To Court the King
As a royal petitioner attending court, the players must parlay their powers of persuasion to gain the support of court officials and sway the King to their cause.
The player's persuasive powers, in a constantly shifting court, are represented by dice. Each starts with three dice. Each turn, a player rolls the dice, sets aside at least one die, and re-rolls the rest until he has set all his dice aside. With these dice, if they form an appropriate pattern, a player may obtain an character card, giving him another die or a special power.
The first player to roll seven of a kind gains the King’s support and, possibly, victory! The support of the King (and Queen) is often the difference in the final roll-off, which determines the winner!
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I first played this game at a con I attended, and the game made such an impression on me that even despite only playing the game once, I have remembered it to this day. This should express my love of the game in a greater way than merely describing it ever could. Even now, I can remember everything about the game in almost perfect detail.
To Court The King is a dice game that offers a lot with very little. All you really need to play the game are the character cards from the game and a WHOLE lot of dice (the game comes with 12, which should be more than enough). Any six-sided dice will do, but the standard variety are the best. The game involves trying to gain the king (and queen) cards through rolling the dice. As the game synopsis provided by the publisher details, you need to do this by rolling seven-of-a-kind. Understandably, since you only start the game with three dice, one might call that a WEE bit impossible. But that’s what the other character cards in the game are for. As you play the game, you can gain the use of character cards that will give you additional die to roll, or possibly allow the manipulation of dice to get a better result.
Allow me to explain. By rolling the three dice you have, you end up with a result. You can store at least one die, or all of them if you prefer. You then reroll the ones you don’t want, at least one, then if you have any dice left, continue the process until all the dice values are set aside. With these set dice, you now have a value, or pattern. With three dice, there are a limited number of patterns you can generate. For instance, a total of 15+ on your die totals will allow you to gain a character that gives you another die that is set to the 1 value initially, that you can reroll along with the rest of the dice if you so wish to gain a different value. If you roll all even dice, you can gain a character that allows you to move one pip between two dice (moving one pip from a four-die to a two-die gives both dice a value of three). And so on and so forth. As you gain dice and the ability to manipulate dice, you can roll better patterns and results to gain more and more ability. And even if you can’t hit a roll, you always have the option to default to a Jester card, which you can get for free (he allows you to reroll one die beyond your normal rerolls).
There is no point system in the game; you don’t gain a score by getting combinations a la yatzhee. Instead, you want to get that seven-of-a-kind first. If you do, you initiate the start of the endgame. There is one round of additional rolling for all players, in which the person who first rolled the seven-of-a-kind goes last. In this round, all the players are trying to better the result of the one who gained the King card. Let me explain this with an example with a 4-player setup:
Player 1 has 8 dice with which to roll. He or she rolls 7 3’s on their roll of the dice. He or she courts the King, which announces the last round of play. Player 1 ALSO gets control of the Queen card, since he or she was the first to accomplish this task. Now all the players will roll once more, with Player 1 going last. Player 2 also has 8 dice, and fails to roll 7 of a kind. Player 2 therefore cannot court the King. Player 3 has 9 dice, and manages to roll 7 2’s on their roll of the dice. Since the value of 3 is greater than the value of 2, Player 3 also fails to court the King. Player 4 has 8 dice, and manages to roll 7 4’s. Since 4 is greater than 3, Player 4 gains control of the King card (but not the Queen). If Player 1 cannot roll greater than 7 4’s on his or her roll of the dice, then Player 4 will win. Player 1 takes their last turn, and gets one additional die to roll because of controlling the Queen card. He or she rolls 9 dice total, and manages a roll of 8 1’s. Although 1 is lower in value than 4, eight-of-a-kind trumps seven-of-a-kind in value, so therefore, Player 1 regains control of the King, and therefore wins the game, since no other player can roll.
Unlike most dice games, there is a a lot of strategy involved in the heat of the moment with this one. You want to increase the number of dice that you have, and increase the amount of control you have over the values of the die. Once you have the right setup, rolling seven-of-a-kind is easier than it sounds. But you need to pay attention to your opponents and their progress, because if you spend too much time on any one facet, you can handicap yourself if push comes to shove. This turns the game effectively into a race, and you need to be creative in order to see the possibilities that will enable you to come out on top. The game is highly competitive, but you’re not doing anything to handicap your opponents, so there are (usually) no sore feelings after leaving the table. It’s all about what you can do with the hand that you’re dealt, and those that are creative enough and determined enough can truly earn the right to court the King.