Talk:Dice/Archive 2

Polyhedral Dice Dating
The section on polyhedral dice opens with saying "Around the end of the 1960's"; implying that this is the origin of polyhedral dice. However, this is clearly contrasted by the image of the d20 from Ptolemaic Egypt earlier in the article. I don't know much on the topic so will refrain from editing, but there seems to be something astray. Xx78900 (talk) 09:01, 18 December 2019 (UTC)
 * That line does not imply anything about the origin of polyhedral dice, only about a the starting point of a modern tradition ("Around the end of the 1960s, non-cubical dice became popular among players of wargames"). "Became popular" ≠ "came into existence". The sentence is technically correct, but not really helpful. The following sentence ("The numerals 6 and 9, which are reciprocally symmetric through rotation, are typically distinguished with a dot or underline.") is about a design detail only relevant to dice with our Arabic numerals, and feels misplaced (or could just be deleted).
 * In Ptolemaic and Roman antiquity, both icosahedra (d20) and pentagonal dodecahedra (d12 with pentagonal faces) were known, but far less common than the cubical d6. Other shapes are even less common from these times and regions. The tetrahedra from the Royal Game of Ur are well-known today, but the four-sided and two-sided stick dice from Ur and Ancient Egypt are less well-known (although more common in their own time for all I know). Some ancient chinese dice are 18-sided (and 14-sided, I think?), and we know about 7-sided, 8-sided, and 14-sided dice from medieval Europe (again, insignificant compared to the widespread d6).
 * 10-sided dice only came up in the late 19th century IIRC.
 * The 1960s brought polyhedral sets into games. Again, the d10 was a late-comer (not a Platonic solid) and only became part of polyhedral sets in the 1980s.
 * There is no encompassing, in-depth study about the history of polyhedral dice. I'm still collecting bits and bits of information from diverse sources. There's no simple reference you could slap into the article to cover this stuff. --Jonas kork (talk) 13:34, 18 December 2019 (UTC)


 * While it doesn't say anything outright, I personally believe that the absence of a statement referring to a time before the 1960's does /imply/ that that was close to their origin, but I accept that you're more knowledgeable on the subject than I am and I defer to you.Xx78900 (talk) 00:43, 23 December 2019 (UTC)
 * If it's misleading, we should change it. Does it sound better now? --Jonas kork (talk) 09:35, 23 December 2019 (UTC)
 * I think you phrased it well. Polyhedral dice are certainly more popular now than in any time in history afaict, and that can be directly attributed to the rise of tabletop games, RPGs especially (and D&D in particular). oknazevad (talk) 17:18, 23 December 2019 (UTC)