Thursday, September 23, 2010

Bad Dice - What is your voodoo?

The picture to the left is an example of a good Snake Eyes.  The snake eyes I have been seeing recently are of a different variety all together. 


In my last five or six games I have rolled absolute pants.  It has been one after one.  I have never been a 'hot' roller but I rely on at least rolling average.

I do my best to always focus on the mission and use the best tactics/strategy I can.  Some times this is enough to win but ultimately Warhammer 40k is a dice game and if the dice aren't with you then you're going to have a grueling couple of hours of game play.

So how can I break this curse?  What are some examples of your own personal dice voodoo?  Do I need to sacrifice a chicken?  Pray to one deity or another?  Do I need to go from person to person that I may have wronged in a past life and apologize to them?

I've changed dice several times.  I rotate between the block of dice I have won several major tournaments and a hodge podge of dice that I have collected with various club or event pictures on the 6's.  Nothing seems to work.

Have I used all the mojo and is it time to just get a brand new set? 

I need you good people of the internet to send me good will. This is not a gimmick - you don't have to follow the blog or make a comment - just pour out a little liquor for me or maybe raise a peace sign to the sky like the rappers do.  Maybe through the power of positive thinking we can band together and get me/us rolling 3+ again!

26 comments:

Aldonis said...

I feel you pain and totally understand.

I have spent most of my gaming career working to overcome whatever gypsy curse has been laid upon my family that forces the worst dice rolls upon me and my lineage.

My record was 9 ones out of 10 dice.

Out of 76 attacks with Harlequins back in 4th edition - all with Kisses - not a single six was rolled.

I have actually started to take some pride in my ability to really and truly beat all statistical averages in my suckiness at dice rolling.

I have other gaming friends on the other side of the spectrum - that never seem to roll less than they need. Sabote is truly a dice rolling GOD from my local club - that combined with high end tactical ability makes him all but unbeatable. I've even tried using his dice and dice box - but the curse still follows.

Many of my friends refuse to allow me to touch their dice.

My only advice is to try to play with as much redundancy as possible and minimize the "bad" that dice can do to you. Thinks like 2+ armor saves, Feel no pain, etc - are your best friends - run lots of terminators and things like Plague marines. Take things in your army that minimize the number of dice you have to roll - high toughness is a blessing.

I've tried other things - sacrificing children, rubbing my dice in the cleavage of hooters girls, soaking them in holy water.....but success there has been lacking.....

Anonymous said...

I feel you Pain Bro.

I Lost the last 36 games due to baaaaad luck.
I roll more 1's in a single turn than my opponent rolls in the whole game.
On one occasion I rolled 10 2+ Saves for 10 Termies...ALL went to hell. Thank God my Opponent kept his big mouth shut :)

Anonymous said...

I have been known to drown a bad dice or two. Keep a cup of water near the gaming table (or on if you have a coaster!) and dice that simply wont roll well go into the dip. It shows them who is boss but leaves room for them to improve their performance for the next game. Plus it is not a weird or final solution.

JROSS

Anonymous said...

it's general knowledge in my gaming club that i am bloody cursed , heck i immobilized 3 tanks and a crusader in the last 2 games all on my own.

i lost an entier assault terminator squad to lazgun fire and fried tigeriuses brain "perils of the warp"in one round.

Anonymous said...

I to feel your pain, I "used" to own the box set of dice that GW offers, hands down the absolute worst dice on the planet. One night my Bro and I were playing in my garage, luckily the door was open when I "re-rolled" them into my lawn! My Bro was a bit surprised and I told him of my horrid rolls in the past, he didn't seem too convinced but we picked up what we could see to finish our game. The next day I proceeded to mow my lawn hoping that I would hit a few stragglers that we didn't pick up the night before. To my jubilation I hit 3 of them! It felt great! It also gave me a reason to buy a brick of "real" dice, to my Brothers and my amazement I immediately rolled better. Was it due to new dice or did the sight of the mangled "3" scare my new brick into rolling well? I'll never know…

Doomicon said...

Gaming dice (chessex, GW) roll bad, http://www.dakkadakka.com/wiki/en/That's_How_I_Roll_-_A_Scientific_Analysis_of_Dice

Invest in casino dice, or swap out.

Exalted_of_slaanesh said...

that's all fine, until you have to roll to wound. . .

CapnDakDAk said...

Roll them backhanded, allow the dice to slip from the bottom of your fist to give them back spin.

Works like magic for me.

Actually, I suspect it might actually be magic.

Hunter_kanuk said...

i flushed a couple of heretic dice down the game store facilitys.

Big Black Fiend said...

I believe we can influence our dice rolls by our mood. It is important to believe you can win and play strong. When you feel good about the game you roll well. Often I can see the result of a roll just before I roll the dice. The power of positive thinking cannot be emphasized enough.

G

dafsdf said...

Don't expect anything, don't even think about trying, and it will come to you.

I've exploded 5 Land Raiders so far with the Assault Cannon on my Redeemer, and everytime it was because I was just going with the flow not even caring. The moment I realize my luck, it goes away.

DeusXenith said...

Next time you roll snake eyes on anything but a Ld test, burn the dice in full view of all the other dice.

Such is the price of failure.

Mart said...

I would say overall my dice rolling isnt bad, except for rolling cover saves, it may as well be 6+ instead of 4+.

Personally I just keep buying more! Not a lot else you can do, unless you got them weighted.... but thats just not Warhammer!

Grayson1980 said...

It could be a kind of "technique"problem
I found that if I do not "let them dance" the results are bad. If really thrown for a good bounce I get better results.
The next thing is:
Luck is not a Lady. She's a bit**. the higher the risk the more the chance she will stab you in the back and laugh over your dead corpse.
So how to beat "Lady" Luck? Roll more dice ^^
The higher the amount of dice the higher your chance get to roll your desired average.
Now that absolutly is not helping when you fire a Melty gun or you roll your Last save for your grandê hero.

In the end a field execution might work:
Burn one of the traitors ;)

tpm_bloodangel said...

Ha! I am certainly not advocating funny dice.

I need some honest to goodness superstition!

tpm_bloodangel said...

I wish I could! I am almost compulsive when it comes to making sure my blocks of dice stay in tact

Dawnstrider said...

Eat a good meal. Drink a single good beer. Spend a half hour stretching and clearing your mind. Do your best to be at peace, inside and outside, when you step up to the table.
No stress.
No fear.
No expectation.
The curse shall be broken.
The Dawnstrider has spoken.

scatterdieKing said...

Slumpbuster!!! You need to sneak your dicebag into bed with you and your signifigant other. Don't do anything too "wierd" with them. As long as they are in the general area, a little good mojo will rub off.

tpm_bloodangel said...

We shall see... gonna play again soon.

11121993 said...

Use same colored dice for different kinds of rolls. For example, I use black dice for armor saves red dice to hit and other colored dice for wounds.

Pharon said...

Well there's always one thing you can do when it comes to countering crappy dice rolls. Field as much template weapons as you can, and I mean by the truckloads.

Nothing more satisfying than netting snake eyes on that scatter dice!

shaumarie said...

Not sure how I feel about sharing my bed with the dice, but if that what it takes to break the curse...

Maybe we'll try the positive thinking route first :)

pimpdaddyork said...

dice for the dice gods!

I have found that is is the dice you pick up like if you pick up a dice with a 6 facing up then you are more likely to roll a one but if you bounce the dice off of something you are more likely to roll a 6. it is a weird thing that I have found to happen to me.

Elbrun said...

I've found that keeping a framing hammer around to 'remind them' that 1's are bad sometimes helps. Nothing beats 3 pounds of dice death dealing hammer for scaring them back into average rolling!

cypher623 said...

my friend had bad dice rolls for a long while. he stopped rolling them by hand and used a dice cup. it worked. zombie dice makes a great cup.
i also read somewhere that buying Vegas casino Legal dice works, because then you know you have "fair" dice.

randomdylan said...

Well I feel your pain dude. I've been playing games (of the deeply nerdy kind) for more than 15 years now and I'm a bad roller. My friends joke about it. I try and seem amused. Eventually I just started assuming I would always roll worse than average and adjusted my play styles accordingly. Maybe your time is nigh.