Farkle
Keep rolling for more points, or bank them before one bad roll takes the lot.
Also called Zilch or Ten Thousand. The scoring table below is the most widely played version; every family has a tweak, so read it out before the first roll.
A turn
- Roll all six dice.
- Set aside at least one scoring die or combination. Non-scoring dice cannot be kept.
- Either bank everything you have set aside this turn, or roll the remaining dice for more.
- Roll and score nothing, and you farkle: the whole turn is lost and play passes on.
Scoring table
- Single 1 — 100 points. Single 5 — 50 points.
- Three of a kind — the number times 100, except three 1s, which are 1,000.
- Four of a kind — double the three-of-a-kind score. Five of a kind — double again. Six of a kind — double once more.
- Straight 1 to 6 — 1,500 points.
- Three pairs — 1,500 points.
- Two triplets — 2,500 points.
Nothing else scores. A lone 2, 3, 4 or 6 is worthless.
Hot dice
If every one of your six dice scores, the dice are hot. Bank what you have or pick all six up and roll again, adding to the same running total. This is where big turns come from, and where they die.
Getting on the board
Most groups require 500 points in a single turn before your first score counts. Until then, banking less than 500 gets you nothing. After you are on the board, any amount can be banked.
Winning
First to 10,000 triggers a final round: everyone else gets one more turn to beat that total. Highest score at the end wins. Playing to 5,000 halves the length without changing the feel.
Questions
Do I have to keep every scoring die?
No, only at least one. Keeping a single 1 out of two so you can re-roll five dice is a normal, and often correct, play.
What is a farkle exactly?
A roll where none of the dice score. You lose everything set aside that turn, not what you had banked earlier.
Is three pairs really worth 1,500?
In the most common table yes, though some houses score it 750 or 1,000. It is the single biggest rule difference between groups.