So what are some ways that you can bling out a board game, or that board games have bling?

First there are fancier editions of board games, might be called collectors edition where they only make a certain number of an ultimate edition where some of the pieces have been upgraded by the company in the game. This might be something that the company puts out like a 25th Anniversary Edition of a game, but another common spot is on Kickstarter where they will have a standard or retail edition of the game where all the pieces are normal card board or whatever it might be, and then there is an ultimate or special edition that has it’s own unique cover and upgraded pieces in it, of course which costs a bunch more.

The next biggest way that people can bling out their board game is known as a custom insert. A custom insert is especially useful for a game with lots of pieces. The main reaso for this is because while you can put the pieces into little baggies, you then have to dump them out on the table and it’s all a mess, you have to know how you put them back into the baggies, and get them to lay flat enough in the box. There are companies like Broken Token and Folded Space that create inserts for these games. A great example of how this works is Gloomhaven. In that game you have monster tokens, status tokens, damage tokens, terrain, and more, to fit that all into the box is just a mess. The insert that I have is a wooden one that I had to put together. It has a spot for all the tokens, the coins, and the monsters so you can lift out trays, keep them in their trays for storage while they are on the table, and keeps them from shifting around in the box. This doesn’t make your game looks any nicer, like a lot of the upcoming ones will, but it makes it more functional to play, especially the bigger games out there, like a Gloomhaven.

Beyond that there are a lot of other ways you can bling out a game. Board Game Geek has items known as Geek Up Bits which are plastic bits to replace the cardboard tokens already in the game, it makes it shinier and nicer. And there are a lot more items like this as well from Etsy. There are companies that are creating custom meeples for games, or 3D printing minis. You can get card holders that help you organize your place space for games like Arkham Horror LCG and Marvel Champions. These can range from cheap little things that might cost $10 to bigger things like for Marvel Champions that might be over $100 plus shipping. All of these things are going to make the game pop on the table more.

Finally, and I mentioned this above, you can bling out your own game with a 3D printer. There are sites, such as thingiverse.com where you can get 3D printer files and print out blinged out pieces for your own game. I’ve seen people who have 3D printed terrain for an RPG and then used that in Gloomhaven as well, or printed out things specifically for Gloomhaven. Out of all of the areas, besides organizers for some of my bigger games, this really interests me, because it means that I can bling out games I want to have blinged out without having to track down some specific Etsy shop and spend a large chunk of money. Now, buying a 3D printer is obviously a pretty large chunk of money as well, but kind of as I’m thinking about slowing down some in buying games, or there are fewer this year that are really standing out to me, this would allow me to really bling out some games and have cool minis and things to practice my painting on. I’d also allow me to create set pieces more easily for D&D games as well, which isn’t a requirement, but once in a while for big epic moments, that’d be awesome.

So those are just some of the ways you can bling out your board game. Obviously, the question is why would you do that, some of it is for convenience, like the organizers, and some is just because you can. And to tie it into food, they say you eat with your eyes first, so the same can be pretty true with board games, if it looks better on a table, you’ll probably be more interested to try it and the experience itself might be better because it looks good.

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The Nerd Who Likes to Drink – Get them an engraved beer glass or whiskey tumbler. You can find all sorts of interesting ones out there, and they aren’t extremely expensive. They are also better options than a shot glass, because most people have too many shot glasses from college. I have two stein style beer mugs that Kristen and I got at ConVergence with Lord of the Rings theme on them. But you can find them on Etsy with almost anything on them. If you want the rebel symbol from Star Wars, or the Vulcan salute, you can get that. This falls into that category of things that are a bit more unique. Or unique booze, that always works too.

Board Gamer Bling – Now, this is slightly different than the next one RPG’er Bling, but basically, help a person bling out their board games. There are a lot of games that use cardboard coins, help them start replacing that money by getting them some metal coins for the game. There are a ton of shops that make awesome coins. Or, maybe they play a resource management game where there are different types of resources, you can probably find little molded or 3D printed pieces to replace those. Little things like that can elevate a gaming experience. Or, maybe a game has meeples in it, you can get custom meeples of the various colors, so that the game has a little bit more of a fun factor to it.

RPG’er Bling – If this was like board gamer bling, I’d just say look back at the RPG list. However, I am going to add in some apparel stuff this list or little fun things. You can get things like D20 (twenty sided dice) earrings that are different, and there is even one place where you can get some glow in the dark ones. There are also necklaces that have D20’s or various dice hanging from them that you could go with. And, tons of goofy RPG related t-shirts that you could consider as well. In the RPG listed, we did some table bling, this time, the suggestion is bling out the player or the DM.

Collector’s Sets – This is really for anything nerdy, and I talked about it in fantasy, while people might have a version of something that they like, they probably won’t, since they already own it, go with the nicer version. So you can do that for them. This can be for books or movies or whatever it might be. But a hard backed version of a book, or the cool collectors version of a movie that comes in a nicer case or with something extra, that is fun. For, for video games, you can sometimes get a larger release pack that comes in a cool case or comes with a figure. With a video game, I would try and get a game the person doesn’t have, as compared to books or movies which can replace the old version on the shelf. I’ve found that people tend to go back to video games as much or at least display them as much. Now, that might be who I hang out with, but that’s my recommendation.

Manga/Anime – This one is pretty simple, if they have the anime or love the anime, consider getting them the manga. If they love the manga, consider getting them the anime. You can also look at what anime or manga that they like and find things adjacent to that, but it can be tricky with some o books or shows, because they are pretty unique.

Experiences – There are plenty of experiences that you can give a person when it comes to nerdy things. A lot of escape rooms have a nerdy theme to them. If the person is traveling or lives near a theme park, you could give them the experience of Star Wars or Hogwarts. Or maybe there is a convention that they’ve wanted to go to locally or not, you could pay for a ticket into the convention. Know the persons means to get to go and do these things, but experiences, as I’ve gotten older, are often just as good a gift as something that will just sit around. Now, that isn’t to say that there aren’t some things that people just really want to get, I know that there are some things that I want, but experiences can be something fun and different. Even if it’s just setting up a gaming time where they get to pick all the games and you’ll play games you normally wouldn’t with them, that would be a great gift that is cheap.

There are a ton of nerdy things that you can get for people or experiences that you can share with someone around the holidays. And, obviously, these aren’t tied into Christmas, they work great for birthdays, anniversaries, or maybe the person just needs a pick me up, and you can do that for them.

Hopefully these lists have helped jog some ideas for you for the nerds in your life.

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