![\"Sharpie](\"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/005-pen-set.png\")
Here’s why. The slide show below shows the Wound \/ Frostbite tokens from Dead of Winter<\/em>. They’re punched out of standard game boards, so of course while they look nice on the top and bottom the sides are rather plain. Plus since it’s cardboard, they’re susceptible to delamination (where the layers separate). What I do is pick an appropriate color (white in this case) and then use the pens to “paint” the outside edge of the token!<\/p>\n The results, in my opinion, are outstanding. Some of the lighter colors take multiple coats to get a nice shiny finish, but the effort is worth it. My wound tokens no longer look like cardboard; they look like I spent a ton of money on fancier acrylic or other custom tokens! I saw this idea posted first on the Fantasy Flight X-Wing<\/em> forum and shamelessly Those were a lot harder to paint mostly because of the irregular edges, but not only do I like the end result but the light blue Sharpie pen color seems to match as if they designed it that way. \ud83d\ude42 <\/p>\n Second, one of the things I was hoping to accomplish was to protect the edges of the tokens. In X-Wing<\/em> and other games, these tokens spend a lot of time being picked up and put down. The edges get quite a bit of wear, not to mention oils (and Cheetos dust) from your fingers. \ud83d\ude09 I felt that once the oil-based paint dried, it would provide a much more durable surface. Essentially it would seal the cardboard inside of the token.<\/p>\n The pens last a long time. I did eventually run out of black, but that was primarily because my older son decided to paint over the gold trim on his football cleats and try to make them black. Oh, and the soles too! \ud83d\ude2f Even when the black was almost dead I found a use for it. When I painted the helpless survivor tokens from “Dead of Winter” I just used black. When I did the zombies, I used red. But the red was too much. I got the idea to go back over the red with the nearly dry black paint pen and the results came out fantastic.<\/p>\n I’m not sure how well it shows up for you in that picture, but I really like it.<\/p>\n One note about the process which is optional but I have started doing it. If you get some Emory boards (or softer sandpaper might work) you can clean up the edges of your tokens before you paint them. Tokens usually have little “boogers” on the edges where they were originally attached to the sheets of cardboard. I have tried to show that in the slide show below but the close-up pictures didn’t turn out great. I will frequently use an Emory board to remove those imperfections before I paint.<\/p>\n Finally, as I mentioned earlier, the pens are good for more than cardboard! Remember I said they’re paint, and they’ll go on anything (even shoes). I used them to paint the sides of the cardboard tokens for Mysterium<\/em>. But I also used them to paint the base of the plastic crystal ball as well. The slideshow below shows the results.<\/p>\n The results shown on the crystal balls required just one coat. I have two black paint pens; one is thicker and the other a finer point pen. I used the finer version for the crystal balls. I think even the black crystal ball looks great because the ball (which I did not paint) has a different shade from the base.<\/p>\n I buy my pens at a local hobby store that regularly offers 40% off coupons, so these are not expensive. They are also available at Amazon and likely other online retailers. You can buy them in a package with multiple pens (that’s how I got a pink one) or as individual pens. They come in standard colors or metallic. (I used the silver metallic for the food tokens from Dead of Winter<\/em>.)<\/p>\n It’s a cheap (from a dollar perspective) way to “bling out” your games. It does take some time (how much depends on how much of a perfectionist you are) but that’s an investment you can control. I’ve added affiliate links below (meaning I get a small commission if you click through) to three different packages currently offered at Amazon.<\/p>\n Have you ever looked at the special upgrade packages available for some games and wished they weren’t so expensive? Have you thought you might like to “bling out” your game just a little bit so it’s a bit more personal? What I am about to show you will change your life! Or at least give … Continue reading “Bling Out Your Games With Sharpie Paint Pens”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,22],"tags":[34,35,18],"class_list":["post-306","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-modifications","category-painting","tag-dead-of-winter","tag-mysterium","tag-x-wing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/306","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=306"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/306\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":785,"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/306\/revisions\/785"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=306"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=306"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=306"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
![\"Dead](\"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/001-wound-before.png\" "\\"Dead")
![\"Dead](\"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/002-wound-after.png\" "\\"Dead")
![\"Dead](\"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/003-wound-compare.png\" "\\"Dead")
stole<\/del> borrowed it. Here’s an example of a before \/ after picture of some X-Wing<\/em> shield tokens.<\/p>\n![\"X-Wing](\"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/004-shield-compare.png\")
\nSharpie makes two versions of these paint pens. (And they are actually paint, not ink. They’ll write on just about any surface you can paint.) One is water-based, and the other is oil-based. I use only the oil-based version for a couple of reasons. First, I’m not sure I want to put water-based paint on cardboard! I certainly would not do it without testing first. I haven’t yet found a color I wanted that was only available in the water-based version.<\/p>\n![\"Dead](\"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/010-dead-of-winter.png\")
\n
![\"X-Wing](\"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/006-before-emory.png\" "\\"X-Wing")
![\"X-Wing](\"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/007-after-emory.png\" "\\"X-Wing")
\n
![\"Mysterium](\"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/008-mysterium-yellow.png\" "\\"Mysterium")
![\"Mysterium](\"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/009-mysterium-balls.png\" "\\"Mysterium")
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/sharpie-03.jpg\")
<\/a>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/sharpie-02.jpg\")
<\/a>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.sunderedrealm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/sharpie-01.jpg\")
<\/a>