Whether or not you are a celebrator of February 14th (or Galentine’s Day the day before), it’s always a good idea to have some present ideas ready to go for the D&D fan(s) in your life.
So, whoever you’re shopping for this February, including yourself, allow us to present some fun ideas and suggestions!
1. Cantrip Candles
We have a longer review talking about this amazing company and their intriguing candles, and we think Cantrip Candles would be an amazing choice for Valentine’s Day gifts.
Maybe this year, instead of a bouquet of flowers (that will die), you could give a bouquet of candles, or a larger candle tied with a red ribbon holding a D&D-themed box of matches. The Love Spells matchbook is really cute!
The Sweet Fig Farmhouse candles are one of my favorites, and they have a really romantic scent that isn’t too heavy and is perfect for winter or spring. If you’re not sure which scents you would like best, you can purchase the Sample Starter Pack of nine tea lights to test and see what you like.
They’ve also just come out with game-time coasters so you can easily keep track of your stats and prevent drink accidents all at the same time!
The slow burn time on the candles will make them last significantly longer than a bouquet of flowers. And for those of us with a black thumb when it comes to indoor plants that are alive, candles make for a much wiser investment.
But what I like about this gift idea even more is something we say on the blog a lot: playing D&D with someone else or a group of people is a commitment to spending time with others in a meaningful way.
What we all do, with this lovely shared hobby, stands against the rapid pace of contemporary culture. It’s an investment of time and in a fictional world, sure, but you’re also investing in one another, both in pairs or couples and in groups. With a 75-hour burn time on the larger candles, you’re offering a physical token of the really beautiful hope of shared time together.
2. Hero Forge Minis
One of our favorite recent presents to ourselves has been personalized character figures from Hero Forge. We’d been using more generic figures, which were fine, but getting to build, outfit, and position our characters has done so much to bring them to life on the table.
We have a 3D printer, so we purchased the digital versions of our characters to make at home. However, their printed figures have really incredible levels of detail, especially depending on the material you choose.
I have personally been drooling over the bronze-cast figures for some time as the level of detail is absolutely incredible (and pretty). As a February special, though, you can upgrade beyond the bronze and have your mini coated in rose gold!
Hero Forge’s figures are available in a wide variety of price ranges depending on your desires and budget. Digital downloads start at $9.99, plastic figures at $19.99, all the way up to the bronze at $99.99.
I love the high level of intricacy and detail that Hero Forge offers. You can adjust your character’s facial expression, gear, fighting stance, everything! They also have lots of different genres of characters and figures, so even if you aren’t playing a fantasy campaign, you can still find gear, races, and accessories suitable for your game.
If your figure has a mount of some sort, like a dire wolf or horse, you can add that to the mini too.
We all love our characters, and whether you’re designing your own or someone else’s, the process and product are both really fun! Maybe your DM has a favorite NPC that you could create for them and surprise them with? Or you could make your partner’s character that they’ve played with for years and present it to them. HeroForge minis marry fun and thoughtfulness, and what’s better than that?
3. BattleBards Subscription
We’ve been using Spotify playlists in our games, but this month, we decided to take our immersion (and epic-ness) a step further with BattleBards. We’ve heard their music and sound effects on Critical Role and in various online videos but weren’t sure about using it ourselves.
As we’re still getting to know the catalog, we’ve found the albums really helpful because they are already organized and sorted by location and last 30 minutes on average, so we don’t have to have everything planned and ready to go ahead of time and can circle back around if needed.
I usually take care of the music for our sessions while Jonathan DMs, and I love the wide selection that’s adaptable to lots of different situations I learn about just as they’re happening. He’s excited to get into the mixer capabilities of the site, and I’m sure that will be part of our games going forward.
Depending on how long you sign up for, the cost is between $9 and $10 per month. With that, you get access to their entire catalog with over 175 hours of audio and can organize and mix tracks for spell effects, languages, and different settings in your game. The mobile player is a bit more limited than desktop versions, so keep that in mind depending on which devices you have available.
4. New Dice!
Everyone loves new dice, right? Like many things in the ttrpg world, dice cost can vary widely depending on the company and materials.
Tabletop Loot
Tabletop Loot is one of our favorite dice companies. I love the Fey Moss dice and bought them for myself and a friend, and Jonathan has really enjoyed Aether Stone, Molten Cobalt, and Oil Slick.
If you’re looking for something more along Valentine’s Day tones, let me suggest the pink and blue Fae Court, the red Fire Opal, light pink Pink Nightmare, and white pearl Saint’s Relic.
We love companies that give back, especially those that donate to schools and help supply and support D&D and RPG clubs. Tabletop Loot is one of those companies! They provide schools clubs with dice through their Gift of Knowledge Dice Drive. If you’re not sure what to get the person who has everything or are excited by the opportunity of giving dice to students in honor of a loved one for Valentine’s Day, this is a really perfect option!
5. Rue Ink
Maps!
You may or may not already be aware of the gorgeous work by the Mistress of Maps Deven Rue, but if you’re looking for a beautiful decoration for your home that doubles as in-game prop, look no further than her printed maps! The leather ones are really beautiful and would make for an interesting and unique statement piece, but if you prefer color, the paper and parchment-effect maps are lovely as well!
Cartography Course
If you are buying a gift for someone (or yourself) who is interested in map-making, you might consider a gift that continues to pay dividends after Valentine’s Day and throughout the year. Deven’s Patreon offers subscribers the option of participating in a cartography course that allows you to learn about map-making to incorporate into your own games.
The cartography course is available for $6/month pledged on Patreon, and you also gain access to Deven’s other maps and art. We’ve already learned so much participating ourselves, and we’re really excited to continue working on our maps for our homebrew world.
Another thing that makes this a great gift and investment is that Deven also continues to add to the various lessons in cartography, is available on Discord to help troubleshoot your map after you complete the course, and offers livestreams for patrons to continue studying mapmaking and worldbuilding.
6. Custom Character Art
Another gift you might consider is a specially-commissioned rendering of a loved one’s or friend’s character! Spoiler: that’s what we’re getting each other for Valentine’s Day from @bardandlute!
Find an artist that you like and get in touch with them about designing a character for you or, if you already have character art picked out, perhaps through DeviantArt or another location, you could purchase a print of the art and have it framed for them (like in our photo)!
7. Wyrmwood
If you’re looking for a personalized and commemorative gift, Wyrmwood is offering five different dice vaults beautifully engraved in Elvish, the script and color shifting a bit depending on if you’d rather be celebrating Valentine’s Day or Anti-Valentine’s Day.
The custom dice vaults range in price from $50 for the “Wood Elf” dice vault to $150 for the “Drow” vault, but you will need to order them by February 8th to receive them in time for the 14th.
8. World Anvil
In their own words, “World Anvil is a worldbuilding tool for Tabletop RPG Storytellers and Authors.” If you know a writer or worldbuilder who might be looking for a way to navigate and organize their various cultures and characters across space and time, this might be the perfect for them!
One of the best parts of WorldAnvil is that you can join for free! If you’d like to upgrade your experience and/or support the developers, the price ranges from $18 to $60 for a 6-month membership. This would be an amazing way to tell a creator that you support and believe in them and want to help with their endeavors!
9. New Books
The D&D 5e-verse is always expanding and growing, and part of the good news there is that you can check out new resources, ideas, or adventures (see #10!) all the time!
Strongholds & Followers
We are planning to talk about this resource more in the coming weeks as they have some combat strategies that would tie into duets really well, but my favorite thing about the Strongholds and Followers project by Matt Colville is that it pushes storytelling and character development inside RPGs and encourages the characters to invest and settle in a region and to hone their crafts and themselves with others by their side.
Open Legend
If you’re looking to try out a different type of RPG or mix up your house rules, check out Open Legend RPG if you haven’t already! The core rules emphasize storytelling and getting out of traditional plot and character boxes. Every roll, no matter the number, moves the story forward in some way, which is a really cool concept. And the art for the Core Rule Book and the campaign setting, Amaurea’s Dawn, is absolutely incredible!
10. A Valentine’s Day Adventure for Two!
Our second adventure on DMsGuild, “Cupid’s Sparrow” is now available pay what you want for download.*
We’re really excited about this adventure, and we hope you find it fun and enjoyable! We wrote it to be a bit different than many D&D adventures. It’s more RP-based than most, and you’ll find lots of randomizing tables to surprise both the players and the DM during your session. While it will work perfectly for a one-on-one game (of course!), it would also be fun with a larger party.
The basic premise is that one or more adventurers arrive in town for the Sune’s Day festival. Asking around for a place to have dinner, either on a date or as a group, the locals will encourage them to check out the Lovers’ Nook Inn, where a few surprises await. Spending the afternoon around town, they’ll run into a mishaps attempting to buy presents for one another, and these odd occurrences only increase during dinner.
We ran through it a few days before posting it in our own duet and had so much fun! We’ll probably play it through again in the coming weeks with a different set of characters!
If you’re looking to start playing a duet with a partner, you can also check out our introductory adventures, the Crystalline Curse Trilogy, available for download on DMsGuild! These adventures will take your characters through level three and, if you’re ready to continue on from there, we have an exclusive 5e adventure available for members of the DnD Duet Community!
Closing Thoughts
A few of our other favorite creators who weren’t originally included in this list can be found in our Autumn Gifts post, notably Syrinscape and some new options from Deven Rue, and we also love Elderwood Academy and Level Up Dice if you’re looking for something really special!
Happy gaming! And Happy Valentine’s Day/Sune’s Day!
This post may contain affiliate links which means that—at no cost to you—we receive a commission when you follow the link and make a purchase.
If you like what you’re reading, please consider supporting the blog by purchasing our adventures and supplements in our shop or sponsoring us on Patreon. We appreciate you so much! Thank you for joining us on this adventure! – Beth and Jonathan
Lexi says
This was super helpful! I got the candles for my boyfriend. I’m hoping he likes them 🙂
Beth says
That’s wonderful! I’m so glad! We absolutely love their candles, and they make for such a perfect Valentine’s Day present. I hope he likes them too!!!