I bought two chonks. One is great and the other not quite as good
Name: Magenta Glam and Venomous chonk d20s
Description: Two sharp Edge chonk d20s. One is green and one is magenta:
Magenta Glam: A sharp-edge chonk d20 with medium translucent resin with some (but not much) gold holofoil inside. The font is inked in a rose gold color. The font is the standard Viridian Gaming font that I can’t find the name of. It’s close to Texturina and Cloister Black in that both are Gothic fonts with a couple of similar elements. The 6 and 9 faces use underbars to indicate their orientation.
Venomous: A sharp-edge chonk d20 with translucent green resin and plenty of yellow/gold holofoil inside. It has the same font as the Magenta Glam d20 described above. The numbers are inked in gold which works surprisingly well with the green resin. The 6 and 9 faces use underbars to indicate their orientation.
Sizes:
Magenta Glam : (Face->Face) 34.01 mm (Point->Point) 42.07 mm
Venomous Green : (Face->Face) 34.01 mm (Point->Point) 42.20 mm
Where did they come from: Viridian Dice
How much did they cost: $10.50 each
Material / color:
Magenta Glam: Medium red translucent resin with a gold holofoil and rose-gold numbers.
Venomous Green: Green translucent resin with yellow holofoil and gold numbers
Quality: Very Good
Readability:
Magenta Glam: Poor
Venomous Green: Excellent
Value: Excellent
Overall Ratings:
Magenta Glam : 8/10
Venomous Green : 10/10
Attempts needed to roll a natural 20:
Magenta Glam: 10 rolls
Venomous Green: 43 rolls
One Hundred d20 rolls (Magenta Glam): 9, 15, 18, 7, 14, 3, 1, 13, 7, 10, 7, 5, 11, 11, 9, 3, 16, 20, 10, 18, 11, 19, 5, 19, 14, 7, 19, 5, 10, 7, 11, 3, 5, 3, 12, 8, 11, 19, 1, 9, 13, 10, 13, 6, 10, 2, 8, 11, 4, 13, 20, 20, 17, 19, 7, 11, 18, 16, 16, 5, 9, 6, 12, 4, 5, 10, 18, 10, 9, 3, 2, 17, 14, 12, 18, 17, 8, 6, 14, 15, 3, 8, 4, 1, 3, 12, 4, 18, 11, 7, 8, 12, 12, 19, 5, 20, 19, 7, 17, 17
Mean: 10.6
Median: 10
Mode: 7, 11
Chi-square: 14.00 **
Result: Balanced
One Hundred d20 rolls (Green Venomous): 11, 17, 14, 17, 16, 4, 6, 10, 9, 13, 8, 8, 11, 10, 7, 1, 16, 16, 14, 1, 3, 9, 13, 16, 9, 1, 17, 4, 5, 17, 15, 10, 16, 1, 19, 7, 8, 14, 17, 6, 18, 10, 9, 2, 10, 14, 12, 4, 15, 3, 12, 11, 10, 3, 12, 19, 17, 8, 7, 16, 9, 13, 11, 8, 13, 3, 3, 17, 20, 17, 4, 1, 13, 5, 20, 19, 15, 3, 5, 9, 17, 7, 12, 13, 1, 3, 16, 18, 18, 9, 12, 5, 9, 9, 19, 12, 19, 7, 10, 20
Mean: 10.72
Median: 10.5
Mode: 9, 17
Chi-square: 17.60 **
Result: Balanced
6d20 drop 1s and 2s stat block (Magenta Glam): 13, 19, 10, 7, 19, 11 (79 total) A Romantic Half-Orc Monk from Waterdeep who rejected a foreign price’s marriage proposal
6d20 drop 1s and 2s stat block (Venomous Green): 20, 4, 20, 15, 18, 4 (82 total) A Talented Halfling Barbarian from the Underdark who lost their best friend in an ambush.
For reference: the Standard Array method totals to: 72 and the Point Buy method totals to: 69.
A 20th level way of the open hand Monk with maxed DEX/WIS, and the following feats: Alert, Tough fighting against a 20th level Battlemaster fighter (unarmed fighting style) with the following feats: Alert, Grappler, Tavern Brawler, Tough. There are no weapons around
The fighter’s shit Dex gives the Monk the first move.
Monk: Unarmed Strike: 3 + 11 = 14 MISS!
Monk: Unarmed Strike: 2 + 11 = 13 MISS!
Monk: Bonus Action: Dodge
Fighter: Unarmed Strike: 13 + 11 = 24 HIT! 4 + 5 = 9 Damage (Grappling strike)
Fighter: 2 + 5 + 11 = 18, Monk: 4 + 11 = 15. The Monk is grappled
Fighter: Unarmed Strike: 8 + 11 = 19 MISS!
Fighter: Unarmed Strike: 14 + 11 = 25 HIT! 8 + 5 + 2 = 15 Damage
Fighter: Unarmed Strike: 2 + 11 = 13 MISS!
Fighter: Action Surge!
Fighter: Unarmed Strike: 20 + 11 = 15 CRIT! 6 * 2 + 5 = 17 Damage
Fighter: Unarmed Strike: 4 + 11 = 15 MISS!
Fighter: Unarmed Strike: 6 + 11 = 17 MISS!
Fighter: Unarmed Strike: 19 + 11 = 15 HIT! 6 + 5 = 11 damage
Monk (Grappled): Unarmed Strike: 7 + 11 = 18 HIT! 4 + 5 = 9 damage
Monk: Quivering Palm
Monk (Grappled): Unarmed Strike: 14 + 11 = 25 HIT! 2 + 5 = 7 damage
Monk: Flurry of blows:
Blow 1: 5 + 11 = 16 MISS!
Blow 2: 17 + 11 = 28 HIT! 6 + 5 = 11 damage
Stunning Strike (DC 19 CON save): 6 + 11 = 17 FAIL!
Fighter: Stunned: nothing
Monk: Ends Quivering Palm. (DC 19 CON save) 3 + 11 = 14 FAIL!
Fighter uses Indomitable to re-roll: 4 + 11 = 15 FAIL!
The Fighter is reduced to zero HP!
Some seriously bad rolls on saving throws by both opponents. Quivering palm reduced the fighter from 248HP down to zero. They changed the rules for 2024 that Quivering Palm now does 10d12 force damage on a failed save instead of dropping the opponent to zero HP. Respect the high-level Monks in 5E!
Random Tables rolls (6d20):
Magenta Glam: Memorable Goblins: – 53 Orgg’mal the Mountain Prince – An unusually large goblin king that became famous for discovering, posthumously, that rocks are heavy.
Venomous Green: Things a Blacksmith makes: – 78 A shovel
(I’m getting these random tables at: https://d100tables.com by the way
The images below are a comparison of the photo of the Magenta Glam die from Viridian’s website (left) and a photo I took of my Magenta Glam die (right). The settings I used for my photo:
– natural daytime light indoors next to a window on a sunny winter day,
– Recent model iPhone camera
– Exposure +0.7
– I used the “magic” adjust button in the photos app on the phone.
Not even close.
Final Thoughts: These were both impulse buys. Finding resin chonk d20s with sharp edges that don’t look like absolute garbage? Oh yeah, those and going to find their way into my cart when I’m buying other things anyway. Buying these in an actual game store would cost at least 50% more.
I’m impressed that both dice are nearly identical in size and both are 1mm larger than advertised. So often dice are marketed with inflated size numbers. I don’t know if that’s just companies being lazy and giving high estimates or if it’s their way of selling you less for more.
I’m going to get this out of the way… I’m not impressed with the Magenta Glam die. It’s neither Magenta nor glam. It’s got a little bit of flash from the holofoil and a fleck of gold leaf inside but not nearly as much as the photo on the Viridian website. Either the chonk digested most of it’s holofoil on the journey to my mailbox or (much more likely) I got a dud. I’m a little disappointed by that but it’s still a nice d20 for ten bucks. When you compare the two d20s, you see that the Venomous green die has much more holofoil inside of it and shines from every angle which is exactly what I’m looking for.
To continue dragging the Magenta Glam d20, whoever decided to use rose gold ink for the numbers chose poorly. There isn’t much contrast and the numbers are very hard to read in anything but the brightest lighting. Compare that to Venomous Green die with the bright gold ink which looks great in even mid to low lighting and gets better and better as the lighting improves.
Overall they’re both very nice dice with a stylish font that I’m warming up to. One of them isn’t gorgeous but the other is. They’re both very well made and have clean lines / edges and no physical flaws/dings/scratches/mold marks that I’ve found. I know that seems like a low bar but some companies still struggle to meet that standard (Post #098 “The Perfect Kiss”). I’ll keep buying nice chonks like this and still call it a win. For just ten bucks you could be rolling a gorgeous shiny jewel that winks back at you.
** Chi-square is a calculation used to test whether your data is as expected. The basic idea behind the test is to compare the observed values (the results of my 100 roll test) to the expected values. (what you would see if a d20 landed on each number with the exact same frequency) and compare the two to determine whether a die is balanced in this case.
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