You may have recently seen a post on the main forum where I asked how tall a full stack of Adventure cards was in FFG sleeves.

I shall now tell a tale of what that was all about! It's not that interesting to be honest, and the results are a little odd, but bear with me!

Soooo....

A couple of weeks ago we were away on holiday in sunny Devon, we were wandering around a car boot sale when I spotted a box with 10p per item (about 15 cents) written on it. In this box was a copy of Jenga, which I felt I could not leave behind, even though we already have at least one copy!

Back at the holiday cottage, I pondered this game and had a look at the pieces. I then pulled out a Talisman card that I keep sleeved in my wallet (for testing boxes I happen across!) and an idea was born -

The 10p Jenga cardholder project!

Take your copy of the old favourite family game, Jenga.

Which has 54 virtually identical wooden blocks measuring 3 inches by 1 inch by 3/5s of an inch.

Glue them together to make three sides of a holder, remembering not to rush it as you end up (like I did) with a couple of wobbly walls!

Take 5 pieces and glue them together to make the base, then realise you only needed 3 as the walls would form part of the base. Prise the other two pieces off and move to the next stage.

Glue the walls and the base together gradually, finally using the spare Jenga pieces to bulk out the middle of the holder so that the walls will stay straight. Don't forget that the glue will seep inside and glue some of the blocks together and make you curse a little as you prise THOSE bits apart!

Tada! You have a rickety tower of wood that used to be a perfectly servicable game!

Stick some bits of felt to the base for stability (less rickety!) and a small strip about 3/4s of the way at the bottom so that the cards tilt slightly. As you can see, the Adventure stack is just about 5 inches unsleeved...

...and the Highland deck is just about 2 inches unsleeved.

Lessons learned

Do not try to rush the gluing process.

Make sure you have a decent flat and straight edge to rest on while you put it all together as it will end up a bit rickety, though it does have a rustic feel to it.

After a year or so of experimenting with sleeves for the game, I have come to the conclusion that I am not very keen on playing with sleeved cards. I know they will get grubby over time, but to be honest I did not mind that in the old days of 2nd Edition. I think it adds to the character of the game.

If I am going to try it again, I will try making a stack around 6 inches high for Adventure cards, and a few others of differing heights for the other large decks.

We play with sleeved cards every week. Took a bit of getting used to, but now we wouldn't be without them! They don't fall over and all the cards remain in pristine condition.

Ell.

Well. I had a few pieces of Jenga left over, as it turns out exactly the right amount, so I made a 6 inch version of the tower.

This one is slightly different as I wanted to keep the footprint of a standard Jenga tower which is 3x3 so the cards will protude slightly this time, but I think it will probably make them a bit easier to extract. This way also saves 3 blocks on the base.

Tower with felt strip at the front edge for "tilt".

Tower filled with a full set of unsleeved cards. It is looking a bit raggy on the side as I had to use some pieces that had been previously glued.

My comment about sleeving was only secondary to this post as it is just something that I have finally decided upon. I think I just prefer my cards to look played with, plus there is the size issue of a fully sleeved set. I have been mulling over this for a long time, and I think it is because something just didn't feel right to me.

As a postscript, I would say that as I already have a couple of sets of the plexi card trays I am not sure which will get used. But it was a fun experiment for me, and I will probably end up getting hold of a few more cheap sets of Jenga for other ideas! Token pots anyone?

I think a "tower" is cool notion, but I'd be caught between a rock and a hard place. It has less of a footprint for the sake of table space, but unlike a rack/box, you can't use a separator panel to slip discards behind (beneath) the stack.... And you'll still have to stack the discards... hmm, unless you make a double tower to hold both deck and discards?

I do empathize on the sleeves issue. Barb and I have waffled on that, for they can be slippery little buggers aside from bloating the decks. At the same time we do use a fair number of home creations and amendments/rewrites, and sleeves are the easiest way to do that... until someone comes up with a quality home card maker for the special price of $99.95.

The Jenga tower is still a slick creation just the same.