Liar's Dice

Overview

Every player hides five dice under a cup. Bid on how many of a given number are on the table across all players' dice — then call the bluff when a bid stops being credible.

Also sold and played as Perudo. The rules below, with ones wild, are the most common form.

No governing body publishes rules for this game. This page describes the most common form. House rules vary, so agree them before you start.

1. Setup

Two or more players, five dice and a cup each.

Everyone rolls under their cup and looks at their own dice only.

2. Bidding

A bid is a quantity and a face value: "four fives" means the speaker believes there are at least four fives among all dice on the table.

Going clockwise, each player must either raise the bid or call.

A raise must increase either:

• the quantity — four fives to five fives, or
• the face value at the same quantity — four fives to four sixes.

You cannot lower either.

3. Ones are wild

Ones count as any face value. So a bid of "four fives" is satisfied by any combination of fives and ones totalling four.

To bid on ones themselves, the quantity is halved and rounded up. If the current bid is six fives, bidding ones requires only "three ones".

To leave a ones bid, the next player must bid double the quantity plus one in another value — three ones is beaten by seven of anything.

4. Calling

Instead of raising, a player may call "liar" — or dudo, meaning "I doubt it".

All cups lift and the dice are counted.

• If the bid was correct or exceeded, the caller loses a die.
• If the bid was too high, the bidder loses a die.

The loser starts the next round.

5. Elimination

A player who loses their last die is out. The last player with dice wins.

6. Strategy

Count what you can see. With ones wild, each unseen die has a 1 in 3 chance of counting toward any bid on twos to sixes: its own face or a one.

Bid your own dice. Bidding a value you hold plenty of is safer, and lets you believe your own bluff.

Watch the jump. A player who raises the quantity sharply either has the dice or is desperate. A player who nudges the face value by one is usually weak.

Track eliminations. As dice leave the table, the maths changes fast, and bids that were safe with twenty dice are reckless with eight.

Commonly argued

• Ones are wild, and count toward every other value.
• Bidding ones halves the quantity, rounded up.
• The caller loses a die if the bid was good, which is what discourages reckless calling.
• Bids count all dice on the table, not just your own.