Everybody's Lying about (DICE GHOSTS)

Dice ghost 101 for dungeons and dragons and all TTRPGs
Paid sponsor: www.kickstarter.com/projects/...
Polterdice
Music -
The Seal Of the Guardians by Shahead Mostafarfar
The Ghost by Martin Muehringer
Discokey by Disiac

[@williampedigo3489]

This is a fantastically animated way of telling us that you've been having garbage rolls lately.

[@shilohmagic7173]

Just twenty nine more likes and we’ll be good!

[@sparkusclark6176]

Hahaha ha 😆

[@doyler3220]

POLTERDICE

[@leonardoacosta4577]

Reject exorcism, embrace becomemin warlock of the dice ghost

[@dovahchicken935]

Fact, im on a gotcha game and I'm doing horrible in luck as usual

[@nathanfriedman7367]

Larry's a nonbeliever, so it makes sense that the "polterdice" would attach itself to him. It doesn't want to be noticed. That's why it takes the form of a raccoon when the curse is passed on to Zee, as he is a professional dice hunter and would realize the problem immediately.

[@tictactin504]

Love the acknowledgement throughout the animation that the ghost is fake and what he sees is a bunch of racoons. Zee couldve chosen to be 100% serious but he added in a bunch of hints you just dont notice on your first watch. I Love It!!!

[@ratoh1710]

That's just what it wants you to think!

[@MDMDMDMDMDMDMDMDMD]

At 2:40 that is clearly not a raccoon outside

[@ratoh1710]

@@MDMDMDMDMDMDMDMDMD If you seek frame by frame (default comma and period) you can see exactly one frame showing it to be a couple of raccons holding on to a branch and each other.

[@MDMDMDMDMDMDMDMDMD]

@@ratoh1710 thanks, I'm on mobile, but I'll have to try that later

[@alextelzrow7136]

"Sage at every corner" was probably the best joke of the video

[@novaraptorus6250]

I don’t get it

[@blakesuggs930]

Pieces of paper with Sage Advice written on them. Sage Advice is the collection of rule clarifications that come from the rule designers of 5e D&D.

[@karlkestel1778]

The way to beat cursed dice is the path to enlightenment. By eliminating your attachment to dice outcomes, the cursed spirits cannot deliver an undesired outcome. But it takes a life of continual practice, for a DM will tempt you with treasure, power, desired outcomes. Your fellow players will tempt you with love, hate, friendship, attachments to characters .By recognizing the cycle of reincarnation, in rerolling characters, you can let go of your attachment to your character's life, your friends' characters, your desired rolls. And in that emptiness, without an ego driving it, the dice are simply random.

[@LocalMaple]

Agreed. Most Ghost Dice are combat minmaxers who want to ruin your game. Have fun with it anyway, and they’ll see their efforts as futile. Either that, or the ghost is an actor who has attached itself to you or your dice. Appease it through great roleplay, freeing it for an afterlife of being DM’d by Tolkien-esque writers with Mercer-level acting and sound effects.

[@rainerernst7410]

this was wonderful. thank you

[@slevinkelevra_2347]

This is the closest path to Discover the high rolls... Im sorry, cannot tell that tale.

[@asbestosfish_]

I’m surprised that Zee doesn’t draw himself wearing a tinfoil hat at this point

[@moodyfingers7301]

Tinfoil Wizard Hat!

[@orcwarchiefreviews]

What are you guys talking about curse dice are real really I've seen it got to be rolling perfect all game just as the dragon opens up its gaping maw oh failure save eaten

[@johnnycashrules157]

“I dunno it’s either a demon of mathematics, or.. or a ghost of a shitty DM” I love that line

[@nicholascampbell1752]

For those that didn't pick up on it gary gygax was either from or lived in lake Geneva and that's why he used a bottle with that written on it like holy water

[@Zedrinbot]

Do you have the steps for performing an exorcism? I have one friend who, in multiple games (PF and 5e both), on any digital platform, rolls one time above 10 each session (twice if the dice gods favor him that day), and the rest are 5 or lower. Not even an exaggeration. In a 5e game, he had advantage for 3 turns in a row and got nothing but 3's, 5's, and 2's. To deal with it, he's just makes chars that don't need to roll high to hit (easier to do in PF, e.g., target touch AC, rely on retaliation damage when he gets hit, or get crazy bonuses to checks where even a 3 is a success) just cause otherwise he'll never beat the DCs.

[@notoriousgoblin83]

He must find 3 dice that have rolled nothing but 20s, crush them, and drink mixed with salt water

[@NoobFish23]

the 'Lake Geneva' was a wonderful addition. As a Wisconsinite, I'm more than a little proud that DnD was first created in my state.

[@runedragon1985]

Wil Wheaton: "...And then, this crazy dude throws this D20 at me, and I've never been able to get rid of it."

[@frederickburton3440]

Playing 2:40 at x0.25 speed and realizing the "demon" is just several racoons climbing over each other, and that Larry saw it as a demon because he expected to see a demon (just like how they expected the die to roll low) was just...*chefs *kiss*.

[@equidistanthoneyjoy7600]

Dude, that animation when he was driving away, the constant perspective change while keeping everything consistent, was amazing. This must have taken so long to do.

[@christianfoster6537]

Ive noticed why Larry is rolling poorly. He has 5 fingers therefore the extra spin from the extra finger puts the trajectory wrong. Whereas Zee has 4 longer fingers allowing for a more balanced and controlled roll

[@MonarchsFactory]

Okay, but I'm gonna need the instructions for this ritual in writing

[@thewerebear1]

I used to keep a recreation of the cursed pirate coins from pirates of the caribbean in my dice bag as a flipping coin Every time I had unusually bad luck my entire group would shout "put the damn gold back"

[@ZrSiO4-ZrSiO4-ZrSiO4-ZrSiO4]

Everyone loves a running joke

[@christophermacdonald7012]

I am so proud of Zee for using such masterful technique, cinematography, time and effort devoted entirely to taking the piss. I feel like he truly deserves to be a household name in D&D at this point.

[@tazedlobster9246]

I love how the first episode at least makes sense. Like, yeah I can understand dice having weird weights and luck, but at this point the shit became paranormal.

[@Arcticgreen]

Saltwater's the giveaway. It shows the dice floating... With low numbers on top. This indicates a lopsided weight, favoring the low numbers on top whenever it/they are rolled.

[@PalPlays]

On a serious note: People tend to treat statistical improbability the same as impossibility. The way I see it, it is statistically possible that there is someone out there that crit fails on every important roll they make. While the odds are against that player being in my group, they *they have to be in someone's group.* I'll leave you with this: My players consider me blessed. They say that I have the power to bestow a curse upon another player, hexing them to roll low. This belief was reaffirmed when two of us made an Intelligence saving throw against a group of mindflayers, pooling their intellect to break us in one wave of malicious intent. Our dice bounced off each other. I rolled a 20, he rolled a 1...

[@deluxeloy]

I won't lie, our local RNG - both the bot we coded ourselves and the website we run sessions on - seems to have a sense for drama. It's not that the Rogue in particular rolls low... It's just that whenever we roll, the result favours... interesting outcomes.

[@pafnutiytheartist]

That's not dice. That's a sign of a good GM.

[@kybett]

@@pafnutiytheartist I came here to post this reply. I tip my hat to you for beating me to it.

[@JimankyGaming]

Once had a player in my campaign that NEVER rolled above a 10. Could never figure out why - so I decided to take matters into my own hands one day. The Goddess of Chaos came to his character in his dreams and explained that he had been cursed by her sister, the Goddess of Trickery, to have unending bad luck. To tip the scales in his favor, she offered him an Epic Boon - a thrice per long rest ability. For a minute, whatever rolls he made on his dice would be reversed. For example, a 1 would be a 20, and a 9 would be a 12. Once he started using that ability, we started to see some serious changes to his character. The poor player couldn’t catch a break, so I’m glad I could do something that saved D&D in his eyes for him

[@adamloga3788]

I like that, a neat in-universe way to fix an out-of-character problem. Well done.

[@beverleybee1309]

Did anyone check to see if he was rolling a true d20 and not a double d10? Many a player has gone down in flames from buying weird dice that had half the numbers repeated twice on their dice.

[@JimankyGaming]

@@beverleybee1309 that was one of my first thoughts, and no it wasn’t his dice. He was gifted many new dice over the months, and no matter what die he picked up he could never roll high. It is the STRANGEST thing I have ever seen.

[@beverleybee1309]

@@JimankyGaming wow. Well then, you did right for your player. Sometimes the Goddesses of chance just like us too much.🙃 And like to play.

[@beverleybee1309]

@@JimankyGaming I'm planning to give a player a "good luck" token, handed down for generations. If he rolls really low, I plan on having "weird" things happen. Wish us luck.😆

[@josephd.5524]

Math demons are no fukken joke. Pythagoras' cult literally murdered someone for suggesting non-linear math.

[@roboticrebel4092]

In our group our DM gave a magical ring that casts a powerful spell that recharges whenever you roll a nat1 to an unlucky player. She has now become death incarnate.

[@DaemosDaen]

Him: “ghost of a shitty DM” Me: “I’m not dead yet god damn it.

[@AspenBrightsoul]

"There's fucking heaps of math demons." I mean math demons are actually a really cool idea for a monster. I mean think about it, demons are chaotic so gaining an understanding of math would let them peak into our understanding of the universe without the clouding we have. They could cast spells like polymorph and edit reality on small levels.

[@euansmith3699]

The trouble with Maths Demons is that they keep multiplying!

[@XenoKnightAlpha]

Wow, it took me over a year and several rewatchings to realize that the creature with horns at the end was actually just an animal or raccoon or something clinging to a branch, upside-down.

[@harmonlanager2670]

Yeah! You see it’s tail around 3:30!

[@venomo2868]

Its a pile of raccoons on a trashcan

[@hunterangle5957]

3:09 "There's fuckin heaps of math demons"

[@BeginswithPIE]

Hey don't joke. When the ancient Egyptians discovered the existence of irrational numbers, they had to sacrifice many goats as an apology to the Number Gods. (No seriously. They did.) Praying to RNG has been around for longer than you think.

[@yourdemiseishere]

I literally expected him to get mad at the ghost and go 'so your entire existence is to make me get bad rolls on the game, that's stupid.'

[@jf_kein_k8590]

A D20-shaped censer, a must-have for all DnD playing priests..

[@DrewBrunning]

The water from Lake Geneva made me laugh pretty hard as a Wisconsinite

[@thomasace2547]

“I don’t roll low, I roll wrong!” - Will Wheaton

[@jay2thedub]

I have a sailor character who has a +4 to nature but whenever he roles to identify a land based creature he never gets above a 9. It's absolutely hysterical

[@Giganfan2k1]

*sees wolf* "Oh yes this one is the called *the land tuna*, as it hunts in packs."

[@urktheturtle2988]

The way Larry says "IT IS" when talking about Confirmation Bias, is pure desperation XD he needs to believe he isnt cursed XD

[@lostbutfreesoul]

How manage stages are there... seven?

[@FlashandZach]

You know looking back at this now, stuff like this is probably why they started playing tabletop games without him.

[@spock023]

There is a creature that exists that is far worse than a polterdice. These shadowy creatures of the darkness never seem to roll poorly but everyone around them always does. Frequently seen but rarely identified these luck vampires steal just a bit of the essence of everyone they encounter. The truely scary part is most luck vampires aren’t even aware that they are one. Jusy skating through life never quire knowing why its so easy for them. How do I know so much about them? I am one, and next time you roll a one you can thank me, i’ll be thanking you for my next 20.

[@Definitely_not_ai]

Oh. My brother.

[@asepsisaficionado7376]

Sounds like a certain investigator from the All Guardsmen Party

[@JD-qq8fz]

Whooaa what the fuck! So makin dnd videos for the past few years has apparently made Zee a full on animator/writer/cinematographer! Your units of quality per time spent is DEFINITELY increasing. Very cool to see, great job dude!

[@kybett]

Had a player who frequently rolled low to an extent of ridiculous consequences. On one occasion, when it really mattered, they had 3 opportunities to attempt something. Three ones. Player was like "oof. That sucks." Another player goes "Damn. What even are the odds of that?" Me: "1 in 8,000." Silence around the table was broken by another player going "Yeah. You're cursed."

[@someotherworldlybeing3167]

Technically, you take the number needed to succeed and you times that. So if a 9 or lower succeeded, you’d do 9/20 ^ 3. So like 729/8000, still low though

[@kybett]

@@someotherworldlybeing3167 Oh, I'm talking the odds of getting 3 consecutive ones, not just the odds of failure. I think the odds of failure were around 1 in 125 (they didn't need to roll high).

[@bankasai3120]

Being able to see Larry's eyes is a cursed image

[@tabletopgamingwithwolfphototec]

The true test is go play a roll under system like Call of Cthulhu . If one starts to roll over all the time. You are truly haunted by a dark force.

[@alexhodson6342]

It's like watching a long running prank. The dice training was a set up for this Polterdice scare.

[@estebanramirez1178]

I have never clicked on a KZbin Notification so fast. I apparently have the Alert feat.

[@timleftwich]

Literally same. I’m a simple man. I see a Zee video, I click the link. Just that easy. 😂

[@PowerfulSniff]

Very clever haha

[@mrguppys761]

If a game shop has hundreds of dice and the shop keeper recommends a specific one, do not buy it.

[@sosbro]

In one d&d campaign, I ALWAYS got low rolls(4s,5s,6s) in combat. Yet, these same dice would ALWAYS give me 20s whenever I rolled bluffs/persuasions/knowledge-checks during diaologue interactions. Golgar wanted to be a bandit barbarian😤, but the dice decreed his fate was to be the tribe's buffed lawyer😑.

[@kgoodies008]

My party's Monk has a cursed die-rolling hand for sure. But he's a great role-player so he makes it work.

[@evertenplaza3673]

is it me? I rolled 3d8 and landed all ones the other day, then the boss rolled 2d20 and got 20s on both rolls and megacrit me.

[@sebastiang8634]

I love how the holy water is water from Lake Geneva. Now that I live in Wisconsin, one of these days I'm going to make the pilgrimage to that most holy place.

[@pedrostormrage]

3:24 "Sage at every corner of the hex" **printed out Sage Advice columns** That cracked me up 😂

[@joeshmuck9683]

Nice touch on the water! Lake Geneva, WI is Gary Gygax’s hometown. Committed players sometimes make pilgrimages to the town to lay their dice at his memorial and receive his blessing. (Or at least I have.)

[@void-creature]

The "polterdie" (aka raccoon) walking undisturbed through the background repeatedly during the exorcism had me breathless from laughter

[@TheLynnz10]

“There is fucking heaps of math demons!”

[@videogollumer]

I just now noticed that Larry rolled 3 sixes at 2:31

[@Smitty-hr2mg]

"Larry..." "Larry... make a driving check... Larry..."

[@ExhaustedElox]

This is why my builds rely on saving throws by the DM rather than rolling myself.

[@WildBluntHickok]

Bad dice come from that one digit that the SCP Foundation had to make everyone forget. If your dice rolls weird it includes that number, if it rolls as expected it was made post-revision and has the number of sides you are expecting. This is also why dice sometimes "roll off the table" or "land at a funny angle so no side was facing up". That's just how your mind explains it away when you roll the redacted number.

[@OneLostTexan]

Wait the SCP Foundation redacted a number? I need to know more.

[@vitorizo]

@@OneLostTexan [redacted]

[@xxcoolkid69xx67]

I am a DM and can 100% confirm dice ghosts. One of my players is so comedically unlucky. Essentially the first round of combat he will always have something do a crazy amount of damage to him.

[@surgeseraphim7741]

I saw him leave and my immediate thought was "Oh you poor fool, don't you know what happens after 3 failed death saves?"

[@CHUCKLZLORD]

"Going to Vegas, baby!" Where do you think you got the Polterdice from anyways? Those things love that city.

[@rvhill69]

I feel Larry pain, in any game of chance my luck is shit, but on the other hand, I have had more real life death saves, then any cat. I think I will stick with the RL death saves.

[@haydoge]

I like the touch of using water from the lake which birthed Dungeons and Dragons.

[@Phyco8]

It’s a beautiful clear lake. It’s also about 60’ deep 30ft off shore. And it only gets deeper

[@TopherPhoton]

I was blown away by the animation of the car driving off! Fantastic visuals in this one, your animations have always been great but they're still getting better.

[@joshuazurkon823]

This would be a really fun 4th-wall breaking monster to mess around with, either as a DM or a player.

[@ATSucks1]

By the power of gygax.. old guard and new... LOL I'm freaking dying here! That was freaking Epic!!!

[@sirgaz8699]

I have a friend who in 4 years of Warhammer and 5 years of DnD has never rolled hot, consistently low. I keep telling him he needs to pray to Ranald and that if he fails the first roll he's more likely to succeed the next roll to bring it back to average but he won't have it going on angry rants about "maths" and "statistics" and then continues to roll terribly even using other people dice. This is a man who, when we switched Warhammer armies because he was complaining my Tyranids were overpowered and his Tau were underpowered, he charged my isolated cheapest possible Tau commander with 13 Genestealers and lost combat . . . how is that even possible!? He then failed his morale test, rolled poorly on his fall back and my Tau commander chased them down and killed them all . . . T F! Yes, I know how maths works, I'm an engineer, but it's WAY more fun this way.

[@doomgod314]

Not sure which I enjoyed more. The fact that there's now canonically a math demon called azimuth or that when I googled math demon to see if there actually was any, I got a result for Matt Damon.

[@Peterowsky]

I mean, there's Laplace's Demon... the conceptual entity that knows the location of momentum of every atom in the universe and thus everything that will happen and everything that has happened from that knowledge and based (initially at least) on classic mechanics. Actual physics and actual math are a good deal more complicated than classic mechanics though, and the idea lost tract between the mid 1800s to the mid 1900s, being conclusively disproved multiple times. But as a cultural reference it's still pretty cool. Also "demon" was popular name for a type of thought experiment in the 1800s

[@josephperez2004]

*looks at Starfinder and how your basic street level laser is called azimuth grade* Dear Gods no...

[@Sinchu9]

Oh so this is what is possessing Wil Wheaton

[@NathtouLightbringer]

10/10 set up, sound and animation top notch. And you managed to get a full-belly laugh outame.

[@davidromsics4630]

this shit is even funnier after seeing the Wheaton Dice Curse act, constantly rolling 1's and 2's....man i dont know what kind of spirit haunts that man but im sorry for him

[@draeganian]

The most ridiculous stuff is that when He need's to roll lower number (different systems etc) He rolls high af xD

[@amistakewasmade6626]

A dm once told me I had the same curse as Wheaton. ....to this day the majority of my rolls are not above a Nat 8 and the vast majority are 4’s. Even in video games with dice rolling mechanics. Should specify that we would use dice bots, not dice too. There was a character of mine that had it the worst, with 5 consecutive Nat 1’s.

[@DrinkyBeery]

That driving sequence. You really pulled out all the toys for this pun.

[@paperbullet1945]

Zee, you should do a video on the darkness/obscurement/visibility/hiding rules. Nobody understands darkvision!

[@HydraQU33N]

My brother is the most haunted being. He doesnt roll low, he rolls *bad*. Any times he might want to roll lower, he rolls only high. Everything else he rolls garbage

[@kajetanmazurkiewicz5459]

I love how elaborate these are getting. The production value is also rising rapidly!

[@MrMaradok]

Half expected there to be a Will Wheaton cameo!

[@karlkhansen]

Love that Larry basically lives in the house from Stranger Things. Amazing story Zee! Animation, writing, sound, all 10/10! You're one talented dude.

[@verdigo1]

My Arbites had a pump shotty that ABSOLUTELY HATED the big-bad Demon of our campaign. Every time we got into a fight with him and and his manifestations, that thing would roll Righteous Fury and blap his ass. I got better weapons but everyone wanted to see how far the streak would go. In the final fight, it pasted him so badly he had to resort to trying to take us out with him. Proved to me that even in-game items can have intent.

[@Codes911]

After having just binged a boatload of your videos, I'm blown away by the massive uptick in quality. Specifically the bit where he's driving away, it looks so smooth and eerie. You rock at your craft.

[@swahilimaster]

One of the players going into my next campaign is the only person I've ever seen roll 5 critical fails in a row, I absolutely will not allow her to touch my dice just in case it's contagious.

[@gmacwizard8890]

I too am haunted by a pair of raccoons standing of each other's shoulders

[@KertaDrake]

Just get them a trench coat and sit them at a table to fill in for a late player!

[@mookiemorjax]

"There's f***ing heaps of math demons."

[@drenemelia2960]

Went from short video explanations to a full on animated series

[@ensokoth4670]

Larry shook hands with Wil Wheaton at a con.

[@MizTree]

and Wil gave him a D20...

[@fangorn23]

I switched from crappy rolls on my regular plastic dice by switching to metal dice THAT I LIKED AND FELT SOMETHING FOR and never had real problems since. I used to be one of the doubters. "they're just plastic. stop talking like they're a flighty princess that needs to be wooed" before: I had "just some dice i bought" that other than liking the color blue made me felt nothing. and I rolled 4s. all the damn time. I once rolled a healing burst with 6 d6s .... all 1s after: I have some metal dice whose colors were my former high school colors and another set whose colors were the specific CLASS colors for my year. Its not like I roll 20s all the time, it feels more like an average of 12ish. but ITS WAAAAY NICER THAN FRICKEN 4S. And I like that they go clunk when I roll them instead of click. they dont run away from the table if they knocked together hard while rolling. I /like/ them. and apparently that relationship is being somewhat rewarded by the dice gods. I dunno. I'm not gonna question it, I'm just glad my time getting screwed by the dice is over

[@FunnyLittleGnome66]

I cherish my first ever dice set which I actually received for Christmas last year since I wanted to get into physical DnD. I like how they look and even though I am completely aware they are very likely cheaply produced by Chinese children and thus probably cursed by an eastern ghost I can't help but love them.

[@michaelrigg3623]

I roll high and low. Never middle. Does not matter what dice I roll. I am the Dice Warlock amongst my friends.

[@MostLikelyMortal]

The scariest part was the fact he still has a landline

[@RexusKing]

1:43 The animation from the POV of the passenger seat inside the car looked so smooth, so good.

[@shannonh2105]

The fact that the KZbin algorithm has recommended a Wil Wheaton dice curse video shows I wasn’t the only one who thought of him in relation to dice ghosts

[@herman1francis]

One of my players always rolls incredibly high on non-important rolls and very low in life threatening situations. He has accepted it and just roleplays it.

[@liallen9380]

I actually had an entire D&D group cursed that way for a campaign. The DM kept complaining about us talking our way out of everything, and our counter-argument is that those were the only rolls we could make if we wanted to live. We're talking constant natural 20's on Bluff/Diplomacy/Intimidate, and nothing over a 5 on any combat roll.

[@herman1francis]

@@liallen9380 the sweet talkers xD. They will roll a nat 20 to intimidate cause if a fight actually broke out they would all die xD

[@Johnny_Shields]

I like to believe Larry didn't get spooked but pretended he was so that way he could curse Zee with a polterdice.

[@theta682pl]

I love how he just goes to Vegas with absolutely no hesitation.

[@wendye1048]

The best cure for Polterdice is to make a Kobold Beastmaster Ranger. :P

[@mongodroid4842]

or just play a halfling and/or take the lucky feat

[@legendzero6755]

This one looked visually really cool, especially the part where car was pulling away from the shop

[@Justjustinp]

Okay, the buildup to the demon just being a raccoon is brilliant.

[@matthewturner5178]

I loved how the dog fell down after the three 6’s for death saves

[@AflacMan13]

Zee... the only person with that problem, consistently enough to be other worldly... is Will Wheaton. Curses are real, and I am THOROUGHLY convinced that man is such.

[@dinofeather]

I my d&d group one of the player rarely roles above 10. As a joke one time he was given a set of weighted dice without his knowledge. The entire night out of dozens of rolls he got three rolls above 10.

[@emilygordbort7300]

The dice and he still rolled below ten-

[@thedudeslawyer]

Goddamn, this is funny. I don't know why, but it cracks me up when Zee and Larry are constantly talking over each other. Quality comedy *and* quality production value. Keep em coming!

[@leejesm]

the background when Larry is driving away with his friend in the rear view is a very nice touch.

[@Keldorah]

I do invite everyone to pay attention to the racoon sub-plot!

[@engineerbill7140]

obviously the demon is just a bunch of raccoons stacked on top of each other

[@sergiocruz6195]

wow i didnt even notice that awsome

[@FlutesLoot]

Masterpiece! "Sage at every corner" *places Sage Advice* brilliant

[@tharrock337]

what the heck, why is the animation so incredibly good in this one? I mean WHAT? that shit was fire!