Farkle

Farkle or Farkel is a dice game that has also been called Zonk, Zilch, 5000, 10000, Wimp Out, Hot Dice, Buzzball, Oh Crap, Quack, Sand, and Greedcite web|title=Farkle Rules|url=http://www.smartboxdesign.com/farklerules.html|publisher=Smart Box Design| quote=|accessdate=2007-07-24] . Its origins as a folk game are unknown, but it has been marketed commercially since 1982 [http://www.farklerules.com/wordpress/?page_id=16 History of Farkle] , Farkle Rules Blog] , since 1996 under the brand name Pocket Farkelcite web|title=Frequently Asked Questions|url=http://www.pocketfarkel.com/frequentquestions.html|publisher=Pocket Farkel| quote=|accessdate=2007-07-24] . While the basic rules are well-established, there is a wide range of variation in both scoring and play, as described belowcite web|title=My New Favorite Party Game -Farkel|url=http://www.bensfriends.com/crosstraining/archives/2005/07/20/my_new_favorite_party_game_farkel.html|publisher=| quote=|accessdate=2007-07-24] cite web|title=Farkle Deluxe|url=http://www.elversonpuzzle.com/farkle.html|publisher=Elverson Puzzle| quote=|accessdate=2007-07-24] *If none of the dice score in any given throw, the player has "farkled" and all points for that turn are lost.
*At the end of the player's turn, the dice are handed to the next player in succession (usually in clockwise rotation), and they have their turn.

Once a player has achieved a winning point total, each other player has "one" last turn to score enough points to surpass that high-score.

Standard Farkle Scoring

The following scores for single dice or combinations of dice are widely established, in that they are common to all or nearly all of the above-cited descriptions of farkle scoring.

Following are the probabilities of farkling if all variant scoring combinations are allowed, depending on the number of dice thrown.

The impact of four or five of a kind is substantially similar if they are scored as 1000 and 2000, respectively. If lower scores are awarded for straights or three pairs, the impact on average scoring will be proportionately lower.

The above table somewhat overstates the impact of straight and three pair on overall speed of play, as they only score on the initial throw of six dice.

Related Games

* Zonk
* Cosmic Wimpout
* Yahtzee
* 10000
* Sierra Games includes a version of Farkle, called Zilch, in one of their Hoyle series of games.
* Bowman Games has a version of Farkle called Fill or Bust! that incorporates cards as well; players gain bonuses listed on cards if they "fill" all available dice, and deal with specialty cards as well.
* Gammonsoft has a version of Farkle for the Mac called [http://www.bestbackgammon.com/farkle Absolute Farkle] .

References