Gridfinity On The Go

Background

Unsurprisingly, the person that decides to make blog posts on Gridfinity is a nerd. Recently I’ve had the fortune to join an in person game of DnD with friends. We’ve so far had a session 0 where I brought way too many of my supplies and asked the GM what they’d like me to bring, which resulted in a bring it all. That was followed by a First session where we got into the story and the world, which I brought the items for.

Pain Points

With my existing solution there’s some things that I kind of don’t like about it. Image of the disparate methods I had before In the above photo there’s a few items, one is a bag that holds bags of dice. This bag of bags method makes it really hard to tell which set of dice you currently have. I’m someone that likes to use the same set so that turns into opening each bag to find out which is what set, and that gets time consuming. With some bags empty from their sets of dice being moved elsewhere it did allow one to be dedicated to holding character tokens by jbeaudoinii.

There’s a selection of wet erase pens that have their own carrying case. The case folds nicely to turn into a stand and allow easy access to the markers but, if one of them rotates then closing the case becomes a process as you have to reorient the pens to the case each time.

Another of the items is a dice box that holds 3 sets of die. As far as I can tell it’s the one by MikeyMakesIt on Thingiverse. I’ve used the box to hold multiple sets of dice as well as multiple sets of tokens from Morgul on Thingiverse. Due to the printer I had at the time the box was printed, it’s a little misshappen. I never printed the clip for the lid and that means it just slids around, which also means that I have to put the lid somewhere when I want to use the dice inside. Normally that goes under the box but it then makes the box easy to slide around. Also due to the printer of the time (and not using the change filament function in slicers) the tokens are entirely one color which makes reading the numbers difficult.

Then there is, yet another dice box. This one is from the recent printables Dice Storage contest, specifically the Dice Book by Digital Teacher. The model itself is great and really shows what 3d printing can do. I however have stored it with the lid closed for so long that it now self closes which is why the lid for the other dice box is holding this one open.

Lastly, with all these separate pieces built up over many years, that means it’s easy to forget one of them when packing before and after the game session.

Process

Now, is it absolutely overkill to dedicate an entire Rugged Gridfinity 5x4 box with matching Lid Insert, probably. Did I have fun printing new things for this, yes. I did however already have the box with lid before I thought to move my DnD stuff into it so the choice I made there was use something I had already. Then it was proof of concept it out.

Initial Proof of Concept seeing if things will fit

In my proof of concept I wanted to see how the dice will fit and printed two 1 by 1 by 6 storage boxes from DatBuschi. The dice fit and with that I more or less had my plan. I just generally laid the other items around the box and that general positiong of items allowed me to figure out that I wanted another six 1 by 1 by 6 boxes for small sets of die and the character tokens, a single 2 by 1 by 6 with 3 compartment divider bin from ZachFreedman for the numbered tokens, and a 4 by 1 by 6 for the pens and pencil. At this point in time I wasn’t sure about the extra d6s I had nor the larger but fun to roll hollow metal dice.

First step showing above mentioned boxes printed

With the printing of things that I had a pretty good idea of done, it showed that I had more room leftover than I expected. Which, is great, it allows one to come up with ridiculous ideas like a collapsible dice tower that fits in a 2 by 2 by 6. That idea is for another day, although likely never on my end. I also started reprinting the numbered tokens with two colors, one for the base and white for the number so the numbers are easier to read and with more colors of tokens more things can happen.

With the box here it also provided me more to work with in terms of what I want, which having to find the correct die in a vertical box is not something I want. I also decided on adding the cool metal dice to my box and was wondering if I could fit the plastic die in a 2 by 1 by 3 box.

Pretty much final photo cause I wasn't expecting to make this a blog post and only partially documented the process with photos

Printed two 1 by 2 by 3 boxes to see how well they stack with the plastic dice and I can proudly report, they don’t. They do however make it easy to grab the specific die so they were added to the box. Since the metal set is so much larger they don’t fit in a 2 by 1 by 3 and I went one larger with the 3 by 1 by 3 for them. Thanks to gridfinity being modular and completely rearrangable, I was able to make a carrying case for my DnD stuff that I think will work better for me.

Completed

Now with the same items but in a different place!

Currently made a minor rearrangement to the marker box positioning so it’s easier to grab the markers and tokens for the GM all at once.

Old methods all stacked on top of the new box

I also compared the size of the old and the new. With the old way it was easier to rearrange the items in bags but overall, they’re about the same space taken up between old and new.

Boxes taken out of the gridfinity box

What the old couldn’t do though was easily pass off all the relevant items to relevant players and make it easy to see. Now when I want to hand the player the dark blue set they used I know where it is. When I want to hand the GM the tokens and pens, all right next to each other and can grab them all with a single hand. With everything having a place too, it’s also easy to know when I have everything I need packed, the box is full and the lid closes.

Closing Thoughts

Gridfinity is awesome. The maker community is awesome.

Am I ridiculous for redoing all of my printed dnd carrying things, yes. Does this make it easier for me to pack and setup, also yes. Would it be cool to have custom cut outs that perfectly seat the die, yes, but I’m happy with how I have it currently.

Again, I really like gridfinity and think that if you have a 3d printer should give it a try cause it can be what you want it to be. Which, I’m incredibly happy with what I’ve been able to do because it exists so while I might not be able to contribute modules, what I can do is write about my experience using it. Here’s my attempt at giving to the maker community that has been so generous with what they give to others.

Background

Pain Points

Process

Completed

Closing Thoughts

Links