Yatzy

About this game

Yatzy is the classic five-dice game, and this is the Scandinavian version it is named after — fifteen scoring boxes, three rolls a turn, and a bonus waiting at the top of the card. On your turn you roll all five dice, keep any you like, and reroll the rest up to twice more. Then comes the only real decision in the game: which box to spend the result on. Every box can be used exactly once, so a good roll in the wrong place is a wasted roll, and there will be turns where nothing fits and you have to choose what to sacrifice. The upper section pays for volume — ones through sixes, scoring the sum of that face — and if the six of them add up to 63 or more you collect a 50 point bonus. Sixty-three is three of every face, which makes it a running target rather than an afterthought: fall behind on the low numbers and you spend the rest of the game trying to make it up with sixes. The lower section pays for shape instead. One pair and two pairs, three and four alike, a full house, the small straight at 15 and the large at 20, chance for when nothing else works, and Yatzy itself — all five dice showing the same face, worth a flat 50. The computer decides what to keep by simulation rather than by rule of thumb: for each of the thirty-two possible ways to hold the dice it plays the rest of the turn out hundreds of times and takes the one that pays best on average. That means it will break up a pair to chase a straight when the numbers say so, and it chases the upper bonus when it is still reachable — which is exactly where most casual players lose the game. If you would rather play a friend, switch to two players and pass the phone. Everything is playable by touch or keyboard, and the whole card fits a phone in portrait.

Controls

Tap Roll to throw the dice, tap any die to keep it, then tap a box on the scorecard to score there.

Keyboard

• 1-5 keep a die.
• R rolls.

How to play

Each turn you roll five dice, then may keep any of them and reroll the rest, twice more at most. When you are done rolling you must write the result into one of your fifteen boxes, and each box can only be used once.

Upper section

• The upper section scores the sum of a single face: put three fours in the Fours box and you score 12.
• If your six upper boxes total 63 or more you earn a 50 point bonus.

Lower section

• The lower section scores shapes: pairs, two pairs, three and four alike, a full house
• A small straight of 1-2-3-4-5 for 15, a large straight of 2-3-4-5-6 for 20
• Chance for the plain sum of all five, and Yatzy — five of a kind — for 50

Taking a zero

• If nothing fits you must still choose a box and take the zero, so part of the game is deciding which box you can most afford to lose.
• Highest total when all thirty boxes are filled wins.

Read the full Yatzy rules and strategy →

Questions about Yatzy