Introduction
FARKLE is a push-your-luck game in which the objective is to be the first player to accumulate 10.000 points. The play is passed back and forth as players attempt to gather point-scoring melds while evaluating if the risk of rolling a farkle and losing all unbanked points is worth the lure of getting just a few more points. As with many games Farkle is played in numerous regions with dozens of variations. The version we have here is among the simpler ones, and only includes the standard melds common to most variations we could find.
Rolling, scoring, banking
The game is played with six dice. A player starts their turn by throwing all six dice.Once the dice have been rolled the player may put aside any dice that form scoring melds (see melds below). A player must put aside at least one scoring die each throw, but beyond that is free in what dice they put aside or throw again.
Players may now roll any remaining dice not already put aside in hopes of being able to make more melds, risking the chance of farkling (see below) and scoring nothing. Players who decide not to take that risk can instead bank. When a player banks any points earned during the round are added to the grand total and are safe for the rest of the game. The player's turn ends and they pass all dice to their opponent who takes their turn.
All dice in a meld must come from one throw
Melds do not carry over between throws. If you score two ones in one throw and set them aside throwing a one in the next throw does not mean you have three ones, it means you have a set of two ones worth 200, and a separate set of one worth 100 for a total of 300. Any formed melds must contain dice obtained from a single throw.
Farkling
If there are no melds on the table after a player throws their dice they have 'farkled'. When a player farkles their turn is over, play passes to their opponent, and any unbanked points earned during the round are lost. With every throw the odds of farkling grow higher, and the player risks more and more points in the process. The key of the game comes in finding when you should risk the farkle and throw again, and when you should call it quits and bank your points.
Hot Dice
In the case a player can form melds from all the dice they threw they have thrown 'Hot dice'. Such a player can now, if they choose, pick up all six dice they have and throw them again, effectively restarting their turn. Any points they already earned before throwing the hot dice are kept as part of the accumulating round total and are risked along with any new melds made with the hot dice. A player can thus continue indefinitely as long as they never farkle.
Game End
The game ends once either player ends their turn with more than 10.000 points banked. The game doesn't automatically end your turn when you hypothetically reach the threshold, because we've found it to be more fun to manually bank for the win and in the cases were we want to see how far we can push our already sizable lead. However once you find that banking will lead to you winning we recommend doing so, unless you just want to show off to Bill.
Melds
The following are the melds that the game recognizes.
- Ones: Any die depicting a one. Worth 100 points each.
- Fives: Any die depicting a five. Worth 50 points each.
- Three Ones: A set of three dice depicting a one. worth 1000 points
- Three Twos: A set of three dice depicting a two. worth 200 points
- Three Threes: A set of three dice depicting a three. worth 300 points
- Three Fours: A set of three dice depicting a four. worth 400 points
- Three Fives: A set of three dice depicting a five. worth 500 points
- Three Sixes: A set of three dice depicting a six. worth 600 points
- Four of a kind: Any set of four dice depicting the same value. Worth 1000 points
- Five of a kind: Any set of five dice depicting the same value. Worth 2000 points
- Six of a kind: Any set of six dice depicting the same value. Worth 3000 points
- Three Pairs: Any three sets of two pairs of dice. Includes having a four of a kind plus a pair. Worth 1500 points
- Run: Six dice in a sequence (1,2,3,4,5,6). Worth 2500 points
And that's it!
Want to play Farkle? Play a round at Cardgames.io.
