I’m guessing there are two main groups of people who don't know what I’m talking about when I keep mentioning polyhedral dice. People who just aren't familiar with the word “polyhedral”, and people who keep thinking, “But all dice are polyhedral!” I'm going to clarify that today and start introducing you to the basics of how I use these dice for divination.
The word “polyhedral” comes from Greek and basically means “three dimensional thing with multiple sides, faces, edges, etc. Are all dice polyhedral? Yes. Then why don't we just say “dice”? Because that word is generally understood as six-sided dice, so sometimes the term “polyhedral dice” is used to talk about the kind of dice used for tabletop role playing games, like Dungeons & Dragons.
Why don't we just say “tabletop role playing game dice?” If you're asking that question, I’m guessing those games are not your thing. I’ll do my best to give you a short answer. Within the context of talking about those games, they're often just called dice. If it is necessary to specify that these are the kind of dice being talked about, they're usually called gaming dice. I don't know why they started getting referred to as polyhedral dice. No one I’ve known who uses them for games calls them that. I’ve only seen it in print. Maybe it's different in other areas than where I’ve lived? Maybe it's about people using the most descriptive generic term possible when selling them so they don't get any trouble for using brand names of the games? I don't know.
These are the kind of dice we’re talking about.
If you're a regular reader, you’ve seen my beautiful and horrifying swirly purple Astral Elder Sign dice before. The common way of referring to each piece is d(number of faces). So the pyramid on the back row is a d4, and you probably know the d6 next to it. The one on the right side of the back row is a d8. Front row, left to right, we have d20 and d12.
These dice (there are others with more faces) are the Platonic solids. They align with elements. I didn't make the rules on this - Plato and his students did - but I did decide to use that information to give meaning to the dice in divination readings.
d4 (Fire): This is where your passion is! This is what wildly, energetically drives things. The spark of creativity. The energy of the soul.
d6 (Earth): Stands in opposition to and refuses to be moved by Fire. That's not always a bad thing. This grounds you and keeps you on track, making things productive.
d8 (Air): Light, fast, and flowing. Problem solving. Short term progress. This helps get things moving.
d20 (Water): Long term progress and results. This can sometimes make the Fire struggle or hold it back. Sometimes puts the Fire out if it's just too much. Peace and healing can also be found here.
d12 (Spirit): Okay, this one is “aether” according to Platonic studies, and we can debate whether that would be the breath of the gods or something else…or we can just call it “Spirit” in the context of doing readings. This is The Bigger Picture , and it can be the most mysterious one because it can't always be applied in practical ways. It does, however, provide some information and guidance for looking at how the current concern that the reading is about weaves with other things.
When I do a Platonic solids reading, it doesn't matter what order the dice land in or where they sit. I look at how the elements of the shapes could be interacting. Earth can fuel Fire in a very contained way, or completely put it out. Fire can consume Earth. Air can quickly feed Fire and make it grow! Water can help get Fire under control or put it out, make Air kind of slow and heavy, and can work with Earth to make something grow or combine with it to make things kind of muddy. While there is symbolism for each element, this is kind of like “Rock, Paper, Scissors”.
You may already be thinking you’ve got the information for the dice now, so why not go ahead and put it together with the numbers and try a reading? You can absolutely do that! One small point to consider, though…we’ve only been talking about numbers one through ten. Your d20 and d12 can give you higher numbers, which we’ll look at next week. I'm not asking you to wait, though. If you want to go ahead and try this, these will be practice readings anyway, so just be aware you may end up needing to roll those two dice again.