Walt and I like role-playing games (in case you couldn’t tell). Much of the games are theater of the mind, where the events are described but not actually seen. Often times, tokens of some sort are used on a map to help show where characters are in relation to each other. For an online game, they are images, such as Walt described here.

These tokens can be simple pieces of card stock or they can be more elaborate miniature figures. Here is a glimpse into my painting set-up for working on figures.

A wizard I painted.

Miniatures for gaming can be metal or plastic. They can be very elaborate or very simple in design. There are people who modify the figures to make them better fit their characters. My figures tend to be simple, and I am not an expert by any measure. The ones we use are scaled to just over an inch tall for a human person.

A way to hold tiny things

The figures are molded and usually need a little clean up before they are painted. I found myself having trouble trying to hold on to the small figure and using a hobby knife to clean it up. I discussed it with Walt, and we came up with a solution.

My painting station.

We took a one inch dowel and cut it into about 5 inch lengths. We took a small board and drilled some holes in it for the pieces of dowel. I use some old bicycle handlebar grip that we had around and put a piece on each section of dowel.

A dot of hot glue holds the figure on the dowel to keep it attached while I am working on it. The figures in the above picture have been primed to be ready for painting.

I usually have 3 or more minis going at once as the paint needs to dry between coats. I use paints from Reaper Miniatures, but one of my coworkers uses acrylic paints from a craft store.

Some figures in progress
Mini butterfly dragon

My figures come from a wide variety of companies. I have some from the early days of Dungeons and Dragons and some that are comic characters.

One of my favorites is this tiny butterfly dragon. it is about 5/8th of an inch tall.

Fancy set-ups

Some people have very elaborate set-ups for play. This shot was from a game at a friend’s several years ago. They have tiles and a wide assortment of figures and items to make the scene more detailed.

Resources

As mentioned, my paints are from Reaper. You can find their products here. As usual, I have no affiliation with them other than being a satisfied customer.