Kuriki

Kuriki is an evolving game with local variations and jargon, even variations of spelling of the word "Kuriki." Ku-Riki, Quirikii, Ka Rickey, Carickey, Kuricki, Kariki or any variant has been known.

Equipment

Two regular Dice and an opaque cup.

Object

To roll high, Lie well, and catch others Lying. The last man standing becomes the winner.

To Start

Kuriki is played with any number of players seated at a table. Before the game, a number of Lives are decided on. Players lose Lives as the game progresses, and the last player with a Life left wins the game. Variation: Before playing, everyone posts equal cash stakes, usually something small, and the winner takes all this money.

Each player rolls one die to choose the player to start the game. In the case of a tie, the players with a tie re-roll, until there is one winner. He chooses whether the play will go clockwise or counter-clockwise at the beginning of the game.

The Play

The first player becomes the Roller. He shakes the dice in the cup, then up-ends the cup on the table and peeks under it.

Once the player has looked under the cup, he declares his roll. In the case of a Fresh Roll (first roll of a game or first roll after a point), there is no minimum declared value. If the player is rolling on a point (if he has taken control of the cup from the previous Roller without pulling it), he must declare at least the value of the previous declaration. He may lie if he chooses to, but he must always declare the roll to be at least equal to the roll he received from the previous Roller. The roll is declared by value or nickname. The ranking of rolls and their nicknames is as follows:

1-2 "Kuriki" Highest possible roll. This roll is immediately displayed by the Roller. The player who would have acted next (the Next Guy) loses a life, and the Roller keeps the cup for the next roll. The Roller also collects all the accumulated foul money. Kurikis are recorded by the scorekeeper with a little drawing of a crown next to the player's name. If a player rolls his third Kuriki in a game, in addition to the life lost by the next player, every player at the table (save the Roller) loses a life. Important: On a third Kuriki, the player next to act (the Next Guy) loses two lives, everybody else loses one. This is true for every third Kuriki any player rolls -- after six Kurikis, after nine etc.

6-6 "Double-Six" also "Boxcars," "Blackout"

5-5 "Double-Five" also "the Mime," after the pretending-to-feel-the-wall-in-front-of-me pantomime game.

4-4 "Double-Four" also "Walnuts," after an episode of the Dick Van Dyke show, where Dick, "Jerry" has a nightmare where all of his friends have been replaced by space aliens who eat only walnuts, but have no thumbs, and so cannot crack them.

3-3 "Double-Three" also "Scouts," after the Boy Scout salute.

2-2 "Double-Two" also "Nixons," after Richard Nixon's double-handed "victory" salute, co-opted by the counterculture as the "peace" sign.

1-1 "Double-One" also "Snake-Eyes," "Evil Eyes," "Danzig," (in ref. evil) and "Mother," (in ref. Danzig's most "evil" song -- Important: must be declared in mock-Danzig singing voice).

Other rolls are simply the tally of their pips, and are ranked in descending numerical value (11, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4). This creates some counter-intuitive rankings:

The lowest possible roll is a four (1-3).

Once the Roller has declared, he may not touch the cup, nor may anyone else, unless taking control of it (Taking the Cup), which requires him to roll, or Pulling the Cup, which exposes the roll and ends the point.

The player to act next, the Next Guy, has three options: He may Take the cup and roll, he may Pull the cup or he may Pass.

Take

If the Next Guy takes the cup, he becomes the new Roller, and the point continues with his roll. On this roll, he also must declare a roll at least equal to the previous roll. It is generally advantageous to Roll if the original Roller has declared a low Roll, because being in control of the cup is a more powerful position than having to respond to a roll. As the declared Rolls get higher, the difficulty of matching or beating the Roll increases, so other choices become more viable.

Pull

If the Next Guy instead Pulls the Cup, he reveals the Roll. If it can be seen that the Roller was lying, then the Roller loses a life, and the Next Guy becomes the new Roller. If he Pulls the Cup and the Roller was not lying, then the Next Guy loses a life, and the Roller rolls again. In either case, the next point begins with a Fresh Roll.

Pass

If the Next Guy Passes, then he assumes responsibility for the Roll (the cup itself doesn't move, and he may not peek under it), and the person next to act becomes the new Next Guy. The new Next Guy may also take any of the three options; Roll, Pull or Pass.

Each player may pass to the next, but in any roll, each player may only pass once. In general, once a player has passed, the rest of the table then passes (choosing not to get involved), until responsibility for the cup (which does not physically move during a pass) comes around to the Roller. The Roller has peeked, so he knows what is under the cup, and knows if he has been handed a lie.

If he has (that is, if he had lied originally) then he may pull the cup on the player who passed to him (the last player to assume responsibility for the Roll). In this manner, lies are often sent around the table as Hate Mail. If a player suspects Hate Mail is on its way, it is in his best interest to Pull the Cup, or, if he is brave, he can Take the Cup and Roll, giving him a chance to take a life from the original Roller.

If the original Roller did not lie, and the cup makes its way around to him, he will certainly pass, so that he doesn't pull the cup on a Not-a-Lie, and cost himself a life. He may exploit this by intentionally passing what is in fact a lie to put pressure on the Next Guy, who will assume the Roll is Not-a-Lie, even if it is. This is a Pressure Move.

Fouls

Other players may try to peek under the cup during a roll, so long as one ass-cheek stays in their chairs. Lifting both ass cheeks is a foul, and earns the player Ass-Lifting to Peek a foul, denoted on the score sheet with a little foul by the scorekeeper next to his name.

Foul penalties vary from game to game, but are usually (in the US) 25 cents. These fines go in the foul pot. A player who accumulates three fouls loses a life, and loses another life for every third foul -- after six fouls, after nine, etc.

Tarting

The game progresses until a player is knocked-out. A player who is has one life left is "in the shit," "in the shithole," "shitholed," "in the stink" or "smelling." The first player knocked-out of the game is required to go (to the store if necessary) and get Poptarts, toast and serve them to everyone at the table who wants them. This player is said to be "Tarted," and a player who has one life left, and at risk of being Tarted is said to be "in the Tarts," or "in the Tart-hole." The preferred flavor of Pop Tarts is Raspberry or Cherry.

Naming

The loser must also be taunted by being assigned an odd name by taking his middle name and scrambling it together with the word poptarts, and then bitch slapped.

Resolution

The game progresses until one guy is left. He takes all the money (including any unclaimed foul money) and everyone cheers him.

Variations

Short games, or those with a lot of players usually have five Lives though this number is varied. Traditionally, a score pad with each player's nickname (names are not used, for some reason) and a star-shape are used to mark the lives lost. A spot is placed at the end of each arm as lives are lost, and one final life is marked at the intersection of all the crossed arms. A + symbol, for example, denotes a five-life game.

The non-double rolls are sometimes referred to by two-digit numbers, for example 3-4 could be declared either 34 or 43 according to necessity. This increases the number of possible rolls from 15 to 36, and has the potential to extend a point for many rolls. In this variant, the highest non-double roll is 65, and Double-One beats it.

After a scoring a Kuriki, a player may reverse the direction of play on the next roll.

Other foul-worthy offenses

Showing Disrespect to the Dice. Usually charged by a player and agreed-to by acclamation from the other players. Lobbying allowed/inevitable. Slam-dunk disrespect cases include: Referring to a single die as "a dice," allowing a die to fall out of the cup and onto the floor (immediate foul, and the table begins a countdown from ten, with another foul being charged if the die is not replaced in the cup before the count reaches zero, and another count-down begins, etc.), trapping a die under the rim of the cup.

Moving the cup once the dice have been looked at (as in sliding) and before another player has taken control of the cup, speaking in a foreign language at the table (the local language is not foreign, all others are).

Some players manhandle the cup, and cups have been broken in the process of juggling or slamming them down on the table. This is a serious disrespect foul known as a Rusk, after the first player to do it. The penalty is a triple-foul (e.g. a life). The player guilty of the Rusk must go get a new cup and clean up the remnants of the old one.

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