alt.hn

5/22/2026 at 6:36:56 AM

Sales and Dungeons: Thermal printer TTRPG utility

 https://sales-and-dungeons.app/

by hyperific

5/23/2026 at 11:15:55 PM

I would love to do some fun things with the thermal printer I have lying around, however, I’m not so sure it is possible to get BPA free paper. Even the “BPA free” paper comes with similar molecules like BPS, which has been shown to be just as bad for the human endocrine system. If anyone can correct me on this and point me to some paper I would be comfortable with my kids handling (kids put everything in their mouths), please let me know.

by VladVladikoff

5/23/2026 at 11:58:37 PM

Most of the alternatives today (including the Costco receipt in my pocket) are labeled "phenol free". As I understand it they use vitamin c or a urea derived compound.

by ortusdux

5/24/2026 at 12:00:36 AM

Whoa! Really? That’s cool! Thanks!

by VladVladikoff

5/24/2026 at 12:11:27 AM

Yep! WA State is the first to ban retailers from using phenol paper starting this year. I'd imagine hobbyists buying thermal printers online are likely to end up with the bad stuff, so I think it's good for people to be aware of the issue and the fact that there are cheap alternatives.

by ortusdux

5/24/2026 at 12:43:06 AM

I really appreciate that you mentioned this, I am now very inspired to do a fun thermal printer project with my kids. Thank you!

by VladVladikoff

5/24/2026 at 3:55:49 PM

Oekobon [0] claims to sell BPA and BPS free paper, they they do say that phenol-free paper doesn't have either BPA or BPS.

[0] https://www.oekobon.de/

by abetusk

5/23/2026 at 11:39:59 PM

Thermal printers for TTRPG handouts is such a good idea. Handing a player a physical slip with a riddle or loot description is way more immersive than reading off a screen.

by caioricciuti

5/24/2026 at 12:12:07 AM

It's actually the reason as to why I wanted to get a thermal printer a few years ago. To be honest, I'm surprised someone else had this idea, too.

Alas, that never materialized as the in-person campaign I was DMing fizzled out.

by DarkUranium

5/23/2026 at 11:58:36 PM

Just a question, but on these threads it’s nonstop talk about how dangerous the paper is like using it for one dnd game will give you cancer but we don’t blink twice at cashiers handling it 8hrs a day?

by iterateoften

5/24/2026 at 12:30:17 AM

I think people here just assume they won't ever have to be a cashier and ignore that risk?

by nemomarx

5/24/2026 at 2:36:32 AM

Wait until they find out that restaurant order tickets use the same types of printers and the tickets are frequently directly in contact with your food.

by SoftTalker

5/24/2026 at 4:36:00 AM

When I worked at a register in my teens we were given gloves to wear.

It’s pretty uncontroversial that the paper is hazardous. And when you’re sweating the BPA absorbs into the skin more readily. The issue is more about the dose curve; according to the FDA and other regulators, it’d be impossible to hit the upper limit on exposure by just handling receipts, while there’s plenty of evidence that there is no harmless threshold. Kinda like lead, albeit without a doubt BPA is less harmful than lead.

by avazhi

5/24/2026 at 5:33:53 AM

Thanks for posting my project! was wondering where the influx of GitHub stars came from :)

by Instantnoodl

5/24/2026 at 5:39:25 AM

Thanks for making such a cool project!

by hyperific

5/24/2026 at 2:57:20 PM

I was thinking about this recently in order to solve the problem of RPG fights. Deterministic combat is not super exciting, but dice throwing is even worse. What if instead you quickly printed a puzzle that you can do on a timer, and your score determines whether you miss or hit a critical.

Also instead of meta-progression through stats you have increased difficulties through the puzzles, but you improve your puzzle-solving skills.

by woolion

5/23/2026 at 11:17:37 PM

This looks awesome but I've read in the past that there are a lot of PFAS chemicals on these thermal printer papers. Is there like "safe" paper they have now that you can use for these things?

by dccoolgai

5/24/2026 at 12:28:00 AM

https://www.pca.state.mn.us/business-with-us/bpa-and-bps-in-...

> If you must give paper receipts, look for “phenol-free” paper, which is safer for human health and has fewer environmental effects. Three types that do not contain BPA or BPS and are competitively priced contain either ascorbic acid (vitamin C), urea-based Pergafast 201, or a technology without developers, Blue4est. The latter uses a coating that reveals an underlying dark layer when heat is applied.

> Companies that offer phenol-free alternatives: ...

by shagie

5/24/2026 at 1:24:23 AM

Anyone have a good recommendation for a thermal printer? I've been looking to get one for printing out daily to-dos and shopping lists.

by kaishiro

5/24/2026 at 4:52:14 AM

There are a ton of brands and I got a random knock off so I can only report on that one. I would recommend putting some thought and research into what size you think you'll need. I got a 58mm printer and I'm realizing it's quite narrow.

Also you might want to consider the size of the printer itself. I bought a open-box new printer off ebay and the seller's photos didn't give any sense of scale. I was surprised how big this "mini" printer is. It's about the standard size of a printer you'd see at a grocery store, so I don't think I'll be keeping it on my desk.

by hyperific

5/24/2026 at 1:10:16 PM

In the US my impression is that printers marketed with a size in inches are quality printers from reputable brands but bottom feeding Chinese printers are marketed with a size in mm.

by PaulHoule

5/24/2026 at 9:57:20 AM

I have one of those AliExpress ones that look like a white box with a colored circle on one side, stylized to look like a cat. They go for a few bucks used in the secondary market. I wrote a simple webapp for it to avoid using the bulky official app, it uses the web Bluetooth API (Chrome only sadly): https://purrint.github.io/

by PufPufPuf

5/24/2026 at 10:46:03 AM

What did you use to reverse engineer the BLE protocol?

by Hackbraten

5/24/2026 at 8:13:01 AM

I'd very much recommend a second-hand Epson TM-M30 if you can pick one up for cheap. It prints at 203dpi and can output true grayscale (multi tone) without dithering.

by edei

5/24/2026 at 5:36:49 AM

For daily to-dos a generic 58mm Chinese ones is probably enough. For pen and paper stuff I highly recommend going with anything 80mm, as 58mm can be too narrow...

Search "58mm usb thermal receipt printer esc/pos" on Amazon and you will find various generic models

by Instantnoodl

5/24/2026 at 1:52:01 AM

I got the Phomemo M02 Pro and have liked it alright for printing out playtest cards on-the-fly. Claude did manage to replicate an integration someone else did the hard work of working out w/ dithering etc, but the native app's fidelity & speed has been better for my use-case, at least

by micimize

5/24/2026 at 10:17:12 AM

Epsons tend to take logical instructions and have linux driver support. They also last forever.

by protocolture

5/24/2026 at 3:23:32 PM

I like my rollo (and i only print standard sticker sizes) but any of the cheap clones will pretty much be equivalent and just as bulletproof.

by busterarm

5/24/2026 at 1:34:26 PM

I have a PeriPage A6 Mini Bluetooth Portable Thermal Printer (https://www.peripageglobal.com/products/peripage-2-a6-mini-p...), the 304dpi option.

There are many similar models from other companies; however, while Bluetooth is advertised as its primary connection, this one also has a USB port, which works with Linux!

Bluetooth also works, but it was too unreliable for me. I ended up using Claude to write a small CLI tool which prints via raw USB: rock solid and simple.

by fractallyte

5/24/2026 at 2:26:38 AM

I just use index cards and a pen, but I wish I was a competent enough sketcher to make them look as cute as these printout templates. These look great.

by debo_

5/24/2026 at 5:21:19 AM

I do this, I give my players an rfid tag, scanning the tag prints their character sheet, background and any secret goals they have (With cuts in between) they can then destroy the secret materials and scan again if they forget.

by protocolture

5/24/2026 at 1:48:24 AM

I kinda love that someone wanted this to exist.

I shared with my ttrpg folk

by SubiculumCode

5/23/2026 at 11:42:17 PM

Probably best left for short lived notes, thermal printouts have tendency to degrade

by PunchyHamster

5/24/2026 at 1:27:10 AM

I wonder, are there modern and cheap dot matrix printers (and papers?). They would give a “roguelike” feel to this sort of output.

I remember I enjoyed the simple typewriter behavior of connecting them to a computer db9 cable and using the terminal that used to come with windows to type out directly in the paper something short. I think this app had a red phone as icon or something like it (and there was a reimplementation later with a donkey on the icon).

by a1o

5/24/2026 at 2:49:14 AM

There are new dot matrix printers but they are expensive cause designed for heavy use. I did find dot matrix receipt printer that could work with this.

by ianburrell

5/24/2026 at 12:40:19 AM

[dead]

by receiptful-io