What if we didn't use dice?

[Dagoth Ur]

How else am I supposed to vicariously live out my crippling gambling addiction with a far more reasonable budget if we remove dice?

[Rogue]

I find it interesting that a lot of the tactical chat around the board is about reducing variance - for example, a flat 3 damage weapon is often considered superior to d6 damage, because you know what you're getting. There's less swing. Likewise pushing things up to 2+, or even 2+ rerolling 1s (the holy grail of hit and wound rolls), because you can then virtually guarantee what's going to happen with the dice and the result.

 

Here in this thread, on the other hand, the enthusiasm seems to be for dice rolling - it's the variability that makes things unpredictable, and therefore fun (and often frustrating, I guess, but no light without dark and all that).

 

I'm not convinced that removing dice would remove all variation from the game. There are too many other points of change - terrain, deployment, mission, maelstrom cards, unit selection. It wouldn't become a case of deploy, then decide who's going to win five turns from now, pack up again and go home. I think that view diminishes player skill, and how they handle their list (as someone pointed out earlier, you can't just pick up a GT winning list and expect to win the next one yourself - it's all about how the list is played).

 

That said, one of my regular opponents really dislikes maelstrom, precisely because of that variability. There, having the game hinge on the luck of the card draw is highly frustrating, win or lose, in a way that a poor run of dice rolls might not be.

[OutlawSixActual]

Luck is a factor in real war, too, dice rolls add to the realism in my opinion :)

[BitsHammer]

Too much luck negates player input, but not enough negates the chance that you can pull out of a bad situation with some good rolls.

 

Basically a good wargame needs some chance involved or it won't be fun, but too much and it just feels random and leaves you uninvolved from impacting the game.

[Panzer]

Well, there's also the phrase "the die is cast" which is most famously used when referring to Caesar crossing the Rubicon to start a civil war (...heh, crossing the Rubicon...Primaris Caesar  ). Dice simply symbolise that an outcome is rarely 100% certain and that applies to war as well.

[The_son_of_Dorn]

Could be worse, could have to rely on random card draws like some cursed hybrid game of the dammed like yugioh meets pokemon *shudders*

[Panzer]

Could be worse, could have to rely on random card draws like some cursed hybrid game of the dammed like yugioh meets pokemon *shudders*

Actually Malifaux is a great skirmish game as well. ;)

[Marshal Reinhard]

Remove dice and it's essentially chess with moddable amounts of pieces for each side and board.

[Kilofix]

The thing about dice is that even though their results can be reduced to an average value through mathhammer; in practice even with an average 7 on 2D6, you could roll a 2 during that crucial moment or a 12; and that’s part of the “fun”.

[Rogue]

Remove dice and it's essentially chess with moddable amounts of pieces for each side and board.

 

That's sort of what I'm getting at. When people win chess games, it's rare that people say 'Oh, you got lucky there'. With no random element (beyond the other player), victory goes to the more skillful player. 

 

Now, if that's not your bag, and the randomness of dice rolling is an important part of the fun for you (generic you, not just Reinhard), then great, but that's a slightly different argument. 

[Panzer]

 

Remove dice and it's essentially chess with moddable amounts of pieces for each side and board.

 

That's sort of what I'm getting at. When people win chess games, it's rare that people say 'Oh, you got lucky there'. With no random element (beyond the other player), victory goes to the more skillful player. 

 

Now, if that's not your bag, and the randomness of dice rolling is an important part of the fun for you (generic you, not just Reinhard), then great, but that's a slightly different argument. 

 

 

In chess both sides are equal though, while in Warhammer two opposing armies are very different. Also units pay for rules that make them more reliable. Taking the randomness away the more reliable weapon now suddenly becomes the worse choice because it's more expensive.

 

Comparing chess and Warhammer is like comparing apples and oranges.

[Soldier of Dorn]

I believe John Lambshead went into diceless wargaming in his One-Hour Skirmish Wargames book, but I'm afraid I've not yet acquired a copy (though it is on my list!,) so can't really speak to how well they play.

 

That being said, the only real advantage of diceless I can see is exactly that which the aforementioned (I presume) takes advantage of -- to expedite the speed of the game. But fundamentally you would design a diceless game very differently: I would envision far simpler combat mechanics and far more gentrified units, more akin to the basic nature of Lion Rampant and the simplicity of its units, though to an even greater degree, then the intricacies of unit interaction that Warhammer 40k offers. It wouldn't be as easy as simply removing dice rolls and reducing them to statistical likelihoods while preserving the fundamental structure of a game designed around concepts of random chance. The entire nature of the game would have to change if you were to journey down that route.

 

Actually... that might be an interesting thought exercise. To compose a diceless version of 40k. Hm... one more thing to ponder, I suppose.

[Trevak Dal]

I would prefer digital dice rollers. Easier, faster, one less thing to carry.

[TorvaldTheMild]

No way.  I like dice, I like the whole process and fun of rolling the dice.  Also some people are not mathematically inclined so it would put off people from playing so it would never happen.  If GW used mathhammer properly when making stats and rules we wouldn't need to replace dice with mathhammer, but also we already use math, understanding averages etc.  Also you need a random generator for the game to work or be fun.  If a unit always had x models predictably die it doesn't work as a simulation for war and it quite frankly would be boring.  The surprise is half the fun, rolling an extremely lucky role that is so statistically implausible that you jump up and down and everyone laughs at how lucky it was.

[Slasher956]

Oh I thought this was going to be trying to nick malifauxs card mechanic.......

[Claws and Effect]

Some of the most fun I've ever had in games happened when statistically improbable dice rolls occurred.

 

Like when I consistently made FNP rolls for my Contemptor Dread over the course of a game and he just refused to die. Then he was finally killed by a single Hormagaunt. The Hormagaunt is named Dave now. The rest of his unit was killed turn 1 and he followed the Carnifexes around the rest of the game.

 

Or the time in Kill Team when my Deathwatch Veteran sniped the enemy Leader in the head with a shotgun at max range. Literally only the model's head was visible.

 

Another Kill Team game a single Eliminator got dogpiled by 2 Tyranid Warriors, 2 Genestealers, and a gaunt. He made every save roll over 3 turns of combat and just refused to die. He got a purity seal for that.

 

If we didn't use dice and everything was based on statistics, none of those things could have happened.

[Panzer]

Same.
The one thing that I will always remember is how last edition my opponents Stormfang Gunship shot at my Railgun Hammerhead. The Hammerhead jinked, barely dodged the shot, then shot back on a 6, hit and the Stormfang Gunship exploded. That's what you get for shooting at my tank, you damn flying brick! :D

[Marshal Rohr]

I've heard of people using a playing card deck, but I can't remember where.