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Organization
- Space Ghost
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- fastkmeans
How do you guys generally organize your games? While I know it is "en vogue" to pretend like you don't have collections, I know the vast majority of you have enough games most would consider them a collection (I say anything over 30+ counts as a collection). Are they organized by type? size?
I am asking now so I can build the shelving in a manner to maximize space -- for instance, I am considering making a small section deep enough to house the FFG coffin boxes long-ways.
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Barring that I tend to sort things out by size/weight just for sheer practicality. I had a friend build me a custom bookcase for my games and while the upper shelves could definitely handle it, for stability/convenience reasons I just ended up putting my heavier/bigger games on the bottom shelves. I think after that the most important groupings are size and frequency of play. Boxes that are the same size stack well together and thus should probably be placed on the same shelves to maximize space. Depending on how you plan to stack your games (on their sides or one on top of the other) having the games you play most often in easy reach is also important to consider. If you end up putting boxes on on top of the other (as is often the most convenient method for storage but not for usage) you should put your favourite games on the top of the stack. Rearranging your shelves every time you want to play something new is a bitch. If you end up placing your games on their sides you have to make sure that they fit the shelves almost perfectly or have some book ends as any tipped boxes might end up in a mess of plastic and wood.
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Steve"at capacity with only 300"Avery
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Other methods I've tried:
By style/theme/category. This would be my preferred method. A place for co-ops, a place for party games, a place for DOAM games. We tried it and it lasted about two weeks. Vastly differing box sizes meant that you had to be extra careful with stacking and some games were just a pain in the ass to get out of their stacks. There's no logical way to put Risk Onyx, Risk Godstorm, Cyclades, and Axis & Allies (2nd Edition) together.
By publisher/type. Ora Et Labora, Gates of Loyang, Luna, San Juan, and Glen More together. GMT games all together. FFG stuff all together, then subdivided by square-box, silverline, etc. This worked better than the previous example because publishers tend to reuse the same box sizes. The problem came in with what to do with one-offs like Survive!, Castle Panic, Betrayal at House on the Hill, Cyclades, Quarriors, and stuff like that. We ended up stacking the "oddballs" by size to maximize space, which leads us to...
By size. This really was the best way for us to maximize the limited space available. It also helps the boxes stay in nicer condition. As much as I'd like to have the space to keep things nicely spaced out and separated by theme & style, we just can't. So FFG's Civilization and Warrior Knights are stacked four-high with Zooloretto and Aquaretto. Our Mayfair Cosmic is stacked with Pandemic. It kind of sucks from a "What deduction game are you up for?" standpoint because they're all over the damn place.
Since you're looking at custom shelves, I'd recommend going with a style and publisher hybrid. I'd put my FFG games together, blending into my dudes-on-a-map games. I'd put my Euros someplace else, and put my coops together too. Let games like Betrayal at the House on the Hill and Cosmic Encounter bridge the gap between real ameritrashy games and the coop games. Then everything makes sense from an organizational standpoint and you can get some space-saving benefit from same-box-size stacking.
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To save space, I ditch many, many boxes in favor of consolidating series games/expansions in a couple of original boxes or in 3.5" blank heavy-duty boxes from GMT (think plain white versions of the C&C:A boxes).
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- SuperflyPete
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For a smaller collection, my single wall unit works just great, and I still have room to throw in some sculptures and art to class it up. The lower shelf I use to store coffin boxes, the rest are scattered around and classified by how a game 'feels'.
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Games the kids play go on shelves the kids can reach. That's the bottom three. They are sized to take a FFG square box upright, but it's a free-for-all for games in there. Things like the wonky WALLENSTEIN are next to WIN, PLACE & SHOW are next to MAG-BLAST.
I have one shelf that is as pretty as can be and loaded with FFG stuff only. There's FFG stuff on other shelves, but this one is just ARKHAM x3, BSG, CitOW, SID MEIER'S, TALISMAN, and uh... PUZZLE STRIKE? What is on the end there? Hmm. Anyway, it's a hodge podge up top and creeping over to the book shelf for books.
The closet is the only place to put the coffin games: WoW, TI3, and DESCENT. I have all kinds of wonky ones in there like a tub of HEROSCAPE, the weirdly big CONFLICT OF HEROES, and a loose KING OIL board.
It's not very organized, but it's 103 games per my eldest and easy enough to find stuff.
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I like the closet organizers for game storage since there is so much flexibility in space allocation.
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- san il defanso
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I have one shelf that holds pretty much everything. A couple of games just sit by the side, but most are organized in some way. If it's an AT game in a square box (think BSG or Fury of Dracula) then it's on the top shelf. Bigger AT games (like Space Hulk and Wrath of Ashardalon) sit on the bottom couple of rows. Past that, there really isn't much organization. It's mostly just sticking things where they fit.
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- Matt Thrower
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I keep games where they fit. I have games in the bookshelves downstairs. Games at the bottom of my wardrobe. Games on top of my wardrobe. Games in the drawers of my work desk. Games in the attic. Games in the space above the airing cupboard. I "store" some of my games on semi-permanent loans to friends who particularly like them.
I doesn't help that I have a pathological fear of stacking boxes. When I was a boy I stacked all my boxes higgledy-piggledy and most of the lids got dented and bashed to shit. The problem, of course, was the haphazard manner in which I stored & retrieved them but that bit seems to be bypassed by my normally rational brain which just screams DON'T STACK THEM! DON'T STACK THEM! Whenever I try to put games anywhere. So they're all standing on sides/ends and the contents slide down to the bottom and threaten to make the lids falls off.
Sometimes I fantasise about having a house big enough to have a games room. Ideally it'd be in a basement - less noise to the rest of the house and less light to fade box art. I'd have bare stone walls, like the interior of a castle. One side of the room would have floor to ceiling shelves for games, miniatures & books. The other would have my unmounted maps placed into picture frames and hung on up like portraits. There would obviously be an enormous table in the middle.
But at the moment, the mere idea of organising games is just pie in the sky.
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