Bang! The Dice Game - Tips & Strategies

If you are the renegade for your first few rounds re-roll almost all your dice that you can going for the gatling symbols. Only keep the range target symbols if you can finish off a character. Use beers for yourself, but be willing to spend a beer, if necessary, on the sheriff.

When playing a 3 player game we observed that the ranged shot of 2 became irrelevant since everyone is considered to be at a distance of one. To make the game more interesting and causing the dice to become more relevant, when a ranged shot of 1 is rolled that indicates that you have shot the player to your right. When a ranged shot of 2 is rolled this indicates that you have shot the player on your left.

While I found that this implementation of Bang is a relatively faithful recreation of the original game Bang, I did find that the Dynamite rule to be rather inconsequential. The rules indicate that when rolling 3 or more dynamite causes the player to lose 1 point of health and allows for resolution of other dice in addition to immediately ending that players turn. Herein lies the problem. If the unlucky player gets at least 3 dynamite, the other non-dynamite dice can still allow for up to 2 shots or 2 beer. Rolling even 1 beer in addition to the dynamite can completely negate the effects of the dynamite itself, this seems very unbalanced.

To correct this situation, we have house ruled that dynamite, in addition to causing the immediate end of that players turn, causes 2 damage and the other dice (not dynamite) are left unresolved and are not used in that turn. Thematically, we have found this to be a better fit and doesn’t allow for the possibility of having the effects of the dice negated.

I believe in the rulebook, it instructs you to announce what job you are once you’ve been defeated. Our house rule states that all jobs are secret until very end. That way, nobody really knows who is who during the game, and it’s a fun little side game even for those no longer playing (watching from the graveyard).

We let anyone who wants to be sheriff, do it. The role isn’t secret and some of my people were getting annoyed at never getting to be the sheriff! Also, if no one wants it, just deal as normal and away you go!! The games are short enough that everyone gets a shot (or gets shot, or whatever).

So, the only complaint we have had with this game so far is that you can’t reach everyone with a roll of 1 or 2 (in a game of 5 or more). So, we decided to allow people to add their dice in order to reach someone… i.e. 1 + 2 = 3. Of course, we added the caveat that a 2 had to be involved… no 1 + 1 = 2. However 2 + 2 = 4 would be just fine. You can adjust this as you see necessary.

House Rule: You can add two dice to reach players further away.