Donate Life America’s ‘The Healing Dice’ Have Tiny Organs inside Them

Table top role-playing games are more popular than ever, attracting an extremely passionate group of fans. Gamers work together to create stories that contain epic drama, life and death themes, and heroic quests. These selfless heroes and healers are exactly the kinds of people likely to become a registered organ donor. Seeing the value alignment, Donate Life America, the nonprofit keeper of the National Donate Life Registry, created a custom set of polyhedral gaming dice with tiny hand-painted organs and tissues inside: The Healing Dice.

While a usual set includes seven dice, this limited edition set has eight—each containing one of the eight organs and tissues that can save and heal a life via deceased donation. The special eighth die, called The Lifesaving Die, features an anatomical heart and will only be for 'death saves' which are key life and death moments in a game.

More than 100,000 people are waiting for lifesaving organ transplants. One donor can save up to 8 lives and heal 75 more.

Kim Nguyen & Kate Placentra, creative directors at The Martin Agency, said: "Donate Life America has an incredible partnership with The Martin Agency, and we were so excited to get to work on this cause. 

"A message about organ donation made specifically for tabletop role-playing gamers seems odd and very niche. Like too niche, but as we fell deeper and deeper into the world of these games, there were so many themes that make sense for Donate Life America. Life and death, healing through selfless acts, teamwork and storytelling, it’s all woven into this world. And this audience is super passionate and surprisingly big. 

"There are a lot of folks out there who love role-playing games and collect things that make their gaming experience more fun and immersive. Our goal was to make something that fit neatly into their world, but also gently nudged these gamers to become registered organ donors. So The Healing Dice! If you like TTRPGs, you get it immediately. If you don’t, that’s ok, they’re still really cool dice."

David Fleming, president and CEO, Donate Life America, says: "Donate Life America is excited to work with The Martin Agency again to creatively engage new audiences in the lifesaving and healing opportunities made possible by organ, eye and tissue donation. The Healing Dice offer a unique opportunity to parallel gameplay that honors and protects life with the lifesaving role each of us can play in the real world.

"The Martin Agency has once again crafted a campaign for Donate Life America that creatively reaches and engages new audiences. We are excited to see how people incorporate the new “lifesaving roll” in tabletop games with their lifesaving role in the real world to help save and heal lives through organ, eye and tissue donation."