I did a bit of googling, like always at the start of the project (even a little one), and stumbled across someone saying they had made a simple dice tray from an Ikea frame (post not sponsored by Ikea, honest). As it happened I had a brand new ribba frame under the cabinet, so I dug it out. A lot of rummaging in the sheet materials box came to naught. However we live in this weird age of Amazon same day delivery, I purchased a pack of self adhesive EVA foam, which just happened to be the exact same width as the ribba frame back board.

This idea was formed at 10am. By 8pm the glass was in the recycling bin (I’ve learned the hard way un-toughened glass is not my friend), the spare pile of adhesive eva is waiting for the next project, and my brand new dice try is ready for my next game of Eldrich Horror, Firefly Adventures, or whatever else tickles my fancy.

I could get used to 1 day projects.

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I had a rough idea in mind, I wanted a round circle with some sort of Lovecraftian symbol on the floor. I also want the minis to take part of that circle with them when taken off to play.

After a bit of searching on Amazon for a plint I came across this trivet, which is perfect. Has a great industrial vibe to it, I won’t even need to paint the metal. The initial plan then was to use milliput on the surface to form the details.

For basing the minis I went to my go to cheap flat basing material, 2 pence pieces. Hard to find washers or anything similar for tuppence. Bit of measuring told me I needed 26mm holes for the coins. So I bought a forstener bit that worked just fine in my bench drill (the benefits of overlapping hobbies).

Now I turned my attention to a symbol. There are certainly a few of those in the mythos, I didn’t realise quite how many! I was going to go for something like the Necronomicon Symbol, but the game is so dark and full of inevitable doom I thought something a bit more upbeat might be nice. Then I stumbled across a stylised drawing of an Elder Sign I liked. A bit of doodling and I had this:

This shows the positioning of the bases and the rough shape of the elder sign. I was thinking in ink about the detailing around the edges, but I’m not sure how, I don’t want to over-busy the design.

When I started laying it out I realised my skills with milliput are woefully under-developed for this design. So I thought, carve it out of foamed pvc. This does mean the minis need pinning to the base to give them something to stick to. Fun fact, the above was my failed first attempt. The holes for the bases didn’t line up with the wooden plinth. If I was starting over I’d glue the foamed pvc to the wood THEN drill one set of holes.

I really need a metal circle cutter. My plastic one shown above has done me proud for going on twenty years, but there’s far too much flex in the design making accuracy a best guess.

And here’s where we are. The pvc is glued to both the wood and the coins. I’ve carved the elder sign into the pvc. All that’s left is to give it a little texture. I’m now thinking stone work pressed on with a rock, and cracks carved in with a scribing tool.

The minis are all converted as needed and the primer is drying. Eldritch horror display stand is well under way!

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I spent a while cruising Thingiverse (fighting their awful search every step of the way – it’s better now to be fair). After sizing up a few options I decided to go for the one by DuncanShadow. The expression is fantastic, he looks so.. cheerful!

I wanted the result quickly so we could get the game in, as a result I ended up using Tom’s scenery Cura profile with thicker lines. Then once printed I spent a while with Citadel’s liquid greenstuff smoothing out some of the rougher layer lights. To be fair it was the support detritus that made the most mess.

The slightly glossy finished is being overly enhanced by the photo I think, it’s not that shiny in real life. But happy with the final 3d printed giant, and shows the potential the 3d printer brings!

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And of course, me being me, I wanted to do something hobby related. The obvious thing to replace is the standees for the investigators. They’re all fantastic pulp tropes, but really are begging for a third dimension.

I spent a long (loooong) time browsing miniature sites. Pulp Figures have some amazing models, as do Crooked Dice. The trouble is to get the 12 models I needed it would have ended up very pricey (Pulp Figures only sell multipacks, and Crooked Dive are a bit spendy). But then I looked at Black Cat Bases, where I’ve bought a couple of small items before. They have a huge selection and with a few artistic liberties here and there, they gave me everything I needed.

Charlie Kane – The Politician
A fairly straight forward find, Mr Big is clearly a king pin, but a fat cat in a suit smoking a cigar (definitely not a carrot).. perfect.

Diana Stanley – Redeemed Cultist
Surprisingly hard to find a 28mm female cultist that works. In the end I went with a generic Praying Cultist. I suspect it’s a bloke, but who’d presume to know what lies beneath the cloak?

Jacqueline Fine – Psychic
I looked for something suitable frail looking, but in the end decided to go with The Librarian. A little austere, but a well sculpted, non-sexualised female will work.

Jim Culver – Musician
Now I know he’s clearly African American and holding a trumpet, but I think with minor tweaks to the clearly caucasian hair the Saxophonist will work. Musician minis, just not much demand I guess.

Leo Anderson – Expedition Leader
A clear Indiana Jones type by description, but I love how haggard he looks in his profile shot. Regardless, I went with Adventurer 1. Good hand options and no bullwhip.

Lily Chen – Martial Artist
Another time when the obvious trope (Asian female martial artist) was surprisingly hard to come by. In the end I went for the Female Gun Fighter. I’ll swap out both hands, in fact one of the others comes with a great open palm.

Lola Hayes – Actress
The femme fatale, the one model I was spoilt for choice on. I ended up choosing Miss Scarlet, fantastic model and an assortment of tools to hide behind her back.

Mark Harrigan – Soldier
A nice generic looking bloke with a tommy gun. Easy to find, I went with Private Eye with tommy gun.

Norman Withers – Astronomer
Another character with lots of model options. I decided to go for The Professor. Slightly shy on the beard front, but he’s holding a book and an amulet, he deserves to be in a Lovecraft game like Eldritch Horror.

Silas Marsh – Sailor
Ok this is where the artistic liberties really had to kick in. You’d think finding pulp era Sinbad would be easy right? In the end I went with the Fisherman with hook and chain. I’m going to have to break out the greenstuff and give him an eye patch and hair. Two things I’ve done before so I’m fairly confident.

Akachi Onyele – Shaman
So I spent hours looking for a female Shaman. Sure they exist, but finding them on a site that carries other things to keep postage costs down was a pain. In the end I gave up. Then Black Cat Bases sent me a couple of free gifts (part of there ‘sorry Covid ballsed up delivery times’ thing). One of the freebies was the Dancing Girl from their Tavern Accessories range. And you know what, that could work! We’ll see how the painting goes, but it has potential.

Trish Scarborough – Spy
Finally the only model I didn’t get from Black Cat. This was a mini I already had, ordered from Artizan Designs‘ awesome Thrilling Tales range. Currently there’s none listed on their site, I can only assume Covid-19 strikes again. But Lily from the Sky Pirates range will work nicely.

That’s it so far. The minis have arrived, total spend was less than £30 which I’m happy with for 12 minis. I need to do the conversions then get them painted up.

However this project doesn’t end with that, I’m working on a display base which I’ll cover in part 2 of this Eldritch Horror article.

Big thanks to Black Cat Bases for getting the minis dispatched at decent speed despite the current madness. And thanks for the freebies!

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Which whilst it’s nice and colourful, it just screamed opportunity for 3D board. And so began my attempt to make a 3D, transportable board for Hour of Glory.

The plan is to have a large case that folds in half, and each half contains the individual rooms. Using blue foam for the floor tiles and foamboard for the walls I roughed out the rooms.

Then with a bit of wood working I made a shell from pine and plywood. Easily the hardest part of the entire process was trying to source some hinges. Failed miserably and ended up having to double up the thickness of the walls at the hinge.

Another issue to overcome is the doors are moveable depending on scenario, so I designed some blanks that will cover the doors when they’re not in use.

The next step is to get the area around the edge of the box padded out then the rooms can be detailed and glued in place.

Finally then I’ll need to add a blank panel that can clip (or magnetize) onto the bottom of the closed case to keep it all sealed. It’s an interesting project to do a 3D board game board mixing in some woodwork. The real test will be streamlining the rules some so I can convince people to play it with me!

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