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2019 was both the fifth anniversary of D&D’s Fifth Edition and the 45th anniversary of the game itself, so series handlers Wizards of the Coast decided to commemorate it with a whopping $300 set of dice. The, er, “gem” of the collection is this D20 with a sapphire in-laid to its “20” spot.Sam Machkovech
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The rest of the 11-piece set is made of solid aluminum, with the D&D dragon logo in place of the max value on particular dice as appropriate. (The D10s skip this dragon-logo stuff, since that can be a confusing logo on a “percentage” roll.)
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The set includes two D20s, in case you’d rather store the sapphire one somewhere safe.
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Where exactly should you roll these valuable things? In spite of no instructions included in the box…
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…if you firmly tug on the dice-storage box, you’ll reveal a felt-lined rolling caddy. That’s where you want to roll these things.
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Sadly, this $300 set comes in a pretty embarrassing paper box.
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You’re gonna see this logo a lot.
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We could take or leave the tassel as an opening mechanism.
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The logo appears again. It’s part of a card…
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…which confirms what numbered place your set is in among the limited 1,974 sets produced.
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A D20 in the hand…
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…is worth an 11-strong set in the palm?
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Also included: a poster with new art and descriptions of the series’ classic Sapphire Dragon monster. Again, we’re docking points here; why couldn’t Wizards roll this poster up for people paying $300 and up, instead of folding it to smithereens like it’s an insert in an average pack of Magic cards?
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Enjoy this new monster spec, Dungeon Masters.
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Some lore.
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These very shiny stickers are hard to photograph. Weirdly, one of them has a circle cut that clips some of the art.
On the occasion of Dungeons & Dragons’ 45th anniversary this November, series handlers Wizards of the Coast celebrated by announcing a rarity from the company: official, limited, super-pricey dice. Are you as old as, or older than, D&D? Does that make you feel so allegiant to the game that you’d like to own a gem-infused 20-sided die with a set of aluminum dice to match?
If so, Wizards had you in its sights with its $300 Sapphire Anniversary Dice Set. Only 1,974 were made (get it?), and from the look of things, they haven’t sold out as of press time. While we’d never recommend spending so much money on tabletop dice—we tend to lose our cheapos thanks to errant, booze-soaked tosses amongst friends—we figured we’d at least photograph and describe the set that surprise-arrived at the Ars Orbital HQ earlier today.
The above gallery tells most of the story, though it only goes so far to convey the glory of a shiny blue sapphire inside of a 20-sided die. We’ve yet to rig up our dice-rolling robots to test Wizards’ claim that an in-laid gemstone doesn’t negatively affect rolling weight for a D20. Instead, I rolled the thing 100 times while uploading this report’s images, and my tally was… drumroll, please… two critical hits, and three critical misses. Hmm.
There’s also a non-sapphire D20 in the set, should you wish to protect the set’s most valuable die; either way, the set comes with a convenient felt-lined rolling tray, which you’ll want for a full complement of aluminum dice by default.
That mix of an in-laid sapphire and the set’s limited nature probably combine to inflate the price, but that’s it in terms of complaints. The font, the blue-on-aluminum styling, and the carrying case’s attachment to a rolling tray are all solid stuff. Should the dice’s aluminum stylings intrigue you, you could head directly to their producers at Level Up Dice and get a similar set for $135 or less. (We’d never suggest spending that much on dice, either, but it’s sure less than $300.)
Listing image by Sam Machkovech
https://arstechnica.com/?p=1642029