Submitted: 11 March 2000

Tidings from the North

by Blakarin C'darn

Kaldar. The Kaldar calls, "Baresh! I promised these boys a round of your finest ale!" They make their way to a large round table and sit, laughing at one thing or another.

By the time the drinks are brought to the band they had already produced two small dice and were throwing them about the table over piles of gold coins. Every so often one of them would cry something in Gamgweth, and they would each rake up a small hill of coins. Blakarin, the Kaldar, noticed Baresh's intrigue and said loudly, "Come on over, we'll show you how to play."

"I was up near Therenbough when I met these four Togs here playing TogBall with a

Blood Wolf." His company cackles with laughter, mimicking Blakarins reaction when they first threw him the 'ball.' Blakarin chortles and says, "After that they showed me this game they play with dice..."

"The game is called Atila. We play it with these." Blakarin snatches up some crude pine dice and shows them to Baresh. "At the beginning of the game everyone places an amount of coins in the center of the table. It's called the zokron, or zok for short; it means the first coin. Usually the zok is about 1 platinum coin." He points to one of the plats in his pile.

"Once the zok is paid, everyone but the roller places a bet. You can put up to one tenth of your zok on either neiv, heg or sei -- low, high or seven --, so here we could bet up to a gold. Once all bets are placed, you roll the dice.

"If the dice add up to 2 through 6 neiv wins, if the dice add up to 8 through 12 heg wins. If the dice add up to 7 sei wins. If no one bet on the winning number then the roll is din'bair, and nobody wins. When someone wins, they get to take twice what they bet back out of the pot. If someone wins with a sei, they take four times what they bet out. Watch..."

Blakarin bangs a hand on the table and shouts "Atila!" which catches the four Gor'Tog's attention. They all throw in gold kronars as two shout 'heg,' one says 'neiv,' and the last spouts 'sei,' which causes the two beside him to whack him playfully.

Blakarin tosses his pine dice with a clatter! They come up showing 5 and 3!

He scoops up his dice before anyone else can touch them.

Blakarin yells, "Heg!" and the first two Togs collect their winnings. "See? It's simple." He looks to Baresh, "And you keep doing that until the dice are thrown five times, or the pot goes dinta; empty. At the end of the game the roller gets whatever is left in the pot and you pick a new roller and start again."

"Come on, play a game with us!"