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electronic brain surgery since 2001

DIY Board Game

Last weekend I felt like I wanted to create something with my hands again instead of sitting in front of my computer for hours. So I looked for a little project that wouldn't take too much time. Of course I spent more time than anticipated.

Originally I only wanted to build my own version of Quoridor which I found on BoardGameGeek. But then I saw that I could easily support the Viking game Hnefatafl as well if I'd just make the board a little bigger…

For Quoridor I needed walls that could be put up beween the individual fields. At the local hardware store I found a mat with small marble mosaic stones. For the walls I bought an aluminum slat that I cut into pieces with a Dremel.

Ideally the aluminum walls should have fitted between the stones on the mat, unfortunately the stones weren't glued on it precise enough. I ended up ripping them off the map, sanding the glue off and hot gluing them back on a piece of plywood. It only took me three or four tries to get the distance correct :-?

For the box/cover I built a simple plywood box. At first I thought about nailing it together but that proved to be difficult and the wood began to splinter. So I used wood glue and a rubber band to hold it together while the glue dried.

To decorate the box I transferred the print of a viking ship drawing to the box by making my own carbon copy paper by blackening the back with chalk. I then transferred the lines by tracing them with an edge. Finally I carved the lines with my Dremel and stained the wood.

The pawns I ordered from spielematerial.de whose owner was very helpful when I fucked up my order by failing to count how many pieces I really needed.

I think the end result is pretty enough.

Tags:
diy, boardgame, games
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