Dice

Most, if not all RPG players can never have enough dice. It’s just a scientific fact that eventually a die will have a poor session and need to be banished from being played with forever, or slightly longer. So more dice is always a good thing, and there are some really cool dice out there. If you want to keep it simple and cheaper, there are tons of interesting dice sets with more basic plastic, but you can also find stone dice or my favorite metal dice. There are even some companies where the metal dice don’t cost an arm and a leg. If you are going really fancy, the dice to get would be a single D20 (twenty sided die), but set of dice are also really nice which should come with a D20, D12, D10, D10 Percentile, D8, D6, and a D4, that is enough for someone to start playing D&D.

Dice Tray/Dice Tower

Both of these serve the same purpose, they are something to roll your dice into. The dice tray is simpler in that it’s only a tray and you can roll it into that without it thudding against the table and denting it, this is especially important for if someone has stone or metal dice as those are heavy. But it also means that you’re not as apt to roll off the table either. A dice tower does kind of the same thing. You drop the dice that you’re rolling into the tower and it has levels that it hits off of causing it tumble. It rolls down into a tray that’s attached to the bottom. The best part of dice towers is how cool they look. I have one that looks like a tree with some birds in it, definitely a unique/fun thing to roll dice in, and there are so many different possible designs to choose from out there for dice towers.

Custom Mini

Now, a custom miniature sounds expensive, but thanks to the likes of Hero Forge, they really aren’t that bad. Hero Forge is a site that lets you custom design a mini based off of the body parts that they have built into the system that you can then get 3D printed. So if you’re in a game with someone that you’d be giving a gift to, this is a fun option. And if you know of someone who has a 3D printer (or have one yourself) you can just print it off from an STL file which you can buy which makes it even easier. I really like this idea for a serious RPG player because it’s something that feels like it’s very thoughtful and something that a person might not do for themselves, because while the prints are a reasonable price, that doesn’t mean that they are $10, or less, like a generic mini.

Book Bag

Might not be something that is needed right away, or maybe you play digitally, but a book bag is really useful. It gives the player or the DM a way to carry around whatever books they have really easily versus having a stack in their arms. You can probably find good nerdy ones related to D&D, RPG’s or just fantasy in general that would work well. A dedicated bag is nice, from my personal experience, because it means that I don’t have to pull anything out ever if I’m always taking it to one person’s place, or if we rotate whose place it is at, I could easily see leaving stuff in there between sessions.

Notebook

Now, a notebook sounds odd, and depending on who it is for, it might be more or less useful, but there are some notebooks or binders that are made for either the player or DM. And as the DM, if they are like me, they might generally do more of their planning a notebook than say, on a computer. But the ones for players are very cool because you can have your character sheet in there, you can keep track of spell and uses, as well as it gives you a spot to take notes for the session. So it’s a one stop shop for your character. I really like the concept, and I have one that is a binder and leather bound for when I eventually am a player.

Obviously there are other things as well you could consider. There are books that are coming out fairly often for all of the main systems so you could grab them the newest one that has come out, but there is some risk in that as normally I’ll just grab the newest books right away as someone who has all the DM sort of books, minus the adventures. You could also do a new system for a game, but depending on what your group plays that might be more or less useful.

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Book Ends

Now, this sounds kind of silly, but let me explain. There are book ends out there that are nice simple metal ones, those are cheap. Anything fancier, not nearly as cheap. Someone might not splurge on something like that for themselves, but it is a great idea to gift for someone. There are a lot of different options you could go with. I’ve gotten ones that you put together, just a CNC cut thing where it’s two flat pieces of wood that slot together to make the L shape for holding up books, plus then a cut of the Fellowship of the Ring as the brace. So you can find a number of things like that which are great because you can tailor it to the type of book that someone likes. We also have some heavier ones, one with cats reaching up onto books and another the top of a castle with a dragon sitting on it. So you have a ton of options and it’s a luxury item, which makes it something that a book lover would love to get, but might not for themselves.

Book Darts

Another one of those accessory items, and this could be book marks as well, but book darts are just cooler. These are little metal clips that slide onto a page of a book. You can use them as a book mark and just mark at the top of the page where you stopped, or you can use the pointier side of the book dart and slide it along the side of the page to mark what paragraph and what side of the page you stopped on. This is something that’d be a great stocking stuffer for a book lover.

A Series Set

This could be given in a few different ways. There are some book series that come on a box set, so you could do that, or there are others that you can just get the person all matching books. I know, for example, my Dresden Files and Harry Potter are not all the same, some are short paperbacks, some are tall paperbacks and some are hard cover. If you know what a person has, you can help them get a more consistent collection just be giving a book that’ll match what they have the most of or what they like the best. This one won’t be for everyone, but swapping books in and out like that will please some people as everything will look more aesthetically pleasing. And if you can find an older boxed or matching set of some of the books, that’s a bonus too.

Special Edition/Early Edition

For someone who loves books, there are versions of books out there that they might be interested in, but just won’t be something they buy, because either they cost more or since they already have the book they don’t feel like they should get it again. Find those special editions, and by that I don’t mean the movie tie-in covers. But I’m talking about the hard cover with the embossed, the one with special art pieces in the book, if it’s an older book, look for an older printing of it. Things like that again are those luxury items that someone might not buy for themselves but that they’ll probably be drooling over and wishing that they could get. Now, be aware, first editions, or some of the fancy editions of books can get to be quite spendy, but even just something that is nicely bound and has a good spine edge on it, that’ll work if it’ll standout and highlight a book on the shelf.

Book Bag

Now, when I say this, it can be two things, it can be a bag for carrying your books, but they also do book printed bags that you could certainly carry books in, but you could also use for shopping, for a day trip, going to be beach, whatever. But they have nerdy or book things on them. My wife has a bag that she has used for crafting that has an image on it made from the words of the a book. So like a scene from Pride and Prejudice that is all just words laid out in order, from Pride and Prejudice to make that shape. Or you can find some with artwork from the book on them. Or maybe a pithy quote or just a quote in general from their favorite book on it. I’d stay away from the more generic ones just because fairly often those are just too cutesy or could miss the mark for the person than something that is directly tied to a book.

There are way more options you could look at as well for someone who loves books. I will say, books themselves, like a new book for a person, are tricky unless you really know the person. I’m a big fan of literature, but there are some things that I just don’t want or care about in terms of books and I know that I’ll be apt to just read them and then sell them used, or if it doesn’t come off the shelf for a long time, just sell. So know your audience, and I like the idea of helping make someone’s books more unique, uniform, whatever by giving them something that they might not get for themselves, like an early edition or a special printing of a book.

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