Here is a assortment of “Dice Advice” for the edification and amusement. Do with it what you would. No guarantees. d20 dice of these ideas seemed to make sense to me for a while. But then various other completely contradictory instruction occurs and it too is practical, in its own superstitious way. The whole lot is rather confusing. Read on and you’ll see why.

What to wear:

Never thought about the best things to wear while gaming? Well don’t worry, you don’t have to get dressed up to have good luck. In fact, based on the traditional stories surrounding the overall game of Craps, “Dirt brings luck. Wear dirty clothes and you will be lucky.” (Hey, that explains that odd odour wafting out of my local game store the other day. There must have been lots of REALLY lucky gamers within!)

Where to sit:

Well, sitting on a handkerchief while gaming is supposed to be lucky. (Best never to combine this one with the “Dirt brings luck” concept… ewww.)

Sitting astride your chair is lucky too. (Tipping your chair back is not lucky however, especially when we were teenagers and anyone’s mother caught us doing it. Ouch.)

Storing Dice:

“Never leave a d20 sitting with the #1 facing up. It will get used to sitting that way, and roll 1’s more regularly.” The “scientific” excuse for this belief says that there surely is a “molecular drift” or “dice creep” because of gravity, evoking the die to become bottom heavy. This might make more sense if dice were semi-liquid, but last time I checked all my dice were solid. Check yours now, just to be sure.

However, “In the event that you leave a d20 sitting with the 20 facing up, it will get tired of being this way, and seldom roll any 20’s.” Hmmm. Besides, how do i tell which way all those dice jumbled up in my own dicebag are sitting all week between games? Oh, such anxiety! I think I need a transparent dicebag!

Where you can throw the dice:

Well, on the table is good… but not just any table. Highly polished tables are misfortune… something to do with mirrors reversing things, giving you the opposite of what you would like I guess.

But having the dice roll off the table onto the floor is bad luck too. When playing Craps another roll after that will be a 7 (minimal desirable number). Plus you may lose the die, a) in the cat’s dish, b) down the heating vent, c) amongst the collection of cheesies, chip crumbs and dust-bunnies beneath the gaming table. Any misfortune associated with the dice falling off the table can be remedied by having the “Dealer”, or the in our case the GM, pick up the errant die and give it back to you. Needless to say, some GM’s don’t like to come from behind the screen for anything… so if you keep asking them to chase down your dice you just might find you luck gets a whole lot worse suddenly “Why do all the monsters seem to be seeking me tonight?! Oh, can you pick up my d6, again?”

What (not) to say:

Never say “You will need not a 1”, because that jinxes the roll. This goes along with the idea that while playing Craps no-one is to mention the number 7. By mentioning undesirable numbers, you are summoning them. So, logically (if I may use that word in this context) calling out “Come on 20!” would be summoning a 20. Someone told me he always says “Hit! You bloody bastard!” while rolling to hit. (Apparently swigging beer before exclaiming this, is the main charm.)

Blessings:

The Hackmaster Player’s Handbook includes a great section in the rear of the book on dice rituals etc. In it they outline a method of blessing a die by rubbing it on the signature of a famous gamer… filled with diagrams! Be sure to check it out.

Rubbing your dice on someone’s head is a way of blessing the dice. Apparently red-headed folks are not good luck though. (I don’t understand this at all. A few of my best friends are redheads!)

Cleansing dice of misfortune is another method of blessing your dice. This could be done by burying them in salt, or washing them in cold water or mineral water. (Holy water my work extra well, but not for evil characters.) Just avoid alcohol to remove misfortune from your dice… it may remove the ink from the numbers too! Needless to say, cleansing dice when they have already been performing well, will be counterproductive. You’ll only be washing away the good luck (and all that “lucky dirt”!).

A “friend of a pal” used to place his dice in his mouth and spit them onto the table, for good luck. No-one ever borrowed his dice. Someone else, used to help keep her dice down her bra. “Boobs bring luck!” she maintains.

Punishment:

“Bad dice! Go sit in a corner and think about what you’ve done.” Uncooperative dice could be coaxed, cleansed, blessed or… punished because of their bad deeds. Some folks will leave the offending dice in the home when they venture out to play: “House Arrest”. Some gamers will bring the dice to the overall game, but not let them out from the dice bag. The bad dice need to sit there listening to their other dice friends having fun and rolling merrily, while they sit in the dark. Other bad dice escape the bag, but need to sit on the sidelines watching another dice frolicking around. (That’s really too cruel, I believe. It reminds me of high school gym class, when I so often waited for the turn that never came. Sniffle. Sob. I’ll be okay ina moment.)

The worst things I’ve ever heard of people doing to poor unsuspecting dice are, a) putting them in the toilet (not flushing though), b) ejecting them into the atmosphere with a slingshot, and c) going for a blow torch in their mind. (This latter, as a dice lover, I regard as outright murder. “Someone call the cops, an innocent die is dying!” The dice, in cases like this, actually were innocent, and not “bad dice” at all. They were sacrificed to the gods of luck as a way to bring good fortune to a newly created character.)

Testing Dice:

I’m not discussing Chi Squared tests here. That’s for another article.

I’m discussing testing the loyalty, balance and general luckiness of dice through such highly rigorous methods as “dice stacking”. Throughout a lull in the game, build up your dice along with each other. If any fall off the stack they’re obviously not very loyal for you, making you look foolish like that… so don’t use them any longer that night.

If any fall off the stack and land on really good numbers, well, that’s different. Maybe they go out of their solution to prove how lucky they are, and you should give them another chance. Kindness counts, I figure. (I’m not the murderous type, as you know.) Call me soft, if you want, but I love my dice, and when I’m nice to them maybe theyll give me that natural 20 when I really need it!!