Build a DnD Idol of Moloch with Flickering LED Eyes and Fire Arduino

Old School gamers will be familiar with the iconic Idol of Moloch from the 1st Edition AD&D Players Handbook.  It's an iconic piece of early D&D artwork and a great centerpiece or objective for any roleplay session.

The Idol of Moloch  

All credit for the idol model goes to Michael Zaveda (aka MZ4250) who has been ploughing through the back catalogue of monsters created for D&D over the years and making 3D sculpts.  His original idol sculpt was the model that made my buy my first 3D printer nearly 10 years ago and I thought it was high time I revisited this as Michael created a much more accurate and smoother version.

The 100mm Base and Steps

In order to accommodate the Arduino board I needed a raised platform and some steps.  These can be downloaded from my Cults3D store https://cults3d.com/en/3d-model/game/d-d-idol-of-moloch-100mm-dias-steps.

How to Build your Idol of Moloch

Programming the Arduino

The Arduino sketch I used is below, you can play around with the brightness values and the delay to your hearts content but I just used the default values.

// Array of PWM pins for the 5 LEDs
int ledPins[] = {3, 5, 6, 9, 10};
int totalLeds = 5;

void setup() {
  // Set all 5 pins as outputs
  for (int i = 0; i < totalLeds; i++) {
    pinMode(ledPins[i], OUTPUT);
  }
}

void loop() {
  // Loop through each LED and give it a unique random brightness
  for (int i = 0; i < totalLeds; i++) {
    int brightness = random(100, 256); // Random brightness between 100 and 255
    analogWrite(ledPins[i], brightness);
  }
  
  // Random delay between changes to make the flicker look natural
  delay(random(30, 80)); 
}