Dice'n Games - The Blog of All Things Dice

There have been some games released recently that are a hybrid between a computer game or app and a physical board game. This could be looked at as either a creative and ingenious idea or as a passing fad. I think it’s a little bit of both, but without the “passing” part. What’s nice about this concept is that the program can do the math for you and keep track of the rules while you concentrate on playing. No more paging through rulebooks, wondering if your roll meant you hit, o …

There was a big revolution in gaming that happened around 2000 that was one of the largest in gaming since the 1970s. It was led by the new edition of Dungeons & Dragons. (Back then they actually would wait many years before coming out with a new edition, so it was kind of a big deal.) The developers of the new D&D had recognized a basic problem with the 2nd edition of the game. Being a product of the ‘80s, it was overly complex, needlessly requiring players to use different types of dice …

Though dice are typically used to randomize events or check against the odds of success, they also have a good use in keeping records and are probably the cheapest way to do it. There are many non-pencil and paper games that want you to keep track of hit points during game play. This is most easily done using dice near the targets, since writing them down means you have to keep erasing and remarking. Dice are also useful when keeping track of ammunition. In cases like this, I hig …

There are apps out there now which allow players to easily roll whatever dice they want. They're fast, they're cheap (I think in some cases they're even free), and it’s easy to choose what you want to roll and roll it. No more needing to look around for which dice you want. You can even make the dice look however you want.This is nice and all, but I prefer real dice.I’ll confess that I have a couple of these apps and I use them every now and then, particularly when I go somewhere to game and f …

Unless you're playing Craps in Vegas, it's usually not necessary to calculate odds every single time you roll some dice. But it's good to have at least a general knowledge of dice odds, whether you're playing a tabletop role-playing game or a few rounds of Farkle. What is the chance of rolling a 6 on an 8-sided die? How about the chance of rolling a 10 on two 6-sided dice? Or what are the odds you'll roll a Yahtzee in a single roll of five dice? Without getting into heavy-duty s …