Updates to the Website (Patreon)

Hello everybody, Alex here! I run the website for Printable Heroes. It's my job to make it as convenient as possible for all our patrons to find Marshall's beautiful creations and use them in their games. Recently I got the opportunity to start working on Printable Heroes full time. This is very exciting for me as Printable Heroes has been a part time passion project for the past seven years. This would not have been possible without all your support. Thank you so much!

The past few weeks the website has received some first improvements that I would like to share with you.

Check out the improvements yourself!

Mini detail page redesign

Starting with one of the most important pages, the Mini Detail Page lets you view details about a miniature. This new design has a slightly larger thumbnail, changed the display of environments, made it easier to do a new search by clicking the tags, environments or RPG Resources, and very importantly brings the Add to Page and Download Files front and center.

Some patrons noted they disliked having to click twice to download a file. I added an option to keep the list of files open on the right (the old page format).

If you have any feedback, please let me know on Patreon or Discord. I read all your messages and will try my best to implement them.

Similar Minis

The Mini Detail page now also includes a Similar Minis section. This feature tries to find similar minis based on tags, environments, size, type, challenge rating and RPG resources. I find the Similar Minis especially useful when looking for inspiration for my next session and it's a nice way to browse through the miniatures without having to return to the main catalog page each time.

Tag system

The tag system also received a rework on the backend. This makes it easier for Marshall and me to manage the tags applied to each mini. Most minis will now have more tags, which makes it easier to find what you're looking for.

Upcoming feature: Collections

We've been working hard on ways to improve the website and we're finally ready to tease a new website feature we're sure will help Game Masters prepare faster and better looking encounters for their adventures.

What are collections?

Collections are pre-built or custom groups of miniatures, props, and/or maps.

Imagine you're planning to have your players stumble on a goblin camp in the wilderness. In between the trees and rocks, four goblins sit around a campfire with their tents scattered around the camp. The goblins are led by a bugbear who guards a large treasure chest.

Right now, if you want to prepare something like this, you would have to search through the catalog to find all miniatures and props you'd need and download all of their files individually or add them one-by-one to a page in the PDF Creator.

With Collections, all these minis can be grouped together and downloaded in just a few clicks!

Plans for launch

For our initial launch we intend to start with a pre-built Collection of miniatures intended to be used along side the Lost Mines of Phandelver starting adventure.

The Lost Mines Collection, featuring:

Part 1: Goblins! Every miniature you need to run the Goblin Ambush and Cragmaw Hideout encounters from Lost Mines of Phandelver.

Part 2: Trouble in Town Every miniature you need to run the Redbrand Ruffians and Redbrand Hideout encounters from Lost Mines of Phandelver.

Part 3: Web of the Spider Every miniature you need to run the Wilderness Encounters from Lost Mines of Phandelver.

Part 4: Echoing Cave Everything you need to run the Wave Echo Cave encounters from Lost Mines of Phandelver.

Future plans

After releasing the first version we would love to hear your feedback to further improve and iterate. You're sure to give us a lot of new ideas that we'd never think of! Here are some of the things we know we want to do and are looking forward to implementing after the initial launch:

User-created collections: Allow users to modify the pre-built collections or create their very own custom collections and save them for later. Imagine being able to organize and build all of your encounters for your own campaign right within the PrintableHeroes website!

Player groups: Allow a Game Master to send a link to their players so they can pick out miniatures for their player characters, even if the player's don't have an account with PrintableHeroes! The selected miniatures will appear in the Game Master's Collections, ready to export into a PDF file or print directly.

Printable organization tools: With the success of the Vault of Mini Things we'd like to further support the "Dungeon Decimal System" for organizing and storing your miniatures to help Game Masters keep track of miniatures for specific campaigns and encounters. Imagine every miniature you need to run a specific adventure all stored neatly in an organized card box!

When will it launch?

We don't have an exact release date yet for Collections, but we're looking at a matter of weeks, not months. We will start with a closed beta for Council Members patrons.

We also have a small preview. Keep in mind that this is still very much a work-in-progress. The closed beta will not look the same. Hopefully it gives a good impression of what we are trying to do.