Sports Dice Review

boardgamequest.com:

At Gen Con this year, the BGQ team met with family game publisher Foxmind Games to see what was new from them this year. One of their more popular lines is Sport Dice, a quick-playing filler game that tries to capture the spirit of various sports.

Since each game plays fairly similar, we thought we’d do a combined review of each of the four Sport Dice games (Football, Soccer, Baseball, and Hockey). Each of us took a different game to test out, so you’ll get an overview of the game in general, and then some more specific thoughts on each offering.

The basics of Sport Dice are pretty easy to pick up. While there might be some sport-specific rules (such as offense vs defense dice in football or the penalty box in hockey), the core of each game is built around the same engine.

Each round, both players roll their six dice. They may be the same set of dice for symmetrical sports (such as for hockey and soccer), or unique dice in the case of baseball and football. Once you’ve both rolled your dice, you check to see who has rolled the most of one symbol type. That player gets to resolve their symbol.

For example, when playing Football, if one player rolls 4 10-yard game results, and their opponent rolls 3 sack results, then the 10-yard game result will be applied.

So what happens when players roll an equal number of one symbol? In that case, there is a tie breaker token. Whichever player’s color is showing can choose to break the tie in their favor, and then flip the toke to the other color, or let their opponent take the result and keep the tiebreaker in their favor. Think of it like the possession arrow in NCAA basketball, but where the team with possession can opt not to take the ball but keep the arrow instead.

Rounds will