Dice Legacy is one of the most unique takes on real-time strategy I’ve seen in some time. On the surface you are doing typical RTS things like gathering resources, building structures, and fighting enemies. What makes Dice Legacy unique is that all your units are dice. Each time you roll one it may have a different skill based on the face it lands on. A Peasant die may be a gatherer one roll, but a warrior the next. The persistent risk that comes with every roll frequently leads to dicey situations where you need a particular skill, but your dice are cold… literally.
On its face, Dice Legacy is a fairly straight forward run-based RTS where the goal is to establish a settlement in a new land, and conquer The Others who were there before you. At the start of each game you can choose from several rulers that provide different bonuses and require certain play styles. You are then placed on one end of a large ring of land, reminiscent of the ring-worlds from Halo, and must make your way to the other side. Sounds pretty standard until you realize that every strategy is potentially upended by a bad dice roll.
You can have a total of 12 dice in your possession at any time, although you can have more on the playfield with the right amount of micromanagement. Each die also has a class which comes with a certain set of skills. Peasant dice can perform a lot of simple jobs like gathering and building, while Citizen dice are the only ones that can generate tech points. There is a lot a overlap between the skills, but each class does have at least one unique skill. It’s important to make sure you have a good mix of classes, so you don’t run into situations where you only have one die that can build, but you need at least two builders to construct even the simplest of structures.
It’s also possible to lose dice through combat, exploration, and even attrition. That’s because each die loses a durability point every time it is rolled or used to complete a task. Luckily you can restore durability at the expense of time and resources. You can also “lock” a die to prevent it from being rolled and thus wearing down. This is also useful if you know you need several dice with the same skills for a particular project. However, if you do happen to lose a die you can make a new one by putting two dice in a house to make a baby die… not sure about my phrasing there. It’s a lot to keep track of and adds a layer of randomness onto a relatively by-the-numbers RTS experience.
There are definitely moments when it can feel unfair because you need a particular skill, but can’t seem to roll it. These usually arise from of the fact that you are constantly being attacked on anything but the lowest difficulty setting. If you do not build defenses quickly enough you have to rely on rolling solider dice, and that can be a frustrating battle between luck and attrition. It’s my recommendation that you play your first game on the lowest difficulty level, which allows you to play without the constant threat of attack. This will allow you to explore and experience all of the game’s systems at your leisure and pay attention to all the tutorials. After that the sky is the limit on how punishing you want the game to be. You can even make it winter all year round, so you have to constantly worry about frozen dice, running out of wood, and farms that don’t produce food.
Dice Legacy really is a unique way to play a real-time strategy game. The randomness the dice rolls provide makes every moment of each game exciting. The dice management layer makes every roll significant, even if you don’t get the exact roll you were looking for. Finally, the huge variety of ways to tweak the difficulty means each game can play out very differently. Trust me that if Dice Legacy gets its hooks into you, you’ll keep coming back to table again and again.
