IIRC isn't there some sort of open source library?

I found out about Thingiverse which should help.
I suppose I'm just betting on multiple horses by asking here as well, since I'm looking for quite some things and there's a decent chance I can't find everything. If I can have everything set by tomorrow, that would save me a bunch of days and since I currently can't do much else since I need to test the present rules first before adding more, that would be great. So there's some rush, hence I'm not doing research *before* asking this time. I'm asking, doing research and meanwhile checking whether someone has a better idea or already found the stuff I'm looking for.

So you even have rules yet?

Rules aren't as important as playing pieces

You just roll all the pieces across the board, whoever has more standing up wins!

A+ would back this on Kickstarter

If it's a prototype why not just use markers? In my youth I used to buy blank sheets of wargames counters.

Because steephie is the incarnate of putting the cart in front of the horse.

@abge: Yes. As I said before, I just had to write them down properly which is done now.

@diplomat61:
With 4 players, 12 different types of components excluding dice and money, a limited-size boardgame and inexperienced testers, I think everything to avoid confusion should be done, and models are more intuitive..

Moreover, I found out there's a 3 -printer I can use so I want to use it! :-)
I wanted to simply use paper to be moved around the board first, but this is better of course.

The unit types and resources are also set, so I might as well make the units now. They'll be made eventually anyway and it's kinda cool to me.

Can we read them?

Ask reddit, that's where you'll find most direct resource models

I agree that models make it easier but don't get hung up on having them. At school I was involved in board game development and my experience is that peripheral elements of a game often get changed or eliminated. For example, you mention resource pieces; those could easily be marked on a sheet of paper or a counter on a track to begin with.

If you look at this, very successful, campaign on Kickstarter https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/617871702/mare-nostrum-empires you will see that the original pitch was entirely counter-based. Models (and upgraded resource counters) were only added as stretch funding goals were met.

FWIW I have backed this and am looking forward to it immensely.

It's interesting to see how you guys love to criticise me while I typically do pretty ambitious stuff for my age and usually succeed..

@abge: I would debate the cart in front of the horse, but I suppose I don't care.
As for questions, not currently. I'll probably put it on my site when I get it online again.

@JY: Thanks! Will check that out.

I found models of Infantry, Tanks and Battleships on Thingiverse so far. Enough of those for 4 colours should keep the printer busy for a while, so I guess that makes things less urgent.

@diplomat61: I think we agree, but I happened to see a great opportunity so I took it. Clearly I'm putting the cart in front of the horse :-)

As for reading them, not currently.*

We critize you because you ask for people's opinion, not because it's fun (although that is a nice side benefit). As someone pointed out, in general, making pieces should be the last step because play testing mag reveal a change in pieces. It's a waste of time and money to make pieces before things are finalized. Now, you can do whatever you want, but the criticism you receive is almost always reasonable

Steephie: I am sure that making the models will be fun, which is the overall purpose of the exercise, so have at it.

To be clear, 3 printers are awesome and if you can you should use one for fun. But be was originally asking about how to make money.

Fair enough, I suppose I did say "Thoughts?" although that was more concerning better ways to do this or something, rather than critique on what I said out to do.
I wasn't offended so no harm is done anyway, but I genuinely wondered about that trend. I guess I did indirectly ask to be criticized so that makes sense now.
In general I think critics that make you think are good critics, this time I feel like we sort of visited this before so it seems more like a waste of time to me, but you guys can be useful in general so I'll just answer and see where it goes.

I can use it for free, so money isn't exactly a concern. It belongs to school because it was put together by some people as a different project, and as far as I can tell the Computer Science (?) teacher mostly uses it to create fun things and discover the printer right now. In essence, I'm the first one who wants to use it for actually useful stuff I believe.

I do apologize if I sounded thankless, I guess I just didn't notice I was inviting critics this time.

So here's a new dilemma: the size of the smallest territory is roughly 2 by 2 cm on A3. I want the eventual size to be around A1-A0 for the board so that helps, but what size should the units be?

I'm breaking my head over that right now. I expect that there could eventually be like 10 units on one territory in some situations..
I will also look into redesigning the map to make the smallest territory larger, so that helps.

That sounds dense.

About .5"/1cm across at the base, up to 1"/2.5cm tall. Easy to pick up without knocking something else over (I am thinking bas-relief, like the metal pieces in some Diplomacy sets.

For play testing purposes you can always stack items off the board if necessary.

If you plan on stacking units, I highly recommend you take the A&A approach of stacking tiddlywinks with one unit to represent them all on top.

That's quite brilliant, actually. With tiddlywinks (had to google that :P) in different colours, I don't even neccessarily need to paint the actual figures; the colour of the tiddlywinks underneath shows you their loyalty..
Maybe that makes the board hard to read though, so I'm still doubting a little.

For playtesting at least though, it remains brilliant.
Now where do I buy tiddlywinks? :-)

Or back to my suggestion of war-game counters.

For example: http://www.nobleknight.com/searchresults.asp?search=blank%20counter

I should add that they come in different colours and you can write on them, even easier than painting.

Not sure I can tell how it works from a picture. Do you simply keep track of what is where, off the board?
Or are they like small carbon pieces to put on the board, their meaning written on them?

The square pop out and you put them on the board. They would each have something written on them. Here's an example of a real game that uses them:

http://www.2xsindustries.com/gifs/21910.gif

http://www.ww2-area.info/wp-content/gallery/panzerblitz/panzerblitz_1.jpg

It's a good alternative, but you'd have to stack them to fit them in one territory, making it hard to figure out what's what. Alternatively you keep them off the board which doesn't make the board easier to read.
Plus, I lack 2-dimensional space so the more use I make of that 3rd dimension, the better I think.

The best option seems to be small coloured circles that are easily stacked without throwing them over, with a small model on top..
It still needs to be easy to handle and not accidentally thrown over though. Not sure how good an idea that would be..