Mach Dice - A Fully 3D Dice Roller!

[err0r]

I'd like to start with this is a great app and thanks a bunch for making it. It is the first app that I've purchased on my phone and will be a boon to my infrequent D&D sessions.

I have noticed, however, that the d4 is not done correctly. Currently there is no way to tell what you rolled. If it's sitting at an angle, how do you choose which number is correct? All d4s that I have seen have 3 numbers on each side and the top (or bottom) number is the number rolled. Am I missing something?

Examples: 1 | 2

 

[gibjer]

I picked up this as it's defiantly one of those apps that will get people ooohing and awing (while everyone can't relate to the need for anything other then a 6 sided die, the animation and usability implements allot of the iPhone's unique features)

I also noted the d4, but it's version 1.0, so I'm sure the app will improve!

Keep up the great work!

 

[Yvan256]

Here comes the money

Given the price of role-playing dices (20 sides, etc), this application is pratically free! (0.99$ vs 10-20$ in dices).

edit: I agree with err0r, the application will need an update for the 4-sided dices.

 

[FoxyKaye]

[url]http://machwerx.com/images/Screenshot1.gif[/URL]
Hi! I wrote a little dice rolling app for the iPhone and, after submitting it a couple of weeks ago, it's finally made it onto the store.

Yay! This looks super, and lots of fun for anyone with multi-sided dice gaming. Maybe make each individual die different colors in the future, to be able to tell them apart?

Anyone tried rolling odd-number sided dice yet? What happens with a 3-sided? 7-sided? Would love to see that...

 

[gibjer]

It comes up as a 20 sided die with ? on all the faces, but still generates the number at the bottom.

I vote to put in a 2 sided coin animation in there as well

 

[err0r]

edit: I agree with err0r, the application will need an update for the 4-sided dices.

I should have specified that it's just how they're visually represented. The application still calculates the value at the bottom. It does this for all the "odd" sided dice as well, but represents them with a d20 full of question marks.

It's a well done application and if more colors or materials (metal, bone, etc) were added it would be perfect imo.

Again, thanks for making it. I hope you get a lot of geeks out there that will buy it.

 

[ArtOfWarfare]

Anyone tried rolling odd-number sided dice yet? What happens with a 3-sided? 7-sided? Would love to see that...

How would you make a 3 sided die? I guess you could have a triangular prism and then... no top or bottom.

 

[arn]

How would you make a 3 sided die? I guess you could have a triangular prism and then... no top or bottom.

rounded top and bottom?

arn

 

[zelman]

How would you make a 3 sided die? I guess you could have a triangular prism and then... no top or bottom.

I have a "3-Sided Die". It's a 6-Sided Die with the number 1-3 printed on it twice. Most D&D players use a 6 sided die, divide by 2, and round halves up.

 

[zelman]

Feature Request

I'm thinking about playing games like "Risk" or "Axis and Allies" where there is an offensive roll followed by a defensive roll. Maybe having separate dice rolling areas that you could swipe between (like various locations in the weather app), and maybe even title would be neat. That would also allow for different labeled sets of dice to be preset for things like different spell effects or weapons in your character's arsenal in Dungeons and Dragons.

I've been RPG free for a half dozen years, and I'm totally geeking out over this concept. I might need methadone to stay off this app.

 

[bk888]

Nice app! I don't actually need this, but I felt the need to support developers making neat, cheap stuff like this!

 

[Zwhaler]

I bought the app and love it. I wrote a 5-star review

Requests:

I read that anti-aliasing is impossible, but anything to improve it even a little bit would be nice (Its not bad, it just bugs me the slightest bit)

A 2 sided coin would be cool, perhaps with customizible faces (heads tails, 1 & 2, etc)

As the dev said, a better interface for choosing # of dice plus # of sides would be nice, and also make it so impossible choices can't be entered (for example, if you enter a 2 digit number for the number of sides, and the first digit is '1', grey out the numbers that cant be chosen for the 2nd digit, like 1,3,7 etc)

Background choices and dice color choices

Locking individual dice

Thats it! Great app as it is, these updates would make it phenomenal. Love the 3D tilt!! (actually thats what sold me)

 

[Pigumon]

No such thing as dices.

Given the price of role-playing dices (20 sides, etc), this application is pratically free! (0.99$ vs 10-20$ in dices).

edit: I agree with err0r, the application will need an update for the 4-sided dices.

Singular is Die, Plural is Dice.

1 die, 2 dice, 3 dice, etc.

 

[Zwhaler]

Singular is Die, Plural is Dice.

1 die, 2 dice, 3 dice, etc.

LoL, this post along with your signature shows that you are quite the little online grammar cop. Don't worry we don't hate grammar cops. Someone has to do it, right?

 

[MachWerx]

Thanks for the continued comments! Some responses:

* As I understand it, Ubiquity dice are used to represent multiples of d2. So you could just use, say, 3d2 for the blue die.
* On the general topic of custom values for dice, it's a tough decision. An unscrupulous person could use it to create a 6-sided die with values 6,2,3,4,5,6 and it'd be harder for a GM to detect that on a virtual die. I have to balance the player's desire for more customization with my desire to maintain the trust of a GM who might be understandably skeptical as it is about virtual dice. It's important to me that people feel like they can trust this application so my first instinct is to hold off on custom values. But it's something that I'm thinking about.
* More dice and background choices are coming!
* I'm still working out what I'm going to do about d100, but 2d10 is a possibility.
* I'm using Gimp and the trackpad on my MacBook Pro now. They're pretty good for most things, but anti-aliased embossed edges isn't one of them.
* d4 graphics are definitely going to be fixed, that was just a temp
* dice formula presets are coming!
* d2 coins are planned
* still looking into a better interface for inputting dice formula

 

[FoxyKaye]

Thanks for the continued comments! Some responses:

* As I understand it, Ubiquity dice are used to represent multiples of d2. So you could just use, say, 3d2 for the blue die.
* On the general topic of custom values for dice, it's a tough decision. An unscrupulous person could use it to create a 6-sided die with values 6,2,3,4,5,6 and it'd be harder for a GM to detect that on a virtual die. I have to balance the player's desire for more customization with my desire to maintain the trust of a GM who might be understandably skeptical as it is about virtual dice. It's important to me that people feel like they can trust this application so my first instinct is to hold off on custom values. But it's something that I'm thinking about.
* More dice and background choices are coming!
* I'm still working out what I'm going to do about d100, but 2d10 is a possibility.
* I'm using Gimp and the trackpad on my MacBook Pro now. They're pretty good for most things, but anti-aliased embossed edges isn't one of them.
* d4 graphics are definitely going to be fixed, that was just a temp
* dice formula presets are coming!
* d2 coins are planned
* still looking into a better interface for inputting dice formula

Seriously - keep up the great work. This is a very handy app and the price point is perfect!

 

[Doctor Q]

* On the general topic of custom values for dice, it's a tough decision. An unscrupulous person could use it to create a 6-sided die with values 6,2,3,4,5,6 and it'd be harder for a GM to detect that on a virtual die. I have to balance the player's desire for more customization with my desire to maintain the trust of a GM who might be understandably skeptical as it is about virtual dice. It's important to me that people feel like they can trust this application so my first instinct is to hold off on custom values. But it's something that I'm thinking about.

I'd avoid adding custom values for that reason. However, if you do decide to add the feature, I suggest making dice with custom values visually different in some consistent way.

Perhaps your coin faces should have generic images, not the heads and tails of a U.S. penny, so you don't end up with demands for other U.S. coins and for coins from other countries. Just my 2 cents -- one heads, one tails.

 

[LordEntropy]

Thanks for the continued comments! Some responses:

* As I understand it, Ubiquity dice are used to represent multiples of d2. So you could just use, say, 3d2 for the blue die.

Yes but the joy of Ubiquity is this.

Say I have a 9 dice attack, instead of rolling 9 dice and looking for the even number to represent the success on 9 dice I roll 3 blue dice instead as each Blue is the equivalent of rolling 3 normal dice. Their creator Jeff Combos has ensured the odds are the same of rolling 1 blues as 3 normal dice, Reds are equivalent to rolling 2 normal dice and white are the same as rolling a normal dice. The numbers represent the number of successes.

Ubiquity dice are great as it allows me to cut down on the number of dice I have to roll which is a boon in a dice pool system.

I do appreciate though that in order to add these into your app you would need the dice in order to get all the faces correctly, which is clearly not great if you don't play and Ubiquity based game.

 

[dwsolberg]

Nice app - keep the rolling the same

I love the die rolling sensitivity. I hope you don't change it at all -- but if you do please make it an option for sensitivity.

My 2¢

 

[gillybean]

I have no use for dice, but I bought the app anyway so I could check out the 3-d accelerometer tilting. Good job on that. I think if apps are visually impressive, some people will buy it just for that quality.

I was a little disappointed that the 100 sided dice don't actually show up as 100 sided dice. How are 100 sided dice done in real life? Instead of using the dice with question marks, how hard would it be to automatically generate the right dice shape for every number from 1 to 100 (2-sided could be a coin, and the appropriate polyhedron for the rest)? If you have a background in computer graphics and computational geometry, maybe it's doable, and it would look very impressive if done right.

I also like how you can just press a button to roll the dice. I tried out the motion X one earlier and the most annoying thing was that I had to keep shaking the iphone.

Also, after using it for a while, the program started lagging and then my 100d100 had very noticeably lag, then the program crashed and I couldn't get back into it (it just hangs at the intro screen), so I removed it. I might try to reinstall it again later (especially if I ever find a use for dice), but I think I got my 99 cents worth just from seeing the tilting.

 

[gillybean]

As a graphics demo it'd also be cool if you could zoom in and out using the iPhone pinching technique. For any even-number sided dice, you could expand on what's done for d10, just adding additional sides to both the top and the bottom.

 

[LordEntropy]

I was a little disappointed that the 100 sided dice don't actually show up as 100 sided dice. How are 100 sided dice done in real life?

You use two ten sided dice. One is for the tens the other for the units.

 

[Dimwhit]

You use two ten sided dice. One is for the tens the other for the units.

Actually, I've seen a 100-sided die. It's pretty round and a little tough to read. By fun to mess around with.

 

[LordEntropy]

Actually, I've seen a 100-sided die. It's pretty round and a little tough to read. By fun to mess around with.

Yes I have seen 1 or 2 of those in my time, although few people use them I think as they practically never stop rolling

 

[TheZimm]

I just got this app and its the best looking one I have =]