A dnd game setup with dice tray, miniatures, battle maps, DM Screen, and other accessories.

What do accessories add to your D&D game?

So if you read about how to get started, you’ll know about the things you need to play and run Dungeons & Dragons, or indeed most other TTRPGs. But there are a load of things you can use to accessorise your game that can help take you to the next level! We look at some of the accessories and what they bring to D&D.

Dice

While I’ve already covered the need for dice in a previous article, one thing that a lot of players like to do is get special dice. This can be for all kinds of reasons: maybe they’re funny, they resonate with your character, they’re beautiful, or maybe you saw your favourite streamer using them. For whatever reason, most players end up with more than one set of dice. And this can be mechanically very useful – as your characters level up they’ll use more damage dice for their attacks, spells and abilities (Fireball needs 8d6). You also might have several in dice jail who need replacing! So wherever you are in your gaming journey, you’ll probably always keep an eye out for new dice, and you just might be a dice goblin! (That’s what these people are called, ok!)

Dice Vaults and Chests

So now you’ve got more dice, you’ll need something to carry them in. If you’ve ever bought cheap dice (the ones that come in the little felt bags) you’ll know it’s really easy to misplace these. Having something that helps you keep your dice in check is really useful. There are two main choices for dice storage, depending on how many dice you have and what kind of dice you like. And that is either a dice box (like a vault or a chest), or a dice bag.

You could get a Dice Vault if you’ve got a special set of dice, or a larger box for when you’ve got a small hoard that you want to carry safely. We make our Dice Vaults to be characterful and help you fully embody your character, or you could get one that doesn’t do that I suppose! Dice boxes and bags tend to be more generic, but they have a lot more space. 

Vaults are great because they’re usually padded or offer some form of protection to your dice (ours have a recess for each die and are lined, many have other types of lining). Boxes and bags have less protection but you can fit a lot more in there. It really depends if you have a trove of dice or you like one set in particular. Or you could get both! Just make sure if you’re getting something to store them in that your dice will fit.

Dice Trays

Now that you’re into the flow of throwing those bones, you’ll notice that sometimes the dice will get away from you. If you’ve got sharp or heavy dice, chances are they will be hard enough to damage your table. Even worse, if you’ve got a chonky die that falls to the ground, it could damage the dice or your floor! Big metal die vs tiles is not a battle you intended to fight. Basically, having your dice scatter everywhere is a pain, and you definitely don’t want to damage them, or your table or floor. So what is the solution?

Dice Trays are one of the best accessories you can get for D&D, especially as a player. That’s because you can marshal all your dice in one place and it’s really easy to see how they roll. For me, after I started using a rolling tray, it made it really clear what “counted” as a roll: if it lands in the tray and it isn’t cocked, it’s the roll. You get all kinds of dice tray, from premium quality hard wood trays like the ones we make, to cheap felt-lined MDF or cardboard ones. I won’t get too deep into it here, but the obvious differences are price and durability. They also come in a variety of sizes and with extras. We designed ours to fit alongside notebooks and sourcebooks, and to be able to handle a good amount of dice – anything too small and you’ll be constantly rerolling; too big and you’ll have a pain fitting it in your bag when you’re on the move.

Dice Towers

A Dice Tower is an accessory designed to create fair and even rolling. The idea behind them is that you drop your dice down the top and they are rolled out the bottom. Why would you need this? Well there are a few reasons. Firstly, some people have trouble rolling dice, and a tower can help those with physical limitations still get to be involved. But they also make sure everything is fair for everyone as it removes bias from the way dice are rolled. I’m not saying anyone is intending to play underhand, but it happens. The best use for them in general is for when you want to leave no doubt. You may have seen the Box of Doom in Dimension 20. When the big rolls are called for, dropping the dice down your tower feels really great. And while it probably isn’t my style, I had a DM do every roll in front of the screen and in a dice tower. He struggled to roll below 15 all night and we had a really tense game! 

There are a lot of different kinds of dice tower, but broadly there are: ones that are obviously dice towers; and ones that are more like dioramas. We make the former, and it’s worth being aware that whilst ours come with a storage and rolling tray that fits the tower, not everyone’s does. With the higher quality wooden ones (like we make), you’ll usually get a choice of different types of wood, and we also give you choices of different styles to bring out your or your character’s personality. The diorama type ones are usually involving a piece of scenery or a creature. Read more about what makes a good dice tower here.

DM Screens

If you’re a Game Master / Dungeon Master, the screen is the separator between yourself and the players. Apparently, Gary Gygax used to completely screen himself from view so that the players would be fully immersed, so having a physical separation in TTRPGs goes back a long time. There is no need to be that extreme though. 

A DM screen achieves several things, and having a way to be screened is well worth it. Firstly, it allows you to hide your notes, plans, and rolls from your players. As the DM, you control the game and everything in it, making sure that’s a surprise for you players is important and so you’ll want to hide your notes. You can do this by propping up a folder or something, but a DM screen is designed to stand up and do that for you.

They also either come with notes and tips inside (typically for Dungeons & Dragons), or they let you add your own. You can get by without these, but they can also be very useful, and there are a tonne of good guides on YouTube about what sort of things you might like to include on your screen. (By the way, while they’re not on our website, we’ll happily make custom DM screens!)

Battle Maps

There are two schools of thought when it comes to running the physical spaces in RPGs. The first is the “theatre of the mind,” and involves all situations being described by the DM and imagined by all involved. To be honest, most games are played like this most of the time. However, when it comes to combat, that is where the big difference comes in. If you’re from a wargaming background you’ll naturally gravitate towards the maps that make the space very clear. You can use a lot of things to make maps: a piece of paper (preferably gridded), a whiteboard, wet/dry erase sheets, all the way up to 3D miniature scenery and terrain (more on that below).

Using battle maps help eliminate ambiguity from the scenario you are in and help bring your combats to life. When it comes to your maps, the more reusable the better, which is why I mostly like the erasable sheets you can redraw on. Obviously using modular terrain is a more immersive way to achieve the same thing, but they take up a lot of space and money that not everyone has. Another great thing about flat maps over modular terrain is that you can take them with you, so if you’re not the host you don’t have to worry about taking a bus load of extras.

The thing to remember about battle maps is that you shouldn’t feel hampered by them, they should add to your game. Even if you mostly run combat on a map you can still throw in a theatre of the mind encounter, in fact it can be really fun to do those. Your maps don’t have to be to scale, they can just tell the players what the space looks like. Or you can have representative mapping and battle spaces that create a much more tactical approach to gaming. Find the way you like to run your encounters

Miniatures

Using miniatures is a real game changer. For those of us who love the painting aspect, you can get a whole load of enjoyment from that. However, even if you don’t paint, there is a massive selection of minis you can get or 3D print for a fairly reasonable amount. And as a DM, when you slam down a fresh mini for the players to fight against the reaction is usually great. You’re absolutely fine to use any markers you like to represent your PCs and monsters, but miniatures can really help to bring your table to life. 

I get that miniatures, especially big ones, can be pricey, so the best place to start if you want to bring miniatures to your games is for the PCs. Monsters and enemies change on a weekly basis, but your PCs should be with you for a long time (hopefully!), so investing in miniatures to represent them is a brilliant first step. And if you’re the DM, you don’t need to pay for them yourself, your players can be encouraged to get their own minis! If you use Heroforge they can also design minis themselves!

Scenery and Terrain

As I alluded to earlier, you can elevate your battle maps using scenery and terrain. Of course, as I mentioned you can draw all that stuff on your maps, but having specialised pieces can make your encounters look really special. I have cut-out wet/dry erase terrain from 1985 Games, but also modular dungeon tiles from Dungeons and Lasers. There are a load of different companies that make terrain that you can use for you game.

Alternatively, if you enjoy crafting things, there are plenty of resources on YouTube, like Black Magic Craft, who can help you learn how to make your own terrain.

Tokens and Coins

There isn’t much to add here that wasn’t covered by miniatures, aside from that you can use tokens or coins for more than just representing entities in your game. If you hand out inspiration, a token could be used as a physical reminder. You can use either as special representation for certain aspects in your game, like spell slots or barbarian rages, spell concentration. Of course, some of those can be represented using…

Condition rings

Condition rings are rubber rings that sit on your miniatures and represent various status changes, spell effects, etc. They are really useful to remind everyone at the table who is blessed, restrained, or frightened. These are usually pretty cheap. An even cheaper option than buying specific rings is to take the plastic rings from drinks bottles: they’re soft and light enough to not damage your miniatures and you can just use them as reminders that characters are affected by spells or conditions. They require slightly more thinking but can achieve the same job.

Props

One thing that some particularly creative players like to do is create props for their game. Sometimes it’s a physical puzzle box for your players to try and open, other times it might be a letter written from one of the NPCs or quest gives. Some of these you might be able to buy, but mostly I suspect people make them (you can tell I don’t!). By no means required, but can also add a level of interaction to your game that is quite special.

Gaming tables

The ultimate statement that you are a serious gamer is a dedicated gaming table. For most people though, your normal dining room or coffee table will do the job. What a gaming table gives you can vary, from recessed playing areas, accessories, or an optimised design to help you play RPGs. A great example is the table in Critical Role that a lot of people have emulated. The DM has a larger area that immerses them in the players whilst giving them the room they need. Other types of table have mood lighting, screens embedded, etc. The gaming table is the ultimate luxury item when it comes to gaming. And while we don’t have a standard version, we are happy to make custom tables too.

Are they worth it?

So there you have it, a massive list of accessories and why you might decide to include them in your games. And there are certainly plenty of other things that you could add to this list, I probably will revise it in the future. My personal opinion is that you can’t really go wrong with any of these accessories to your game; not only do they feel like a fun investment in the hobby, they can also be great gifts. But you don’t need any of them to have fun and you shouldn’t judge or feel judged at the lack of one or all of them in your game. As you spend more and more time in the hobby, you’ll get a sense of the things that you like and are willing to spend time and money on to get your perfect gaming setup.