Plenty of adults will not be drinking at a game night, for reasons that are nobody's business. A snakes and ladders game for adults suits that table, because this dice game keeps hands busy while people talk. What it needs is an ending that settles things. This article is about the format, and my claim is that a short knockout beats a round robin, with the arithmetic to show it.
Why does a round robin disappoint?
A round robin sounds fair. Four people, six pairings, everyone plays everyone. The trouble is what comes out of it. In a luck game each pairing is close to a coin flip, so I counted all 64 ways six coin flips can fall.
A single winner appears 32 times out of 64, half the time. A tie for first between two players appears 24 times, which is 37.5%, and a three-way tie 8 times, 12.5%. So half your evenings end with a playoff nobody planned.
What is the knockout instead?
A knockout cannot end level. With four players, two pairs play a semi-final each on two tables side by side, and the winners go through to the final. Make the semi-finals single games and the final a first-to-3 match.
Between two evenly matched players, a first-to-3 match lasts three games a quarter of the time, four games 37.5% of the time and five games 37.5% of the time. The average is about four games.
How long does the evening run?
The game page gives 10 to 25 minutes, and my own simulations in the repository put a two-player game at about 52 throws in total, which is the quick end. I will take ten minutes for it, a rough guess and not a timing, so the plan runs like this:
Semi-finals, both played together: about ten minutes.
Final, three to five games: thirty to fifty minutes.
That is roughly forty to sixty minutes of play. Add talk, snacks and the pause while people argue over who faces whom, and it fills an evening without stretching it. If the final should be shorter, choose Ladder Garden, which plays about a third quicker than Classic.
Is the final fair to the player who throws first?
Almost. In my calculation on the Classic board, seat one takes 50.8% of two-player games. The edge is not a skill gap, since nothing in the game can be skilled. It comes entirely from ties. If both counters would finish in the same round, the first seat wins by moving first. A tie has a 1.58% chance, and half of it, 0.79 points, is the entire head start.
A first-to-3 match evens that out, because the turn carries on to the next seat when a new game starts instead of snapping back to seat one.
What goes on the line, if not a drink?
A forfeit that costs nothing: the loser chooses the next game, or makes the tea, or puts on the next playlist. I would keep money out of it. The charm of a luck game is that skill never enters, and real stakes make a few people feel robbed by the die.
Setting it up online
A host can open both semi-finals as separate tables on Boardit and switch on first to 3 in the lobby for the final. Friends in different cities can play snakes and ladders online from a laptop or phone, with nothing to install.
Before the first throw
Say the format aloud, in one breath: two semi-finals, one final, a forfeit for the loser. This multiplayer evening works with friends because everyone knows where it ends. People settle into a game when they know where it ends.
Ahmed Moaz builds Boardit, a free browser game site.