Daddy needs a new Sword of Wounding

[prillalar]

I am off to a gaming (D&D, etc) con this weekend. (Dragonflight in Seattle, in case you're going to be there.) And I have been thinking lately about the various superstitions we have about our dice.

* I won't let anyone else touch my dice. If someone does, I have to discard that particular die.

(That's also how I came to ship Bob and Dave. In one strip, they were rolling up new characters and Bob was having a terrible time. Dave offered to let Bob use his dice. My god, I thought, Dave has it bad for Bob. Bob, though, was horrified and refused.)

* The Boy likes to train his dice. He leaves them sitting on the table with the highest number showing. (Since he's usually our DM, sometimes I turn them all to ones to train them more to our advantage.)

* We have a group superstition that it's bad luck to roll your dice on the battle map.

* A friend sometimes uses a "helper die" when she has to make an important roll. She adds a d10 or d12 in with her d20, just to make the d20 roll better.

Do you have any dice superstitions or other gaming rituals? I could use all the luck I can get for the con!

Comments

[sophia-helix.livejournal.com]

Hee. My friend used to train his d20s. It actually appeared to make a difference, or at least he would claim that. ("You're having a lot of 20s tonight!" "Well, I've been training my dice.")

I think you've covered most of my rituals -- although it's also bad luck if they fall off the table mid-roll -- except for the evil hoodoo I used to do on other people. When playing Yatzhee, for example, just as another player dropped the dice I would mutter "No twos" (if that was what they were going for), and by god, there wouldn't be any twos. It got to the point that my siblings insisted I stay silent during their rolls, because I was "cursing" them, and many an argument was spawned. *g*

[prillalar]

You are evil! You don't still curse people, do you? *edges away*

[merith.livejournal.com]

i haven't done that sort of RPing in years... i will have to ask my son, though, if he has any superstitions.

that is something, though. as a bit of a humorous/curiousity thing, why not make up a quick poll for those at the con, and find out what others do. write up a little article (specific to that con) showing some of the responses and the outcome of the poll. might be able to get it published.

[prillalar]

That's an interesting idea -- maybe I'll do that. Thanks. :)

[mousapelli.livejournal.com]

not so much, but i do have a funny story involving dice.

I used to play with a group who did Star Wars RPing, and at the end of one session, as we were packing up, the DM (the JM?) came up short a die. He asked if any of us had it, and we all began hunting around the table, but turned up nothing.

"Stop!" he demanded. "Somebody make a perception roll!"

[prillalar]

Hee! And I love that icon. :)

[miko-no-da.livejournal.com]

Before starting any game, I'll take out all of my dice of the type that I'll need... ie all the d20 in a pile, all the d10, etc. Then I'll roll the whole pile, discard anything that gets a low number, and just keep going until I have only a couple of dice left. Then I'll roll both of those several times, decide which had either the highest average or the most high numbers, and keep that one... setting aside the other as my backup in case the high roller decides to start misbehaving. ^_^

There's a gaming con in SEATTLE this weekend??? OMG I wanna go! But... Cnd just lost her job, we're not supposed to be spending any money... *sniffles*

If you're close enough to Seattle to go to a con, are you close enough to drop into Vancouver some time for a visit? We can geek over anime and gaming! ^_^

[prillalar]

Wow, don't you worry you're using up the good rolls that way? I would never over-roll my dice like that.

Re Vancouver, it very well may be so. :) We should email on that topic some time.

[miko-no-da.livejournal.com]

Nope! It's generally worked for me. I don't have any dice that 'tend' to roll high or low, but they do seem to have good nights and bad nights. So it's all about determining which kind of night they're having. ^_^

Of course, I'm a crappy roller in general, and have been known to curse dice in the past. -_- My gamer friends don't let me NEAR their dice, I've ruined ones that used to consistently roll high or low. My characters inevitably take more hits and more damage than anyone else in the party, which is why I whine until the GM lets me twink the character, just so I can SURVIVE. >.

[atrata.livejournal.com]

*delurks*

I need to practice with mine. I will roll them many times, explaining to them what must be done. If, after several rolls, they are still failing me, I will swap them out for more reliable dice.

And I totally have separate sets of dice for games where I need to roll high and games where I need to roll low. This is so they don't get confused.

Mmmm. Dice.

*relurks*

[prillalar]

I have several sets, but I don't differentiate between games like that. But like I said to miko_no_da, I would worry about using up the good rolls doing practice rolls. Talking to them sounds good, though.

[spike21.livejournal.com]

the ugliest die in the bag rolls the best numbers in an emergency. This is why it's important not to be too much of a purist vis a vis matching die sets. You need at least one hideous orange d20 with some wierd stain on it for those emergency rolls.

[prillalar]

Hee! I forgot to mention it in the post, but I have a bright orange d20 that is used for combat rolls only.

[laurashapiro.livejournal.com]

*g* Dice superstitions are a whole new world to me. I never had any, nor did anyone I ever gamed with. I am quite amused.

Have a great time at the con! Talk to you a week from Sunday, I guess?

[prillalar]

It's funny you've never come across any before now. Yes, a week from Sunday. It's been so long since we've had our regular chat -- we'll have lots of news saved up.

[penknife.livejournal.com]

If the dice start rolling badly, then you have to switch to new dice, because clearly they will work better. It therefore helps to have a lot of dice. Also, if one person in the party is rolling well, they may generously pass their dice around to whoever is facing a critical roll.

[prillalar]

It's true, fresh dice will help. We never pass them around, though.

[planetalyx.livejournal.com]

I have 'loaner dice' that I'll give people to protect my real dice. And nobody ever gets to touch my die from the Money Tree Casino, because that's the one I use as the multiplier for killing damage in Champions.

[kelly-yoyo.livejournal.com]

Hey, I've touched that die!

My dark green dice roll high so I only use them for damage. My clear green ones are for to hit rolls, and they roll nice and low. My orange chaos dice are just for looks.

[planetalyx.livejournal.com]

Beware, for the Money Tree die is vengeful, and tends to roll six as a multiplier when you mess with its karma.

[prillalar]

Secrets of dice violation revealed!

[prillalar]

We have a set of loaner dice as well. If someone forgets theirs and has to use them, they are roundly mocked by all.

[planetalyx.livejournal.com]

Ahh, mockery is always such fun.

[kylandra.livejournal.com]

I train my dice as well. And whenever we're about to start a session, I'll go through my dice rolling them to see which ones roll better, and keep those--though the others stay there as backups if the one I picked starts screwing up.

I tend to roll horribly anyway. Dice hate me. But sometimes I can do this thing where when I start to get frustrated with my crappy die rolls, I'll insist that I'll fail rolls and then crit spectacularly. I've tried being clever and doing it right out of the box, but that doesn't work.

[prillalar]

The dice are fickle. They love us not.

[harriet-spy.livejournal.com]

I haven't played in a while, but I used to blow on the dice just before rolling them. This works especially well with multiple dice rolled with cupped hands.

[prillalar]

I do that sometimes, too, for important rolls.

The tag line almost made me sniffle a little....

[starshine24mc.livejournal.com]

I miss my Gunmen! As an aside, did you know that the guy playing "Elron" in that scene (as in "Cash, Elron, I don't take no cheques from the Bank of Middle Earth.") was DDs personal assistant at the time? Makes ya think.... ;)

Re: The tag line almost made me sniffle a little....

[prillalar]

I miss them too. :(