Posted in: Board Games, Games, PAX East | Tagged: Chessex, dice, PAX East

Acquiring a New Set of Dice from Chessex via PAX East

Published Mon, 16 Apr 2018 08:20:28 -0500

For the longest time in my personal collection of Doctor Strange-ish items, I have had a proper gaming dice set of speckled black and red design from Chessex, which have both served me well and been the bain of my existence at critical times. So when I was hanging out at PAX East and got a moment to breath between appointments, I popped by their booth looking for some additions to make to the current pile, and something new to possibly use for the future. After all, if you're playing a character in Dungeons & Dragons or Pathfinder, your dice should match every bit of who you are and who your character is supposed to be. The crew at the table were kind enough to provide me a new set to review as I will now utilize them to represent my current Rogue Inquisitive.

I personally wanted something that spoke regal to me, and when you think regal, you think Prince. And when you think Prince, you think purple. The exact version of dice we got is called Lustrous in their catalog, which comes in Silver, Shadow, and this unique shade of swirling purple with gold numbering. The thing I love about this set is that when you roll them, no matter where they land, it's clear as day what you rolled as the numbering almost glows from the indent. Sure, it doesn't make for great cheating as you can't fake a number with the Dungeon Master, but it is all too satisfying when you hit that 20. All of the standard seven polyhedral roll well with a good chance of randomness and no badly shapen edges to cause an unbalance and force you to take specific numbers. The first set is well crafted and lends to some possible amazing rolls.

The second set we got was a block of twelve 16mm D6. Because if you're going to have dice, don't rely on just the one D6 that comes in the other pack, be ready to roll some massive damage. Like the previous set, these are pretty well balanced with rounded corners that make whatever you roll very unpredictable. I spent a good five minutes rolling different combinations and finding them to be both lovely to stare at and fair when it comes to number ratios. Sure, there's a suspicious part of me that will always roll to find the "good ones" that day, but for what its worth, they all fell really good.

This is probably one of the better choices from Chessex I have had the chance to check out, and it's also a color scheme I don't see too often in hobby shops. This set feels like it was created to make a statement when it hits the board and is suited for characters that either don't like getting their hands dirty or players who feel that their presence in the game will make things a lot more interesting. And let's be honest, there's one in every game. I fully admit to taking on that role and being the arrogant party member who falls flat on their face frequently for laughs. This is the perfect dice set for just that sort of person. Both sets go for about $10 a pop, but I do caution, this is one I checked around at my local shops for and they didn't have them. So you may be visiting Chessex's sites (which needs an upgrade) to get them or find them at your next massive gaming convention.