How to Play Yacht Dice Game

Yacht is the public domain dice game upon which the published games Yahtzee and Kismet are both based. Here's how to play.

The Basics of Yacht

Players

1 or more players. Best with 2 to 5 players.

Equipment

5 six-sided dice, along with pencil and paper to keep score.

Goal

To score more points than your opponents by rolling certain combinations of numbers.

Setup

Create a score sheet with 12 rows and a column for each player. Label the rows as follows:

• Yacht
• Large Straight
• Small Straight
• Four of a Kind
• Full House
• Player's Choice
• Sixes
• Fives
• Fours
• Threes
• Twos
• Ones

Definitions

• Yacht: Five of the same number (e.g. 4-4-4-4-4).
• Large Straight: Five in a row starting with 6 (i.e. 6-5-4-3-2).
• Small Straight: Five in a row starting with 5 (i.e. 5-4-3-2-1).
• Four of a Kind: Four of the same number (e.g. 5-4-4-4-4).
• Full House: Three of one number, two of a different number (e.g. 4-4-4-1-1).
• Player's Choice: Any combination of dice.
• Sixes: Only sixes count for scoring.
• Fives: Only fives count for scoring.
• Fours: Only fours count for scoring.
• Threes: Only threes count for scoring.
• Twos: Only twos count for scoring.
• Ones: Only ones count for scoring.

How to Play

A turn starts with a player rolling all five dice. The player may then set aside any number of dice, rerolling the others, or he may stop rolling and proceed to scoring. It is legal for a player to reroll all five dice. It is also legal to reroll dice previously set aside.

On each turn, a player has a maximum of three rolls. After a third roll, the player must stop rolling and proceed to scoring.

Each player will have 12 turns during the game. After each turn, the player must enter a score in one of the rows on the score sheet.

Example: Ana rolls a 1-2-2-4-6. For her second roll, she decides to keep the 2s and reroll the other three dice. She rolls 4-4-6, so she now has 2-2-4-4-6. She has already scored a Full House, so for her third roll, she decides to keep the 4s and reroll the other three dice. She rolls 1-4-4 and now has 1-4-4-4-4. She decides to score for Four of a Kind.

It is likely that a player will make a roll that does not qualify to earn points in any of the remaining categories. In this case, the player must mark a "0" in one of the available categories.

Yacht Scoring and Values

• Yacht: 50 points. (It does not matter what numbers are on the dice.)
• Large Straight: 30 points.
• Small Straight: 30 points.
• Four of a Kind: Up to 30 points. (Add the point values on all five dice, so 4-4-4-4-1 would score 17 points. It is legal to use five of a kind for this category, so 6-6-6-6-6 would score 30 points.)
• Full House: Up to 28 points. (Add the point values on all five dice, so 3-3-3-6-6 would score 21 points. To earn points for a full house, the three of a kind must be different than the pair.)
• Player's Choice: Up to 30 points. (This serves as a "wild card." Simply add the point values on all five dice.)
• Sixes: Up to 30 points. (Add the point values of all sixes rolled.)
• Fives: Up to 25 points. (Add the point values of all fives rolled.)
• Fours: Up to 20 points. (Add the point values of all fours rolled.)
• Threes: Up to 15 points. (Add the point values of all threes rolled.)
• Twos: Up to 10 points. (Add the point values of all twos rolled.)
• Ones: Up to 5 points. (Add the point values of all ones rolled.)

Winning Yacht

After every player has scored in each category, the players each total their scores. The player with the highest score wins.