Sharp edge resin dice from WoTC showing up in a bookstore was a surprise
Name: Tasha The Witch Queen Adventure Dice Set
Description: This is a set of sharp-edge resin dice that are slightly above average (think Chessex) size. They are pink with gold holofoil suspended inside. The numbers are inked in a yellowish-gold color. The font is again hard to track down and properly identify. It’s in the same ballpark as Romana light but with a few more serifs (foot of the 7, terminals of the 3, 6, and 9. The font is nice and very readable. The high face of all of the dice each have a different logo on them. They are all somewhat related to witches I guess. (A Cauldron, a Spellbook, etc…) The d10s have edged waists. The 6 and 9 faces use dots to indicate their orientation. The die came in a paper framed box with a big window cut out to show the dice which were trapped between two pieces of plastic film. There’s a hexagon with a nice illustration of Tasha on the front which swings open to reveal the dice.
Size:
d20: (Face->Face) 23.42mm (Point->Point) 28.92mm
Where did they come from: Barnes and Noble (of all places)
How much did they cost: $40
Material / color: Resin, purple with yellow/gold numbers
Quality: Quite good, especially for WoTC/Hasbro
Readability: Excellent. the numbers really stand out
Value: Fair to good. This is a reasonable price to pay for sharp edge resin dice with holofoil inclusions
Overall Rating: 8/10
Attempts needed to roll a natural 20: 9
Fifty d20 rolls: 8, 11, 2, 17, 16, 8, 2, 3, 14, 8, 9, 3, 17, 15, 16, 9, 2, 12, 3, 13, 10, 4, 3, 5, 1, 20, 16, 16, 4, 11, 17, 6, 6, 3, 16, 10, 16, 10, 15, 10, 4, 10, 14, 9, 7, 2, 10, 11, 4, 16
Mean: 9.48
Median: 10
Mode: 16
6d20 drop 1s and 2s stat block: 9, 13, 11, 13, 13, 12 (71 total) A Decisive human Wizard from a boarding school who is secretly fond of embroidery
For reference: the Standard Array method totals to: 72 and the Point Buy method totals to: 69.
A 28th level human wizard (Witch) named Tasha with maxed CHA/INT wearing a Robe of the Archmagi fighting against a CR 19 Balor:
Tasha makes 3 attacks per round. Balor acts first in initiative order:
Round #1
Balor attacks (longsword): 5 + 14 = 19 HIT! 34 damage
Tasha’s Arcane Rebuff unleashes 9 lightning damage on the Balor (who succeeded on the DC20 Dex save). Tasha teleports 60′ away.
Balor can’t reach Tasha for a second attack.
Tasha attacks (Caustic Blast): 9 + 14 = 23 HIT! 21 acid damage
Tasha attacks (Caustic Blast): 13 + 14 = 27 HIT! 21 acid damage
Tasha attacks (Psychic Whip): Balor fails the INT 20 save. 21 psychic damage and the Balor is stunned until the start of Tasha’s next turn.
Round #2
Balor is incapacitated and can’t attack
Tasha attacks (Caustic Blast): 13 + 14 = 27 HIT! 21 acid damage (adv)
Tasha attacks (Caustic Blast): 5 + 14 = 19 HIT! 21 acid damage (adv)
Tasha attacks (Psychic Whip): Balor fails the INT 20 save. 21 psychic damage and the Balor remains stunned until the start of Tasha’s next turn.
Round #3
Balor is still incapacitated and can’t attack
Tasha attacks (Caustic Blast): 13 + 14 = 27 HIT! 21 acid damage (adv)
Tasha attacks (Caustic Blast): 20 + 14 = 35 CRIT! 42 acid damage (adv)
Tasha attacks (Psychic Whip): Balor fails the INT 20 save again! 21 psychic damage and the Balor remains stunned until the start of Tasha’s next turn.
Round #4
Balor is still incapacitated and can’t attack
Tasha attacks (Caustic Blast): 19 + 14 = 33 HIT! 21 acid damage (adv)
Tasha attacks (Caustic Blast): 18 + 14 = 32 HIT! 21 acid damage (adv)
Tasha attacks (Psychic Whip): Balor succeeds against the INT 20 save and is no longer stunned but takes 10 damage
Round #5
Balor attacks (longsword): 1 + 14 = 15 MISS!
Balor attacks (whip): 5 + 14 = 19 HIT! 25 damage
Tasha’s Arcane Rebuff unleashes 19 lightning damage on the Balor (who fails on the DC20 Dex save) and falls dead.
Total: 290 damage from Tasha and the Balor is slain. Failing those INT saving throws 3 rounds in a row (The Balor’s rolls were even made with advantage!) and missing it’s attacks while stunned completely lost the battle for the demon. The dice were rolling like garbage for the Demon coincidentally. I didn’t see the point of casting Tasha’s Hideous Laughter as it’s a pretty weak spell.
Random Tables rolls:
Zombie Gods, Funny Encounters: 91 – The party meets a god of the undead who is more interested in playing pranks and jokes than wreaking havoc. He has an affinity for practical jokes, such as giving people fake zombie bites or dressing up like a zombie and scaring passersby.
Different Arrow Types: 18 – Arrow of Returning – After firing and striking something, the arrow will vanish in a puff of smoke and return to your quiver.
(I’m getting these random tables at: https://d100tables.com by the way
Final Thoughts: I had no idea that these dice existed. I was in a Barnes and Noble book store a few days ago and looked at their not so meager D&D section and looked past the Chessex and other dull plastic dice and saw this set of sharp-edge beauties hiding in amongst the undesirables. (no offense to Chessex, I’m a total dice snob at this point). Sharp edge… Holofoil inclusions… has a readable font that’s not dwarven/dragon/elven/Comic Sans/etc… What’s the catch? They have a design on each of the high faces but I’m willing to overlook that as it’s on every face. The packaging is terrific as well. I love the big illustration of Tasha on the fold out flap that shows what dice it contains on the reverse side. The entire center section of the front and back is a clear window so that you can see exactly what the dice look like. For $40, it was worth the gamble.
What I like about them: They’re very sharp and they’re a great size, noticeably bigger than the standard 18-19mm dice that WoTC sells. The purpleish/magenta color of the dice is lovely and when paired with the gold/yellow numbers and the gold holofoil inclusions, they’re very pretty. The packaging was very well done, lots of information and great artwork.
What I don’t like but don’t hate about them: The logos on the high face of each die…. They don’t mean much to me. I get the cauldron (she’s a witch), the stereotypical witches hat, and the book (spell book) but the rest I haven’t figured out yet. I’m glad that it’s not just the 20 face on the d20 that has the picture on it. Next: they used the prism d4 shape which I’m surprised to see. I didn’t think that WoTC knew that alternate dice shapes existed. I can’t imagine I’ll ever see a rhombic d12 from them though. The d12 is a bit undersized for the set. It would ideally be slightly bigger than the d6 and nearly as large as the d20. The tip of the d4 is very slightly chipped. I only noticed it because I took close-up photos of all of the dice and zoomed in on the photo. The dice roll very low for me so far. Finally, they’re a bit plonky rolling. They don’t roll smoothly, they kind of skip on the vertices or stop and slide on a side depending on how they land. Heavier dice have the inertia to roll end over end and lighter dice seem to spin faster. These are mostly small complaints though, I still like the dice plenty enough to use them / keep them.
I’m going to look online and see if I can find any other sets like these from WoTC. I’d love to get a Xanathar, Mordenkainen, Acerack, or Vecna set of themed dice if I can find them. If you’re reading this WoTC marketing people, please make this happen if it isn’t already in the works. Us nerds love this kind of thing. In any case, for $40, these dice are a good deal and I’m glad I got my hands on a set. Worth the money for sure.
Update: Tasha is the only set of NPC themed dice so far. Come on WoTC. Any of those 4 I mentioned in the paragraph above would be great to use for a themed set of sharp edge resin dice. They’d sell like hotcakes!
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