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I would support it only if they supplied non-rounded off dice. I won't use rounded dice because they roll around off the table and everywhere too much. If I had to use rounded off dice for a tournament I'd seriously reconsider going because I'd be paying for something I didn't want and would just throw them away at the end.

To those who might perceive an advantage in squared off dice, I say I'd LOVE for people to be using the same type of dice as me in a tourney! That's the good part of it. The bad part is using dice that are so much of a pain to roll that it's barely even fun playing.

I would be suspicious if TOs handed out dice. They could well give cooked ones to their friends.

G

Have a pool of dice for each table - that would be awesome!

New dice won't have enough time to grow to hate me - like the dice I own do!

This is one of the sillier and logistically impossible things I have heard. No need for tourney specific dice.

Also, why not have the paint/theme judges just check the dice when they check the army?

But in all seriousness, this is one of those "issues" that's not really an issue, but on the internet everyone gets to blow it up all out of proportion, and it's one more thing that the TO's think they have to worry about, and they have enough to worry about already.

There is no need for "tourney" dice supplied at the event.

I'm still not convinced 'dice cheating' is as big an issue as the forums make it out to be. The only challenge I've ever come across is having custom dice where either the '1' or the '6' is a special design. Sometimes it is hard to remember which is which, especially when a person using various custom dice. However, I don't think a person was trying to cheat me. I've learned sometimes to jot notes down in game to save me the trouble.

Either way, I really don't care if I'm supplied dice or I bring my own. If folks are really so desparate as to switch dice in their hotel room, frankly, they have bigger issues in their own lives for me to really worry about playing with my toy soldiers.

Well some people feel its a big problem but I got my own selfish reasons.

I just like collecting some free dice (Yea I know its part of the entry fee but atleast you get to go home with some dice)

I am very strongly against the concept of providing tournament dice. Not only is it logistically difficult to do (even if you made 'table' dice, what are you going to do when those dice are missing for the next round?), it also costs money that has to be pulled from somewhere, likely the money that would be put forth running the event better and/or providing prize support.

But more importantly, I am totally against doing anything that would help perpetuate the myth that steps need to be taken in order to curb the 'rampant cheating' that is supposedly occurring in tournament games of toy soldiers.

Great, dice are now provided by the tournament, are you going to also provide someone to move models for both players in order to ensure that movement is measured consistently between the players? Are you going to have terrain on every table glued in place to ensure that no player is gaining an advantage by sliding terrain pieces? Are you going to assign a judge to each table to ensure that line of sight is being applied uniformly by both players?

The fact is, if there are players out there who want to cheat to win a completely worthless game of toy soldiers, then they're going to find a way to do it.

PLEASE, I hope that no tournament organizer will fall for the idiotic trappings of believing that the need to combat a ridiculous idea calls for removing some of the basic parts of the hobby gaming experience.

One of the reasons I like the game of 40K is because it is fun to roll dice, and I greatly enjoy rolling my 'Dakka' dice and yelling "C'mon, Dakka!" when I need to roll some sixes.

But you want to degrade my tournament experience to protect me against people who are supposedly cheating me with loaded dice?


Just think of how insane that really is. I have almost certainly never played against a player using loaded dice, and if I have I certainly don't care about it, and yet you would want to make me enjoy each of my tournament games slightly less by forbidding me from using my own dice?

I've often thought that the idea of cheating at toy soldier games might possibly be one of the most idiotic concepts possible, but the idea of degrading the game experience in order to combat this supposed cheating is even more idiotic IMHO.


I've said it before and I'll say it again:

If I ever for a second start to care whether or not my opponent might be using loaded dice in a tournament game then that's the moment I need to sell off all my miniatures and pick up a new hobby, because I will have clearly forgotten the point of doing all of this.

Frazzled wrote:

Is that a real issue you've come across? I say that as I'd be fine with it. I'd just want to make sure I get all my dice back.

Yes. I say at least once every tourney I play an opponent who uses regular 'small rounded wargaming dice' for most rolls but keeps a pair of larger, squarer 'special' dice on a hill on his side fo the table for 'special' rolls. Anytime he needs to take an important leadership or armor/cover save, out come the special dice.

And if I want to use them I get some gak about 'mojo' or 'superstition' or 'why would you want to use my dice?'

It isn't so much the dice are 'loaded' it is larger, squarer dice can be rolled in such a way where the player controls the outcome. I met a guy who can roll a 4+ with a yahtzee white square dice with uncanny precision and can do 6s 4-5 times straight. How are we going to curb that? forced use of dice cups? Or forcing you to use junky wargaming dice which means equally bad rolling for all.

I don't like special dice for any reason. If it is good enough to roll 30 of them for random shooting, it is good enough to roll your game-impacting 2+ invulnerable save. Issuing dice makes all the dice 'the same' which is the issue for me, not so much the fear of loaded dice. Using a special or lucky dice that is clearly different, rolled differently and segmented from regular play should not be allowed.

I have to disagree.

Regarding logistics--I don't think this is a nightmare waiting to happen. I've lost dice, as I'm sure most people have. I can't imagine losing enough dice over the course of a couple days to impact play. If you are that absent minded, ask your opponent to borrow his.

On money--I'm pretty sure the OP said the cost of dice would be added to the cost of admission NOT deducted from funds allocated towards prize support or anything else for that matter; so no impact if that is a concern.

On cheating--lol, anyone that thinks dice cheating is rampant has some screws loose. I can see the point of not wanting to do anything to perpetuate the myth but really, I don't think the focus on providing dice should be as a method to curb cheating. However, consider marginalizing the 0.5% of gamers who mod their dice for cheating further. This is a fringe benefit at best and I can't imagine any argument to the contrary.

The parallels you mentioned while certainly ridiculous would indeed be a logistical nightmare. However, if a TO provided me with automatons to move my pieces exactly, fixed terrain at every table, and a personal judge at the table side, I hardly think it would affect my gaming negatively. Actually, lets add a speaker system to broadcast hits/wounds so that I don't have to worry about Johnny Quick Hands, ya dig?

Yes, cheaters are worthless. I don't consider bringing my own dice as an essential part of the gaming experience. Custom dice are awesome, but you can run into more problems than they are worth IMO. Lots have people have commented on the mixed bag of colors, obscure symbols, strange alien patterns...I've never been the victim of a dice cheater to my knowledge, but I would estimate that 1 in 5 games I've played I've been affected negatively to varying degrees by this practice. You want black on white, or white on black?

Oh, you ever come across a guy who has a stack of dice and, over time, if a particular dice has a tendency to roll high he hangs on to it because its clutch; or that guy who throws dice which perform poorly across the room, never to be seen again. I have. Is this person a cheater? If so, does he deserve a spanking?

I don't know about you guys, I love my dice. I call out to all the gods, do my lucky dance, juggle to accumulate mystic powers in the dice--I would do this with brand new supplied dice and my superstitious ass would not care one jot.

Make it about consistency, getting a souvenir, marketing and promotion of the event, ANYTHING. There are lots of good reasons for this. It should not be a countermeasure to cheating, as this is laughable. If some people don't like it, well you know what they say about making an omelet.

nkelsch wrote:

Frazzled wrote:

Is that a real issue you've come across? I say that as I'd be fine with it. I'd just want to make sure I get all my dice back.

Yes. I say at least once every tourney I play an opponent who uses regular 'small rounded wargaming dice' for most rolls but keeps a pair of larger, squarer 'special' dice on a hill on his side fo the table for 'special' rolls. Anytime he needs to take an important leadership or armor/cover save, out come the special dice.

And if I want to use them I get some gak about 'mojo' or 'superstition' or 'why would you want to use my dice?'

It isn't so much the dice are 'loaded' it is larger, squarer dice can be rolled in such a way where the player controls the outcome. I met a guy who can roll a 4+ with a yahtzee white square dice with uncanny precision and can do 6s 4-5 times straight. How are we going to curb that? forced use of dice cups? Or forcing you to use junky wargaming dice which means equally bad rolling for all.

I don't like special dice for any reason. If it is good enough to roll 30 of them for random shooting, it is good enough to roll your game-impacting 2+ invulnerable save. Issuing dice makes all the dice 'the same' which is the issue for me, not so much the fear of loaded dice. Using a special or lucky dice that is clearly different, rolled differently and segmented from regular play should not be allowed.

Really, thats interesting. Then again I play with one brick and I roll it for everything. But that brick of dice is older than some of the posters on this board so it has sentimental value, hence the "make sure I get my dice back" thing.


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I'd note, I'd think some nice dakka equivalent dice handed out to everyone with the the name of the tourney on it would be a very cool takeaway from the tourney.

To answer the basic question, I wouldn't mind paying the extra bit of money for "standardized" dice.

Now to expound a bit.

As has been said, people that are willing to dice cheat will find a way to cheat some other way. My take on this, is that standardized dice doesn't have to be about "preventing cheating". To me it is more about "equalizing the playing field". If both players are using the same pool of dice then you have equalized the playing field in regards to dice. Is it fair that someone that spent 100's of dollars on precision dice should have an advantage over the guy using chessex dice? Is it a miracle solution? No. But I personally think it's an interesting idea.

I don't think you would want people taking the dice to their hotel room at night. The dice would need to be accounted for after every round. I think the dice would have to be table specific, and possibly shared. The colors would need to be changed up every round(or at a minimum between days) or another option would be to have different colored dice on different tables with the idea that getting assigned to a differnt table will handle randomizing up the colors. At the end of the tourney, all of the dice bricks are collected and the participants are allowed to select their dice brick based on the way they placed. I would order the choosing from last place to first.

GG

Black Blow Fly wrote:I would be suspicious if TOs handed out dice. They could well give cooked ones to their friends.

G

Oh, you so blew it! I had dice ready to give you at my tournament that are so hot, they roll 7's! Now you get to struggle along with the crappy, standard 1-6 radomness.

Cyporiean wrote:What about supply each table with dice, rather then each player?

This is what we did for the US GTs (GW) one year. I walked up and down the aisles dumping a bunch of white and red dice and some scatter dice on each table. They stayed on the table for the entire GT.

yakface wrote:
I am very strongly against the concept of providing tournament dice. Not only is it logistically difficult to do (even if you made 'table' dice, what are you going to do when those dice are missing for the next round?), it also costs money that has to be pulled from somewhere, likely the money that would be put forth running the event better and/or providing prize support.

But more importantly, I am totally against doing anything that would help perpetuate the myth that steps need to be taken in order to curb the 'rampant cheating' that is supposedly occurring in tournament games of toy soldiers.

Great, dice are now provided by the tournament, are you going to also provide someone to move models for both players in order to ensure that movement is measured consistently between the players? Are you going to have terrain on every table glued in place to ensure that no player is gaining an advantage by sliding terrain pieces? Are you going to assign a judge to each table to ensure that line of sight is being applied uniformly by both players?

The fact is, if there are players out there who want to cheat to win a completely worthless game of toy soldiers, then they're going to find a way to do it.

I've often thought that the idea of cheating at toy soldier games might possibly be one of the most idiotic concepts possible, but the idea of degrading the game experience in order to combat this supposed cheating is even more idiotic IMHO.

Perfectly stated. I recieved the suggestion of videoing the top 5 tables and reviewing the tapes before awarding prizes. I offered a plate of ground glass with a glass of antifreeze to wash it down in response.

I'm gonna have to second Yak and Jwolf. I think that the idea that there is "rampant" cheating at top tables at GT's is mostly histrionics. Personally I wouldn't want anyone to film my game no matter where i was at the tournament. But the top table is already tense enough if you both know you have a decent shot at overall so why add the drama and tension of being on video.

Overall I tend to agree with the illustrious Yak and Jwolf. Most of the time if you just specify in the tournament rules that players must share dice with their opponents if asked, you’re all set. Players can also contact a judge if they suspect genuinely-loaded dice, and the organizer can do a bucket test.

That said, I would have no objection to the dice idea, and I don’t think it would really be a huge logistical hassle. The organizers really just need to buy three colors in bulk, and distribute a few dozen to each table, to be used as a shared pool. Any modifications anyone could do in a hotel room should be pretty obvious to the eye, and since the dice are shared, if one guy’s die seemed to be rolling hot, his opponent could just use it as well.

This thread > the current thread

Good points here... but the other is more fun

Sarigar wrote:The only challenge I've ever come across is having custom dice where either the '1' or the '6' is a special design. Sometimes it is hard to remember which is which, especially when a person using various custom dice. However, I don't think a person was trying to cheat me.

There's a notorious gamer in my area who does the custom "1 is 6" cheat all the time. I'm always leery of anyone playing with custom dice.

Come to think of it, that would be another reason I wouldn't like assigning dice:

For one, they'd add to the pile of custom dice you could cheat with in non-tournament settings (don't laugh, my worst game experiences ever were not in tourmanents.)
For two, it would make me play against people with custom dice. That in and of itself is an unpleasant experience for me due to my previous experience with said cheater, even if my conscious mind knew the dice were all the same.

I think it'd be nice to have custom dice available for separate purchase, even ordering them ahead of time so that the tournament organizer could accurately plan how many of each color to order.

I think that'd be a great idea... it might even raise some more money for the event that way. I love custom dice so it'd be a nice option... but definitely no need for it to be forced upon people! Just have it as a souvenir item, like everything else.

Custom dice available for purchase.....hrm.


My initial thought is that a block of dice for everyone would be great. But then I realize that I'd have absolutely no use for a second block of dice. I already have three blocks of chessex dice. I think the real problem is that people use custom dice that only have 4-5 pips instead of 5, and 1-2 of the facings are replaced by a club logo or something.

I think a one line addition to the rules packet of an event would be just fine: All personal dice used in the event are required to have six pip facings.

That would do the trick; no custom dice allowed that replace any of the pips with a logo.

Dashofpepper wrote:I think a one line addition to the rules packet of an event would be just fine: All personal dice used in the event are required to have six pip facings.

That would do the trick; no custom dice allowed that replace any of the pips with a logo.

I heartily endorse this event or product.

i like the logo sided dice. I did check a few of my opponents logo dice to make sure the logo was the 6.
but the dakka dice or my "bring it" dice are fine. if you question your opponents dice pick them up have a look. they will not care.

Dice are Dice. If it makes my opponent feel better, sounds good.

You could give them away at the end and call it the booby prize.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Dashofpepper wrote:All personal dice used in the event are required to have six pip facings.

But aren't some of the GW dice like this? Doesn't fantasy have the Hammer for one of the facings?

Uriels_Flame wrote:

But aren't some of the GW dice like this? Doesn't fantasy have the Hammer for one of the facings?

I don't know....but my point is that we shouldn't have to care.

Tournaments already have standard requirements:

1. Fully painted and based armies.
2. 4-6 copies of your army list.
3. Tape Measure
4. Codex/Rulebook
5. Dice
6. Any other required gaming materials

It wouldn't be hard to change the dice requirement to "block of chessex non-customized pip-facing dice" or something similar. No one can complain. Preference might dictate that someone prefers dice that others can't read as easily as normal dice, but there's no reasonable objection to be made about it. If you're going to be a circuit player or go to large events and shell out $30-100 plus travel expenses, add $7.95 to your expenses and get a block of legal dice.

Honestly, Dash, I do have a problem with that.
If the tournament is providing dice for everyone (regardless of who pays for it), I'm okay with it. If, on the other hand, they tell me that *I* have to bring chessex dice, I'm going to be pretty p.o.ed. It's pretty common knowledge that chessex dice roll an abnormal amount of 1's.
I'll bring my own dice, but I'm bringing square-edged Koplow dice.

Also, on a separate note, I'm curious. Why does everyone keep saying "pip facing" dice? What would be wrong with dice numbered 1 - 6?

Eric

Its not chessex die that are problematic specifically, its rounded die altogether that are symptomatic of non-randomized rolling, resulting in an increased probability of less 6s and more 1s.

Why don't we take this a step further then?

How about my tape measure, red stick, tac-template doesn't have numbers and has symbols instead?

And my army list is in French. You can tell me what the symbols on your dice mean and I can tell you what the words on my army list mean.

MagickalMemories wrote:Honestly, Dash, I do have a problem with that.
If the tournament is providing dice for everyone (regardless of who pays for it), I'm okay with it. If, on the other hand, they tell me that *I* have to bring chessex dice, I'm going to be pretty p.o.ed. It's pretty common knowledge that chessex dice roll an abnormal amount of 1's.
I'll bring my own dice, but I'm bringing square-edged Koplow dice.

then I am going to request that you use a dice cup for rolling since it is also common knowledge that hard-edge dice can be rolled in such a way to control the outcome when not thrown down a distance on a flat surface. Since board space and wargaming usually does 'shake and drop' the rounded dice help make up for the fact that we are not capable of rolling properly.

One thing rounded wargaming dice do is roll like crap, but at least you can't control the outcome and everyone is in the same boat. You showing up to an event with hard-edged dice and refusing to use the same gear everyone else is using makes you suspicious and rude. If the event says rounded dice need to be used, then they need to be used. The are the only fair dice that can be rolled en masse and shake and dropped. Hard edge dice require a rolling box, dice cups and a sideways roll across a distance to be actually 'fair' where rounded dice don't.

Also, on a separate note, I'm curious. Why does everyone keep saying "pip facing" dice? What would be wrong with dice numbered 1 - 6?

The main beef is people get 'custom' dice with one of the 6 sides being a logo. Some dice make the 1 a logo. Some make a 6 the logo. It is not consistent. When rolling quickly, it is not uncommon for people to forget which are the logos, 1s or 6s which then requires inspection of the dice. Some even put symbols on the dice that make the reading of the faces hard to do. It is a royal pain, especially when someone has 'these dice the large logo is a 1, these dice it is a 6, I collect lucky dice!'

What he means is, he will pretend the logo will be whatever he needed to roll at the time and call you a jerk for thinking he would lie about it. IE: preemptive sportsmanship assault.

How hard is it to just use simple, GW-style white rounded dice?

While cheating may not be rampant, being cheated against is a horrible feeling, especially when you WILL get dinged on Sportsmanship for pointing it out, and trying to stop it.

I would like the 'free' dice, but they should be table dice, not player dice, and they should be a distinctive colour (eg, Lime Green) so that no-one can 'accidentally' take them back to their hotel room, unlikely as that would be.

As for Judges at every table? Certainly, if splitting the event up into a 'Consolation' Bracket and 'Potential Winners' then yes, every 'PW' table should have a judge at it, and an active one, what's more. If they see cheating, they should instantly intervene, not wait for a complaint. If a player can't handle the extra pressure of having a Judge there then perhaps they aren't quite 'Winner' material?

If the tables are close together (likely) one judge per 2 tables is obviously also fine.


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IMO.

Maybe I've been playing at the right events, but I've never run into anything like dice cheating at any event I've gone to. I honestly think that a lot of this "cheater fever" going on right now is incredibly ridiculous. Why should we go through so much effort to skim off what is an incredibly small amount of cheating just seems stupid.

This whole business of judges at every table and such needs to die a quick death also. Most events don't have enough judges for this, and honestly I can say I'd never want somebody sitting there second guessing me for an entire game. Sorry, I hate having to deal with that in my job, I'm not going to deal with it at a supposedly fun weekend. All so some guy can slander me after the event because of a misunderstanding or honest mistake.

I don't know why everyone has gotten so caught up in finding cheaters, but can't we go back to looking for witches/reds/whatever again and stop ruining the gaming experience for everyone trying to root out these few phantom cheaters who apparently play everyone at every event.