D&D and RPG Accessory Items you HATE!

[FitzTheRuke]

Does it help? I'm skeptical about the benefits of penal punishment for my dice.

It's not about the dice, really. It's about the player(s).

 

[Dire Bare]

Hey. If my die seriously misbehaves, it's going to have to do some time.

Prison is a bit extreme for misbehaving dice, there is a less severe option . . .

 

[amethal]

Prison is a bit extreme for misbehaving dice, there is a less severe option . . .

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I've got one of them. Not my fault, it was a present.

 

[delericho]

Prison is a bit extreme for misbehaving dice, there is a less severe option . . .

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Back in the day one of my player took a much more extreme view - he lined all his other dice up to watch as he smashed the offending one with a brick.

 

[delericho]

I'm not a fan of RPG accessories in general - I tend towards the view that the less you need the better. That said, there are very few that I would say I hate. For the most part, if players want to opt-in to something, that's their prerogative.

The two I do hate, though, are both types of dice: the first is the very heavy, metal dice. I had a player use one once, and then was immediately banned from using them again. My table bore that scar for some time.

The other was a low-contrast dark green dice with dark red numbering, which couldn't be read except from very close by. The player was then in the habit of rolling the dice, calling the number rolled very quickly, and then snatching them up again - curiously, those were also his "lucky" dice. (Then again, that was also the same player from the post above, so maybe they were just thoroughly intimidated. )

 

[Doctor Futurity]

I was thinking that I don't particularly hate any of these things but then realized I do have two pet peeves: the first is dice that are hard to read, they drive me nuts! The second is a bit more of a love/hate scenario and that is metal dice. I bought several sets but I stopped using them for the most part, as many are just too gimmicky or hard to read, and I often have my doubts that some of them are truly reliable RNGs due to all the stuff often added to them.

I would never buy and use a dice tower but I have players who live by them and will always roll dice off the table without one, though.

 

[Thierry-Advent]

The other was a low-contrast dark green dice with dark red numbering, which couldn't be read except from very close by. The player was then in the habit of rolling the dice, calling the number rolled very quickly, and then snatching them up again - curiously, those were also his "lucky" dice. (Then again, that was also the same player from the post above, so maybe they were just thoroughly intimidated. )

Way back Chessex dice did not have painted numbers. One player bought a crystal d20 and sat the opposite of me at the other end of the table. I couldn't see the numbers. He would call 20s far too often for my taste. Next session I brought a red Crayola and put red wax in the 20 and the 1. He was not 'lucky' anymore.

 

[abazaba]

I was thinking that I don't particularly hate any of these things but then realized I do have two pet peeves: the first is dice that are hard to read, they drive me nuts! The second is a bit more of a love/hate scenario and that is metal dice. I bought several sets but I stopped using them for the most part, as many are just too gimmicky or hard to read, and I often have my doubts that some of them are truly reliable RNGs due to all the stuff often added to them.

I would never buy and use a dice tower but I have players who live by them and will always roll dice off the table without one, though.

Dice that are hard to read are indeed something I also hate/not like. Some sets look very nice, but are not very practical because of that. And in the same category: dice that both have a '6' and a '9' on them (like d12, d20), but do not include some sort of 'marker' (like a 'dot') on the bottom of the number, so you cannot tell whether you rolled a 6 or a 9.

 

[Willie the Duck]

For me, it's anything that takes up a huge amount of space on the gaming table/in people's gaming gear, and then doesn't see a use/enhance the game/takes up as much time as it saves. That can be the custom dice carrier that looks like a mimic/dragon egg/plastic sword but only holds like 10 dice, a novelty digital dice roller that laughs maniacally when you roll a 1, or custom dungeon terrain that takes an hour to set up and still doesn't have the variety that you aren't sketching half your scenes on a battlemap in dry-erase anyways.

I have to admit however that a group photo where the DM wears the one on the left and everyone else wears the one on the right would be hilarious.

I'd love a photocomic with the same set-up, but it's everyone having fallen asleep at the table--then two gamer-spouses standing in the doorway, one saying to the other, 'I think Jerry thought those shirts implied something a little more risqué.'

 

[Sossij]

Or even more likely: kill me, with his/her dice gun (and spiked metal dice).

If you make dice guns illegal, only criminals will have dice guns.