Dice Town
Who will own the town when the dice are rolled?
Gold mines are lush prairie land await, drawing pioneers and settlers like bears to honey. Prospectors and bank robbers, cattle barons and swindlers descend on the town, all competing to cut off the biggest piece for themselves. Opportunities are everywhere, if you're smart enough - and lucky enough - to snatch them up.
Dice Town is the poker game of dice and land grabs, where your roll determines your luck, not the other way around. Roll the poker dice and build the hand that gets you what you want. Rob the bank, mine for gold, or settle the land, but be smart, because only the best rolls can win, and there's always someone willing to steal your hard-won rewards right out from under you. If your hand isn't what you hoped it would be, you can always pay to try again - as long as you can afford it, that is.
Featuring high-quality poker dice, plastic dice cups and beautiful illustrations, Dice Town will entertain two to five players and wrap up in less than an hour. Spend your money to make the best hand you can, because in this town, luck may decide the winner, but the best players make their own luck.
User Reviews (3)
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I played Dice Town for the first time six years ago. At that time, I didn’t own it, it was my friend’s copy and for a period of time, we used to play it every weekend. Then, the owner of the game started to get tired of the luck component of the game, arguing that everyone is luckier than him and that everyone goes against him, trying to steal his properties or his higher value cards. Anyways, my husband and I always liked this quick game, its components and the theme and we finally decided to buy it, hoping to introduce it to our family, since we believe it is easy enough for our parents or the younger people in the family to play. Let me explain how the game works:
GAME PLAY
Each turn consists of two phases:
1) Put together a Poker Hand using the 5 Poker dice that each player has
2) Depending on the nature of the hand, taking control of various places in Dice Town that allow players to do different actions
Putting together the Poker Hand is very easy: Players roll the dice and choose one die to keep it aside. Then, they roll the remaining dice and choose another one until they have five. However, players can also keep more than one die or none, paying cash as a penalization (a dollar per extra die kept/removed). When one player is done rolling dice, then the rest of the players have one last roll.
Once everyone has a Poker Hand, the actions that can be done in the city are resolved in the following order:
9’s: the player with the higher number of 9’s receives as many gold nuggets as the number of dice showing a 9.
10’s: the player with the higher number of 10’s steals the bank, where the money that was paid the turn before has been stored
J’s: this is the general store: the player with the highest number of J’s takes as many cards as the J’s rolled and choose one. Players can find Equipment cards, which award victory points (from 1 to 8 VP), or action cards, which allow players to take an action twice, to change a die when rolling, and other different actions
Q’s: the player with the highest number of Q’s goes to the Saloon and is allowed to look at other player’s cards, as many as the number of Q’s in his hand, and keep one.
K’s: the player with the highest number of K’s receives the Sheriff title and is thereon the person in charge of resolving ties.
The Town hall: the player with the best Poker Hand receives the first of the three Property cards revealed. Then, for each Ace, a player may take the next Property card. Property cards also provide victory points, from 1 to 5.
Finally, if a player has not been able to complete any action, she can go to Doc Badluck and do one of the three possible actions depending on the dice rolled.
Turn after turn, players do the actions that their hands allow them until all the gold nuggest are taken or all the property cards are acquired. Then, players can finally add their victory points. Victory points can be obtained from different sources:
– Property Cards
– Equipment Cards
– Sheriff title in the last turn: 5 VP
– Gold nuggest: 1 VP each
– Money: 2 dollars=1 VP
CONCLUSION
All in all, and in my opinion, this is a fast-paced game in which luck plays an important role. It probably plays better with 4 or 5 players, since it becomes harder to keep track of which player has the highest value cards. Also, the more the players in the game, the highest the chances of ties happening, which makes the role of the Sheriff more important. This game can be a great filler for hardcore gamers and a favorite for family gamers. I haven’t tried it with kids yet, but I am sure they will love it, especially when it comes to rolling the dice or stealing cards from other players. The most difficult part, being able to understand what the best hand is, can be overcome thanks to the summary provided in the back of the property cards.
Bought this game just before the holidays. Took it out, read the directions, and was ready to play in about an hour or so. The game plays 5 players wonerfully and seemed to play better with more folks.
The goal of the game is to build poker hands and then influence the town members. The cool thing is that having the best hand is not always the absolute best case scenario. For example a fistful of nines influences different characters while queens and kings work on other townsfolk. After all the dice are rolled, and by the way , there is an excellent mechanic to keep dice or to discard them while building your hand, the board plays itself out. That aspect is similar to Age of Empires Three if you have played.
Once those hands are played the real fun begins. The players then have cards and powers they have been accumulating in order to “jinx”the board….and it gets downright cutthroat.
Numerous strategies lead to victory in this game and it is possible to come from behind and wollop the whole gosh darned table. As far as ages, well my ten year olds played this as well and were able to compete. Some luck, some strategy, and lots of calculated risks make this game an absolute keeper in my house!!!!
Dice Town is a great family game. It has the “cowboys and Indians” aspect which appeals to little boys and girls and an almost nostalgic appeal for parents and other grown-up players. The graphics are good, the rules are clear, and it’s easy to play. As with many tabletop games, it does take a while to learn to play, but the repetition of the steps in each round of the game make it easy for beginners as well as more advanced players. A big plus for my gaming group is that it is easy for beginners to play alongside more advanced players without slowing down the game and lessening the fun for the more advanced players. It’s great for players of all ages because it doesn’t take much strategy to play.
I’d recommend the game especially for family play. We have played with players much younger than the recommended age of 8, and except for needing some assistance making the best poker hand from their dice, the younger players had no difficulty. Everyone enjoyed the pieces of gold and the Old West aspects of the game.