maybe he was doing it to just psyc you and or any other players out.. like the ones who like to tap their fingers etc etc.. If they know it annoys you then they keep doing it because if thats what you are noticing you may be missing something else!

Next time I play, I'm wearing my lucky pants. Nobody want me to remove that edge.

I used to play warhammer against a guy and after rolling his 'hits' he's use the dice that 'missed' to roll for his 'wounds' (obvioulsy only the same number as the number of hits he had).

His rationale?

The dice that had 'hit' had used up their 'luck' for that turn

Utter bobbins but i found it quite charming and funny so started doing it myself. Clearly it has no impact at all on your rolls but you oddly sort of feel that it does

I'd have to say nay, unless your opponents dice consistently do not bounce around when they hit the ttable (IE a soft landing) then it really isn't cheating. I have a really strong flick I do with my wrist every time even with an open hand. Sometimes I place the dice all hits face up just because I think it will bring me luck. I can say with a strong backbone that I have rolled as many good dice in a pinch as I have bad dice.

Totally tangent dice story.

Once back in our school days we played this epic game of 40k, hundreds of models a side, loads of characters.

My mate Paul had amazing luck that game, but only when it counted. If he needed to get a 6 to save he usually got it, if he was going to die from 'anything but a 1' from a las cannon shot , he spookily rolled ones.

He came clean after the game that TWO of many of his identical red dice had been tampered with. One had had new holes drilled into it to have two '4's, two '5s' and two '6s' etc. ANother had had spaces filled in and carefully painted to have 1 to 3 twice.

if it was a critical roll he'd carefully swap to the dice 'optimised' for the low or high roll he needed.

He came clean about this late in the game and we all thought it was really funny as he'd had us all fooled. it wasnt a malicious attempt to cheat so no one really cared but it did make me realise that if you were the unscrupulous type its a good way to fix important rolls in D6 based games!

Yeah, good point Gadge. I'd probably not notice if somebody didn't have enough blanks or whatever on his attack or evade dice. I never check them before a match. It's easy to cheat and get away with it, I think, but that doesn't bother me so much because the stakes are so very low. It'd take a special kind of loser to cheat at miniature spaceships.

The the dice roll/bounce after hitting the table. If the answer is yes then you've got a legal and random roll of the die. The player "influencing the dice" is only fooling themselves.

I think there is a pretty obvious line between using non-physical means (ie lucky hats) to influence an abstract entity ("luck") and actually trying to remove randomness by physically manipulating dice to move in predictable ways. That said, I agree that it would be difficult enough to fix rolls that whatever this player thinks they're doing, it's probably not working.

As someone who's played D6 games for two decades, I can tell you that if you hold the dice in your hand with the face you want showing, and consistently "roll" them from the same height, and in the same direction, you can influence probability. By holding the dice showing sixes, and dropping from the same height, with the correct amount of roll, you can get far more sixes than you otherwise should if you actually rolled them randomly. I've seen it done, and tried it myself outside of games. It's possible.

Whether it's possible with D8s, I don't know, but it would seem likely.

The more I think about it, the more I think that a dice tower might be the smart idea for any competitive event. It would do a good job at randomizing the dice, avoiding tampering, and also keep the dice in one easy to control spot. Rolling dice off the table is an annoying fact of board gaming.

I'm in the market for some of these lucky roll all hits/crits/evade dice if anyone's got any going spare.

Mine are broked.

Cheers

Baaa

As someone who's played D6 games for two decades, I can tell you that if you hold the dice in your hand with the face you want showing, and consistently "roll" them from the same height, and in the same direction, you can influence probability. By holding the dice showing sixes, and dropping from the same height, with the correct amount of roll, you can get far more sixes than you otherwise should if you actually rolled them randomly. I've seen it done, and tried it myself outside of games. It's possible.

Whether it's possible with D8s, I don't know, but it would seem likely.

It isn't possible with D6s or any legal dices...

If you or someone you know claims to be able to do such things with dice put it to a scientific test. Roll the dice 1000 times (this would still be a small sample size) and each time expect the same result. Record how many times (out of 1000) you get said result. You might think that (on a 6 sided die) that anything above 17% is proof positive, but that's not the case. The claim is one can predict the outcome of the die roll. Anything less that 70% would prove the technique does not work.

Been going over google scholar for studies on this topic, as I figure nerds would be writing scholarly papers about it with lots of math. So far, just going over the debate regarding the "dice control" crowd in the casino game of craps. Some people claim to be able to manipulate the results of the dice with statistical significance, but the scholarly studies are inconclusive.

I think this is a matter of etiquette; looking at how the dice lie in your hand has the potential to draw suspicion, and if you're not cheating why on earth would you want to act suspicious? Even if you were why would you. You wouldn't put your face as close to the table and look at the deck in a card game even if you couldn't see what was being drawn for this exact reason. Therefore I feel it's just good etiquette not purposely not look at your dice mid-roll. Whether that's the most-common double hand cup, or a back hand up single hander, or even the classic arm-out-to-the-right-whilst-looking-at-your-opponent-dead-in-the-eyes-and-telling-them-this-is-a-natural-4-hit-Attack-and-then-not-even-looking-at-the-result-until-you-see-the-despair/relief-in-their-face, I think it's important to consciously be aware how you roll the dice and act generally in a game for the benefit of your opponent.

This again... People, it is nigh-impossible to influence a dice roll if the dice bounce. The higher you go up the dice# the more random your roll. Anything else is just a superstition.

I like to look at my dice in my hand and set them to hits just before I roll if I'm having a bad run. It's a gambler's fallacy though, like anything to do with unmodified dice.

I think there is a pretty obvious line between using non-physical means (ie lucky hats) to influence an abstract entity ("luck") and actually trying to remove randomness by physically manipulating dice to move in predictable ways.

Exactly. The attempt itself to physically manipulate the outcome is cheating. It doesn't matter if it works as to whether it's cheating or not. It only matters that the player is physically making the attempt, because saying that "it's only cheating if it succeeds" puts the responsibility to "prove it works" (or not) on the wrong player.

There is a clear difference between attempted dice manipulation and belief in a lucky shirt. It's remarkable that anybody even has to type the previous sentence.

Oh my, this thread again...

Oh my, this response again...

Really the important question to ask is:

"How can we be more inclusive of different dice rolling styles in Xwing"

Yeah if I get a really good roll (say 3 hits/evades on 3 dice) I'll deliberately not roll the same 3 dice again on the next roll, as I feel I've 'used up' the luck and won't get that lucky a second time in a row on the same dice.

Is that considered 'suspicious'?

Ok here's one I haven't heard discussed. How does everyone treat dice that have fallen off the table when rolled? I'm sure this happened plenty of times to everyone but do you keep the result or reroll it? The way I do it is, if my opponent rolls the dice and 1 or 2 fall off the table and I'm unable to see the result we just reroll. If I'm able to see the result it stands as is. If it's someone I know then just keep the result no matter what. Just curious how others play that scenario. Since I've had a few games where individuals consistently seem to throw one or 2 dice that roll off the table and then reroll them. Again it's still random when they reroll them what they will get but still I wonder haha.

Even the attempt to physically influence the way the dice roll is cheating, so the answer is: probably. I'm not sure how you prove it, unless you ask, "Why are you doing that?" and he says, "To get better rolls."

FWIW, as long as he's actually rolling the dice, and they're bouncing and jouncing together normally, his idiotic attempts at cheating are just that: idiotic. There's a reason that pit bosses in Vegas don't care how you arrange the dice in your hand before throwing them ... they only care that they're actually thrown. The reason is: it doesn't work.

Exactly as long as the are hitting the table and moving and bouncing into each other it's fine. Unless he waves his hand over them after rolling then I would call watto over.

*opens door to see the conversation, rolls eyes*

Ok here's one I haven't heard discussed. How does everyone treat dice that have fallen off the table when rolled? I'm sure this happened plenty of times to everyone but do you keep the result or reroll it? The way I do it is, if my opponent rolls the dice and 1 or 2 fall off the table and I'm unable to see the result we just reroll. If I'm able to see the result it stands as is. If it's someone I know then just keep the result no matter what. Just curious how others play that scenario. Since I've had a few games where individuals consistently seem to throw one or 2 dice that roll off the table and then reroll them. Again it's still random when they reroll them what they will get but still I wonder haha.

My rule is that dice only count on the table. It doesn't matter what game I'm playing, but if they hit the floor, they need to be rolled again. It's ridiculous having people duck under tables, chairs, etc. trying to see how a die landed. That's my take on it.

It is a little harder to control X-Wing dice, so that makes the conversation less relevant.

Don't do things that make you look like you are cheating even if you are not cheating. It is poor sportsmanship. If someone asks you to roll instead of drop your dice, roll your dice. It doesn't hurt your day, it just increases randomization.

If your opponent is concentrating that hard on rolling his dice, he's probably not paying enough attention to the game. You should have an advantage in the tactical game.

If it really bothers you, just ask him nicely what he's doing. If he's cheating it will scare him into not doing it any more. If he's not cheating, you'll probably get a funny story about superstition.