World of Darkness Dice Sets Review
To be truly hip and popular at your World Darkness gaming table, you to need to have official World of Darkness dice. This review will examine all of the World of Darkness dice (for the new WoD) to date and determine which is the most fashionable set. This will forever settle arguments that have threatened to end friendships, break up relationships and maim characters, all over who has the coolest official WoD dice.When you buy your WoD dice, you will get ten d10s in a little bag. I urge you to upgrade the bag as soon as you can, as they tend to fall apart or even worse, let dice escape if you don’t knot the strings tight enough. As everyone knows, having a set of eight or nine d10s is not the same as a set of ten d10s, and you will have to discard the misbegotten set for a new batch of dice. Otherwise, as you use your official dice set, you will feel hollow and empty. Incomplete. The streets will seem darker. Madness and hunger will gnaw away you from within. (But then, then again, this may help you with your characterisations.)
So, which dice set to choose from? Now, I’m not concerned with how well they roll or statistical averages. It all comes down to purely how they look. (You should know how d10s work by now, anyway.)
All of the dice sets have the following traits in common:
- Ten d10s in a crappy little bag with a skull motif. (The type of skull will depend on which splat the dice are for.)
- The success numbers (8-0) will be a different colour from the failure numbers (1-7).
- Some plastic and packaging. Best forgotten.
World of Darkness Dice Set
- Base Pattern: Swirly grey/black.
- Failure Numbers (1-7): Blue.
- Success Numbers (8-0): Silver.
- Bag Description: Black bag with white skull.
- Skull on Bag Description: Human skull.
As I stare into the dark oiliness of the dice in front of me, I shudder, thinking of the long shadows cast by the World of Darkness. These dice are pretty good – the silver success numbers stand out and the blue failure numbers are still quite legible.
The shadowy, marbled background really carries the vibe of the World of Darkness core book quite well. (Even though the core book has a blue cover, the rest of the core book supplements have black stripe down the cover, indicating that the default colour for the base WoD is black.)
Style: 4
Vampire: the Requiem Dice Set
- Base Pattern: Black speckles on a red base.
- Failure Numbers (1-7): Black.
- Success Numbers (8-0): Silver.
- Bag Description: Red bag with black skull.
- Skull on Bag Description: Skull with fangs.
Vampires. The Damned. The Kindred, tormented by their inner Beast, playing out an endless game of politics to wile away the endless nights of despair and torment. But yet, these red dice speckled with black do not speak “Vampire: the Requiem” to me.
Maybe a black base speckled with red would have worked better, as they may have looked more like blood splatters on an obsidian tomb. Instead, we get something like coal dust speckles on a red, er, fire engine. The black failure numbers merge in with the black speckles, making them hard to read, if you want to use these dice outside of your WoD game. The silver success numbers are readable enough. But the whole package is not very vampire-ish.
Style: 1
Werewolf: the Forsaken Dice Set
- Base Pattern: Cookies and cream. Sort of brown speckles on an off-white, cream base.
- Failure Numbers (1-7): Black.
- Success Numbers (8-0): Red.
- Bag Description: Brown bag with yellow-ish skull.
- Skull on Bag Description: Wolf skull.
Ah yes, Werewolves, the endless hunt against the spirit world. But the base colour says: “cookies & cream” to me. I think White Wolf was going for a rune-carved, bone look. How I wish this had been the case! Instead, when I look at these dice, I am reminded of the Magnum Cookies & Cream ice cream, with its white chocolate coating... Damn you, diet, for tormenting me like this! I shall fly into Kuruth (Death Rage) soon if I don’t make my Resolve + Composure check. Ah good, one success. On with the review.
Anyway, yes, these dice don’t really succeed at the primal, bone aesthetic. I think a straight bone-coloured base colour would have worked better. The red and black number sets don’t really contrast or match very well against the cookies & cream base either. They are more readable than the vampire dice, however. It would have been really cool if the numbers were all jagged, as though they had been carved out with claws. All in all, they’re not very cool dice at all.
Style: 2
Mage: the Awakening Dice Set
- Base Pattern: Blue swirly stuff.
- Failure Numbers (1-7): Dark gold.
- Success Numbers (8-0):
White.- Bag Description:
Blue bag with white skull.- Skull on Bag Description:
Human skull with pentagram on forehead.
As I gaze at these dice, I feel myself connecting with the Supernal Realms. I am Awakened. Yes, for White Wolf can actually design a pretty set of dice! The best of the bunch so far – the white success numbers are clear to read, the dark gold failure numbers look great and the entire aesthetic of the dice set feels like Mage. The swirly blue base colour is reminiscent of legendary, sunken Atlantis, and it’s a lovely, variable blue, perhaps resembling the churning of the surf against those long-forgotten, tidal ruins.
Style: 5
Promethean: the Created Dice Set
- Base Pattern: Bright white. It looks like it might be glow-in-the-dark white, but it isn’t.
- Failure Numbers (1-7): Purple.
- Success Numbers (8-0): Black.
- Bag Description: White bag with purple skull.
- Skull on Bag Description: Skull chopped up into fragments.
When I first got these, I was excited, because the white dice kind of look like they might glow in the dark. Alas, they did not, despite me staring at them for several minutes in the gathering gloam, feeling Disquiet settle in across the apartment. My yearning for them to glow in the dark, like the yearning of a Promethean to become human, would never be fulfilled. On the plus side, these are the cleanest dice set in the WoD line and are quite easy to read. However, I found them boring.
Style: 3
Changeling: the Lost Dice Set
- Base Pattern: Green base with black speckles.
- Failure Numbers (1-7): White.
- Success Numbers (8-0): Pale green.
- Bag Description: Green bag with white skull.
- Skull on Bag Description: Human skull with thorns around it.
Hmm, speckled dice again. When White Wolf meddles with speckled dice, they are playing with forces they do not understand, because the vampire and werewolf dice sets are ugly. However, the green base with the black, blotchy speckles actually works, conjuring images of a mossy, forbidden forests and the mystery of the Hedge. My only problem is that the failure numbers stand out far more easily than the success numbers. I used these in a game the other week and since I just count the dice that stand out, rather than identify each number by its shape, I was confused for the first few times, as my eye was drawn to the white failure numbers rather than the successes. Still, at least White Wolf finally got speckles to work.
Style: 3
Dice Ladder
My preference for the dice sets goes in this ladder:
- Mage
- World of Darkness
- Changeling
- Promethean
- Werewolf
- Vampire
So there you go – the World of Darkness dice have been fashionably rated! I hope that brings peace to your cold, darkened hearts, lessens the pall of your innermost torment and quietens your burgeoning rage.
I give the entire range of dice 4 for Substance (as they are indeed substantial sets of ten d10s and 4 for Style, because the last few sets show the dice are becoming more thematic as to their splat. And the Mage dice are cool.
