Dice Ships is a game in which you and your opponent take turns rolling a whole bunch of dice and shooting at one another. Each player starts with 8d8 to divide up between weapons, shields, and engines. You can upgrade a die by downgrading another one; for example, you could start with 2d10, 4d8, and 2d6 if you wanted. Assign all of the dice to the systems as you desire; you do not need all of the systems to have the same types for a system, so you could in the aforementioned scenario assign 1d10, 1d8, and 1d6 to weapons.
On your turn, choose to target either shields, weapons, or engines. Roll the dice assigned to weapons; the defending player can either choose to use shields or dodge. Dodging involves rolling engines, and if the defender rolls higher than the attacker, the dodge is successful and no damage is taken; the attacker also must roll one fewer die to defend the next turn. If unsuccessful, the dodging ship loses two dice from the targeted system. Shields allow you to roll shields against the roll of the weapon dice. If the defender rolls higher, no damage is taken; if the attacker rolls higher, one die is lost from the targeted system.
Whichever ship first runs out of dice is considered to lose; if all of the weapon dice are knocked out first, players may choose to convert a die from another system to a weapon instead of attacking. I have not playtested these rules at all and have no idea if they work. Let me know in this week’s What Are You Playing.
Bonus question: What’s your favorite English word and why?
​Andrew Ross (@dengarsw): The usual Pokemon Go/Let’s Go combo to help continue my exercise routine and ability to be the best like no one ever was. Or, at least good enough to not hold back most raids and smash casuals from my old PoGo group. Plus there’s the Easter Egg event going down and I love hatching eggs!
Favorite English word is tough, but I’m going to go with disseminate. I had a teacher in Japan studying for a test and he wanted to understand the meaning of the word, so looked up the etymology. You should too. Prepare to laugh. Gymnasium is another good one (especially if you know the German meaning). At any rate, the other teachers were quite confused why we were laughing so hard. Neither of us have forgotten what the word means. Yay learning!
Andy McAdams: I’m still all in on Final Fantasy XIV, and continuing to get distracted by… just about everything else in the game that’s not MSQ. Hoping to keep chipping away at that this weekend.
For my favorite English words, it’s a pretty close tie between “Daft” and “Kerfuffle.” I’m not British, but hell if I don’t love their vocab. I also use “bloody” as an adjective more than I probably should. I’m daft and probably going to get into a kerfuffle over my use of bloody. High five! Anyone? Anyone at all? …damn. I’ll show myself out.
Brianna Royce (@nbrianna, blog): Am I too exhausted to play video games at the moment? Kinda! I didn’t get in much Guild Wars 2 this week because of all the extra work, so obviously I need to get back in there. I need to tend my neglected food factories too (hey fellow Star Wars Galaxies Legends chefs, there’s a good Bespin Port resource up right now, go get it!).
Chris Neal (@wolfyseyes, blog): My very good friend hit level cap in The Elder Scrolls Online, so that’s new motivation to try and catch up to her so we can maybe do some high-end dungeons together. Patch 3.5 has hit the public server of Star Citizen so I’ll definitely be taking a peek at what’s new there (provided things actually are operable there), and I’ve been granted some very handy tips from Eliot for catching up to the item level climb in Final Fantasy XIV, so now it’s about time I act on that advice.
One of my favorite words in the English language is “effusive,” which is defined as the expression of gratitude or pleasure in “an unrestrained or heartfelt manner.” I am all about that feeling and so that word definitely is a top five pick.
Eliot Lefebvre (@Eliot_Lefebvre, blog): My expansion prep in FFXIV continues, and there’s also an event going down in Granblue Fantasy. My wife and I have also finished going through our console games, so I’ll likely spend some time on that as well.
Ever since I’ve learned the word, I’ve loved “apotheosis.” It’s such a fun word to say and to use in the proper context.
Justin Olivetti (@Sypster, blog): I probably should take advantage of that free FFXIV week sooner or later, so that’s sort of on my radar. Lord of the Rings Online’s Yule Festival is back, so I’ve been running that to pick up a few more cosmetics, and my Dungeons and Dragons Online group is trying to assemble for another fateful run as well.
Mia DeSanzo (@neschria): I might play some Riders of Icarus, in between family activities. This weekend and next weekend are going to be packed with things to do.
I like the word “fishery.” I am a big fan of fricatives.
Samon Kashani (@thesamkash): I’ll be doing my best to get more time into Albion Online. I have a lot of IRL activities to participate in this weekend so I’m not sure if I will get much time to play anything else.
Loaded is a great word. Many people tell me it’s a loaded word and I should be more careful when and where I say it, but I don’t care since I’m loaded.
Tyler Edwards: My usual D&D session is a given. We’re fighting an Oni right now. Otherwise not sure. The Division 2 is still a possibility, but I’m feeling a bit of shooter fatigue right now and craving a good fantasy RPG. I’ve thought about dipping into my Steam backlog and giving Demonicon a try.
Bonus question: My favorite word is verisimilitude. “The appearance of being true or real.” The idea that something seems real but isn’t. It’s a crucial principle of story-telling because everyone wants a story that feels real, but no one really wants an actually realistic story. If we wanted realism, we wouldn’t be reading fiction. Thus the challenge of any story-teller is to find that balance where people are lulled into the illusion of reality even when events are not realistic at all.
Every Saturday, join the Massively OP community and staff for What Are You Playing, our roundup of what MMORPGs and other games we’re hoping to play this weekend (with a bonus question or two for our amusement). Tell us what you’re up to! Go off-topic! And don’t forget to have fun!
