How does a d5 work?

Hardhead · Dec 4, 2003

This site has d5s for sale that aren't just d10s renumbered. The picuture they have isn't very informative, though, and the description ("Shaped like a triangle with additional thickness), isn't very helpful either.

Can someone explain d5s to me? Or point me to some better pictures?

Ankh-Morpork Guard · Dec 4, 2003

...I'm not sure HOW it works. I wish they had a better picture.

Buttercup · Dec 4, 2003

It looks like a d4 to me. I'd like to see a top down picture.

PowerWordDumb · Dec 4, 2003

You *ARE* seeing a top-down picture. Take a triangle, and extrude it thru your playdough machine until it has depth. It's three rectangles on the sides, with two triangles for endcaps.

Might be easier to visualize if you take a carrot, cut off the ends, and whittle it down until it's triangular in profile. Then what they did was pogressively cut it 'shorter' until the balance was right and all sides came up equally often.

It's just tough to visualize when we're all used to dice with equally shaped/sized faces.

edit: Now I want to go home and make myself a set of carrot-dice. Fun to use, and you can combine them with onions and celery to make a nice mirepois sauce-base in a pinch!

Hardhead · Dec 4, 2003

PowerWordDumb said:
You *ARE* seeing a top-down picture. Take a triangle, and extrude it thru your playdough machine until it has depth. It's three rectangles on the sides, with two triangles for endcaps.

Might be easier to visualize if you take a carrot, cut off the ends, and whittle it down until it's triangular in profile. Then what they did was pogressively cut it 'shorter' until the balance was right and all sides came up equally often.

It's just tough to visualize when we're all used to dice with equally shaped/sized faces.

edit: Now I want to go home and make myself a set of carrot-dice. Fun to use, and you can combine them with onions and celery to make a nice mirepois sauce-base in a pinch!

Ohhhhhhh. Thanks.

der_kluge · Dec 4, 2003

Pardon the crude picture, but this is what I think they're trying to say.

MadScientist · Dec 4, 2003

Okay, but with the different sides being different shapes I wonder how they ensure that the die is fair. I would guess that you would land on the rectangular sides more than the triangular ones.

Brown Jenkin · Dec 4, 2003

die_kluge said:
Pardon the crude picture, but this is what I think they're trying to say.

You are correct Sir. I own one and that is what they are like. I also own the d7 whick is a pentegon with thickness. The surface area of each number should be close and the coners are also beveled at a non-45 degree angle to ensure that the die roles true (Equal chance of any number coming up).

MerakSpielman · Dec 4, 2003

MadScientist said:
Okay, but with the different sides being different shapes I wonder how they ensure that the die is fair. I would guess that you would land on the rectangular sides more than the triangular ones.

What Jenkin said. You can make a rectangle and a triangle that have identical areas. It just might look a little funny.

I still want to get a d3 - they're shaped kind of like a football, with 2 points and three edges.

BigFreekinGoblinoid · Dec 4, 2003

MadScientist said:
Okay, but with the different sides being different shapes I wonder how they ensure that the die is fair. I would guess that you would land on the rectangular sides more than the triangular ones.

They hired some summer interns whose job it was to roll these dice 10,000 times a day for three months, recording the results. What a job eh? Seriously though - how else would you test them?