Introduction

In late November (2001) discussion on a wargaming list turned to dice. As the thread debated the harmless rituals taken to encourage dice to be more sympathetic to a players needs, "Madcam" suggested the seductive approach. Bradley responded with:

Hey thats a great Idea ! But how can you tell if a die is male or female ? I am looking all over this one and I just cannot tell..... Are you gay if you fondle male dice?

This led to the following digression (for me anyway, grading exams was getting a bit too grim) on the sex life of dice.

Ahem, the reproductive system of dice has been the subject of many a scientific paper. Early systems to classify dice were fraught with difficulty as it turns out that dice are in fact polymorphous rather than dimorphous. That is, the male can take one of several distinct phenotypes. Nonetheless, the German author Weier's ground-breaking taxonomic system "Revision Der Wurfel", published in 1935 is regarded as the best starting point. Alas it is difficult to get a copy. The fluffy dice used by some motorists are an interesting instance of parallel evolution as they in fact, have no relationship to the more common and wide-spread 'wurfelspeil'.

Gender of dice is determined in the egg-stage of the nest. Like some crocodilians (the phylogeny of dice and crocodilians remains in fierce debate), temperature is crucial to determining the gender of the dice.

Actual determination of sex requires an internal examination of the dice. The genital operculum is protected by a hard plate or 'scutum' over the one-spot. Females have conspicuous ovaries and are often small and drab in appearance. The expert can always tell.

Dice fondling is regarded as an unsafe habit due to a parasitic mimic of dice that will inject its eggs under your skin- where they will literally, make a meal out of you. Most wargamers carry sharp knives to expedite the rapid excision of such parasites when they are large enough to be readily located. It is speculated that this parasite injects its host with a hormone that promotes weight gain and a sedentary life style so as to perpetuate the future supply of food for its young.