I worked for a couple years as a professional dice dealer at a casino. I’ve also done some research into “dice setting”, and seen it attempted on a daily basis when I was employed as a craps dealer. I would consider myself to be an authority on the subject.

First, it is possible to influence the outcome of a dice throw. Research “dice setting” if you want to know more about it. Second, there is a difference intentionally influencing the roll, and unintentionally influencing the roll. One amounts to cheating, the other amounts to bad form from someone who is probably oblivious to what he is doing. I think this point is crucial; a person with bad form and a not-very-random roll is most likely NOT intentionally cheating. Also, it’s entirely possible that a guy is influencing the roll, but in a counterproductive manner.

If you want to keep your rolls random, the best way to do this is to know how to influence the roll. Knowing how to influence the roll will let you know what not to do. Knowledge is power!

Here is a quick and dirty tutorial on how to influence the roll:

If you drop the die and it barely rolls or tumbles, you could also possibly influence the roll, the ways to influence the roll are many and varied. Imagine if you attempt to roll the die in a manner where it spins on an axis. Imagine taking a die, and drawing an imaginary axis through the 3 and 4 (which are always on opposing sides). Now imagine throwing the die in a way where it spins on this axis, while the axis always remains parallel to the horizon. If you do this perfectly, the only possible outcomes are {1, 2, 5, 6}. In Axis and Allies terms, this means your defending infantry (2s) will hit 50% of the time. Also note, if you pick up the die with the “1” facing up, and spin it in a manner where the axis of rotation severs the 2 and 5, your 2s will hit with only 25% effectiveness! Noteworthy is the fact it’s impossible to improve the odds of a 3 hitting using this method.

This would be a good time to point out that if you simply put the dice in your hands, cup them, and give them a shake, that’s plenty good. If you use a cup or dice tower, that’s plenty fine as well, but for me, I think that’s a bit of overkill. However, if you have a cup and don’t mind using one, or have a fancy dice tower, rock on, more power to you.

Personally, I like scooping up the dice, and throw them at the corner of the box. I recon that’s about as good as you can get without a separate device. No matter your preferred method, as long as you throw the dice, and they land with any degree of force, and you are not trying to rotate them in a specific, pre-examined manner, your roll is probably “sufficiently random”.