Alea Tools makes some great plastic marker discs that have embedded magnets. These discs have a multitude of uses at the table, mostly with miniatures.
Hirst Arts blocks are far from cheap, quick, light, or easy, but if made with the right material and some extra attention they will be the sturdiest and most durable terrain/dungeon pieces you will ever have. They WILL last a lifetime.
Dave Graffam makes some great paper models which are for sale. He also offers some good pricing on bundles and several free models. His paper models are usually layered which gives the Frugal GM multiple buildings from a single PDF download. Cost effective and high quality.
Amber's Secret Cove is an etsy shop run by Barb & Jolly Blackburn (of KenzerCo/Knights of the Dinner Table fame). What I really like about the terrain items they make is the fact that most of the pieces seem a bit clunky, or "off". This adds a lot of charm to the pieces and makes them seem more realistic, at least to me.
Fat Dragon Games also makes some great paper models. They have some good 2D dungeon and cavern sets and a good collection of 3D models as well. Fat Dragon has also come up with a really good system for attaching their modular 3D model pieces.
Acheson Creations is a small manufacturer of resin models. I highly recommend the small accessory pieces as one of the best bang-for-your-buck terrain pieces that will work with just about any setup. Paint them yourself and save some serious cash.
Inked Adventures is a cool collection of hand-drawn dungeon tiles and assorted terrain pieces by Billiam Babble. Pretty cool artwork that is pretty easy to work with as well. Some of his newer designs are in black & white line art so you can easily (and cheaply) print it out at home if you don't have a great color printer.
Dungeon Crafter 3 from Shardgames is a free dungeon mapping software that allows a GM to quickly make simple maps.
This software's website is no longer available, but the software may be available from other sources.(link to one on this thread)...at your own risk.
Hexographer is a map-making software program that allows users to create hex-style maps as well as town maps, battlemats and hex star-maps. There is a good free version as well as a paid version.
MapTools is a great cross-platform game aid for making digital maps for use in online games. It has integrated chat, dice rolling functions, and can easily be integrated with system-specific frameworks.
Dundjinni is a great mapping program that can create some high-resolution battlemaps suitable for online or tabletop use. Their
forums are a great resource for free maps and map graphics.
MapForge is a battlemap creator for Mac and Windows PCs, supported by a vast library of mapping assets covering various genres. Generates output suitable for printing or use in any virtual tabletop (VTT). Free version available, but a license is required for high-resolution output.
Dyson's Doceahedron is a great little blog whose author likes to created old-school maps. The thing is, he is great at it and he pretty much releases all of these maps out into the wild. I really doubt you'll not love his site.
Save Vs. Dragon is the home of New Big Dragon Games Unlimited. These guys put out some awesome d30 product and offer a ton of freebies in the form of tables, GM Aides (Forms), and adventures.
Doomslakers is J.V. West's blog where he posts a lot of cool OSR material. Not everything is cross-posted to his professional website,
located here. You might also want to check out his DeviantArt page (link on his website).
Blue Boxer Rebellion is
Doug Anderson's blog. Doug does some great isometric room maps and is the creator of the Dungeonteller RPG. Personally I think this game would be great for younger kids just getting into their 1st RPG experience.
Rae'Chel Does Some...Stuff is a new (April 2023) channel that only has a couple of videos, but the production value is good, the craft is cool, and she approaches a couple things from a different perspective.
The DM's Craft is a YouTube channel where DM Scotty builds inexpensive set tiles for use in any table-top RPG.
Mini Terrain Domain is a YouTube channel with even more miniature terrain building goodness.
The
DMGinfo is another YouTube channel making tons of cheaply-made bits & bobs for RPG Terrain.
Yet another RPG Terrain channel,
Wyloch's Armory likes to use a 1.25" standard for terrain pieces and while I thought "meh" at first it really made some sense.
Dungeons & Gluesticks is a terrain building channel in the flavor of The DM's Craft, but the builds are different enough that these videos are a great addition to the other channel. There are also some more complex builds that seem easier to tackle with guidance
Grey Tower Games is yet another building channel, but most of the builds involve much different materials and processes than the channels listed above.
Game Terrain Engineering is a terrain building channel from a regular Make Magazine contributor.
Luke's APS (Affordable Painting Service) is a custom terrain & mini channel with some great advice for affordable options in making terrain and minis.
Uncharted Territory is a newer YouTube channel with drawing tutorials.
Black Magic Craft is another mini an terrain channel with tons of cool DIY projects that look quite professional.
Quassi's Bell Tower is another crafting channel that has some similar, yet very different builds than some of the earlier channels.
Questing Beast is a bit of a "general" RPG YouTube channel, but I really like the "
Fantasy Map Making Tutorials for DnD"
Landvaettr's Lair is a cool channel that makes some seriously high-end DIY terrain. Some pretty sweet builds that look great and seem reasonably attainable.
Tabletop WitchCRAFT is another foam crafter/builder channel, but this channel has a
publisher page on DriveThruRPG where you can get some "blueprints" to serve as stencils so you can make your own. Most of these stencils/cutting guides are free or PWYW, but the others are inexpensive.
Real Terrain Hobbies is an interesting channel in that Neil, the host, does what looks like these complicated builds, but he shows just how easy it can be...provided you have the time. His workspace isn't anything special, nor is his tools, but if you follow along you can easily get up to the same builds he does.
Crooked Staff Terrain is interesting in that it simply builds upon some of the other 2.5D terrain others have been working on and adds some really easy-to-do twists for a great looking finished product that doesn't take up a lot of resources to accomplish.
I thought I should highlight the different Patreon campaigns I'm involved with (
past or present). I think each of these is worth checking out and I'm putting them in alphabetical order. I will go through these once in a while and if these folks have ended their Patreon campaigns I'll remove the links.
Last Updated: 04/04/2023
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