How many of you use or have used Crown Royal bags to store your dice? Are they a cheap cop out to a real dice bag or a gaming staple?
I love them...I have a big one for my regular dice and a small one for a spare set to keep with my d20 modern stuff. I'm not much of a whiskey fan, but I personally believe the Crown Royal bag has had an informal but significant presence in the kit of gamers around the world, as I know I can't be the only one using them.
In the past I've used commercial dice bags (kept coming open), a well made leather German coin purse (lost it, don't know what happened to it) and suede lined wooden boxes to store my dice, but I always seem to gravitate back to the Crown Royal bag, roomy, tough, light and you can tie it shut securely or loop the string around the top for easy opening.
Is it cheesy or classic? What do you guys think?
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3 of the 7 in my group use them. I personally have a chainmail dicebag that I made from raw links that I purchased online from "The Ring Lord". Also bought a book on how to make chainmail armor. Got a half completed chain shirt around here somewhere....but I would use a Crown Royal bag if I didn't have to drink the stuff, not much of a whiskey fan.
FH (the unarmored)
Gamer's staple, as far as I'm concerned. Every game I've been in, somebody has had one. Don't like Crown Royal myself, but my bag was a gift from a player. Chainmail and leather bags are the shiznit - I am always on the lookout for one at an SCA event. They have to fit my criteria, though, which is able to hold my dice, still in their plastic boxes, within. I'm fairly anal about what dice I use per session - they all gotta be the same color and style.
However, it is really really really easy to make your own dice bag. I can't sew a straight line and I can make them. I just haven't made any I like yet. :P I may have to have my friend make them instead - she's much better at it than I.
Crown Royal bags were some sort of status symbol among gamers at one point, when I was but a wee gamer.
I remember getting one of the Bacardi Select bags (black w/ silver embroidery & stitching) and creating something of a stir in my gaming community.
I suppose when we were too young to drink, Crown Royal bags could be seen as some sort of status symbol and subtle way to show how "rebellious" you were. Of course, nowadays a gamer might have to show up with a dice bag made from puppy skin in order to create any kind of a stir. I never saw the Bacardi bags, but black with silver embroidery probably looked cool.
I suppose when we were too young to drink, Crown Royal bags could be seen as some sort of status symbol and subtle way to show how "rebellious" you were. Of course, nowadays a gamer might have to show up with a dice bag made from puppy skin in order to create any kind of a stir. I never saw the Bacardi bags, but black with silver embroidery probably looked cool.
That must have been it. The Bacardi bag was very cool, but it must have been a limited run or for a special promotion. I have never seen one since.
Ever since being stationed in Germany, I've used the same leather dice bag I bought from a street vendor on the Koenigstrasse.
I used a German leather coin purse with a metal "snap" closure for the longest time, but I can't find it anymore. I'm going to look for something similar next time I'm visiting the fatherland. I just saw chainmail dice bags on e-bay for $14, I'll probably get those as christmas gifts for my gaming friends.
Well, I've never drank whiskey, and hope to never will. I just like the coloring of it, and the fabric, it's nice and soft. I have a friend who does the same, doesn't drink, he got it as a wedding present, gave the whiskey to his new father-in-law and kept the bag for his dice... that was wow almost 13 yrs ago now. Still brings it every week.
I don't drink. My parents don't drink.
When I got into D&D, I thought Crown Royal made dice bags. I didn't find out about the whiskey until much, much later.
I didn't get my first Crown Royal bag until a few years ago (I'm 37) when my wife's uncle brought some Crown Royal over for a holiday gathering. I turned down the drink but he let me have the bag.
Everyone burst out laughing when I took it to my next game.
So... Gamer Staple vote for me.
i dont make a habit of drinking whiskey but i believe that crown royal bags have become a gamer staple over the years.
I found a link on the Crown Royal website where customers talk about why they love the bags and what they do with them. Gamers are absent from the mix, but who knows what the future may hold?
The story about the guy whose girlfriend was making quilt out of Crown Royal bags and then left him before it was finished got me all teary ;)
I sewed my own out of what used to be a teddy. A friend of mine cleverly used a washing-machine tablet bag.
Is it cheesy or classic?
Classic. No doubt about it.
I think it's amusing that no one has admitted to actually liking the whiskey...my mom and stepdad love the stuff, but they're the only ones I know that drink it.
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I think it's amusing that no one has admitted to actually liking the whiskey...my mom and stepdad love the stuff, but they're the only ones I know that drink it.
I'm guilty. I love Crown Royal. Smoothest North American Whiskey on the planet.
Oh yeah. I do use a Crown Royal bag for my dice and I have done so for over a decade.
I use a fanny pack; crown royal bag just doesnt hold enough stuff ie dice; pencils; erasure pencils; templates; pain releivers; etc. Of course, I still have a crown royal bag of dice; presented it to my kid as her first bag of dice :) an hmm, crown royal is not cheap and way back when I was a teenager, darn hard to get.
I don't drink. My parents don't drink.
When I got into D&D, I thought Crown Royal made dice bags. I didn't find out about the whiskey until much, much later.
I didn't get my first Crown Royal bag until a few years ago (I'm 37) when my wife's uncle brought some Crown Royal over for a holiday gathering. I turned down the drink but he let me have the bag.
Everyone burst out laughing when I took it to my next game.
So... Gamer Staple vote for me.
lol that is a full belly laugh; thanks for sharing :)
I think it's amusing that no one has admitted to actually liking the whiskey...my mom and stepdad love the stuff, but they're the only ones I know that drink it.
Since I am ...unpleasant... when I drink, I avoid the stuff.
Any brand of rum come with a bag? I don't care for whiskey or bourbon, but I love rum.
I use a dice bag purchased years ago from Wargames West. My cousins thought they were original when they used a Crown Royal bag.
There was that Bacardi special reserve, but I only ever saw one of those bags. Haven't seen one since, so it must have been some special promotion or the like.
Wargames West? I remember them! You from the Duke City, or did you mail order that bag?
Certainly seen my share of Crown Royal bags but when everyone is doing something, I'm doing something else. Call it a personal flaw.
Before I bought a really nice antique, a carved wooden box which I lined with felt, I used to keep my die in this big plastic apple that opened across the top. I always transferred to die bags for games because I didn't think players, or a DM, would understand my big transparent apple full o' die.
Crown Royal bags are definitely a staple. I have one friend in particular who has had his going on 20+ years. Sure, it’s a little battle worn, but still holding up fine. :-)
As for myself, I currently have a couple of different leather pouches I used to hold my “in use” sets. My other sets are sorted into plastic tackle boxes. I periodically change out the dice in the pouches with those in the tackle boxes so as to maintain some variety.
I think it's amusing that no one has admitted to actually liking the whiskey...my mom and stepdad love the stuff, but they're the only ones I know that drink it.
It didn't occur to me that I should "admit" to liking CR.
I'll just put it this way: I've got about two dozen large CR bags sitting on a shelf in my home office, waiting for me to figure out some useful purpose for them. :)
Well, you don't have to "admit" anything, LOL...it's just that until I pointed it out, no one in this thread had yet admitted that they like drinking the stuff.
Personally I don't buy dice bags...I either make them out of chain mail or use a tupperware container.
CR bags a cheap cop-out? How much does one spend on CR to get the dice bag out of it? Much more than purchasing just a dice bag, eh? Nothing cheap about a nice soft purple bag that the scotch came in...
Besides...it also allows you something to drink while gaming...
Definitely staple; I have a custom black Crown Royal bag (some limited edition or whatever) that I've had for years - I even replaced the pull string after it broke.
Coming from the restaurant business years ago, I was never wanting for one; a bartender actually collected enough of them to give a pile to his grandmother, who unstiched the seams and made a comforter out of them.
M
I've seen many CR bags at my local gaming store, and I'm sure for those guys, it's a staple. Some have been playing for years, some are kids who get the bags from their folks. Either way, they are not scarce here in Indiana.
The funniest dice "bag" I've seen in recent memory accompanied a young kid who's been playing at the store for a couple of years now. It's a plastic shark with a zippered mouth, the kind of thing you'd buy at a zoo or dollar store. It's ugly, bright blue, and his d4 keeps getting wedged in the tail. We give him plenty-o-grief, but he keeps bringing it. Very amusing . . .
I received one as a gift from a guy who worked at the local gaming store. The shops is closed now, the owner ended up moving on to other things. The bag is now sort of keep sake from all the good times I spent in that place. Apart from the sentimental value, its a great bag! It can hold plenty of dice and the string makes it easy to open and close, not to mention durability. The other bag I use regularily I scavenged from a traveling kit for my electic razor. It's a pretty big bag, is made of tough synthetic leather and has a zipper. Used it for years with no problems.
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I use a fanny pack;
ouch! sorry vale, I had to do it :) I used to like Crown Royal but it is now added to the list of hard liquor that I can't even smell without dry heaving.(SoCo,Beam,etc..) I liked Beam until a girl I was dating convinced me to take a shot in the morning to cure a nasty hangover. Don't fall for that urban legend!!
Crown Royal bags are staple. I don't use one now - I use a small PLANO plastic tray; holds my different dice sets (6 colors), 3 compartments for my "masses of d4, d6 and d8s", glass beeds and magnetic markers and the last compartment for all my pens, pencils, erasers and tape measure/laser pointer combo. Yes, it is quite a sight.
Before the PLANO DM Set of Ultimate Death, I used a CR bag.
Anecdote:
I was once a bouncer at a pretty hawt bar 2001-2003. One of the bar managers, a closet gamer like a few others of us, kept all the CR bags the bar went through. We had hundreds of them... seriosly... HUNDREDS. One late night, after closing, we sat down and split hem up. I ended up walking away with about 60 bags.
We had DnD players, Axis and Allies players and White Wolf stuff players. All of these folks needed dice bags.
I used the majority of them as bags to hold gifts, rewards, etc. for my gamers. They all have them now. I still have a dozen or so left over.
I do remember my SCA days, I made a few chainmail and leather bags myself. I still use a leather dice cup I made for the "10d6" fireballs I occasionally bust out on my players - when they arent' maximized!
anyone know what the current score is? am too lazy to go back and count.
Staple, definitely. Now that I think about it, I wonder where my old one is? Must have been all that Maker's Mark...
Well it appears as if my DM/player create quite a stir with this age old problem! To admit being a drunk player or not!
I have been using a Crown Royal bag since the eighties, and it has never worn out. What else can you say about a bag?
As for the best drink there has ever been in my long line of experience 20+ years, three liver transplants and two marriages, was a single malt scotch; Loc Dhu (no longer in production, by the by if anyone has any let me know. )
Oh great DM/Player I believe you lost that German wunderbar bag
on one of our great excursions into the wilderness sponsered by Mickey'sd Malt liquor!
Yes, Mickey's Malt Liquor back when it had a built in melee weapon--before the age of political correctness and (wisdom) said---"hmmm....maybe we shouldn't include a shank with every bottle of malt liquor we sell..."
You guys don't know how happy Ray'Kal was to find out that drinking 4 cups of coffee a day cuts your danger of liver cirrhosis by 80%! This revelation by researchers finally revealed why he hasn't really needed those liver transplants yet ;)
Yes, Mickey's Malt Liquor back when it had a built in melee weapon--before the age of political correctness and (wisdom) said---"hmmm....maybe we shouldn't include a shank with every bottle of malt liquor we sell..."
You guys don't know how happy Ray'Kal was to find out that drinking 4 cups of coffee a day cuts your danger of liver cirrhosis by 80%! This revelation by researchers finally revealed why he hasn't really needed those liver transplants yet ;)
Mickeys hand grenades had shanks too?!
Ray'Kal, re: Loc Dhu Scotch (The Black Scotch)
One bar here in Portland has some. Paddy's Bar and Grill, top shelf of the wall of booze.
Yes, back in the early 80's and prior, Mickey's Malt liquor bottles used to open by peeling back the metal top via a triangular strip down the middle of the metal bottle cap. When removed, the top was a three bladed cutting instrument.
Once I gained regular employment, Mickeys went out the back door. I picked up some in the early 90's for nostalgia and found that: a) It tastes like crap b) the shank was gone, replaced by a screw top that is useless as a weapon....oh well....
I happen to have about 12 Crown Royal bags. They are faitly easy to get, considering the amount of people I know who drink and the fact that my wife is a bartender ;). I do believe they are a staple of gaming society. Every member of my last group had at least 2 each.
I have a plethora of Crown Royal bags. About a yar ago or so, the company that makes Crown Royal offered personal embroiderd names for their bags at a small cost. I bought one and got it embroiderd "DnD Boozers Dice Bag". :-)
Plain purple cloth, plain shiny-yellow-thread embroidery, pre-technology draw-string top. A Crown Royal bag would blend into the D&D universe. Given how well it matches, whether inadvertently aside, I find it hard to call it a "cop-out." There are few better thematic options.
"Copping-out" is my players and their zip-loc bags or back-pack pockets.
Fanny packs are a test of courage, so I won't slight their selection.
A Crown Royal bag would blend into the D&D universe.
Does anyone remember the magazine ads that came out about the time of D&D 3.0? They showed a forested scene, with a sword, mace, shield...the core rulebooks and a bag that looked a lot like a Crown Royal one. It amused me greatly that someone thought to include what seems to be a Gamer's Staple in the advert.
Now that you mention it, I'm sure I've seen "Weigh Your Options" ads that had purple cloth drawstring bags on the non-CDs side of the piles...
So, that would kind of mean that the Crown Royal bags are actually sort of a... erm... thing-that-designates-status-as-a-visual-cue... Hallmark? Calling Card? Symbol of Geekhood? What's the word I'm looking for here... Part of how we display an association, like a guild tattoo...