Yeah, we wrote the characters in a way where none of them really listen to each other's advice, but they do come to respect each other eventually. I based both off the relationship I had with one of my mentors.
As far as the controls go, it's your fault we wanted to make them difficult to show how terrible of an idea pool with dice would be. We didn't give you the tilt controls back because we wanted you to be engaged throughout the game, and tilting dice around on the table isn't as fun as trying to herd dice towards the pockets.
Glad you liked it! Thanks for the great feedback!