Like all TTRPGers, I like dice, especially polyhedral dice, and I own many sets of different colors and styles. I’ve even rather famously designed a few games with specialty dice, and that was a joy. And I own a few dice gizmos that are fun, ranging from a 1980s electronic Dragonbone, to a couple of spinning CoinSides, to a ceremonial dagger with spinning rings.
But I can’t remember the last time I felt this excited about getting sets of dice, as with the ones in the Black Oak Workshop Halloween Advent calendar 2024.
In part, it’s that I’ve done a couple of RPG treatments of the Dracula novel, attempting to be faithful to the supernatural abilities and weaknesses of Stoker’s tale. And I’ve a favorite character — Petit Louis — built on those details, for which these dice are perfect.
But there’s also the cleverness of the designs, especially among the d4’s. In both the “miniatures” nature of the platonic d4’s, and that of the elongated ones. First revealed was the brown, like a stake, then the black a few days later.
Then Monday shortly after midnight, Jennifer came in to have me open day 29, too curious to wait until morning to discover what that longish cavity held.
Out tumbled those two ivory dice, like a pair of fangs, marked uniquely with the bloody numbers of the black set.
It takes some fitting to get all these dice into that coffin box, but it does hold them, which adds to my pleasure.
Happy Halloween!