This is how The Gaffer punishes his bad dice.
This article has no intrinsic value at all. I just feel compelled to bemoan my recent dice rolling—and what The Gaffer has done about it.
A top view of our Dice Jail.
We all have stories about bad bouts of luck with the dice. It’s part of a wargamer’s lore. I once witnessed someone roll a 1 on a 20-sided die—14 times in a row. The odds of that are higher than your chances of living to 120—or winning $100 million in the lottery.
There are dozens of imaginative versions of a Dice Jail.
My dice rolls aren’t quite that bad. I do remember firing a 10-man Space Marine squad and saying, “Threes and higher”—and rolling all 1’s and 2’s.
Agh.
Both The Gaffer and I have had such droughts of luck recently. I’ve been tempted to throw my bad dice across the room, and I did voice the idea of grabbing a hammer and threatening the future existence of any die that rolled another 1.
The Gaffer found a more humorous solution: He bought a Dice Jail.
It was a silly, impulsive purchase, but it actually paid for itself. There is something irrationally satisfying in venting your frustration by locking up your wayward dice. I found myself chuckling at the absurdity of “punishing” my dice, but I can’t deny it tickled some corner of my brain.
It actually helped lower my blood pressure.
The manufacturer of our particular Dice Jail has been forgotten, and a Google search failed to uncover it. But, there are lots of options online, so if you’re looking for a little novelty item for your game room—and you want to buy your buddy a silly something—you’ll get some value out of it
Still, I still am tempted by the idea of venting my anger with a hammer (on the dice, of course).—TheGM
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The Corvus Cluster is a Warhammer 40K blog documenting our hobby adventures in the fantastical sci-fi universe of Games Workshop.
Categories: Review
I support the bad dice jail 100%. I would have destroyed how many dice if I could of over the years with all the bad dice rolls. I know that the majority of games want high dice rolls so gamers are use to the idea but I think I am drawn to the games with low dice rolls. They may be fewer in number but rule sets needing low rolls to win fit my overall lack of high dice rolls.