Designed by: John D. Clair
Ready Set Bet is, as you may have gambled, a betting game. Channelling the turf-pounding hooves of racehorses into a dice-rolling tabletop experience, it impressively conjures up a similar sense of excitement, without costing you any actual cash.
There are two boards – one is where the (tiny, wooden) horses race, and the other is the spread, where bets are made. Unless you want to make use of the app, one player takes the role of moving the horses for each race (there are rules that allow them to bet as well, although all house bets are before the race begins). The rest get some cardboard betting chips of various values, and can bet at any point during the race until three horses have crossed the red no-bets line. Each roll of the dice moves the corresponding horse – and rolling the same horse twice in a row triggers a bonus move. The dice-roller starts rolling the dice, and you’re away!
What can you bet on? You can bet on any horse to win, place (first or second) or show (first, second or third). Horses have colours, so you can bet on a particular colour (each colour covers two horses, except the statistically-favoured number 7). There are other options too, like prop bets and exotic bets that offer similarly quirky propositions (eg two horses move three or fewer spaces, or Horse 4 finishes ahead of Horse 6) but essentially that’s it – it’s a loyal representation of the real thing. Each betting space only has room for one betting disc, so timing is key. When the race is over, players harvest their winnings – should they have any – and pay any punitive fees for non-winning discs that some betting spaces charge.
After the fourth race, the player with the most money wins.
Apart from players grabbing a betting spot first, there's no interaction to speak of
None - once the race starts, it's all real time turf action
Not the rules, but the array of options versus the ticking clock and speed-of-thought
You'll need to be okay with emotional exhaustion and a dry throat, but why not? Each race is distinct in terms of prop bets and exotic bets, and of course, the horses themselves, who seem to defy the odds in the most incredible ways
2-8
Players
10+
Years
30-60
Mins
Sam says
The first thing to note about Ready Set Bet is that it's LOUD. Because of the real-time aspect of bets being placed while the race is on, not only is there the tension of grabbing the likely-to-pay-out spots on the spread before others do, but also the inevitability - with our gang, at least - that everyone will be encouraging their backed horses to win by exhorting the indifferent dice to come up trumps for them. For that reason you come out of the experience almost exhausted - but in an exhilarating way. Obviously some of us will not want a game that so openly embraces gambling as a pastime, but if that isn't an issue for you Ready Set Bet is high-volume fun.