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DM of the Rings XXVII:
Luminous Treasure
Previous in DM of the Rings: DM of the Rings XXVI: Our Dearly Discarded | Next in DM of the Rings: DM of the Rings XXVIII: More Magical Topography |
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Sooner or later, we all become Dave.
A quick glance around this site should reveal that I have a profound dice problem. I can’t walk into the geek store without picking up a couple of new dice, even when they are sold for the outragous price of $0.75 ea.
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Previous in DM of the Rings: DM of the Rings XXVI: Our Dearly Discarded | Next in DM of the Rings: DM of the Rings XXVIII: More Magical Topography |
There are 78 comments here. I really hope you like reading.
Very nice. I’ll spread the word and hope you don’t get your bandwidth hammered.
Are you using Comic Life for this?
Hey! Guess what I just…. oh. Good stuff man, I’m really waiting for the two seiges later on, and the overland hunt for the orcs that captured mary and pipin should be fun, the joys of a split group.
As a DM and Player for over 25 years, I love this comic and website with an un-holy and perverse love.
Keep the good stuff coming.
The funny thing is, after years of not buying dice because I let myself realize I friggin had plenty… I bought 2 sets the other week. Just because I felt like it. I’m falling off the wagon! =P
I’m not using Comic Life. Looks like that program is Mac-only. I’m using Comic Book Creator from Planetwide Games. After using it for two months I have many nitpicks with it, but so far it’s getting the job done.
As a Dungeon Master, I carry two sets of dice with me at all times (and I mean ALL times). One is white, and good, the other is black, and evil. My friend keeps trying to make me buy a blue set for law and an orange set for chaos, but I think that’s going too far.
I love the comic!
oh… this is sheer genius.
As a D&D player for over 25 years and long time Tolkien geek… speechless.
Keep up the good work!
And get a nice leather dice bag like mine! ;o)
There’s a brand of Scotch whose bottles used to come inside a purple velvet bag with a drawstring. Even when I used to drink I hated Scotch. (It tastes like soap.) But I bought a bottle of the stuff just to get the bag, which I used to use for my dice.
I’m still in love with this comic. thank you from d-orange!
The bags you’re talking about are Crown Royal bags, and almost every gamer I know has at least one, often two, to hold their dice. An exceptional and long-lasting bag.
Hello, I just found out about these comics through an LOTR site and I just love them. They’re funny and easy to understand, even for a non-D&Der like myself. ^_^
Cheers!
The bags are from Crown Royal, but it’s not Scotch. It’s Canadian rye whiskey. In fact it’s made not far from here.
I can’t stand Crown, myself, either. And whiskey is pretty much all I drink.
After all the years, my dice don’t even match anymore… and they’re now in a plastic Ziploc baggie. I can’t seem to part with my old trusted dice, motley though they are.
you can use the whiskey in cooking; you don’t have to drink it to get the bag. Bon appétit magazine published a great fake Chinese recipe that uses whiskey.
Sooner or later, we all become Dave…
I admit it, I was Dave at the start of our most recent campaign….
Just discovered your LOTR comics via a friend. Very, very funny! I know that it’s a few strips back, but I wish you’d gone with the joke about the players not wanting to deal with the grapple rules. I was always completely intimidated by that section of the combat rules.
I have a d20 from the Basic D&D boxed game that’s so frickin’ old, it’s nigh on round. It sure does roll, though.
Good lord, I just realized I’m trying to brag about how long I’ve had a 20-sided die. SHOOT ME, NOW!
Since we are on the subject of dice…
Looking back at the OLD AD&D Player’s Handbook (old – like 1st edition rules), there is a reference to rolling a d16. It is in the description for the Magic-User Find Familiar spell.
Naturally, everyone just says it is a typo. But I have to ask – is it possible that at one time there might really have been plans for a d16? Perhaps one really exists?
Surely someone as hooked on dice as yourself might know the true story behind this d16 reference? :-)
As a mathematician, I’ll leave as an exercise to other readers how to design a d3.
You make this fair die in a way that is symmetric about its equator and rotationally symmetric about an axis perpendicular to this equator. (Like a d8 or d10. Note that d8 and d10 each have different angles through which they are rotated until they look the same; this is legal).
Once you figure out the d3 you can generalize it to any number of sides…
I need… some dice
Mmmm… Polyhedral dice.
God this strip is too funny, or as Homer once said “It’s funny ‘cuz it’s true!”
Our gaming group is loving it… We even know which one of us is Legolas, even if Dwa…, er, he hasn’t figured it out yet. ;)
Keep up the good work, and thanks!
1) d3 – use a d6, number 1-3 twice. (I have at least 2 such.)
2) Bag – I made one using a bandana, grommets and shoelaces. It opens out totally flat, so I can SEE all the dice, and closes up reasonably tightly.
Never got a Crown Royal bag. Had a neat little leather bag my aunt had given me when I was 10, and then I made the bandana one when that got to be too small for the growing dice collection. My husband always kept his in a nice wooden box, and he has stopped collecting dice. (I, on the other hand, have a set on my thinkgeek wishlist and have drooled over some at Dragon’s Lair recently….)
I have some of the Crown Royal bags, some of the commercial dice bags, other odds an ends. What I like is a ornately carved wooden cigar box with a plush velvet interior and nice latch. It looks so regal for the DM to have his dice in one of these. Tis good to be King!
Keith (LedZepRules)
But… I want some Frosted Emerald Translucent Luminous Gem Dice. Now!
I can’t believe I don’t have any like that – my glowing dice are all made of the same plastic.
Hmmm lets see…
1) D20 from Pre 1st Edition box set…. Got it
2) So many dice I need a Crown Royal bag just to carry them…Got it
3) Crown Royal bag holding my dice… Got it
4) 1st Edition set of rules…Got it and can top it!
I have hidden away here the 1974 pocketbook set of Rules that was released before the Hard-bound books and the 8X10 box set of rules.
Scary eh?
Comes from being one of the players that started in 1979.
Now what is bad..is that I get the “old man” label at Con Games now. **shutters**
On a side note:
I was hoping to see the interactions of the party durning the fight of the Balrog.
I could just picture the snide remarks of the players as Gandalf says, “YOU SHALL NOT PASS!”
Raven: Wow. 1979? I was eight. I didn’t even SEE a D20 until 1985 or so. I didn’t OWN one until 2004.
Yes, well, somewhere in this house is a 30-year-old cardboard box containing the following five pamphlets:
Chainmail (spiral bound)
Dungeons and Dragons (period. No distinguishing descriptor.)
Greyhawk (introduced a a fourth (gasp) character class.)
Must be in a box somewhere. I hope. Got ‘em something like the second week of college, freshman year I think.
So there.
Karen,
I think you are discribing the same thing I am.
The 1974 rules had 4 light tan books in it.
A spiral bound Silver colored book called Chainmail
and stapled/folded “book” of referance sheets.
The first books was Men & Magic
the second was Monsters & Treasure
the third was The Underworld & Wilderness adventures
Greyhawk was the very first supplement to the rules system.
Now Sherman lets set the Wayback Machine to 1978.
Can any one tell me “underground” set of rules were released in almost the same kind of format and same kind of covers?
Shamus: :) yes 1979…. scary is not?
What is really bad is I have at least 4 18 gallon plastic totes full of gaming suplies in storage. Things like the 1st Ed of SpellJammer, 1st Ed of Paranoina and so forth.
Now you see why I get the “Old Man” label at con games.. LOL! ;)
They’re a relatively new development, but yes, D16′s do exist now. Look here: http://paizo.com/store/gameAids/dice/byManufacturer/chessex/d16
But I never saw one in 1st-edition days, so probably that old reference *was* a typo…I don’t really know.
My dice bag is chainmaille. I made it myself a couple years ago. It’s terribly shiny, and doubles as a convenient weapon in a pinch.
‘Course, that’s just for my White Wolf dice (d10s). I keep my D&D dice in a little tiger-print pouch I hand-stitched awhile back. I only have one set of D&D dice (plus the extra d20 left over from my Magic: the Gathering days–it made a nifty life counter).
Incidentally, awesome comic, the whole series. It’s *far* too accurate.
Hah! So we were not the only ones to use d20′s as M:TG life counters.
Brilliant.
huh, and i thought every1 used d20s as counters
my rougue says, “Hello, my beautiful 6d6 snk atk dmg!”
Original box set. Check.
Dice addict. Check.
Crown Royal bag. Check.
Egads, I’m home.
Okay, I have 8 sets of dice, six are various forms of pink, including my pepto pink dice, and one set of Bright yellow and black, like a happy face, aptly named the shiny happy dice. I only have the yellow ones cause my ex had them first and they hated him but liked me :D
Siiiigh…Haven’t bought dice in ages.
I saw that there has been a reprint of Blackmoor material for 3.5… But even better, I recently found Dave Arneson’s old home page where he has a scanned image of the original map from Blackmoor and a PDF of the Blackmoor book!!!
http://www.jovianclouds.com/blackmoor/
:( $0.75 I wish come to Canada they milk us for $150 per or like $8.00 for a set of 1 of each type
OMG – Julia: I just bought some dice @ Dragon’s Lair this weekend!
Wonderduck: You should be careful with that dice. You’re going to think that I’m joking, but roaches really like to eat those dice. I lived in Houston, so most of the folks I know lost their 1st ed dice to the brown menace. Not that I ever owned any. Not me, no way… (ahem)…
I think this is the only time we’ve seen the DM and a player in an agreement that wasn’t forced.
I have a green felt bag which my sweetie sewed gold beads onto in the shape of my initial in Celtic script. I was the ubergeek for the next three sessions.
Re: post 28 — Were these books you’re referring to the dread Arduin Grimoire? They contained perhaps the nastiest critical hit table I’ve ever seen.
And I started playing in 1978.
I am really enjoying this comic!! Only been gamming for 10 years but it so hits home with how players act. I have only bought 3 sets of dice. One set came with the AD&D beginner set that I bought and the other 2 were from chesex so that I had a couple of complete sets. All the other dice that I have came from what I was told was a well honored tradition of older players giving a “lucky” dice or two to a new player. Wasn’t told till later that what that meant was the dice were bad luck to them and so they gave them away to take away the bad luck to give it to the new player lol. Don’t know if it worked for them or not but my dice roll fairly decent all things considered. Until I let a friend use them……then they botch consistently for them lol. And yes I have the crown bag heheh.
I too have a strange addiction to cool dice.
1. I too cannot overlook a store full of dice without buying at least one. It’s an addiction 10 times more powerful than marijuana.
2. I actually bought a kickass set of dice once, and the players kept begging me to show them to them. It was like the opposite of this situation.
I could do 400d6 damage out of my two crown bags. came in handy when we all went on our not to infrequent all night axis, allies (infantry and tanks 1/2 off)and beer binges.
Just reminded me… I need to get a new set of dice… *runs out to buy*
Re: post 38
OMG if you have roaches that can eat *dice* I am flat ***never*** visiting Houston!! I remember seeing dice like those you mention (didn’t play D&D in those days though). Even though they are small, I’m still really creeped out by that. Eeuwww. That is worse even than South Carolina’s fire ants!!! Ack!
BTW I have been playing on and off for 18 years. The last 7 have been with a nearly-20-year-long standing campaign. They still use 1st ed because it would be just too frellin’ complicated to convert it.
As for me personally:
1st ed books (a few): check.
Crown Royal bag: check (I even have the distinction of wearing a hole into one seam).
Crazy collection of dice: so-so. I stopped collecting and did the dastardly deed of organizing them into this little mini tackle box. Except for the **giant** (raquet ball size) d20 I bought at a sci-fi con last month. Oh, no! Now it’s my turn to be Dave!
Strong resemblance to the players in this comic: Ohhh, yeah. See also “Dork Tower” and just about any other fun and well-done spoof on gamers and sci-fi geeks.
You pegged us too well, friend.
Give yourself a pat on the back!
Well I have collected soo many dice over the years, not to mention glass globs for use as counters for VtES.
I find the the Plastic Screw top Kool-Ade containers provide a neat storage container.
Shamus… Keep up the good work!
I’ve never been much of a dice guy. Miniatures on the other hand…I spent way too much money on them. Every once in a while my group actually finds one relevant to the encounter.
Woot! 50.
Anyway, first time poster, first time reader. Just gotta say I love the comic and I love my dice… though they don’t love me anymore. Although… I don’t usually bring attention to my dice, other people do it for me. (Thus I look like less of a dork.) They are shiny and sparkle though.
P.S. I’m a chick, so it’s cool if I have girly dice. :P