Dice Notes: Beating a Dead Horse (literally)

 After the last post, I had hoped to start talking about some aspects of my 5th edition campaign that may be useful and/or instructive to other DMs, but then something happened that curtailed all of that: I got my order from Infinite Black's second Kickstarter, Elder Dice: Unspeakable Tomes. This was a huge relief, tantamount to the scratching of an itch in the middle of your back, as their Facebook page has been dominated with posts from people lamenting that they haven't gotten their dice yet, followed by another post from someone who ordered one of everything, proudly displaying their new wares and cackling like the mentally deranged. For variety, as a palate cleanser, someone would jump in and post a picture of a crushed shipping box, with the notation, "But the dice inside were fine!"

A couple of people voiced concerns or complaints, and the devoted rank and file set upon them with pitchforks and Internet Sarcasm, in disproportionate ratios, and while I had always intended to talk about my dice when they came in, I resolved not to post my thoughts on their Facebook page, because I have no desire to get into a slap fight with anyone at the moment. Besides, as of this writing, it's all academic, anyway. I'll explain later. For now, let's talk about my dice and what has generated so many words of concern about good design.

First off, I was also one of the crunch-box recipients. But this is purely academic, in that I didn't have anything inside that could be damaged beyond repair. The cardboard quality is perfectly in keeping with Chinese shipping; kinda soft, sorta cheap, but with a lot of give to it. Most packages from China look like they have been closely examined with a ball peen hammer, but I've never had anything damaged. So I wasn't too concerned about it.

 Like everyone else's shipments, the insides were packed with loving care by young factory workers who are no doubt being paid top dollar to make and ship plastic gewgaws to pasty-faced Americans.

But what did I get, anyway?

I got one of each polyhedral set, and one of each tube of d6 dice, because I have several of those Cthulhu-based board games and they use said d6 dice. The polysets came in a slipcase (like the first KS) and I am unfortunately that guy who wants it all to match for display purposes. I don't know why this matters to me, but it does. And the guys at Infinite Black know it, which is why they offer the slipcase if you go all in.

The metal "d2" coin was a freebie, a stretch goal. It came with my order.

There were a lot of options they offered; GM screens, pins, coins, and I can't remember what else. Playmats, I think. But my interest lives and dies at the dice level. The rest of that stuff, I either have, or don't need.

You can see in the picture above that they offered three new symbols on three new colors of dice: red and black swirls, purple and black swirls, and yellow and black swirls. The latter were the Yellow Sign dice. And it's these dice that I will discuss in nauseating detail below.

I want to note that I took these pictures using the lighting I routinely have available for my games, with no color corrections of any kind. I didn't want to tamper with them so that you can see what I see, without filters.

 Here's what they looked like in their very cool "tome" box, a spiffy magnetic closure container dressed to look like an old book. This is perhaps the most brilliant packaging ever, and I applaud them for getting to it before anyone else did. This KS came with "Lore Cards" for each set, which are lovely but completely unnecessary, as the only people ordering these dice are people who already know all about this stuff anyway. This is not a product for people dipping their toe into the gaming worlds of H.P. Lovecraft; rather, it's for people who are swimming in the deep end of the deep one pool.

 Out of the box, here's what the polyset looks like. The picture on the left is showing the 1's on every face, and the picture on the right is showing their designed Yellow Sign on every face.

You can see that there is a lot of variation on the dice themselves, and even when you click these photos to enlarge, some of the gold ink washes right out on the yellow plastic. Which I knew would happen, and so did a lot of other people, too, judging from the Dice Mail photos on the Facebook Elder Dice fan page that don't have the Yellow Sign dice in them.

I know I could swap out the offending
d6s with my tube of d6s, but then that
would mess up my d6 set. Arrgh!

 Looking specifically at the d6 dice, you can see I kinda lucked out. I got a heavy black swirl, a medium mix swirl, and a light black swirl. One of each. And from about eight inches, these symbols show up pretty good.





However, in successive photos, I kept backing the camera up, until I was sitting normally in my seat, just as if I were running a game. You can enlarge the photos if you want, but let me confirm your suspicions; from about two and a half feet away, the gold ink all but disappeared, just like I knew it would.


This just squeezed my giblets, I can't begin to express how frustrated it made me. This is a rookie mistake; getting locked into a way of thinking that results in a bad product. And this is a bad product. It's made all the more frustrating because the other dice in both Kickstarter projects don't have this problem. Only the Yellow Sign dice.

Of course, the gold ink on everything doesn't help, either, but in this case, "Yellow Sign" means that the sign itself could be (and maybe should be) yellow (or gold). The dice color doesn't matter, not really. It's not the important part of the equation. Only the Yellow Sign matters. I think the King in Yellow would agree with me on this.


Here's what the d20 die looks like. It's got the same problems as the other dice, and I'd be much more inclined to use this die as a GM. Symbols coming up behind the screen mean awful things for the players, but I can't see the symbol on this die. I will acknowledge that my eyesight is not as sharp as it once was, but I need reading glasses, not corrective lenses. And I can see things from three feet away, too. It's not just me on this.

Oh, and last and certainly least, here's the coin. It fell out of its package during transit, but it was unscathed by the liberal swaddling of bubble wrap the goods received. If I didn't already have my own inspiration tokens, I'd be more excited about this product. But it was free, and so I'll figure out something to do with it. Exactly what, I have no idea. I won't be using it as a d2. I think that's dumb. Maybe a paperweight for notes? It's got good heft, and seems well-made. If this is your kind of thing, you'll likely love it.

HOWEVER!

All is not lost! There is a ray of dim, cosmic light, and I am happy to point to it.

Infinite Black is about to launch their 3rd Kickstarter for Elder Dice: The Colors Out of Space. All I can say to that is, Thank Dagon that space is mostly dark. These colors are dark blues and purples, colors that gold ink shows up on just fine.

For stretch goals, they are offering new versions of previous dice in new colors. Remember when I wondered in my earlier review why they didn't do their Cthulhu dice on green? Well, if enough of their fan base fund the project, we will get Green Cthulhu dice as a stretch goal. And do you know what else? Yellow Sign dice on a purple and green swirl! Very Mardi Gras! But more than that, 100% more readable than on Yellow plastic! Whoo hoo! See for yourself by clicking those photos on the right.

Now, I don't think they did this just because I pointed it out. I cannot possibly be the only person who said as much. They are smart guys. But I am certainly going to perform the "I Told You So" victory dance, in full moose antler headdress, on the bald hill in the woods, because I think those stretch goals will drive this third set. We are back to what made the first Kickstarter so good; smart design, something new and different, and clever marketing.

Now I can just leave the other Yellow Sign dice on the shelf, as a complete set goal, and actually play with the above dice, which both appeal to my sense of propriety and also make it much easier to utilize since I can see what I'm rolling.

Was that so hard?