For Sharon and I Dominion is our absolute favourite board game. We just obtained the most recent expansion, Allies, as well. We have purchased a massive card box for all the sets, but alas with all the playmats and tokens this has not been large enough. I’ve had the idea for a while now to make something to lay out the basic money and victory cards with a place for all the non-card pieces of the game – today was the day.

Dominion Deck Builder Game

I took a look through my workshop to see what kinds of scraps I had on hand. I found a half sheet of 1/4″ birch ply, the good stuff where there are no voids and the finish is good enough for cabinetry. I also had a bunch of pieces of this ply left over from another project. Perfect.

I laid everything out in Sketchup after spending some time measuring out what I would need. I want drawers that I can pull right out and use as trays for the various tokens used in the game. The drawers needed to be large enough to accommodate all the bits and bobs I want to keep sorted. And the surface needed to be big enough for two rows of 5 cards. With those dimensions in mind I started sketching it up.

unfinished carcass of the token box

First I built the carcass, using a 3/4″ strip in the center for stability. I put in a strip on the token side for a clip I will use to keep the draws from falling out when moving the unit. I need to find handles and something to use as a clip next – after I post this I’ll go looking. I used a few brads on the sides and screws on the top and bottom so it is not coming apart. I filled in any imperfections and the divots for the top screws. When I sanded it up it looked pretty clean.

Then I cut up the parts for each of the drawers, measuring them up for each drawer space. I wanted the front ones to hold coins, debt tokens, victory shields, embargo tokens, and the wooden cubes that a obligatory in a Euro game.

exploded drawer
all the parts for the large drawers

On the backside I made larger drawers to hold player mats – there are a lot of these. I should be able to put in the player tokens as well and there might be a bit of room for expansion. I am thinking of this a more of a prototype, if it is handy maybe I’ll make a couple for my Dominion loving friends. We’ll see.

fitted drawers on the front
carcass from the back

Here it is with the token drawers fitted and the back of the carcass. I just came in from final sanding and adding a layer of clear poly. Not bad for a quick project.
Tomorrow something harder – replacing the screen on my Roland JX305 synth!