Daft Dice Review
A few weeks ago I was lucky enough to come home to a rather awesome surprise. A box from Daft Concepts was waiting for me on my dining room table. It was just a cardboard box, but it might as well have been a giant wooden treasure chest because inside were wonders to behold. (I warn you know that my pictures do not do these enough justice)
Chris Urinko had sent me a sample set of his many awesome designs for Daft Dice along with a few complimentary wooden business cards with a pop out laser cut die inset in them. And to hold the great bounty he also sent along two of the decorative dice boxes. I’ll go through each die separately then let you know my general opinion.
First the business cards: these things are pretty sweet, though a little thick for fitting in a wallet. They look so awesome with the dice in them that I almost didn’t want to punch them out. Ultimately, for you I did, and I was glad I did because the dice are far from a novelty item. They are sturdy and roll well. The size is great for the hand and they snap together so perfectly they require no glue. I have been rolling em around and playing with them for a few weeks and they are still awesome. These would make a great swag item at a convention, especially if you could get the cards stained or colored in some other way before or after the cutting. As primary business cards they are a little thick though. Seeing how they are made I wonder if a nice stiff card stock could be used, but they might sacrifice the sturdiness of the dice. Either way they rock pretty hard core.
Moving on we have the larger set of wooden puzzle dice. These things are like the smaller business card version only larger and laser etched with thematic faces. I’m hard pressed to say which ones I like the most, but I think the ninja dice edge out as my favorite. I love the weapons that match the number faces for sides 1-5. Like the business card dice, these things are sturdy and great to roll. Being hollow they don’t weigh as much as solid wood cubes would, which really adds to the dice feel instead of just wood blocks.
After that we have the laser translucent acrylic. These are great for gamers who want colored dice. They come in some nice neon colors and get a pretty awesome effect that you can’t get with solid dice. The only down side is they are harder to read from a distance, but that is easily outweighed by being able to finally get some dice to match with the neon sneakers and wind breaker. Now you can really roll in style and get your swag on in the club or the con.
Next up we have the mirrored acrylic dice. These things are, figuratively speaking, the jewels of the set. They sparkle like awesome and, due to the dark backing, are actually really easy to read. I made jokes about matching your outfit with the neons, but these are the real bling here. I would not suggest playing in bright lights, but if you are of the basement dwelling geek kind these will become your precious in no time. Just keep them out of the reach of those nasty hobbitses as they will yoink them first chance they get. As with the wooden dice, both versions of the acrylic are stout enough to take some abuse and the laser cut designs are flawless.
The last one is the solid acrylic. This is by far my favorite of the set. The detail in the faces is exquisite. The one Chris sent showed off the standard numeral design as well as the extremely detailed and beautiful Cthulu design. My only problem was that you really could not see all these beauties had to offer from a distance. I found though, a hidden benefit, you can easily do a color fill with some sharpies or any other paint you have to tint the grooves so that you can add some nice color accents to really make the designs pop.
For mine I tried a few things, first I did a white fill on one of the faces with red ink and it looked great. Not too opaque, but just perfect for easy identification. On the Cthulu side I got creative and colored the whole face with a blue sharpie then went back through with isopropyl alcohol to clean all the flat bits. What I was left with was a blue highlighted fill on all the detailed groove work around the face. Absolutely gorgeous and I wish I could get a full polyhedral set of these.
Every set of dice needs a place to rest when they aren't working their magic in the world, and awesome dice like this need an awesome place. No more crown royal bags, regal though they may seem. Instead Chris has designed two different laser cut precision crafted boxes. The two we were sent came in the pop off top variety and the sliding matchbox style. The box with the pop off top has decorative feet and reminds me of a Persian treasure chest. It fits all but the largest wooden puzzle dice perfectly and wouldn't be out of place decorating a desk in an office or a table at home, while also functioning as the perfect place to store your daft dice. The matchbox style is a little more simple but is my favorite because I love the sliding top. Something about the perfectly lasered grooves and easy sliding action just screams professional craftsmanship to me. I would honestly buy a set or two of dice just to have an excuse to also buy the boxes to put them in.
When I took these to the local store people couldn't quit playing with them. They are very novel and seem much more stately than tumbled dice. It looks like you are using some great heirloom dice passed down through generations when you break out the wooden dice and the solid acrylic is honestly a work of art. The fact that you can order dice with your own designs makes this concept even more amazing because they are significantly cheaper to order on a small run than cast dice and allow for MUCH greater detail in the faces.
I suggest you head on over to Daft Dice and check out the Kick Starter, and while you're at it, send Chris an e-mail as he is an incredibly friendly and professional person to work with.