Answers back from Chessex
I wrote Chessex and got some answers on these cool but missing dice.
Hello!
I assume that the dice you mention are some of the convention designs that
we created for Gen Con.
We have some new machines here that allow us to make small print runs of
dice with custom designs on them by engraving images onto the face of blank
dice. We used the machines to generate a handful of D&D centric random
generator dice. I have attached a few photos to this email of some of the
designs we made.
The dice in the photos are not exactly like the dice you may have heard
about, however. The dice in the photos are engraved with the various images
and then painted and polished to generate the dice you see in the photos.
Currently, however, our pricing is based on the number of custom faces on a
die which makes dice with more faces cost significantly more then dice with
fewer faces. Most of the cost with generating these dice comes from the
painting and polishing process which is, at the moment, mostly done by hand.
The dice we had at Gen Con were similar in design to the dice in the photos
but were done with a slightly different process which doesn't look as ice,
but also doesn't need to be painted. This makes the dice significantly less
expensive, but not as nice looking. The last photo attached to this email
(vectored dice.jpg) is a group photo of some of the same dice, but made with
this cheaper method. Due to the nature of the artwork, this cheaper method
of engraving can't replicated the trap d12.
The vectored dice are available to purchase but are not a part of our
regular line of dice currently due to their custom nature. If you wanted
some, I would have to generate them to order for you. Here is a breakdown
of the designs and their cost:
Character Class d12 (regular sized) $1.75
Character Class d12 (large sized) $2.75
Monster d12 (only available in large size) $2.75
Race d8 (only available in small size) $1.75
Alignment d6 set (one of each) $3.00
Clock d12 (regular sized) $1.75
Clock d12 (large sized) $2.75
These prices are for the non-painted versions of the dice. As they would be
made to order, I can put the designs for the small sized dice on a variety
of colors which I can supply to you if you would like. The large d12 are
only available in white for the moment.
The painted and polished versions of the dice are currently rather expensive
but, shortly after April, we expect to have a better painting process which
will allow us to generate these dice at a much lower cost which will make
their prices closer to that of the non-painted dice. Currently, the cost
for the specialty painted dice is $1.00 per side on the die (a d12 is
$12.00, for example). I can only make the Trap d6 this way, currently.
As these dice are generated using our custom engraving process, I am capable
of generating custom dice of this nature for you beyond the set designs that
we have already worked up. If you have an idea of a die you would like to
see along these lines, feel free to let me know!
I hope that I answered all of your questions.
I look forward to hearing back from you!
Joseph Kogin
Chessex Manufacturing LLC
<I respond thanking him and asking permission to post his reply. He said yes and answered a few other questions too.>
Hello again,
You can definitely post my reply. I skimmed through the forum a bit and
there are some interesting ideas on there.
In most cases, if I have a customer with a particular concept for a custom
die, I request that they supply the artwork. I use some pretty flexible
software so most graphical formats work. In general, the higher quality the
image, the better conversion I can make for the engraving process. I can
always try to find clip art for you if you have a good idea of what it is
that you are looking for.
I just skimmed the posting so I didn't see the Dungeoneering Dice, but I
imagine that you are referencing the dice in the photo attached to this
email, correct?
I can still make these dice and we sell them for $2.50 each or $8.00 for the
set of four dice.
The Dungeoneering dice are also undergoing an update involving the painting
and polishing process. The art design isn't finished yet, but should be
ready for production once the new painting process is finalized. I expect
that these new dice will be somewhere between $1.00 and $1.50 each once we
hammer out the process. Once the new designs are ready for sale, we may
discontinue the old versions as they are a bit of a pain in the rear to
produce!
I hope that I have answered all of your questions.
I look forward to hearing back from you!
Joseph Kogin
Chessex Manufacturing LLC
All pics but the "Vectored dice" are below. The vectored dice pic is in the next post
