Jun 19, 2016 | By Alec
It’s no secret that 3D printing technology provides a fantastic opportunity for spicing up your gaming nights. Nothing quite takes the fun out of an evening of tabletop gaming as fighting over the same cardboard constructions every time, but you don’t have to bankrupt yourself to change that. Thanks to Masterwork Tools’ excellent OpenForge 2.0 project, you can now easily 3D print amazing scenery pieces free-of-charge, from fantastic wall sections for D&D dungeon crawls, to castle walls, gothic crypts fantastic Egyptian-style monuments and a lot more.
Of course this is not the first attempt to combine 3D printing with tabletop gaming. You might have seen various wonderful examples of Printable Scenery’s 3D prints for wargames float past, while Open Board Games launched an entire platform for 3D printed games last year. But few are as extensive or as easily available as Masterwork Tools’ collection of open source scenery and tiles in the OpenForge project, which already includes 103 unique designs in nearly 1,000 variations.
This fantastic collection has been built up over the last few years, and all pieces have been completely designed by maker and engineer Devon Jones from Denver. By day, he works for cloud startup Sendgrid, but has been working on gaming tools for years as well. As part of Masterwork Tools, he has also been working on a series of Android apps (including Masterwork Tools: Pathfinder Open Reference) designed to make gaming at the table easier and more efficient, but has now shifted his focus back to modeling again. By launching a Patreon for the OpenForge project, Jones aims to finance even more fantastic creations and provide them free of charge through Thingiverse.
If the existing collection is anything to go by, this is a fantastic opportunity for fans of tabletop gaming. “With the OpenForge project, I've created hundreds of 3D-printable tiles usable for tabletop gaming since 2013. These tiles allow gamemasters and war-gamers to create a nearly limitless number of scenarios. They are modular and compatible with a wide variety of tiles produced by several companies and individual makers. I create these tiles for my games and yours,” Jones says. All can be 3D printed at home on just about any desktop 3D printer, and are fantastic props that pump excitement into any game.
As Jones explains, they are a firm believer in open source sharing, and are therefore releasing everything under the Creative Commons - Attribution - Share Alike license. “Users are free to sell the tiles they print and even publish derivatives, as long as they commit to using the same license so others can benefit, too,” he says. “I want to release tiles often, and I want people to be delighted with each release instead of worried about the cost.”
The Patreon campaign simply provides Jones with the means to develop and share even more inspiring designs with the community. “With your help, I'll update the tiles to allow them to interlock so you can create more stable gaming surfaces, as well as multi-story buildings,” he says. Among others, cut stone tiles, Tudor tiles for cityscapes, and tiles for city streets, mines, wooden buildings and castles are all on his agenda. Numerous accessories, such as a working portcullis, doors, windows, stairs, bridges and boats can also be expected.
If you’re interested in using 3D printing to spice up your own games, be sure to go through Masterwork Tools’ amazing collection of open source tabletop gaming scenery and tiles on Thingiverse here. Also definitely check out their Patreon page here; a modest donation can do a world of good.
Posted in 3D Printing Application
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