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BGonline.org Forums
Opaque dice - a cautionary tale
Posted By: Colin Owen In Response To: Opaque dice - a cautionary tale (Rod)
Date: Tuesday, 9 April 2013, at 7:43 p.m.
I first learned about this particular kind of weighted die on Wikipedia, just a few weeks ago. I see there is also another kind of adjustable gaffed dice called 'tappers'. They have a column of mercury that can be shifted into another position by tapping the die. Again, it seems remote that such dice would be made in even the darkest of transparent colours.
These very sophisticated methods of weighting dice, and the simpler, traditional fixed ones surely mean that we have a loophole in the game's rules. All rule sets seem to give precedence to precision dice, but I know of none that specify favouring transparent dice over opaque. Even the excellent Phil/Chuck/Jeb rules set do not address this issue, and the possible abuse of opaque dice.
The argument for opaque dice is that they can, particularly in certain lights, be easier to read. Yet I have seen off-white opaques with multi-coloured pips that generally lacked the clarity of the darker transparent dice, so this is not always the case. Larger (5/8") transparent dice, with the largest style pips and the deepest colours (dark red and dark blue) have loads of clarity and, certainly if used with a baffle box, the size of the dice should not be a concern.
Ron's sessions with opaque dice could, of course, merely have been freaky aberrations. It seems to me though that, as with baffle box use, the use of transparent dice is not so much about stopping cheating as reducing the suspicion of it, thereby increasing the enjoyment of playing.
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