Dice...

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finarvyn
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Re: Dice...

Post by finarvyn »

birthright wrote:Of course, I meant to say use the 1d2 as a 'control die'.
I prefer the d6 as a control die simply because it rolls well. I find that a d2 (coin flip) is awkward, but a d6 fits in my hand with the other dice and I can just toss it with the others.

You control die works just like mine, otherwise. 8)
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Re: Dice...

Post by birthright »

finarvyn wrote:
birthright wrote:Of course, I meant to say use the 1d2 as a 'control die'.
I prefer the d6 as a control die simply because it rolls well. I find that a d2 (coin flip) is awkward, but a d6 fits in my hand with the other dice and I can just toss it with the others.

You control die works just like mine, otherwise. 8)
Well, when I roll a 'd2' its usually a d4 or d6 with low=1 and high=2
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Re: Dice...

Post by Harley Stroh »

Off-topic, but one of my favorite geek-out moments, to date:

I'm running the DCC RPG at NTRPG con for a table of players, ages 13 to mid-40s. The youngest, Gabe is playing a warrior and gets excited when I toss him the d5.

He rolls it a couple times for kicks, his eyes lighting up at this weird new dice shape. We're all geeking out about dice when Frank Freaking Mentzer steps over to our table to show off his d7. It was a multi-generational dice appreciation moment, with one of the founders of our hobby.

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Re: Dice...

Post by Tortog »

I love the mechanics of the new system. Including how the Zocchi dice are used and I am impressed by the "pioneer" spirit of GG for using them, but the cost argument [& from what I'm reading, their quality of craftsmanship] is pernicious. I like the idea that I'm not going to have to purchase then lug around a suitcase full of books to play this game and that this $ savings off sets the cost of the dice nicely. :)

That being said, I'm an avid collector of DCC products already, so sales from me are pretty much a guarantee. :wink: For what its worth, you could probably re-coop some lost revenue by selling print and digital copies of everything. I'd buy both: it preserves the collectors value of the print copies and lets me keep all my gaming materials on my laptop computer where I need them.

I like the idea someone posted that we really only need a d14, d16, & d24. the rest are easy enough to simulate. Maybe GG can release the core rules, a module, and some basic Zocchi dice as a box set... for the same price the "other guys" are charging for their core materials. :mrgreen:

Since the subject of "turn offs" has been tossed about, for me the only parts I don't like are the "Moorcock" style Alignment rules, and I'd like to know how much of the previously published material will still be considered "cannon." I'll find a better threads for these subjects. :D
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Re: Dice...

Post by finarvyn »

Tortog wrote:I'd like to know how much of the previously published material will still be considered "cannon." I'll find a better threads for these subjects. :D
Just a quick nit to pick ... turns out that "cannon" is a gun that shoots projectiles. "Canon" is gospel. :P

Sorry. Just had to mention it. Bugs me a lot like "your" and "you're" where folks get the wrong one and don't even think about it.
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Re: Dice...

Post by reverenddak »

Tortog wrote:...from what I'm reading, their quality of craftsmanship] is pernicious.
But they're not! They're the highest quality dice you can buy. Without going into details, you can find information about the "flaws" online, they have a few quirks. The little burr upsets people, I "almost" can see why. But it's like a trademark, I don't mind it, and it's not on all dice. People don't like the sharp edges, I love them. The dice stop quicker too, just like casino dice. That's why they're called precision dice. It is unfortunate that no other manufacturers make the other shapes, yet. Crystal Caste makes funny dice, I can see them adding new dice with minimal effort (I believe Zocchi has his particular shapes patented.)
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Re: Dice...

Post by joela »

For the non-inked dice, which crayon is best used to darken the numbers. Black?
What do you mean no?
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Re: Dice...

Post by reverenddak »

joela wrote:For the non-inked dice, which crayon is best used to darken the numbers. Black?
Depends on the colors, but this should give you a good idea:

http://www.gamescience.com/pricingandcolors
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Re: Dice...

Post by goodmangames »

Treebore wrote:What would be the best way to simulate the D14? You mentioned threads talking about this, which forum are they in?
Treebore, the dice generation methods pop up in several threads throughout these boards, so I've created a sticky thread addressing this very question:

http://www.goodman-games.com/forums/vie ... 60&t=15068

Hopefully this one will be easy to find!
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Re: Dice...

Post by QuentinTheTroll »

The sticky is great: I might add that you can go old school seat of the pants, and put 14 chits in a cup.

Some of the old chit-based games, as well as "funny" dice games, when they ran short of stock, threw in a cardboard panel of numbered chits for random number generation. This is very easy to reproduce with card stock and computer printers these days, and a subtle homage to the old ways.

Old man voice: "We didn't have your high falutin' conveniences. Alls we had for adventure was a coin flip, a "Life" spinner, three fudge dice and a flip book!"
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Re: Dice...

Post by Treebore »

goodmangames wrote:
Treebore wrote:What would be the best way to simulate the D14? You mentioned threads talking about this, which forum are they in?
Treebore, the dice generation methods pop up in several threads throughout these boards, so I've created a sticky thread addressing this very question:

http://www.goodman-games.com/forums/vie ... 60&t=15068

Hopefully this one will be easy to find!

The "control die" can definitely work for me, I used it a lot over the years for the D30, but now I have a couple of dozen D30's! (Got them as part of a big dice lot I bought on eBay, Okay, HUGE dice lot!).
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try this

Post by shadewest »

d3:1d6/2 or 1d4 reroll 4
d5:1d10/2 or 1d6 reroll 6
d7:1d8 reroll 8
d14:1d7(see above) 50% chance to add 7
d16:1d8 50% chance to add 8
d24:1d12, 50% chance to add 12
d30:1d3 (see above) as 10's digit, read like d%
...unless the judge rules otherwise.

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Re: Dice...

Post by OakesSpalding »

I find the hostility to the dice bizarre. You can buy all the dice for the price of a pizza, and use them for the rest of your life. Or you can wait till the game comes out and (I assume) get them with the game.

I learned about Zocchi and his dice while reading about the impending beta release. Fascinated with the concept of many of them--what would a d5 look like?--I ordered a few sets, and they ended up beating the beta to my mailbox by a few days. The people in my office--geeks and non-geeks alike--loved them, and mad experimental die rolling sort of shut down work for ten minutes or so.

There is no question that the (then) new and different polyhedron dice were a big part of OD&D's appeal and identity in the 1970's. So why not try to rekindle that feeling almost forty years later? In my view, it's simply for fun (or because it's just "kewl"). Have we really lost our sense of that? :)

Now watch someone say that they don't need a d14 to have fun. :):)
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Re: Dice...

Post by Harley Stroh »

We couldn't agree with you more, OS.

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Re: Dice...

Post by smathis »

OakesSpalding wrote:I find the hostility to the dice bizarre. You can buy all the dice for the price of a pizza, and use them for the rest of your life. Or you can wait till the game comes out and (I assume) get them with the game.
I understand why people feel the way they do about the dice. I think part of it is the unfamiliarity and part of it is the price of entry -- which I feel is negligible considering almost all of the dice can be modeled using the standard polyhedrals.

What I don't understand is the ire. The "hostility" as you put it. But, then again, this is the internet...

My only wish regarding the dice is that DCC adopt a standard "ladder" to scale up and down on -- instead of assigning bonuses and penalties. Something like d2 <=> d3 <=> d4 <=> d6 <=> d8 <=> d10 <=> d12 <=> d14 <=> d16 <=> d20 <=> d24 <=> d30.
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Re: Dice...

Post by Treebore »

The "dice ire" is nothing for me to understand in comparison to the people who post "If its D100 based, its crap." That's something I will never understand. They don't care what RPG it is, if its based on D100 its crap and they will have nothing to do with it.
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Re: Dice...

Post by finarvyn »

smathis wrote:My only wish regarding the dice is that DCC adopt a standard "ladder" to scale up and down on -- instead of assigning bonuses and penalties. Something like d2 <=> d3 <=> d4 <=> d6 <=> d8 <=> d10 <=> d12 <=> d14 <=> d16 <=> d20 <=> d24 <=> d30.
It's possible that the game may evolve in this direction. There certainly have been several folks voicing similar opinions.

Totally off topic, remember TSR's old Alternity RPG from the 1990's? What they could have done with all these funky dice! (The mechanic was to add or subtract dice to the d20 roll, which is somewhat different from just using a different die type.)
wikipedia wrote:The type of situation die being used depends on the difficulty of the action. Difficulty is scaled in die types of -d20, -d12, -d8, -d6, -d4, +d0, +d4, +d6, +d8, +d12, +d20, +2d20, +3d20. A character's base situation die is +d4 for broad skill or feat check, +d0 for specialty skill or action check. A minus situation bonus means player uses a larger negative situation die set, while a plus situation penalty means a player uses a larger positive situation die set.
So with the funky dice the difficulty scale expands quite a bit. 8)
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Re: Dice...

Post by Abacus Ape »

I don't reckon it would take that much time to just make some chits. It might not be what some what many folks are used to, but something different might be neat.
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Re: Dice...

Post by rabindranath72 »

meinvt wrote:My major complaint about the funky dice is that I want convenience most of all (particularly when dropping $20 on a dice set). To me that means:

Opaque dice
Pre-Inked in a contrasting color (easily visible)
No sanding or 'fixing' required to use
A complete set of the non-standard shapes in one box

I respect Zocchi, but I'd rather have pre-inked tumbled dice than something with mold marks that need to be sanded off before use. I don't want to ink my own, and I don't want dice I can see through.

I do want the full range d3, d5, d7, d14, d16, d24, d30, d34 in one package if that is what is needed for the game.

I wanted to go buy dice for playtest, and concluded that I just don't like the options available. So, for now I'll be improvising with the set I have. Put a $20 set of DCC RPG (special dice) with one of each the above eight shapes in the same simple color scheme, and I'll buy. Probably more than one set in different colors.
Same here.
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Re: Dice...

Post by Tortog »

For the record: I'm not hostile to the new dice {sorry if it sounded that way} I was a little irritated that I'd have to use cumbersome dice formula, or expensive, quirky, hard to find dice. I wasn't going to invest in them unless I knew I was going to get a table on Sat. Well, I got the table. And the Game shop has enough Zocchi dice (though they are from gamescience) that if the players want them they can get them, I bought a "Table Set" for everyone to use.

I have no problem with the sharp edges. I have a set of regular D&D dice that are the same. That these new dice have a knob on the side from the sprew is, in fact, the sign of poor craftsmanship. It completely imbalances the dice and the heavier side will nearly always land at the bottom, causing certain numbers to pop up more often.

My d5 rolls 5's 80% of the time, then 2, then 4... all because the knob is low on the border with 1 & 3.
My d24 will probably never roll a 1, because the knob is on the border of the #'s 1,7,14,& 6. It consistently rolls 11,17,19,21,24 because they are opposite the heavy point.
My d 14 consistently rolls 8,11, &14...

I'll file them down a bit, but there is the chance that I could take too much off... then I'll have the opposite problem...

Same goes with the inking of the #'s. If you're going to do it then:

a) don't use multiple colors on the same die; different colored crayons/inks have differing densities
b) be careful to clean off all the excess and that there is an even coating in each number

I can admire the vision and the courage it takes to incorporate these new dice into the mechanics, but if you guys want us to use them; then start hounding the manufacturer(s) to produce a better product. :D
--------------

PS> Pick all the nits you want... I'll breed more... :shock: but I'd still like an answer as to how much (if any) of the old material will be kept... & how much will get stuffed onto a Goblin launcher and tossed.
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Re: Dice...

Post by goodmangames »

Tortog wrote:I can admire the vision and the courage it takes to incorporate these new dice into the mechanics, but if you guys want us to use them; then start hounding the manufacturer(s) to produce a better product. :D
Don't worry, the "hounding" is in process. I know I call them "Zocchi" dice and we all talk about Gamescience as the manufacturer, but there are other folks out there. For example, Koplow makes a d16, d24, and d30 in opaque colors (more like "normal" polyhedrons) and they're open to molding a d14...

As for the mention of chits and spinners, LOVE IT! How retro! Nuclear War is one of my favorite games just because it involves a spinner. How cool is that? Maybe Goodman Games should release a "Zocchi spinner set"... :) (just kidding, don't go re-posting that and getting me into trouble!)
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Re: Dice...

Post by numenetics »

I was talking to my wife about the dice ire yesterday, and we came to the conclusion that it's kind of funny. Put a d6, a d8, and a d14 in front of the average person, and the d6 is the only one that is "normal." We already use weird dice, we are just used to it.
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Re: Dice...

Post by finarvyn »

numenetics wrote:I was talking to my wife about the dice ire yesterday, and we came to the conclusion that it's kind of funny. Put a d6, a d8, and a d14 in front of the average person, and the d6 is the only one that is "normal." We already use weird dice, we are just used to it.
Amen. I keep thinking back to when I got the OD&D boxed set in 1975 and had to start bugging my parents to get me some polyhedral dice through the mail. (No game stores nearby back then.) They looked at me like I had two heads. You want what? Four sided dice? Eight sided? Twelve? Twenty?

For my birthday a couple years later my sister found a really nice set of dice for me. Only the d20 was numbered 1-10 twice, and it was pre-inked so that I couldn't just use red and black sharpie markers. They still didn't get it.

Guess what. It's 1975 again! :lol:
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"The worthy GM never purposely kills players' PCs, He presents opportunities for the rash and unthinking players to do that all on their own."
-- Gary Gygax
"Don't ask me what you need to hit. Just roll the die and I will let you know!"
-- Dave Arneson
"Misinterpreting the rules is a shared memory for many of us"
-- Joseph Goodman
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Re: Dice...

Post by QuentinTheTroll »

Here's a chit sheet for the "funny dice disinclined"

http://www.mediafire.com/?lt6b1p4t23y4q6l

For those of you too young to recall the 20th century, here's how it works:

1. Download it.
2. Print it on card stock
3. Cut out the numbers you need
4. Put the chits in a "cup" (A cup is an ancient receptacle used to hold beverages, used in civilizations that predate the plastic water bottle.)
5. Blindly draw the number. If it is a number unfavorable to your character, quietly slip it back into the cup before anyone notices, and draw again.

I'm using this until I can get the feature dice.

Because feature dice are kewl. And you are less likely to sprain a finger rolling them than you are fumbling for a chit.
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Re: Dice...

Post by arcadayn »

I just received these dice from Gamestation: http://www.gamestation.net/GameScience- ... Glow-inked

They are opaque and have black inked numbers and are extremely easy to read. The mold knobs are disconcerting. The one on my d24 is especially large. However, if you have been holding out for a matching non-clear inked set, this is it!

I'm very happy to hear that Goodman is working on putting together a deal for a full set.
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