Tabletop roleplaying games are flexible. You can get started with a sheet of paper, some rules, a handful of dice, a few friends, a pencil, and go nuts with it. That’s as far as you need to go. But, if you’re like me, you can also scale up and start exploring the wonderful, albeit expensive world of miniatures and miniature terrain to add a level of tangible, three-dimensional playable space to your game. Whether your flavor is Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, Call of Cthulhu, or any system under the sun, there’s just something undeniably cool about plucking the game out of your group’s collective imagination and bringing it to tiny life in front of you.
That’s where WizKids’ new WarLock Tile system comes into play, a new line of three-dimensional terrain that bridges the gap between prohibitively expensive terrain sets, and the alternative of 3D-printing or crafting your own. And that’s pretty much why I gravitate toward WizKids’ suite of TTRPG products in the first place, over the last several years the company has quietly become a top-tier developer in the space, producing some of the best miniatures that strike a balance between affordability, quality, and style.
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Check out this slideshow gallery to see everything included in the WizKids WarLock Dungeon Tiles I set.
So for its debut line of modular terrain, I got to check out the soon-to-be-released WizKids Warlock Tiles: Dungeon Tiles I set and the Doors & Archways expansion pack ahead of its launch. And from the hours I spent building, breaking down, and rebuilding the sets I’ve handled, I think the WarLock Tiles system is an excellent place to start if you’re looking to get into miniature terrain.
What’s on the Table?
WizKids’ opening salvo of terrain sets is fairly robust. Though you can pre-order every set now – and you’ll find links below to do just that – when they hit online and retail stores soon the offerings fall into two categories: Base Sets and Expansion Packs.
The Dungeon Tiles 1 set is the base kit priced at $100 USD that comes with an enormous amount of materials to build a very respectable-sized dungeon for your miniature monsters and player characters to murder one another within. There’s also a tavern-themed kit called the WizKids Warlock Dungeon Tiles: Town & Village (also for $100 USD) that’s functionally identical in size and scope to Dungeon Tiles 1, but exchanges the stone aesthetic for a wood-and-plaster look.
The five introductory expansion packs are each priced at $50 USD, and consist of Doors & Archways (more doors and archways for your dungeon), Dungeon Dressings (a collection of scatter terrain to fill out those empty dungeons), Stairs & Ladders (for the vertically minded dungeoneer), Summoning Circles (three 4×4 reversible tiles covered in runes and symbols), and the Expansion Box 1 (which includes more select pieces that come in the base sets.)
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Keeping It Locked
The biggest takeaway from WizKids’ WarLock Tiles are the easy locking clips that encompass the “Lock” portion of the WarLock name. Every floor tile and exterior wall and door contain grooves that these clips slot into, so you can snap them together and your build will hold its shape while it’s in play. The connections are so sturdy that I was even able to pick up an entire dungeon I built ahead of time and carry it out to my game table when I needed it.
While locking tiles aren’t new, WizKids WarLock Tiles are really well thought through. The clips go in with minimal effort, are sturdy enough to stand up to moving the whole build or surviving an accidental collision with your players when they’re reaching across the table, and come apart pretty quickly. They’re also entirely optional. Builds are less sturdy if you don’t clip them in, sure, but each terrain piece supports itself well enough that if you’re looking to quickly build up and break down rooms as they’re encountered you can forgo the clips without worrying about the whole thing falling apart on you as you dismantle old locations to construct new ones.
The only downside I found to this locking system is the same one you’ll find with all terrain locking clips: pulling the clips back out of the pieces can start to be uncomfortable on the ole fingers if you’re yanking out a couple dozen of these clips by hand in quick succession. But since the WarLock clips are very sturdy hard plastic, if you’ve got a pair of pliers you can effortlessly tug them out of place forever without worrying about the clip standing up to the pressure and being damaged.
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Built to Last
Having used a number of different terrain brands over the years, I’ve seen quality swing wildly from pieces you could throw off a building and they’d be fine to terrain that starts to crumble after a few weeks. But I’m happy to say that WarLock Tiles are well-built and sturdy, extremely light, and really compact so they store easily – while the box they come in doubles as a carrying case. And WarLock Tiles are also really efficient for the cost thanks to the modular design and reversible tiles, meaning you can mix, match, and customize a number of different builds with the pieces available.
I appreciate the level of thought that’s gone into this set. For example, those reversible floor tiles can be flipped between stone floors and wooden tavern floors to visually separate different areas of a build. The kit also comes with a number of stone edge caps that you can stick into the outward-facing slots on the floor tiles just because it looks better. On top of that, the eight outer doors included are fully functional and swing open and closed. These little flourishes are such small considerations in the grand scheme, but it’s really the level of thoughtful design on display makes me think the WizKids has big plans for the future of this line, and it’s being built with that in mind by people who actually care about miniature terrain as something more than just a place to put your minis while you’re whipping d20s across the table.
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And most importantly, the set offers a really respectable value based on how far your money goes for what you get, compared to other terrain sets out there that cost considerably more for the same or less playable space. That coupled with the fact WarLock Tiles are compatible with the OpenLock and DragonLock 3D-printed terrain (with the included adapter clips) means if WizKids doesn’t offer a certain piece that will really pull your dungeon together, the odds are pretty good you can buy it from an online 3D printing marketplace to add the finishing touch.
In short, if you’re looking for a place to start blowing your disposable income on miniature terrain, the WarLock Tiles is an excellent jumping-off point that’s future-proofed enough that you’ll be able to mix and match your sets with future WarLock Tile sets as they come. And that’s really the only drawback I could find at this precise moment. Since this line of terrain is new, it’ll likely be some time before WizKids gets around to developing full environmental sets for the Enchanted Forest, the Subterranean Caverns, the Glacier of Frigid Doom, the Digestive Tract of the Tarrasque, or whatever they have in store. But, honestly, if the worst thing about this set is that there isn’t more of it, I think it’s in pretty good shape.
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Brandin Tyrrel is a Senior Editor at IGN and really enjoys making small plastic creatures fight for his amusement in small plastic environments. You can find him on Unlocked, or chat over on Twitter at @BrandinTyrrel.
