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2000 Year Old Roman d20 Up For Auction
dolo666 writes "There is a d20 for sale at Christie's. Titled; "A ROMAN GLASS GAMING DIE", this item dates to circa 2nd Century A.D., and it's likely to go for a mere $6k USD! Just think of the die-hard dice gamer on your list, this festive season! That would make all those late night Cthulhu missions with Lord Nekrull, my 16th level Assassin demi-god, a smashing good time!"
Modern scholarship has not yet established the game for which these dice were used.
Actually these are called Slave Dies and were popularised by the Roman Emperor Publius Helvius Pertinax in the mid 2nd century AD. During periods when professional gladiatorial combat was lacking, 400 slaves would be seperated into 20 groups of 20 each. The diplomat (or the Emporer himself) running the game would roll a Slave Die 4 times. The first time selected a group, the second a slave within the group. The 3rd and 4th rolls repeated this selection.
The two slaves would then be outfitted with crude weapons and ordered to fight to the death. Because slaves had horrific medical care the survivor of the battles usually died from infection later on.
If, in the odd event, the die rolls selected the same person twice then that slave would immediately be freed and given a not insubstantial amount of gold as it was deemed that the gods had smiled on this person.
It was a horribly stressful thing; you wouldn't want to be rolled once, but if that were the case you'd be praying for a second roll to select you.
actually.. I made that all up, sure sounds good though, eh? PS: f1st pr0st
Trolling is a art,
"That would make all those late night Cthulhu missions with Lord Nekrull, my 16th level Assassin demi-god, a smashing good time!"
You, sir, are a nerd!
Care to play some time?
hey!
I think PvP says it best:
http://pvponline.com/index.php3
CRAPICUS!
Scott Kurtz did a little scetch on this in his latest comic
-- Sorry, I can't think of anything funny to say here.
I had no idea DND went back that far. It makes me wonder where Gygax got his claims to have invented it.
Good, inexpensive web hosting
A d20, huh? Very cool. I'm certain some older games (like MELE) could be adapted to use this. Masquerade would be fun with it too.
And the fun isn't just in the variable. Imagine watching it roll and roll and roll and roll...
Could take a while to get the thing stopped.
Anyway, for the avid gamer and historian alike, the price is right.
Damon,
http://actionPlant.com
Alea iacta est!
Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
gotta get one of these for a real classic feel @ my next role playing session. Get out the 20 year old scotch and the ancient di
is it lucky or unlucky?
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
And now we finally know why it took over 20 stabs to fell Ceaser; Brutus, like many frustrated gamers, suffered from the profound disability of often rolling low on his hit die...
So this was a die to die for?
Omnis amans amens
There is also a hilarious cgi version of this sketch, perhaps someone can post a link!
(DM) Utena- Galstat, you have entered the door to the north. You are now standing by yourself in a dark room. The pungent stench of mildew eminates from the wet dungeon walls.
Juri- Where are the Cheetos?
Utena- They're right next to you!
(Galstat) Anthy- I cast a spell!
Juri- Where's the Mountain Dew?
Utena- It's in the fridge, duh!
Anthy- I wanna cast a spell!
Juri- Can I have a Mountain Dew?
Utena- Yes, you can have a Mountain Dew, just go get it!
Anthy- I can cast any of these, on the list, right?
Utena- Yes, any of the first level ones.
Juri- I'm gonna get a soda, anybody want one? Hey, Grem I'm not in the room, right?
Utena- What room?
Anthy- I wanna cast magic missle!
Juri- The room where he's casting all these spells from!
Utena- he hasn't cast anything yet!
Anthy- I am, though, if you'd listen...I'm casting magic missle!
Utena- Why are you casting magic missle? There's nothing to attack here!
Anthy- I'm attacking the darkness!
(Laughter)
Utena- Fine, fine. You attack the darkness. There's an elf in front of you.
Anthy- Whoa!
Utena- Yeah, you guys can talk to eachother if you want.
Anthy- Hello, I am Galstat, sorcerer of light!
Elf (Nanami)- Then how come you had to cast magic missile?
(Laughter)
Utena- You guys are being attacked.
Juri- Do I see that happening?
Utena- No, you're outside, by the tavern.
Juri- Cool! I get drunk!
Utena- There are seven ogres surrounding you.
Elf (Nanami)- How could they surround us? I had Morton Kiden's magical watchdog cast!
Juri- I'm getting drunk! Are there any girls there?
Utena- No, you didn't.
Elf (Nanami)- I totally did! You asked me if I wanted any equipment before this adventure and I said no, but I need material components for all my spells, so I cast Morton Kiden's faithful watchdog.
Utena- But you never actually cast it!
Juri- Roll the dice to see if I'm getting drunk!
Utena- (dice rolling) Yeah, you are!
Juri- Are there any girls there?
Utena- Yeah!
Elf (Nanami)- I did, though, I completely said when you asked me...
Utena- No, you didn't! You didn't actually say that you were casting the spell, so now there's ogres, okay?
Juri- Ogres?! Man, I got an ogre-slaying knife that's got a +9 against ogres!
Utena- You're not there, you're getting drunk!
Juri- Okay, but if there's any girls there, I want to DO them!
Going... going... gone!
I guess Ancient Roman civilization really WAS advanced... Wonder if they had Mountain Dew and Doritos, too...
...thinking that d20 was referring to a 20-Denarii coin. D'oh
Tubal-Cain smokes the white owl.
I'm so sorry Publius, but you only rolled a XVI and you needed XVII to hit an Orc with Armor Class IX with your +I short short sword.
Maybe because you are, as we say in Latin, a "dorkus malorkus."
I bet the Romans played by the old rules! And they remembered what the letters TSR stood for!
Ph-nglui mglw'nafh Gates M'dna wgah'nagl fhtagn.
Yeah, well, now that slashdot readers know about it, there's no way anyone's going to be able to get a bargain on that die too...
Rats, and I was really hoping to surprise a friend with that too. Nothing says "I'm a geek" more than a nearly two-millenia old d20.
So what makes them think this was for gaming? Given the religious significance of regular polyhedra in the classical era -- including but not limited to the Pythagoreans -- it's much more likely that this was either a divination tool or a model representing someone's cosmological theory.
Proud member of the Weirdo-American community.
Holy crap! 2,000+ years old? My white plastic d20 from the D&D boxed set turned into a flaky sphere after about six months.
"Hardly used" will not fetch you a better price for your brain.
Whoa. Back when we were playing D&D (20 some years ago), the cool thing was to come up with the coolest looking dice. Some of us made them out of epoxies, some of us bought cool looking clear dice from the local gaming shop and my friend Gary comes up with this six sided die that he claimed was from ancient Rome that he got from his dad. We laughed our asses off, thinking (as 13 year olds are prone to do) that multi sided die were a modern invention but........ Gary, I hope you still have it.
Visit Jonesblog and say hello.
I just don't get it. The article is about an ancient game of some sort, but nobody really knows what, and you think that this will somehow highten the excitement of some seemingly unrelated game of which your mastery is directly proportional to your sex appeal.
"She's a West Texas girl, just like me" - G.W Bush Iraqis
I knew, as soon as I saw the d20 version of CoC, that this kind of crap would happen. Oh well, I can still play it the way I want.
I'm getting it. I need a lucky die to roll my THAC0.
Yes. I'm a 2nd editioner, so what!
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
Wow, I guess the geeks really did inherit the earth.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
Yes, thats it! I would mod you up if i hadn't posted already :)
This is the Link
From excellent karma to terible karma with a single +5 funny post...
Hmmm... I have a two thousand year old d20 that I want to liquidate. The auction folks think it'll fetch about $6000. How can I get more than that?
What if I can manage to get it mentioned on a news site for nerds where thousands of gamers will read about it? Wow! Slashdot ahoy!
Shades of Grayden
Just for the halibut...
(Not my Experience, I found it Out There(tm))
The Gazebo
This is a story of a DM (Ed) and a paladin (Eric) during a game of AD&D.
ED: You see a well-groomed garden. In the middle, on a small hill, you see a gazebo.
ERIC: A gazebo? What color is it?
ED: (Pause) It's white, Eric.
ERIC: How far away is it?
ED: About 50 yards.
ERIC: How big is it?
ED: (Pause) It's about 30 feet across, 15 feet high, with a pointed top.
ERIC: I use my sword to detect whether it's good.
ED: It's not good, Eric. It's a gazebo!
ERIC: (Pause) I call out to it.
ED: It won't answer. It's a gazebo!
ERIC: (Pause) I sheathe my sword and draw my bow and arrows. Does it respond in any way?
ED: No, Eric. It's a gazebo!
ERIC: I shoot it with my bow (rolls to hit). What happened?
ED: There is now a gazebo with an arrow sticking out of it.
ERIC: (Pause) Wasn't it wounded?
ED: Of course not, Eric! It's a gazebo!
ERIC: (Whimper) But that was a plus-three arrow!
ED: It's a gazebo, Eric, a gazebo! If you really want to try to destroy it, you could try to chop it wih an axe, I suppose, or you could try to burn it, but I don't know why anybody would even try. It's a @#%$*& gazebo!
ERIC: (Long pause - he has no axe or fire spells) I run away.
ED: (Thoroughly frustrated) It's too late. You've awakened the gazebo, and it catches you and eats you.
ERIC: (Reaching for his dice) Maybe I'll roll up a fire-using mage so I can avenge my paladin...
At this point, the increasingly amused fellow party members restored a modicum of order by explaining what a gazebo is. This is solely an afterthought, of course, but Eric is doubly lucky that the gazebo was not situated on a grassy knoll.
note that the pedigree of this item is a single
statement that the thing was bought by the sellers
father in Egypt in the 1920's.
That is the kind of pedigree that would bid this
item up to about $20 as a curio.
The seller is smoking crack, as is anyone who bids
more than a few bucks on that thing.
"That would make all those late night Cthulhu missions with Lord Nekrull, my 16th level Assassin demi-god, a smashing good time!"
I feel sorry for the poor kid who'll never be concieved.
"Derp de derp."
Thanks to your informative linking, now I have both a new bookmark and a new sig.
Get off my launchpad!
Come on. Be creative. Post something original.
I, THE mare troll, DEMAND: Mare trolls must be AT LEAST medium quality.
Stay to the topic, keep the posts short, juicy and funny. This thing is just mildly annoying. Give them a decent chance of getting "+1 Funny". Allow m2'ers to honestly mod "offtopic" as unfair. Be creative - show people that sight of a mare pussy is actually inspiring, something that gives you wit, humour and intelligence, not rots your mind, encouraging to thoughtless pasting of some dumb FAQs. People who want those FAQs can STFM. The others will just get pissed off and that's not the point.
Trolling is like hacking the mind. Making people pissed off at zoophiles has hack value of 0. Making people actually show some interest and become zoo-friendly has quite a decent hack value!
Modern scholarship has not yet established the game for which these dice were used. Obviously they were used for Ulterius Carcerae et Draconae
...Historians were amazed to see the words 'patent pending 44BC' in small print on the die.
Stories posted on Slashdot fall into one of 5 categories:
1. Affiliate Whoring
2. Buddy of an Editor gets plugged on the frontpage
3. Editors discover Tom's Hardware
4. Dupes
5. Affiliate Whoring
Makes you wonder what'll go under the hammer next...
- a clue-by-four
- a LART
- a grue
What would otherIn fact, I just had an idea. Head over to this entry in my journal and let's get some ideas of geek relics and the bids they might attract...
"It is dark. You are likely to be eaten by a grue." -- Zork
I have a dutch auction for "Clue You Need to Get a Life". There are 10 items in this auction with a starting bid of $0.10. The winner(s) of this auction will receive a clue that they need to get a life*, and save a bundle of money over getting the same goods from the 2000 year old d20 auction. As a special bonus, shipping and handling is free!
* New life not included.
paintball
I bet the Romans played by the old rules! And they remembered what the letters TSR stood for!
TSR? Terminate and Stay Resident? Yep, I think the Romans knew a lot about that.
That mod certainly never played any RPG!
No matter how finely crafted, a die that throws poor rolls is worthless, while a die that knows when to roll 1 and when 20 is a real treasure! Every player knows that!
(when I buy dice, I ask the shopkeeper for whole box, toss them, pick out best rolls, toss the best rolls, pick out the best from amongst them, toss again, buy the best results. If a D10 rolled 10 three times in a row, there's a good chance it will continue to do so during the session!
Even the Ancient Roman's had bad taste in gaming mechanics. ... (duck) ...
Let the debates begin. Muahahahaha!
best web host ever
Rest In Peace, MTV's Downtown. We hardly knew ye. The 5th episode took place at a Sci-Fi/Horror/Gaming con, and got everything right. A classic. Shouts out to my homie Chris Prynoski..
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
The original audio of this is from the group The Dead Alewives, from my hometown. Look for it on p2p and try to find part 2, one of them brings their girlfriend along.
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
TSR = Tactical Studies Rules, you geeks.
;-)
TSR was the company, I believe, that started in about 1974 with the publication of "Dungeons & Dragons - Rules for Fantastic Medieval Wargames Campaigns Playable with Paper and Pencil and Minature figures"
I know, cuz' I read it on the front of the box, that I still have.
hat would make all those late night Cthulhu missions with Lord Nekrull, my 16th level Assassin demi-god, a smashing good time!"
:-)
Jeez. CoC doesn't even have levels. And you call yourself a geek
I think posting this on /. is the dumbest move ever for someone hoping to buy the die. Putting this auction in front of possibly the largest assembly of D&D players in the universe is not going to help keep that price down! I predict it will sell to some sorry/savvy geek for 10g's at least.
If Dolomite really wants to do something good for gaming, why is he creating a mod called Doom for Columbine? Oh, he backpedals and says the game isn't about shooting kids, but I'm sure those innocent kids who died that day think it's funny. And if he thinks it's all a media scam, well that's great. He's still an insensitive fuck.
$6k and you don't even get the crayons to fill in the etchings!? What a jip! :)
For those not often used to bidding at major auction houses - the estimates are always very conservative. An auction is judged to be succesful if many items beat their estimates.
Beat that!
The empire fell because the Romans became D&D addicts.
I didn't think it was possible for a web comic to be just as unfunny as penny arcade!
You made a grammatical error with one of the words, "Brutus" is a second declension noun but -as is a first declenstion ending. Furthermore as Brutus is being addressed directly, the vocative singular ahould be used as opposed to the accusative plural. The form you were reaching for was "Brute" (with a macron over the e)
Roman gamer dude 2: Woah! Dude! You rolled an alpha!
Roman gamer dude 1: Shit.
Repeat the following ad nauseam: Dice is the singular of the noun dices.
Come on, this is what differs and elevate us pen and paper types from and above them, those computer gamers (scoffs)
So in the paraphrased words of Penny Arcade, "Maybe I can roll it to see if you're retarded."
Karma: It's all a bunch of tree-huggin' hippy crap!
One of the AD&D 1st Edition books.
They show a picture of a wizard, barbarian, etc. sitting around with parchment and dice, and the wizard is telling a newcomer something like "We're playing a game where we pretend to be students and workers in a post-industrial society."
That and the picture of the plate-mail clad fighter jumping into the wizard's arms when he sees the rust monster make the 1st Ed. books keepers.
... they found "made in China" in fine print...
:-)
On a side note, I hope it comes with a translation manual. I can imagine the late nights spent arguing over whether that die roll was a 20 or a 1 on the saving throw... heh
--- root@127.0.0.1
Matthew 27:35
Mark 15:24
Luke 23:34
John 19:24
I've heard some people claim that when the Roman soldiers "cast lots" as mentioned here, they actually played a dice game to see who would get Jesus' clothing. It doesn't seem to mention dice though. *Shrugs*
"You spoony bard!" -Tellah
... That sounds really cool!
I hope the propane bombs are fully functional in the mod, tho...
Can you go outside and shoot at the cops, too?
That would make all those late night Cthulhu missions with Lord Nekrull, my 16th level Assassin demi-god, a smashing good time!"
Meanwhile, I'll still be enjoying nights with your wife.
I think someone was trying for "Funny" and missed.
As thousands of gamers find out they can't mortgage thier parents basments to grab this gameing jewel.
If some gamer buys this, please work with some dice company to make replicas available. Thanks.
This sig is not the Zahir. Lucky for you.
in the form of a winged polyphallus.
Holy Shit you might be right!
---Realises grave error posted by some dumbass, drops his computer in the trash and goes out to hit on chicks!
Wait, are you demanding homosexuality from us? Damn, I knew you linux users were weird, but I had no Idea you were so demanding!
Cause everyone knows trolling slashdot is better than playing D&D with real people.
It's from a classic FRP-based comic strip:
The Knights of the Dinner Table:
http://www.hoodyhoo.com/kodt.htm
...what saving throw do you need against the mighty joint?
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
"Jesus Saves! Takes half damage."
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
The thing is that Roman stuff is not worth a lot... here in Britain they left SO MUCH stuff all over the place that people regularly find pottery in the garden and it's really not worth a whole hell of a lot in spite of its age.
Jesus Saves!
And takes 1/2 damage...
>And they remembered what the letters TSR stood for!
>TSR = Tactical Studies Rules, you geeks.
wasnt it TSR = The Strategic Review ?
One level 3 Stormbolt would kill him instantly.
meh
My Latin teacher (mumble mumble years ago) told me this:
In English, the sentence "The die is cast." Can be read two ways
1)The die (cube) has been thrown.
2)The die (form) has been filled and set.
But both readings mean the same thing - something that has already been done cannot be changed.
The Latin versions of the above sentences have the same correspondence. And again both readings mean the same.
Don't remember the exact Latin - it was a looong time ago.
My other Slashdot ID is much lower.
I guess that shirt that says "Jesus Saves, the rest of you take damage" wasn't so far off...
No, the gazebo story is allegedly real and anyway does predate KoDT. Given that KoDT acknowledged that the story came from somewhere else, it seems a little odd to ascribe it to them.
This is why L.A.R.P and time travel should not mix.
Proconsul: "Oh $@#$@!! Not my Level 28 Thracian!"
Emperor: "Hold on... he's not dead yet. Roll it."
Proconsul: *Rolls D20*
Proconsul: "%#@@#&!!!"
Emperor: "A 10.. "
Emperor: *Peeks behind screen*
Emperor: "I'm very sorry, but Maximus has failed his saving throw..."
Emperor: *Makes thumbs-down gesture to crowd*
---Crowd boos
---Gurgle of dying gladiator from arena floor
Proconsul: (Muttering to self) "By Jupiter I swear that he will live to regret this day! There are many in the Senate who would welcome the elevation of a new Dungeon Master..."
That would make all those late night Cthulhu missions with Lord Nekrull, my 16th level Assassin demi-god, a smashing good time!"
Did you say assassin?
THOU HAST LOST AN EIGHTH!
It's virtually certain that Caesar was referring to the rolling of a die, if he indeed actually said this at all ("the die is cast"). Caesar makes no reference to the occasion in his own autobiographical account, De Bello Civilis. Some later scholars have suggested that Caesar may actually have said "alea iacta esto"; "let the die have been cast". The difference in meaning is that between "I have made a momentous decision" and "may this have been an important event".
All employees must wash hands before seeking equitable relief.
For some reason, you felt the overwhelming urge to explain the oldest joke in the book. Way to go. I suggest you go find yourself a hero cookie now.
I'd still roll a 1 and somehow fumble a shot into the throat of the princess we are supposed to be saving, thus fucking up the entire adventure.
How the hell is one supposed to roll a glass die without it exploding into glass shards?
It's gone from the mere US$6 to "4,000 - 6,000 U.S. dollars" in the space of a few days.
Your use of the word "slave" is offensive to the patriotic americans and especially to Californians. Please start referencing to them as freedome challenged.
You can't handle the truth.
I C-x C-c
Wow, DMs are getting soft, it seems..... ; )
-shpoffo
If they could certify [OK lie!] that Cthulhu himself once surfaced to roll this particular die. He had to come up for a stretch sometime in the last few milleniums!
I got a natural H on my attack roll! Score!