Games

Question

The DM at the table I was at for the WOTC DD 1 hour dungeon delve at Gencon this year was using some neat little status markers to indicate when your character was bloodied (little plastic blood puddle about as thick as two quarters that would sit under the miniatures), or to indicate a dead character (a blood puddle with a shape of a body cut out of the middle, again about as thick as two stacked quarters).

I've been looking for them online, but can't find them. Anyone have any idea where I could get some of these? Or anyone know of any good status markers for RP w/ miniatures that are creative like this and not just little round colored magnetic disks?

Answer 1

You know, let me divide this into things that are creative and then a bunch of less creative things in case someone else is interested.

Creative Solutions

• Gale Force 9 sells a line of tokens branded for D&D
• Dapper Devil sells tokens, mostly square but with entertaining art
• Litko Aerosystems is probably the people who sold the tokens you're talking about -- check out these, which I think are the dead markers
• Dark Platypus sells both tokens and these little magnetic flags for tracking conditions; a bit fiddly, and better if you use their magnetic battlemat

Less Creative Solutions

• I've seen people buy craft wire of various colors at stores and twist together little loops in one or more colors; this is prettier than soda bottle rings, another low cost alternative
• Alea Tools are the magnetic markers than I know you don't want; this is for the benefit of anyone else reading the question
• Fiery Dragon's Battlebox, which has a bunch of round cardstock tokens

Answer 2

Litko Aerosystems has both standard sets, and does custom orders, for translucent plastic markers of a great variety of shapes.

They sound like the ones you describe.

Many guys I've seen over the years use cheap poker chips instead.

Answer 3

My solution: Craft Foam!

haha, I didnt notice this question earlier. I keep a few multicolored sqaures of this in my miniatures box. Blue for "marked", red for bloodied. It's stackable in a way that you can read the stack without lifting the miniature and real cheap.

Answer 4

If you are feeling crafty, you can cut 1" furring strips from the hardware store into tokens, then paint them in various colors. This costs almost nothing but your time, and they look and feel great on the table.

I did it with a miter saw, setting up a .2" jig, and the actual cutting took less than 15 minutes. If I did it again I'd pre-paint all the sides.

Answer 5

A completely hacked/not classy solution that my encounters group uses is the rings from soda bottles (the part that's left when you twist off the cap) of various colors (from various sodas). Red represents bloodied (coke) black, death (coke zero) green for poison (sprite) etc. They are a cheap/free solution (depending on how much soda you and your group drinks) and work really effectively as you can drape them on the minis themselves (very visual, and a mini with multiple status effects looks weighed down).

We also use Penny Gems (there will probably be a third round if not more if you are interested) which are modified pennies to denote area of effects on the map as well.