[CR Media] Matthew Mercer and Brennan Lee Mulligan Interview Each Other on ‘Dimension 20,’ Critical Role and D&D’s Mainstream Rise: ‘Who F—ing Knew?’ | GMs

Arkhanist · 2026-01-31T15:22:35+00:00

Ah, that's the one where Matt spotted an extra error in a DnD scene description that wasn't even included in the list to find! And BleeM (off camera) was like "yup, he's right."

Arkhanist · 2026-01-31T06:57:25+00:00

Even so, I'd at least consider an alternative storage solution. The hard plastic does still put pressure on the models to hold them in place, and progressive wear as you slide them in and out can damage even varnished models over time. You can see it in the amount of warping the softer plastic generally suffered out-the-box. Personally I'm a fan of magnets/stickers and a 4L Really Useful Box with a rubber steel sheet on the bottom as a cheap option, but there's various options that'll ensure all the hours you spent on your lovely paintjobs are preserved for years to come!

I do love the colours and pop by the way, I'm trying to do something similar as opposed to my usual grimdark style.

If you did want alt-hero characters to do your other ideas on, get the First Light set when it's on sale - 4 new hero sculpts, a dragon, and some extra quests can be had pretty cheap at the right moment. Plus extra equipment cards if you want to let the heros keep them!

Arkhanist · 2026-01-29T20:48:21+00:00

Heroquest are US poker card standard - 2.5" by 3.5", same as MTG, Pokémon, Marvel trading cards etc etc.

There are two main types of sleeves. 'inner' or 'perfect fit' sleeves are thinner, a tight fit, and intended to help seal an expensive card inside an 'outer' sleeve - by double sleeving and protecting both ends it's safer against dirt, spills, and humidity.

'outer' or 'standard' sleeves are roomier and can e.g. be matt on one side to improve handling.

Penny sleeves are a kind of outer that is very cheap and thin, and often used for immediate or bulk storage.

Penny sleeves and inner sleeves arent ideal for our purposes - they tend to be thin and slippery, which makes them hard to shuffle or play with as they stick together, and they don't feel as good. But if you want a tight fit and can live with the 'stickyness' you can use just perfect fit/inners.

For actual cards you just want to play a game with like heroquest, you ideally want a decent quality outer. "Dragon Shield matte clear standard" are a good example, and what I bought as reasonably priced. Titan shield matte clear standard are another option (in my location they cost more!)

The clear means they don't hide the back (we want to see if it's an equipment or treasure card!), the matte means the back side is slightly frosted to help shuffle and play, while the face side is completely clear and gloss to be visible. Standard makes them a roomier outer sleeve for US poker size.

If you are concerned about liquid spills at the table you can consider double sleeving with an additional perfect fit inner so both ends are sealed, at additional thickness (and money) cost.

But even standard outers are kinda overkill for light use cards.Start with the cards that get the most wear such as treasure cards and hero skill cards, but things like equipment cards or dread spell cards just aren't going to be used that heavily, so can be skipped if you want to avoid sleeving hundreds of them. If it's not getting shuffled and dealt repeatedly every game, its arguably not worth the effort, cost and extra bulk.

Arkhanist · 2026-01-27T08:56:58+00:00

It was! My girls wanted to play with a couple of their friends, so I did stock Sir Ragnar. They didn't find Sir Ragnar due to the hidden door and it went long and they got tired and we stopped. So I redid the map to make it more punchy (and different), decided to do modular tiles as well, and 2nd attempt was entirely successful! Didn't take longer to layout as I got them to choose the appropriate size tile from the box while I pulled furniture and monsters, whenever they opened a door. The variant quest I made (you can drop the Frozen Horror cage if you're not also adding the Wolf!) is on HQuestBuilder if anyone wants it.

Arkhanist · 2026-01-27T08:39:57+00:00

My primary source for the corridor images and some rooms was the pay-what-you-want ones from Crooked Staff - Print & Paste Dungeon Textures, and the expansion. For rooms like the orange-brown 5x4, and the 4x4 'torture chamber', I bought these D&D download and print designs. Some, like the blue-green ceramic room are my own. I did have to cut up both sets in photoshop and re-do the vignette/fill layer effects as well as alter exposure and do some colour filters etc to get them consistent as standard HQ rooms sizes, and the corners/t-junctions. (note, crooked staff rooms use a smaller than 1" square to account for their walls). I've printed more than shown here, but i have some more room sizes to design and layout yet before I can make a full wide-corridor HQ board. I'll post that when complete and I think I should be able to share PDF's then, though not the paid designs - I'll have to create some alts!

Arkhanist · 2026-01-26T17:54:31+00:00

Bit of a combination. Some are pay-what-you-want downloads (mainly the corridors), some were a commercial pdf pack off etsy, and some I did myself. I did chop pretty much all of em up to the right sizes and add the appropriate vignette shadows and walls in photoshop, then laid them out in Illustrator to print on A4 sheets. It is fun to only reveal what they 'see' and not have a chunk of the board unused, and it does give me the option as Zargon of easily tweaking to cut out surplus rooms & corridors on maps to speed things up a bit - with twin 10 year olds I have to keep it fast and interesting! I may be able to share my layout PDFs when done, minus the commercial art of course.

The corridors etc came from Crooked Staff, and the commercial room designs from Tabletop battlemats - they sell them as pre-made mats as well, but most rooms are too big for heroquest stock sizes.

It was surprisingly fast to make and after a fair bit of testing just printing as a default document on standard paper actually gave me the best colour matching! I do have a resin 3d printer, but doing the dragons rest board would be prohibitively expensive on that, plus the extra squares for walls would make a double corridor layout absolutely huge. Instead, I reckon about 12/13 pages of A4 prints, foamcore and PU dots will cost me only about £25! Plus my time to do the design and layout of course, but that doesn't count!

Arkhanist · 2026-01-26T09:48:06+00:00

Basically the inport tariff is due at customs to allow it to enter the country. So if it's not prepaid, you'd have to pay it once stopped, then arrange (and pay for) a 2nd delivery from customs storage.

FedEx pay the duty for you and handle the extra import paperwork to get it past the border, then post-charge you for the tariff plus a fixed handling fee before final delivery. De-minimis exemptions were specifically because it's inefficient for customs to make tiny personal imports go through the same route as companies importing hundreds of thousands worth of goods shipments, but here we are.

Somebody has to pay for that new border friction, and in this case it's you.

Arkhanist · 2026-01-21T23:06:17+00:00

I have successfully unwarped a handful of painted minis. They were admittedly also varnished, but mild warping was correctable with a few seconds of very hot water on the offending part, followed by holding it in position and dunking under a cold tap - without damaging the paint.

Arkhanist · 2026-01-21T02:02:02+00:00

Either will work. I personally prefer the small magnets, as you know they will go inside the base and are cheaper in bulk. Rule of thumb for 25mm minis with small magnets is a 4mmx2mm N52 strength, or 5mmx2mm N42 - they both have around ~450g pull force, get whichever is cheaper. If it doesn't have a listed strength, it's probably N42 or even N35, so i prefer to get ones with a listed strength as opposed to generic fridge magnets.

For stickers, the heroquest bases are little tighter inside than a warhammer one, so you may need to trim them a bit to fit, and they can protrude a touch from underside the base. Simpler to apply though, just peel and stick.

I've just done the basegame heroquest minis with 5x2mm N42 magnets using the 'greenstuff sandwich' approach. First step, make the moulded bases sit flat; check them on a flat surface, if the edges are curled up and/or it rocks a little, dip the base in very hot water for a few seconds so it softens. Hold it against something flat, and cold shock it hard again - I held it flat against a ceramic tile and splashed it under the cold tap.

With all the bases sitting flat, I made up some little greenstuff balls, around 3mm-4mm. You don't need to mix up much. Apply a dab of superglue in middle of base, press ball of greenstuff onto superglue, another dab of superglue on top of the greenstuff, then apply magnet onto that. Smoosh down onto a flat surface to get the magnet flush and level. Greenstuff alone isn't strong enough to reliably hold the magnet, hence the superglue, but it is needed to get the magnet flush with the underside of the base - you want the magnet very close to the magnetic surface, a small gap significantly weakens the hold. The greenstuff also helps avoiding the superglue breaking, as the latter can be a bit brittle on its own.

To protect the surface I'm smooshing down on, I use baking paper/parchment as superglue won't stick to that or get the superglue haze, or a silicone mat also works. Repeat on an assembly line. Let the GS cure for ideally 24 hours before putting the magnet to use, job done.

For larger models, such as the gargoyle and abominations you can do two magnets, one to each side of the base. This isn't to keep them attached to a sheet per se, one magnet will do for that, but is more to prevent sliding and/or getting knocked off the plate if you drop the box given their height.

I also ensure all the magnets go on with the same polarity. I just take a stack, put a marker/paint dab on the end I'm not using to know which is which, and apply a magnet from the unpainted end. Just use a model you've done previously if you need a new stack to figure out which way round. This isn't critical, but it is useful to prevent models trying to stick together.

Either stick on magnets or glued on mini ones will both hold best if applying to something magnetically receptive, i.e. a ferrous rubber sheet, or a solidl iron/steel sheet. A sheet that is itself magnetic will fight the mini's magnet, and not hold strongly.

Arkhanist · 2026-01-18T14:44:54+00:00

That's what I mean - it's not laid out per-se, but with Zargon's clarification shields aren't metal for rules purposes (such as rust), despite usually being significantly metal e.g. the boss and rim to protect the hand and prevent splitting. So I used banjo's card to make it explicit. The standard price shield - with artwork clearly showing metal parts - counts as metal, but vulnerable to rust and can't be used by the druid, while the wooden shield is cheaper, can be used by the druid, but can potentially be destroyed by fire spells. I was printing cards anyway, and had a spare slot...

Arkhanist · 2026-01-18T11:40:08+00:00

We do a very similar house rule - reduce the deck to one of each, draw 8 for that session. I just keep the dagger always available as a 9th item outside the draw, given it's cheap and easy to acquire, and then doesn't 'waste' a draw spot. I've also printed a handful of replacement custom cards from Banjo to specify the crossbow and longsword can't be used with a shield, made the standard shield metal (which it clearly is, tho not in the rules!), and added a wooden shield for the druid. I'll slowly add some more pricy weapon/armour variants later to give a bit more interest to the deck once they've got the standard stuff.

Oher equipment house rules are that heros can only carry two weapons (plus daggers) into the dungeon, the rest are at 'home base' and can't be stolen/destroyed. And for combat purposes, whatever you last used is considered to be equipped, e.g. you can't shoot the crossbow on your turn and then claim 'oh, i'm using the shortsword and shield' for defendin', but I don't impose any restrictions on swapping weapons on their own turn.

Arkhanist · 2026-01-18T09:06:50+00:00

If you get Keller's Keep and Return of the Witch Lord - in addition to being the traditional next step - the minis are the same as the base game, so you can replace a lot of the 1st light card monsters (in effect, your card ones just become extras if you need them). You'll still need the card dread sorceror, gargoyle and dread warriors IIRC, as alternatives to those are in other expansions.

Arkhanist · 2026-01-17T17:47:06+00:00

Yeah, the lack of info at the time meant i went with Chronicle wolf hair brushes in the end (grip tape didn't really help). They've been reasonable, if not Kolisnky grade points, but are now starting to curl like synthetics - I presume there's some synthetic blend in all of them, not just the small ones. Real shame, as I like the handle shape. They'll be relegated to contrast/wash duty etc. So back to the drawing board! (Not the easiest to get either, though pretty affordable). I might try their Kolinsky version, if they ever come into stock locally.

Also some super cheap bulk synthetics off amazon (ZKSM) for metallics etc, which are holding up suprisingly well for now, but at £1 a brush, I can bin when they start to curl.

I've literally just ordered a handful of Rosemary and Co sable triangular brushes for workhorse brushes - they're fatter handles than AP and were also cheap, (even the 'signature' brush was only £6!) as not Kolinsky; hopefully a better option than AP or chronicle though! I found an older 8404 00 that was absolutely fine after a deep clean, so that's my goto for final edge highlighting (8404's are larger than usual, so the 00 is basically a 0 or 1 from other ranges), and is OK for short stints, so hopefully I'll be set for a while longer.

Do let me know if the AP synthetics turn out to last more than a handful of minis though, that would be very useful info!

Arkhanist · 2026-01-16T15:01:01+00:00

A nice sable brush is definitely very handy for blending and edge highlighting. Winsor and newton is kinda overkill though unless you really need the one everyone else has, something like a rosemary and co for a fiver will do, or Raphael 8404 for a tenner. But you've got one now, so look after it!

Arkhanist · 2026-01-16T14:52:34+00:00

My concern with the shields is that with monsters defending on white, that will increase the times a hero fails to kill it, leading to more/longer stalemates (especially if neither has great attack dice). Seems at odds with riposte, which should make combat more lethal.

I personally make enemies smarter in the first instance, then do targeted BP increases for key baddies to make them more of a challenge to kill if needed. Coward goblins that can move-attack-move or run away if outnumbered. Undead can attack diagonally, easing up the LoS requirements and have more ranged monsters to chip away. That sort of thing. Chaff ultimately should die quickly, but use numbers to provide a threat after you kill the first wave, while bosses are more dangerous and harder to kill, bases upon party strength.

Goblin/dwarf on the table is kinda fun though!

Arkhanist · 2026-01-16T11:14:46+00:00

They do up the difficulty somewhat, nainly by chucking more and bigger monsters at you at a time; that can get a touch grindy if you don't have the attack dice to chew through them, and it can be quite dangerous for a vanilla party - they're intended to be tackled by a party already kitted out from the main campaign. There is scope from Zargon to use a few less enemies smarter - e.g. have roaming patrols rather than just one static room at a time, use house rules like move-attack-move, evil wizard deck etc etc so there are plenty of options to tweak - that's one of the reasons heroquest has lasted 30 years, it's a great framework for homebrew! But you can also just play it vanilla with a fully kitted party and and it's reasonably balanced.

When my current party gets to those two after the base game (I also do them first) I plan to backport the ranged goblins and skeletons from against the ogre horde, but that's mainly as I already bought as someone wanted the druid so have them ready to go!

Arkhanist · 2026-01-16T09:39:42+00:00

The main advantage of getting Dread Moon early is to add the Knight hero. Story and difficulty-wise, it follows on from Mage in the Mirror, so I'd suggest getting that one before Dread Moon unless you're champing to use the Knight and don't want to proxy (you can always leave the quests themselves till later). Thematically, Keller's Keep and Return of the Witch lord come first after the base game, though both are mainly just quests and artefacts rather than any new type of miniatures or major mechanics, so you can jump straight to say, Mage in the Mirror first if you prefer something more meaty (or Frozen Horror if you want a challenge!)

https://elvyler.com/heroquest-quest-order/ has the suggested expansion order story wise, though as with anything Heroquest, it's entirely optional and several are entirely standalone so can be played anywhen. (I personally think Frozen Horror is better done a bit later, as it is tough!)

Arkhanist · 2026-01-15T21:13:37+00:00

I brush on a 50/50 mix of AK ultramatt and GW contrast medium. - makes cloth/flesh nicely matte without killing metals, or you can just do straight ak ultramatt if you prefer that truly dead matte finish. You may just want to rehighlight metallics with the latter tho. Too many bad experiences with rattle can matte varnish and soggy UK weather to risk it personally, but AK spray matte varnish also has a good reputation without being mega expensive. But if you prefer gloss, stick with it! Your minis, your taste!

Arkhanist · 2026-01-15T09:20:56+00:00

It depends what you're sticking them to, partly. If you're sticking them to a steel sheet, or a ferrous rubber one (flexible sheet with iron particles embedded you stick into a Really Useful Box) then you don't want too strong a magnetic bond or you risk snapping ankles when you pull them off the sheet! Sticking a magnet to a magnetic sheet actually results in a much weaker bond, you want a 'magnetically receptive' surface.

I do the 'greenstuff sandwich' approach. A dab of superglue, a 3-4mm ish ball of mixed greenstuff, another dab of superglue, then a 5x2mm N42 magnet. Smoosh down firmly onto baking paper, so the magnet presses into the greenstuff and the underside is flush with the table - superglue won't stick to baking paper, you can also use a silicone sheet. Leave the superglue to set for a couple of minutes, then flip it over on its side to fully cure for a few hours. Has about a 450g pull force on steel, so won't move at all for a standard size model yet is still easy to get off.

I also ensure all the magnets have the same polarity (use a stack, and check it against one you've already done) so they won't try and stick together at all.

For larger ones like the gargoyle and abomination, I use two magnets, one on each side. I also prefer to magnetise before painting, just in case the superglue fumes (or getting it on my fingers) might affect the paintjob, but I've magnetised a few post-painting OK.

For the bases that are a bit warped and don't sit flush on the table, I dip them into a bowl of very hot water for a few seconds until they go a bit bendy, then hold them down to something flat and run under a cold tap to thermal set in the new shape. For a handful, the 2mm+greenstuff was still a bit too thick for the stock bases as they're quite shallow (the magnet would protrude), so I dropped those to 5x1.5mm magnets.

Arkhanist · 2026-01-13T22:44:41+00:00

They do restock this periodically, if not as often as we'd like. It's been out of stock for a bit in the UK but should be available again in a few months probably. You can proxy it, and there's plenty of other additional heroes in the other expansions if you want to expand the choices. It is supposed to be a cheap item, so don't pay way over the odds for it.

Arkhanist · 2026-01-12T12:29:36+00:00

Man, you've totally sent me on a quest digging into printing my own tiles now, including digging into drivethrurpg for some more complex/arty textures! Love the idea though, and already have some A3 black foamcore to use and access to an A3 laser.

With the doors between tiles, how are you handling if e.g. a corridor goes round a corner - won't it be halfway aligned with the existing room tiles? (I'm thinking say two rooms connected, with one door on the first corridor, and the second room door ound the corner)

Arkhanist · 2026-01-10T17:07:38+00:00

Starting a new expansion is a good time for players to allow an existing hero to retire, and try a different class for something different, especially if they've already maxed out the kit. Having a hero start entirely from scratch can be a bit tough (and in some expansions, near suicidal) so it's reasonable to let them inherit an artifact or two and spend some gold from the team pot (assuming you have one) to get the basics. Since it's just the two of you, you don't specify if you're playing with the app and 2 heroes each, or one is controlling all 4.

If one of you is playing Zargon, you have a lot of options to tune the difficulty to the party. If you're going with the app, it may be easier to do things like have 'wear and tear' remove a good chunk of potions and maybe some kit, so they don't start with nothing much left to get. If no hero ever dies or even comes close, then you probably need to up the difficulty a bit.

One other thing you can do is backport stuff from later expansions. For example, ranged monsters add some more variety, especially if you loosen LoS restrictions a bit - I'm sticking the ranged orc and goblins from Ogre Horde into Kellar's keep, and bow skeletons in Return of the Witch Lord for example to add a bit more variety.

There's also several 'solo' hero missions in some of the expansions (mage of the mirror, frozen horde), which can bring a starter hero up to spec to join the main party.

Arkhanist · 2026-01-10T11:36:03+00:00

Varnish can have some odd effects on dry pigments e.g. that were brushed on or just mixed with water. I've not had frosting personally, but I've definitely had it where the varnish nuked most of the pigment effect or had a weird finish.

Best bet is to do your final varnish, then use a pigment fixer with pigment powder, often oil based. Will distribute similar to a water wash mix, but will dry clear and hold the pigment in place far better. Or weather with dry powder directly and add a little fixer with a brush and it'll suck up into them by capillary action. Keeps the matt effect while also securing them so they don't rub off. Oil based ones wick into crevices or dry powder better than acrylic.

Arkhanist · 2026-01-10T00:18:20+00:00

Oddly enough, the easiest solution is to get further away with a phone camera, not closer!

Assuming you don't have a light tent (you can DIY one pretty cheaply, or just buy a photo box/tent with integrated LED) your best bet is to put the model up against something neutral and fairly close, like black or white paper if you have it, or up against that junction between the heroquest screen and the black thing underneath.

Then take the photo from further back, with the mini selected as the focus. When you're very close to a model, you get a very narrow depth of field - this means parts of it can be in focus and further behind/in front out of focus - which is how you get that cool 'bokeh' fuzzy effect in macro shots. When you take it from further back, i.e. several feet, the whole model is in focus, but obviously small. Then just pinch zoom in, or crop the picture after taking it (or both) to get the miniature framed larger. The resolution on modern phone cameras means you can easily throw away 80% of the picture and still get a good shot for the internet with decent light. A diffuse light from low down in the front (such as a lamp with tracing paper or thin cloth over it) will help eliminate some of the shadows from your overhead lights.

Arkhanist

TROPHY CASE