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Been thinking about the changes dice have gone through. And, was missing the old-school, sparkly, sharp edged type.

They were really hard to read - and you had to use crayon or pen to be able to tell the 6 from the 8. But, they were cool to look at.

We recently found a red d12 to join our other multicolored ones. Happy thoughts....

http://battlegaming1.blogspot.com/2016/03/dice-old-school-clear-sharp-edged-d-rpg.html

Thanks

One of my buddies from middle and high school was a true dice cheat, caught many times, but still fun to game with. He used your crayon method to weight the dice down on the low sides to help accentuate his chances of rolling criticals. We then changed the critical tables and magically his dice changed as well

I always preferred the sparkle dice:
http://cdn1.bigcommerce.com/server4800/70184/products/569/images/383/7pc_glitter_go__48682.1336953747.1280.1280.jpg?c=2

I wouldn't worry about balance too much with those dice- they are not balanced at all! I don't know that the crayon method would make a significant difference. Usually, you can find high/low rollers pretty easily if you want.

I read a research paper out of a local university that a student wrote examining the actual statistics of 'sharp edged' dice (also called 'casino dice' since casino still use them - read on) vs modern Chessex style rounded corner dice. Long story short, the Chessex style rounded corner dice are not as effective as being pure random number generators and tend to favor 4 out of the six sides more often where as the sharp cornered ones were damn close to being perfect.

This is why casinos still use the sharp cornered and sharp edged dice in their games. The student apparently contacted Chessex for comment or clarification why then went with the rounded corner and Chessex said is saved enough money to warrant the change, although they did not comment on the statistical imperfections their cost savings seemed to result in.

I can't seem to find the original article now - must be on a long dead harddrive.

I also remember low-impact plastic dice. A friend of mine still has a d20 that is more-or-less round due to the edges wearing. He doesn’t use it, but it’s a fun little bit of history. If I dig around in my old bulk dice bag, I’ve got my original basic D&D box set ones in there.

https://www.thediceshoponline.com/dice/4374/GameScience-Precision-Coal-7-Dice-Polyset

Yeah, sharp edged doesn't mean precision dice. Chessex dice aren't rounded to save money, they are rounded by the polishing process. Opaque dice can be used to save money as a manufacturer can rush cooling, which produces air bubbles in the dice but also uses less material. This common with the cheap white 6 siders.
The old sharp edges were just injected plastic. Casinos use milled dice. It's one of the issues I have with Gamescience- injection dice will never be true precision dice because of this. True precision dice pips are filled with material of the exact same density as the dice.

But for practical purposes, it doesn't really matter. And the Gamescience ones probably aren't much better than any other dice. Here is a neat experiment with 1000 rolls of Chessex and Gamescience dice:
http://www.awesomedice.com/blog/353/d20-dice-randomness-test-chessex-vs-gamescience/

Ill stick with my cheaper cheesex china made dice.
the price point knocks me out :/

however i do wish i had those kick ass artisan dice. would love some of there wood ones