There are a great and growing variety of gummy products on the market. A quick local store or Internet search reveals a dizzying array of colors, shapes, sizes, flavors and textures. Let’s review a few with a range of features to see how well they work as gummy minis (due to copyright laws we’ll infer rather than name and show).
The Bears
There are a number of bear shaped gummy products, each with a similar size and shape. The silhouettes of the majority found in stores are fairly rectangular with two little bumps for ears. The faces incorporate some soft ursine details and the arms and legs round out the more prominent bear features. Universally, the bear shapes work perfectly with our stands and the legs present a nice groove for the F-tabs to slide into snugly. They also tend to be less squishy, although there are a few on the market including some organic brands that may be easier to squeeze but provide more resistance to being deformed. They range in size from very small to medium, and are ideal for monsters or humanoids of that ilk. Also, if you can find some “hot” cinnamon bears, they are ideal for a gang-up of fiends!
The Dinosaurs
You gotta love the opportunity to lay a few real monster shapes on the map. The more popular brand of dinosaur gummy products offers strong, character silhouettes in a nice variety of species and their size squares up menacingly against your average hero minis. They are a slight challenge for the stands in that they present in profile and are “flatter” than typical gummy candy. The t-rex/allosaurus shapes are also very tall with small, irregular bases and the stegosaurus and triceratops shapes are quadrupedal with a bit of a gap between pinchable gummy material.
There a few ways to handle the tall t-rex, and we find clipping the tail so that the end is parallel with the foot to be an important first step. Then, squeeze the width of the foot or tail until either one slides between the F-tabs. The dinos are usually of a stiffer texture than some of the other longer gummies like the worm varieties, and will remain upright without much trouble as the stands base width will prevent them from tipping. The four-legged shapes can usually be pushed down until their bellies are pinched in the tabs, or one foot can be squeezed allowing for a “rearing up” effect. The brontosaurus shape is fairly flat at the bottom, so sliding it into the stands is pretty easy. One nice thing about the dinos is that their profile silhouettes mean the tabs cover the sides of the creature, allowing them to face your heroes head on.
The Kids
You know the ones I’m talking about: they’re covered in citric acid and cause you to make a funny face when you pop them in your mouth. Love them! These gummy products are different in that they present forward but are also fairly shapeless and flat. Fortunately, their bases are regular and instead of pinching we suggest pushing or smooshing once they’re inside the F-tabs. Because their recipe includes modified corn starch rather than gelatin, they’re less resistant to deforming and will spread out enough to give us the snug fit we’re looking to achieve. I find their presence in an encounter rather striking despite there being less detail in their appearance. They stand tall and are clearly humanoid, and can tower over hero minis with their big heads and long bodies. They make excellent doppelgängers or golems, but any medium or large humanoid or monster would be adequately served.
The Worms
Obviously, worms are stand optional. They don’t present upright (although they can depending on the texture which makes for an awesome presentation) and they look cool enough stretched across the mat. But if safety and less mess is of interest (and it really should be), two or three stands can easily accommodate most wiggly and wriggly gummy shapes – which at their size would more than likely represent high CR monsters or bosses. Just push the bodies down into the tabs and you’re there. What’s also cool is that, with three stands, you can turn them to occupy three spaces around a corner. Eeek!
The Rest
Bottles, letters, circles, squares, trees, pumpkins, skeletons, bats, apes, sharks, dragons, pizzas…the list of gummy products that fit neatly into our Gobz™ Stands is endless and endlessly expanding. The bottles work beautifully as humanoids of any description, and weird shapes do well as weird creatures. Christmas tree gummies are obviously great as treeants or awakened/animated trees but make excellent trolls as well with their (often) green coloring and branches representing multiple arms. Fruit, stars, octopuses, even robots can be purchased to add to your repertoire and delightfully surprise your players, and the great majority will be easy to place into the stands and move around in battle.
Final Note
It’s not always possible to hide which gummy products you’re going to place on the mat, but if you have a DM screen, your stash is reasonably tucked away and your players are cooperative, it can be a hoot to set your gummies up and then reveal what monsters they represent after your players lay eyes on them. If you’ve done your due diligence and made your purchases wisely, the moment you declare your foe will be one of the more enjoyable moments in your session.
– Norton
