"Are Chessex dice too hot?" Topic

Have a bunch of their 16mm D6 in different colors and types, and they all seem to roll on the high side. Some so high I can't even play test with them. Anyone else have this problem? Ron

i wish !

LOL! Send those my way!

Now that's a problem I want to have.

Drop them in a tall glass of water and see if they flip.

Mine appear to mimic room temp.

Of course, for any dice, if they have engraved numbers on them, there will be some variability as to actual results, e.g. more sixes rolled, since that side weighs a little less than the single pip side.

If you are overly concerned about it, use flat dice, sold/manufactured by casinos.

Sadly, I haven't found any other sizes of "casino dice", but would love some, e.g. D10s, D20s, etc.

My Chessex dice role low. From the Chaos Dice to the sets. Now my old Armory yellow D20….yeah. Players and GMs have hidden that die from me.

Same with me for Chessex dice. I need to find a game system where low is good. One memorable time I had to make 21 saving throws where a 4-6 was successful. I rolled them all at once and made…… two.

Have you tested them? I bet if you roll them lots of times in a non-gaming situation they'll come up pretty fair.

I've done tests with ten rolls, 12 dice, and they come up a little to the high side. In game situations they seem to roll better. I'll do some tests with 20 rolls of 12 dice and post the results.
Predictions are:
Red dice = red hot!
Green speckled = hot
White = a little above average
Blue speckled = a little below average!

Sometimes I wonder if it goes by set. I know of a couple of buddies that have sets that roll consistently high. Then there are other sets that roll consistently low. I've rarely seen a set that rolls average.

Tests are in, the speckled green dice came out almost perfectly average. The red dice rolled fewer one's, but less than half of the six's rolled than average.

Maybe the dice know if it's a real game.

Have you tested them? I bet if you roll them lots of times in a non-gaming situation they'll come up pretty fair.

Are you saying they are sentient?

On a serious note, you can use the chi-squared test to look at the fairness of a die. Probably a bit involved for our purposes. Plus it takes the "voodoo" out of the process.

link

Edit: I found this shocking treatise on Chessex and Warhammer dice

The myth is true: Warhammer six-sided dice roll 1s more often. That's the conclusion of an American engineering professor who rolled dice 144,000 times and dissected them using a hydrogen-cooled diamond saw.

The experiment tested Games Workshop dice, Chessex dice, and precision casino dice. The GW and Chessex d6s rolled a ‘one' 29% of the time, when the average should be one in six or 16.6%. That makes the dice almost 75% more likely to roll a ‘one', giving your rogue a crappy damage roll or your Warhammer unit a pass on a leadership test. The casino dice were spot on at 16.6%.

link

I knew it! I had already found out that the white GW dice roll too low to properly play test with.

The engineer who tested those dice said that GW game mechanics might have developed with low scoring dice in mind.

If both sides in a game use the same dice, or are willing to swap dice, who cares?

A difference for one is a difference for all. Anybody that I play a game with who says "these are my lucky/special/best dice" and refuses to share them probably won't be someone I'd play with again!

John T

I am sceptical about how bias a die can be (exceptions of course for a die engineered to be bias). The amount of net weight difference between two sides is going to be minimal. If they are rolled so they bounce I can't but feel that the entropy so introduced will overwhelm any slight offset of centre of gravity.

You can very easily engineer dice with an offset to roll a "side" rather than a flat.. which would result, on average, more of the desired number, but not always that number… like weighting a dice to roll one or two adjacent to it…. the weight (design) is set to make it lean that way rather than the 5 or 6, so the weighted "warble"/desnsity, whatever you want to call it is off center and near the 5/6 sides…. it won't work like a weighted dice, but will give you statistical averages of the desired lower or higher number, however you design it.

And I agree completely….. GW dice roll an aweful lot or "1's".

I have a large amount of small, flat side dice that I picked up over th eyears, they seem to be very "fair" in their results.