Is "dice" a singular noun in the UK?

Check out this picture of a cardboard spinner which was distributed with board games when materials were scarce during WWII, so they couldn’t make dice.

The instructions on the spinner say, “when one dice only is required use large inside figures” and “The small figures represent the first dice, the large figures the second dice.”

They also appear to use “dice” properly as a plural on some parts.

So is this correct British English or an abomination?

Games Workshop, a current company based in the UK, does this as well.

According to the Cambridge online dictionary, it is. Singular die is cited as U.S. or “old-fashioned.”

And apart from in formal contexts (like on exam papers) I don’t think I’ve ever heard someone use ‘die’ as the singular noun over here, it sounds a bit weird.

Where’s “over here?” Do you really hear people (aside from little kids) say “give me one dice?”

Uk roleplayer for twenty years here. I and everyone i’ve ever gamed with use dice interchangably for singular and plural.

How often do you have occasion to use the singular of “dice” in RPGs, though? In my experience, you almost always have to specify the type, so you wouldn’t say “Hand me a dice”, you’d say “Hand me a d6”.

In roleplaying you’d be more likely to say “That’s my lucky dice”, “this dice is jinxed” and so forth. But plenty of scope for referring to individual dice.

Not I. Die = singular, dice= plural.

The dice is casted.

Dice is overwhelmingly singular and plural, similar to data.

Most people say “the data is conclusive” and “the dice was (or were) loaded”.

If I hear pepole say “the data are (or datum is) conclusive” and “the die is loaded” it tells me something about them (mostly that I would prefer to avoid an evening in their company).

Where do you live?

An exceptionally horrid maths teacher certainly taught me that the singular was die. That knowledge didn’t (and still doesn’t) stop me from using dice as both the singular and plural.

London, and yes. It wouldn’t feel completely natural to say “give me one dice” but it would be weirder to say “give me one die”, no one really uses that as the singular any more.

Another Brit: dice is singular and plural, and “die” is hardly ever used. In line with Wallenstein, somebody insisting on the “correct” use of die or datum isn’t somebody I’d be likely to hang around with!

Apologies - I’m in the UK.

I knew someone who always said “hand me a die 6” instead of “d6”. US though.

Jolly good show! I’d also rather die than give in to this modern corruption.

A lot of people here (including me) will say dice for singular as well as plural, even though it isn’t strictly correct. My brother takes the opposite view.

By modern, you mean “stemming from the 15th century”, right? :stuck_out_tongue: