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Glass/Plastic 'Beads'

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Nestalawe
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Joined: 08/07/2008

Hey ya'll,

Does anyone know of a good supplier of, or examples of, glass and/or plastic beads?

By Beads I mean like those that look like melted marbles and come in different colours, usually used for decorative purposes i.e. in vases. Are there cheaper plastic equivalents?

For the main game I am working on I would ideally like to have around 5 different colours of these beads, which will be used for determining effects, i.e. by placing certain amounts of different colours in a cup or bag and then drawing from them. So they all need to be the same size, shape and weight so players can't differentiate them by touch.

For my 'Master' version of the game I will most likely buy some nice looking glass beads, but in the Real World it would be nice to know what my options are if I was ever going to make more than one copy of the game and send them off to poor sods to play :wink:

Other options are to use cardboard chits, which would get terribly worn over time, or to use crappy platic chits, or to use wee wooden blocks. But glass beads look the coolest :wink: ...But they are the heaviest and most likely most expensive as well.

To get what I mean, Runebound provides card 'beads' - top left corner - which many players replace with 'Real' - so much nicer - glass beads. So that is always an option, but a really uncool one (why should you provide crappy game components and advise players to buy better ones...) but is of course well cheaper :wink:

Do people know of any other games out there that come with a whole lotta glass beads? I haven't tested yet but it is looking like there will need to be upwards of 20 beads in five colours, so 100+ is realistically needed for the game.

p.s. how can I get my smilies to work? :cry: it says they are on in my profile...

OrlandoPat
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Joined: 10/16/2008
MegaMarbles

MegaMarbles has great glass beads. That's what we use for the "stones" in SiegeStones. At least I think they're glass. I'm not sure. They might be resin.

Nestalawe
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Joined: 08/07/2008
Glass/Plastic 'Beads'

Ah yes dems the ones! I will see if there are any UK suppliers.

OrlandoPat, can you let me know how much they cost you? PM me if you wish, they have no prices online so its hard to estimate how much they may be...

Cheers!

OrlandoPat
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Joined: 10/16/2008
An Annoying Answer

I realize that this is annoying, but the answer to your question is that it depends on the quantity you order and whether you want them bagged or not. Our first run of SiegeStones was 1,000 games, which meant I was ordering 80,000 stones. Our second run was 5,000 games (400,000 stones).

If you're looking at ordering 100, I don't know how much they're going to cost.

Nestalawe
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Joined: 08/07/2008
Glass/Plastic 'Beads'

No worries, how much for the first 80,000? I can probably scrounge 100 or so from various stores, but it would be nice to know how much they would cost in bulk...

FastLearner
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Joined: 12/31/1969
Glass/Plastic 'Beads'

I figure the reason you don't see real glass beads in many games with large print runs is twofold: if they break in shipping, you're sending broken glass shards to people, even to the point of having sharp glass bits coming out of the box before it's opened, and two, shipping cost is already a big factor for publishers and distributors, and a pound or two of glass stones doesn't help with the weight.

Doesn't make it a bad idea, imo: it's just the slight possibility of the glass shards and the extra weight that make them less popular than they ohterwise would be.

-- Matthew

seo
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Joined: 07/21/2008
Glass/Plastic 'Beads'

I think Matthew has a good point. Maybe you can settle with clear plastic for a cheaper, lighter and safer version.

If your game becomes a hit, you can then produce a deluxe version with glass beads and a foam cushined case. ;-)

Seo

Nestalawe
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Joined: 08/07/2008
Glass/Plastic 'Beads'

Ah yes, glass shards, very good call... My main concern was always weight and cost, but I don't want any medical bills comnig my way

There is no essential reason they have to be glass, apart from the better aesthteic look and feel. I will save them for me home deluxe version ;)

I will check out plastic, see if there is anything nice, rather than sending out crappy plastic bits so that players open it and immediately think that I have been budget and given them a bad substitute for nice glass bits...

Rick-Holzgrafe
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Joined: 07/22/2008
Glass/Plastic 'Beads'

Samurai uses plexiglass figurines. No idea how much they cost, but they look and feel very cool indeed, and they are harder to shatter than ordinary glass.

BTW I asked the same question about smileys in postings once. The answer is that they are turned off for the entire site. Apparently people got tired of the ones that move.

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