Dice, Dice Baby

 I had it all figured out. All my questioning, all my deducing had finally revealed the solution: Mr. Green, with the rope, in the Conservatory. It was my turn and I was only three spaces away. Victory would soon be mine! I grabbed the two dice, shook the dice vigorously inside my cupped hands, and let them fall. The dice clanged on the table, scattered, tumbled, and then fell still and silent. As they came to rest, the joy that had been building like a balloon being filled with helium from a tank was quickly squeezed out with all the resounding splendor of a juicy flatulence. Both of the dice read one. I moved two spaces closer, but still a very distance space away from the Conservatory and a sure win.

Full disclosure- Clue may actually have only one die, and I might have flubbed on the rules a little bit. I'm not sure if you are forced to be in the room of which you are making your final "official" guess, but that's how we've always played. The above scenario is fictitious, but it represents so many real situations- having everything you need to win except the most fleeting of resources- luck of the dice.

So many of the board games most of society can recognize depend on dice to move and without any way to alter the results. The winner of games like Monopoly and Mouse Trap will most often be those whom luck favored with the dice. Perhaps it's hyperbole, but most people will never any board game other than these that they've played sporadically since they were children. And board games must be for children since the dice alone determine who will win and not any particular skill or choice. If a player is unable to escape fate- the luck aspect, there is no reason to waste time on board games except on the rare occasion of being shut in, or without power, or being so bored any activity will do. In short, board gaming is a worthless pursuit of what only luck can provide.

That grand sense of fatalism would be correct- bizarre and over-the-top, but understandable if that was all there was to board gaming. If that was truly the pinnacle of design. But board gaming innovations didn't end at Life (and don't let anyone fool you- a spinner is no less lucky than dice). Developers found a way to limit the randomness; to make the luck a little less overwhelming, and a lot less controlling. 

Roll Again (and Again)

Perhaps the first major mitigation mechanism is the most simple. Released officially in the 1950s, Yahtzee gave players some control over their roll. The aim of the game is to roll different poker-style sequences with five dice. What set it apart, however, was the ability to roll, put aside the dice you wanted to keep, and roll the other dice again. Then, players could repeat this process one more time for a total of three rolls per turn. This simple rule gives players room to strategize and to decide what they want to go for on their score card. It grants more opportunities to be successful in whatever their pursuit is.

In the seventy years since, this "Yahtzee mechanic" has been used in many hobby board games. Richard Garfield's King of Tokyo is probably the most famous of this mechanism's adopters. Others include Bang! The Dice Game, Dice Throne, and my family's favorite Run, Fight or Die: Reloaded. 

Play On Your Own Turn!

Settlers of Catan swept the gaming world away when it was released in 1995. In the thirty years since, it has sold over 40 million copies, which, for context, is over 60% more copies sold than Super Mario Bros. 3 (around 24.5 million)- the third-best selling game of the NES. 

Catan has players anticipating everyone else's turn almost as much as their own. The active player's dice roll may end up giving resources to others at the table based on the result. It does not, however, have any way to manipulate the dice. A game often compared to it does using another nifty trick.

Sum or Separate

Space Base took the bones of Catan, collecting resources during other player's turns, and fleshed it out with individual choice. No longer do dice reading three and five mean the result is eight. It still can, mind you, but perhaps a player might prefer to use the dice separately if it would offer a better benefit. Space Base allows any player to do just that. Using the dice in this way makes luck less influential, and a player's strategy can be rewarded more frequently whether they choose to diversify or load up resources on only a few numbers.

Other games that allow a player to take sums are Mountain Goats and Trek-12. Trek-12 ups the ante forcing players to take the sum of the dice only four times in the twenty turns it consists of. In addition, players will also have to take the difference four times, the product four times, and the high and low result only four times each. Can't Stop forces players to make two results out of four dice, creating two pairs and taking the sum of each. But those pairs are the player's choice, which still provides some agency.

I'd Pay to Re-roll

This particular way to affect luck is probably my favorite. Players are given (and/or can gain more of) a resource that may be spent to re-roll or manipulate the result of a die. Cthulhu: Death May Die is a good example of this. Player characters have a small stress track that can be increased to re-roll a single die. However, it is a very limited resource and must be spent to do other very necessary things as well. Players must use this stress track wisely to do well, and will need to take "rest" actions to heal both life and stress- each being nearly equally precious.

What makes this mechanism even more delicious is when the resource required to re-roll of augment a die result is also worth points at the end of the game if unspent. That twist makes choosing to try again or alter a bad die roll more excruciating and provides space for far more strategy. Any "Favor of the Gods" tokens in Champions of Midgard are worth two points a piece at the end of the game if they haven't been used, so is it worth forfeiting those points to re-roll when in combat? Sometimes, yes, but not all of the time.

Castles of Burgundy has workers which can add or subtract one to the die result for every worker spent. They are also worth a point for each pair that you still have at the end of the game. There is always an internal struggle of guaranteed value or greater potential in the mind. That's not just good for overcoming luck, it's deep with strategy.

Your Rolls Are Buff

Other games provide different opportunities to change or augment the result by giving buffs. In titles like Dragonwood and Here to Slay, players can gain cards that improve stats that are added to the number shown on the dice. These passive gains continuously improve your results.

Longshot: The Dice Game allows players chances to simply ignore the rolled result. Don't want to use the five that was rolled? No problem. Make it a seven instead. Or a two. Or an eight. Whatever you want! This ability to change the die result is limited, but it can open up possibilities to generate points giving a roll-and-move game a bit of strategy to chew on. 

Dice Differently

There are still other titles that mitigate luck in board games in their own way such as Creature Caravan, Destinies, and Andromeda's Edge. Each of these games do something unique to take power away from fate and hand it to the players.

Creature Caravan gives players abilities on their main board and on cards played. These cards possess powers that are activated by placing a die on them. Some of these spots may require a three or higher, while others grant their ability with any die result. Typically, the better the ability, the more difficult or more exclusive it is to activate with some powers only able to be used with a six. 

Throughout the game, players will move their piece across a map. If a player ends the turn on a location with a fruit icon, that player is rewarded with a fruit token. These tokens are mighty powerful as they can be placed on a card of the player's choice to allow any number rolled to fire off the ability it possesses. Any result of the die allowing you to do exactly what you want is the best type of mitigation of luck. As Harvey Dent said in Dark Knight, "I make my own luck."

Destinies is a game where dice rolls occur frequently as skill checks in one of three areas: intelligence, dexterity, and power. When engaging in a skill check, a player will always use his/her two "main" dice. However, each player is also given a pool of three "effort" dice, which may be added to the dice rolled for a check. What keeps players from simply rolling all five dice each time is that only one of the "effort" dice get refreshed back to the available pool at the beginning of the next turn. Only getting one of these "effort" die back at the beginning of the next turn is a serious consequence for deciding to dedicate all of the "effort" dice for a single check. But the ability to roll extra dice is certainly a way to mitigate the luck of the roll. Or at least try to mitigate it, anyway.

Andromeda's Edge is the next evolution of the systems popularized in Dwellings of Eldervale by Luke Laurie. While many elements of this game are more Euro designs- worker placement, engine-building, resource management, etc., combat plays a role. The largest, baddest fleet is not guaranteed victory, however.

A common criticism of Dwellings of Eldervale is how the combat resolves. Different figures on the board give its player a certain amount of dice to roll. One player in the scrap may have five dice, and another only two. But it's not the total result that matters, but the individual. The player with the five dice may roll: 4, 3, 3, 2, 2 while the player with the two dice a 5, 3. Five is the highest roll, so that player wins the combat.

In Andromeda's Edge, however, the number of ships a player has in a disputed area plus any targeting bonuses gives that player a "targeting value." This value sets a minimum number that may be kept. For instance, if a player's targeting value was four, any result less than four will be re-rolled until each die reads four or more. The player who attacks with one die can still win, but it's much less likely. The targeting in Andromeda's Edge greatly limits the dice luck in combat.

Rolling to an End

Despite the great potential for disastrous results, I enjoy rolling dice in games. Something joyous occurs as they rattle in my hands and dance around before revealing their decision on your fate. I think it takes us back to a simpler time when obligations were few. Now that we are adults, the moments of triumph and exhilaration make us shout with elation when the dice show us mercy and help us succeed. Having some ability to increase our chances of success make it all the more grin-inducing. So, I'll happily continue playing games that require dice to accomplish a gaming task, be it for crafting the perfect poker hand, gaining desperately needed resources, traversing a fantasy land, winning a combat, and yes, even reaching the Conservatory.