Gamers that make games better. Gamers that make better games.™

Demoing Dragon Dice™ 101

One of the most common things I hear from players at cons is “I just love this game, but I can’t find anyone to play the game with.” My answer to this problem, Demo, Demo, Demo. If you go to your local store and provide demos for people to try, you will generally get one of three responses.

Dragon Dice™, I love that game and I have a lot of dice.

Dragon Dice™, What is that? (Believe it or not)

Dragon Dice™, Yea I tried it but it just wasn’t for me.

If you get response 1 or 2, then you can reply with, “ Well Dragon Dice™ has been purchased by a new gaming company SFR, Inc. and is starting to get the word out that Dragon Dice™ is back. SFR is getting local reps to provide demos in order to get new and old players back into the game.” After this little intro, if the player is still interested, ask if they would be interested in doing a demo.

One of the keys to providing a demo is experience, the more demos you perform, the better you get. Also, very good advertising is necessary to get a good attendance at the demo.

Once everything is set for the demo, learn how to teach another player the game. For the purposes of the demo, use SFR Novice rules. These are simple and fast, they can get two people that have never played the game before to start playing in a matter of 5-10 minutes. An outline below is what I use when I perform Demos.

Start by opening the starters and separating by dice size (d12, d8, and d6s)

Pick up the Dragon (d12) and show the players the jaw icon (face), if you follow the face to the back side of the icon, there will be two claws, followed by a belly and two wings if it is a (Wyrm), then you will see the back two claws and the dragons tail. The designers literally took a dragon and wrapped it around the dice, thus they called the game Dragon Dice™.

Explain that Dragon Dice™ is a game of conflict and any conflict is usually over territory, thus the two d8s are the terrain in which the battle is to be fought.

Explain that the d6s are the units, which make up the armies in Dragon Dice™. Explain the rarity (large d6 Rare, middle d6 uncommon, smallest d6 common) also explain that in Dragon Dice™ each dice is worth a value: Rare 3 points, uncommon 2 points, and common 1 point.

Now separate the d6s by color and explain that Dragon Dice™ is made up of different races, these races have two different colors. (Red and Gold are Dwarves) (Red and Black are Lava Elves) (Blue and Green are Coral Elves) ( Gold and Black are Goblins) Explain that the first print run of goblins were “muddy” because the gold and black mixed. Later print runs actually have gold and black goblins.

Set up the game as explained in the novice rules. Place one terrain at home and one terrain at the frontier (middle). Then place the race with the most health at the home terrain, the race with the second most points in the middle and the rest of the d6s in the hoard, at the opponent’s home.

Have both players roll the hoard army and count up Maneuver Icons, explain that maneuvers are any icon that looks like movement. (Feet, hovers, claws, boats) Show them the icons on the novice sheet. Also in this roll, explain that all units (d6s) have an ID icon, the face of the dice which identifies it correctly. The ID when rolled acts as a sort of wild card. It counts for which ever icon you are rolling for. Thus, in this case IDs would count as maneuvers. Also, Ids count as the point of the die. Thus a rare would be worth 3 points, and uncommon would be worth 2 points, and a common would be worth 1 point.

Help the players add up the icons and IDs and determine which player will go first and choose the middle terrain. Then roll the terrain dice to determine the starting distances. Now explain that the terrain die goes from 1 to 8. At 1 the armies are very far apart and can only cast magic to effect one another, as the dice goes up the armies are getting closer until a arrow shows on the terrain, which means the armies can now shoot at each other with missile, then as it gets closer and closer to 8 a sword will appear which means that the armies are very close and can engage in hand to hand melee fighting. Until finally the goal of the 8th face is reached. Control 2 8th faces and you win the game.

Go through the composition of a march. The first thing is to attempt to maneuver, have them both roll and count up their icons. Then explain that the army attempting to maneuver can turn the terrain dice up or down one spot, if they win the maneuver. Then go through the action (magic, missile or melee)

Explain that the first army is now done and can not perform another march, thus you have to pick a second different army and perform the second march. Help add up icons for the maneuver and the action.

Explain that the two marches are over, now the player can reserve any dice from any army to a neutral area called the reserves. The reserves allow the player a way to move from one terrain to another. They also provide an area for your armies to regroup, thus magic is the only action that can be performed from reserves and that magic can only help his army by casting helpful spells. The reserve army can not cast spells to affect the opponent or any terrain.

Tell this player that after the reserves are finished that his turn is over and the next player begins his turn by following the same pattern, first march, second march, and reserve.

The other pointer is after the second turn, begin to allow the players to add up the icons them selves. Ask questions like, so that is an ID for a rare unit, so how much is it worth?

That about does it for my knowledge of performing demos, if you need any help please feel free to e-mail me at , I will gladly provide you with the information you need.

Thanks,

Steve Braun
SFR, Inc.

Main | Dragon Dice™ | Purchase | News