Official Horse Race Game Thread (10 Viewers)

[WedgeRock]

x4 through x6? That’s a ton of scratches. What were these originally used for?

Optional doubling the scratch fine for the 2 and 12 horse.

 

[Parrothedd]

I am going to implement the rule where a player roles a 2 or 12, everyone else pays 2 units to the pot. We also play a "Daily Double" as the last race where all scratch fines are doubled - as is the jockey purse (ante).

 

[Venturalvn]

A buddy of mine must be jonesing while at home with his wife and kids...weather is nice so why not? Just got this pic sent to me

 

[Sprouty]

A buddy of mine must be jonesing while at home with his wife and kids...weather is nice so why not? Just got this pic sent to me

View attachment 900656

I have been thinking about a custom felt set up as a drag strip so I can use hot wheels. I was also thinking about using a single d12 die.

 

[Thisfiendis138]

How it started…

How it’s going…

 

[T_Chan]

I have been thinking about a custom felt set up as a drag strip so I can use hot wheels. I was also thinking about using a single d12 die.

Someone was telling me about a version they have for their backyard. It's huge which you put on the lawn. 6 horses, 1 die so you just bet on a horse and that's it. Not sure if there's still any scratches involved, but the single die makes it so that each horse has the same number of pegs since the odds are all the same.

 

[rrobyrrroby]

I tried the game last night with my friends and everyone just loved it!
"Designed" the bord in Excel, saved in pdf and printed as poster in 12 pages...

 

[rrobyrrroby]

Unicorn mold for the win!

 

[BSteck]

The Blanton board is done and ready for racing.

 

[TheOffalo]

Gonna take another shot at the horse racing game with my regular group of guys who didn't care about it that much. Already signs of dissent; I said we'd start at 630p with some ponies and poker, and one guy asked when the poker part was gonna start...

Maybe it'll catch, maybe it won't, but I'll give it the old college try. If it fails, there may be a For Sale post on the board...

 

[legonick]

Gonna take another shot at the horse racing game with my regular group of guys who didn't care about it that much. Already signs of dissent; I said we'd start at 630p with some ponies and poker, and one guy asked when the poker part was gonna start...

Maybe it'll catch, maybe it won't, but I'll give it the old college try. If it fails, there may be a For Sale post on the board...

It does feel like the perfect slot for this game is in cash games where you can play with the chips already on the table. You toss it in every X orbits, and it acts as a good way to take a break from poker, and also potentially distribute some money to those who are getting beat in poker.

That said, I've had fun with it playing before tournaments, but like you, I'm not sure how it'll stick. BUT - I am also looking forward to getting it into play with non-poker players. My neighbors sometimes have people over on a Friday or Saturday and I need to see if they'll let me bring this to mess with. I'm not a core part of that group, but get side invites sometimes. I also have another group of friends, 3 couples, that I think would have fun with this as well. Some of them are put off by the "hardcore" nature of poker, but this game is much more inviting.

 

[Chris Manzoni]

I've done the game once - as a "satellite" for a tournament, where players used chips and we counted the totals at the end and the leader got a seat to the tournament. A couple of interesting things -

I ran it as a "free roll" meaning I put the money for the seat up myself - and only 5 players out of 25 showed up early to participate. Literally giving money away and only 5 takers. Strange to me.

The game itself was hilarious and a great time, all five guys who showed up whooped and hollered and had a fantastic amount of fun. So much fun that when they were done playing, they, on their own, agreed to do another game and this time put in their own money and play with quarters for real money. They had another game with just as much yelling and laughing - and chips flying all over the place.

So I think there is great potential here, even faced with a fairly indifferent player pool - those that did show up had a raucously good time.

I am going to run another "satellite" in a few weeks at my monthly event. I won't be putting up my own money this time, it'll be $5 apiece. If I get fewer players it will likely be the last one, but hopefully word has spread as to how much fun it was and we'll get at least a half dozen or so.

 

[legonick]

I've done the game once - as a "satellite" for a tournament, where players used chips and we counted the totals at the end and the leader got a seat to the tournament. A couple of interesting things -

I ran it as a "free roll" meaning I put the money for the seat up myself - and only 5 players out of 25 showed up early to participate. Literally giving money away and only 5 takers. Strange to me.

The game itself was hilarious and a great time, all five guys who showed up whooped and hollered and had a fantastic amount of fun. So much fun that when they were done playing, they, on their own, agreed to do another game and this time put in their own money and play with quarters for real money. They had another game with just as much yelling and laughing - and chips flying all over the place.

So I think there is great potential here, even faced with a fairly indifferent player pool - those that did show up had a raucously good time.

I am going to run another "satellite" in a few weeks at my monthly event. I won't be putting up my own money this time, it'll be $5 apiece. If I get fewer players it will likely be the last one, but hopefully word has spread as to how much fun it was and we'll get at least a half dozen or so.

How did you determine the winner? Most chips after X amount of rounds? If so, what was your X? And how did you estimate that in relation to time?

 

[Chris Manzoni]

Just played one race. Everyone started with 40 chips. Whoever had the most chips total at the end was the winner. If we'd had a tie we would've had a tiebreaker race.

 

[wonderpuddle]

So I’ve been working on a little project to have my game allow for donkey racing instead of just ponies. My upcoming CPC set is donkey themed:

So I decided to try to come up with some donkeys we could race. Busted out the 3d printed prototypes at @TricycleClub ’s game last night:

Next up: trying to get him cast in pewter…

 

[Samuel]

Sweet, WP!

Didn't need them but I bought a few more mario kart mini figurines and installed 6mm set screws in my Fineni board holes. Screwed some computer hard drive mounting screws into the bottoms of the figurines, added some magnets and voila, we can now play upside down if need be... haha.

Ordered 4 of these little guys for the scratched positions but they haven't arrived yet...

 

[TheOffalo]

@wonderpuddle @Samuel ingenious both of you!

 

[Sprouty]

Love the different ideas rolling through!

 

[Darson]

Does anyone have a good feel for what size chipset would work well for this game? So far we've only played at my house so there's definitely no shortage but my buddy is having a Derby themed birthday party this weekend and I wanted to take the game along but will have to bring chips. I was thinking something like 200x quarters and 200x $1.

 

[BSteck]

Does anyone have a good feel for what size chipset would work well for this game? So far we've only played at my house so there's definitely no shortage but my buddy is having a Derby themed birthday party this weekend and I wanted to take the game along but will have to bring chips. I was thinking something like 200x quarters and 200x $1.

I'd say you want starting stacks at least 100x your base amount - 200x would be even better. So for a quarter game you'd want $25-$50 starting stacks.

 

[Teach42]

Trying to catch up on this and just did a quick read through of the rules.... Ultimately, is this all just chance? Or is there any skill to it at all?

 

[NotDunric]

Trying to catch up on this and just did a quick read through of the rules.... Ultimately, is this all just chance? Or is there any skill to it at all?

100% chance.
I've brainstormed some ways to add a bit of agency to the game in the form of drafting cards instead of dealing them completely blind, but haven't had a chance to try any of the ideas yet. Ultimately with it being dice-driven there's enough randomness regardless, so it wouldn't likely change much anyway.

 

[CrazyEddie]

100% chance.
I've brainstormed some ways to add a bit of agency to the game in the form of drafting cards instead of dealing them completely blind, but haven't had a chance to try any of the ideas yet. Ultimately with it being dice-driven there's enough randomness regardless, so it wouldn't likely change much anyway.

I had a few ideas about turning it into a game of skill using trading and auctions. Very simple extensions that would add a lot of skill to the game over the long run while still being mostly luck in the short run - which is exactly how horse race handicapping works (and poker, for that matter). See here and here.

 

[TheOffalo]

So the second try at horse racing last Friday was more of a success. I implemented these changes:

• We bought in and cashed out separately for the horse race and did not carry those stacks into our poker game, even though we play cash and it shouldn't be a big deal, but some of the guys didn't like that last time.
• We rolled for scratched horses very quickly (just had one player do it), re-rolling if an already-scratched horse was rolled, and cards were not dealt out first so no one paid out during the scratch phase.
• We then dealt out an equal number of cards to players, setting aside the remainders. That means some horses only had 2-3 cards in play and each card held a bigger share if the horse won.
• We used a flat 1x (25¢) scratch bet amount for all four scratched horses, with everyone anteing 1 unit.

This allowed the game to get to the rolling stage very quickly, and kept the pot relatively small. We ran three races before everyone there for poker arrived, so 4-5 players for the race, and people seemed to like the way the races ran better.

Next time, I'll probably introduce the 1x through 4x again, but maybe keep the scratch phase quick and simple, and only pay bets during the roll/race phase...

OR I'll reintroduce paying during scratch phase but keeping it at 1x for all four horses, starting with equal number of cards, setting aside remainders, and then letting players who were hit bad during scratch phase get the remaining cards (hopefully there are some left after scratches).

 

[legonick]

So the second try at horse racing last Friday was more of a success. I implemented these changes:

• We bought in and cashed out separately for the horse race and did not carry those stacks into our poker game, even though we play cash and it shouldn't be a big deal, but some of the guys didn't like that last time.
• We rolled for scratched horses very quickly (just had one player do it), re-rolling if an already-scratched horse was rolled, and cards were not dealt out first so no one paid out during the scratch phase.
• We then dealt out an equal number of cards to players, setting aside the remainders. That means some horses only had 2-3 cards in play and each card held a bigger share if the horse won.
• We used a flat 1x (25¢) scratch bet amount for all four scratched horses, with everyone anteing 1 unit.

This allowed the game to get to the rolling stage very quickly, and kept the pot relatively small. We ran three races before everyone there for poker arrived, so 4-5 players for the race, and people seemed to like the way the races ran better.

Next time, I'll probably introduce the 1x through 4x again, but maybe keep the scratch phase quick and simple, and only pay bets during the roll/race phase...

OR I'll reintroduce paying during scratch phase but keeping it at 1x for all four horses, starting with equal number of cards, setting aside remainders, and then letting players who were hit bad during scratch phase get the remaining cards (hopefully there are some left after scratches).

Interesting tweaks. Glad to see everyone had more fun this go around. I'm surprised those changes worked - I like the scratch phase as it sets people up for the race. Figuring out what horses you have a stake in, and who your "teammates" are - those with shared horses. Especially fun when it's split evenly between 2 players.

I'm going to sneak this game into my buddy's kid's birthday party on Saturday. No idea if we'll be able to play it at all due to all the other stuff going on, but maybe we'll be able to get a few games in. Hope he doesn't kick me out! LOL.

 

[legonick]

Trying to catch up on this and just did a quick read through of the rules.... Ultimately, is this all just chance? Or is there any skill to it at all?

Pure chance with the basic game.

I've enjoyed adding some tiny element of choice with having Aces being dealt out and acting as a "skip paying the pot 1 time" card. Adds some agency but takes a little money out of the pot. Worth trying it out...if you like how it plays, keep it!

 

[TheOffalo]

Interesting tweaks. Glad to see everyone had more fun this go around. I'm surprised those changes worked - I like the scratch phase as it sets people up for the race. Figuring out what horses you have a stake in, and who your "teammates" are - those with shared horses. Especially fun when it's split evenly between 2 players.

I think what was annoying to people the first time was they were learning how a totally new game worked for the first time, when they were there to play poker live after not playing for many months. So probably not the best time to delay the poker playing. And then we collectively, but especially a couple of people, were super unlucky during the scratch phase, having to pay a decent amount into the purse before the race even started, so seeing their stacks dwindle before the exciting part...

I agree the scratch phase can be fun for the reasons you mentioned, but not as fun as the race phase, so I'm trying to get them hooked on that more and then sneak the more traditional rules back in.

 

[swana]

I've got a little bit of a dilemma...

I've aquired the chips for a new custom relabel set with a $0.50 being the smallest denom. I did this to help nudge my game into higher stakes beyond the $.25/.$50 game we play today (granted the game plays bigger with 200x bb buy in). However recently also introduced the horse race game which has been a huge hit and by popular demand will now be a fixture in my game moving forward. The dilemma is that using $.50 as the base bet for the horse race game AND a move up in stakes might be a little rich for my game.

I have not actually relabeled my chips yet so am contemplating 1) just changing what was going to be the $.50 to a $.25 and stick with a $.25/.50 game 2) keeping the $.50 chip which would cause a raise in poker stakes AND in horse race game stakes (which might turn off a few players). 3) keep the $ .50 denom and use $.25 chips from another set for the horse race game ONLY. My concern with this approach would be guys just reverting to $.25 / $.50 blinds given the chips are already on the table.

Thoughts?

 

[warma]

You could go 50¢, 50¢, $1, $1 on the scratches. So it plays a bit higher than a 25¢ game, but not by much.

You could also play 50¢/50¢ poker for starters and refine from there.

 

[swana]

You could go 50¢, 50¢, $1, $1 on the scratches. So it plays a bit higher than a 25¢ game, but not by much.

You could also play 50¢/50¢ poker for starters and refine from there.

I like the idea of the $ .50 / $.50 / $1 / $1 on the horse game!! Great suggestion! I was thinking about the $.50 / $.50 blinds already as the baby steps for poker. Our game pretty much already plays like a $.50 / $1 but with for some reason ppl have been reluctant to increase blinds.