Cocawount is a dice race game for two or more players (it plays better with
at least three players). Players compete to be the first to reach the finish,
while often moving other players back.
The name Cocawount has no special meaning.
The Board:
Rules:
Each player has a token and marker chip of her color, and a standard 6-sided
die is used for movement. Colored tokens and chips can usually be found at
school supply stores, or at specialty game shops. The goal is to be the first
to move your token to (or past) the finish on the board shown above. Players
advance clockwise around the spiral board. The board consists of 101 spaces
arranged in 20 slices.
To offset the advantage of moving first, players start at different positions.
The first player will always start on the position marked start. The
other players will be staggered around the track, as per the table below. For
example, with four players, the players start 5, 10, and 15 spaces ahead of
the starting space. This roughly matches the position that the players should
be seated around the table. Each player should place her chip and token in
the proper space, with the token on top of the chip.
Number of Players
Starting Spaces
2
start, 10
3
start, 6, 13
4
start, 5, 10, 15
5
start, 4, 8, 12, 16
6
start, 3, 7, 10, 13, 17
7
start, 3, 6, 9, 11, 14, 17
A player’s turn consists of a series of rolls of the die. After each
roll, the player moves her chip (not her token) forward or backward
(her choice) the number of spaces shown on the die. She can then decide to
stop or continue to roll. If she stops, she moves her token, placing it on
top of her chip, and passes the die to the next player. She can continue to
roll as long as she likes, but if she rolls a 1 she must return her chip,
placing it underneath her token. In other words, rolling a 1 destroys her
turn.
If a player moves her chip forward beyond the finish space, she wins
the game.
If during her turn the player’s chip lands in the same slice as another
player’s chip, she frees that chip, pulling it out from underneath the
token (but leaving it in the same space). On subsequent rolls, she may choose
to move the other player’s chip instead of her own, usually moving it
backwards. If this chip lands in another player’s slice, she can free
that player’s chip and move it too, and so on. If the player stops
before rolling a 1, she moves all tokens to their chips. If she rolls a 1,
she returns all the chips.
