Thema: Explodierende Ubiquity-Würfel

[Orok]

Da im Neuheiten-Thema die Frage danach aufkam:



Die Würfel sind eine neue Idee von Jeff Combos. Sind 2016 durch den Mars-Kickstarter mitfinanziert worden, und wurden schon auf der GenCon verkauft. Im Handel sind sie wohl noch nicht. Vielleicht Bestellung sammeln, und dann Jeff direkt mal anschreiben?

Was er dazu schreibt:

At long last, here is everything you'd want to know about the new Ubiquity dice (hopefully). One of the reasons this update took a little longer to put together is because I wanted to get all the production details ironed out, but I also struggled with writing a quick, pithy description of what makes the new dice special:
“New Ubiquity dice: make your games more explosive!”

No, that’s not quite right.

“New Ubiquity dice: now 2% more explosive!”

Nope. That’s worse.

“New Ubiquity dice: watch them blow up in your players’ faces!”

Um…let’s just move on, shall we? The less said about that last one the better.

Why make new dice?

Without going into exhaustive detail, costs have gone up I’m going to have to raise the price of the existing dice. If I was going to do that, I figured I should make some improvements so you’d feel like you were getting a little something extra.

(FYI, this Kickstarter will be one of the last places to get the existing Ubiquity dice at the $6 price point. Also, for those that are interested, I’ll go into more detail on the pricing of the existing dice in the comments section below.)

Over the years, I’ve heard four major complaints about the classic Ubiquity dice:

    I don’t like using special dice.
    I get them confused with my regular d8s.
    I don’t like how d8s roll.
    I’d like them in other colors.

Well, the first one is easy to address, since you don’t need to use special dice to play Ubiquity games. You can use any dice you already own. With that being said, Ubiquity dice will make your life easier by letting you roll 1/3 less dice, make counting successes easier, and now add a little extra dramatic randomization to your games, so there are compelling reasons to use them.

The second and third complaints are the ones the new dice will directly address, which you will read about in the next section, but if we are successful in making these new dice, it will also open the door to being able to produce theme-colored dice for the different flavors of HEX and other Ubiquity games, so they will address the fourth complaint as well.

OK, without further ado, let’s get into the exciting stuff!
How do the new dice work?

The new Ubiquity dice will have a truncated octahedron shape, which is essentially a regular d8 with all the points shaved off. This means they’ll have the same numbering scheme as the classic dice, but have a distinctive, rounder shape that also rolls better. You’ll never confuse these dice with your regular d8s again!
The only downside to the new shape is that there is a 2% chance that a die will end up on one of its blank, truncated faces. Actually, that particular quirk may be a downside to pure mathematicians, but for us, it opens up three gameplay options:

    Exploding: When a die lands on one of its blank faces, re-roll the die and another one just like it. This means that a white die (0-1 successes) explodes into another white die and a blue die (0-3 successes) explodes into another blue die. Thus, rolling a higher value die means less chance of an explosion, but it’ll be bigger if it happens.
    Advantage: Instead of adding extra successes when a die lands on one of the blank faces, roll it twice and keep the highest result. This is a great option for GMs that want bonuses and Style points to be the primary way to increase maximum possible successes, since it only helps players generate a better result on a given roll.
    Reroll: If you like the look of the new die but don’t want to mess with the probability curve, you can simply re-roll it if that lands on one of its truncated faces. With this option, you get the distinctive look and better rolling, but the same probability distribution as the classic dice.

I’ve been having some good conversations with people since I posted about the exploding dice stretch-goal, and in my enthusiasm, I may have given some of you the wrong idea about their intended purpose. You don’t get a second chance to make a first impression, but let me see if I can clarify a few things.

I don’t think there is anything wrong with the existing Ubiquity dice, so I’m sorry if I gave you the impression that my main motivation was to “fix” or replace them with the exploding dice. Far from it! I like the original dice so much that I’ve been selling them at close to cost because I know they are an optional accessory, but I’d still like people to use them.

Wenn jemand mit dem Englisch Probleme hat, sagt einfach Bescheid. Dann übersetze ich gerne das wichtigste.