What is Joker scoring?
The joker rules decide what happens when you roll five of a kind and your five-of-a-kind box is already filled. In the standard game here there is no joker: the roll goes into any open box and scores what the dice make there, so a Full House or a straight box would get 0. The table setup offers two jokers on the classic sheet.
The forced joker is the rule of the official rule book. You must score in the upper box of that number if it is still open. If it is filled, the roll is a joker: it goes into any open lower box and scores the full value there, 25 for a Full House, 30 for a Small Straight and 40 for a Large Straight. Only when the lower section is full too do you enter a zero in an open upper box. The free-choice joker lets you use any open box, but the joker values apply only when the upper box of that number is already filled.
Rule changes
| Rule | Standard Five Dice | Joker scoring |
|---|---|---|
| When it applies | Standard Five DiceNever: there is no joker. | Joker scoringWhen you roll five of a kind and the five-of-a-kind box is already filled, with 50 or with 0. |
| Forced joker: where to score | Standard Five DiceIn any open box. | Joker scoringIn the upper box of that number if it is open; if not, in any open lower box; if the lower section is full too, a zero in an open upper box. |
| Free-choice joker: where to score | Standard Five DiceIn any open box. | Joker scoringIn any open box, as without a joker. |
| What the joker scores | Standard Five DiceWhat the dice make: Full House, Small Straight and Large Straight score 0 with five of a kind. | Joker scoringFull House 25, Small Straight 30 and Large Straight 40, as long as the upper box of that number is filled; the other boxes score as usual. |
| Bonus | Standard Five DiceEach extra five of a kind earns 100 while the five-of-a-kind box holds 50. | Joker scoringThe same: the joker does not change the bonus, and a zero in the five-of-a-kind box still means no bonus. |
| Other options | Standard Five DiceThere is no joker on any sheet. | Joker scoringThe jokers exist only on the classic sheet. In Triple a joker starts once all three five-of-a-kind boxes are filled, and its values need the upper box of that number filled in all three columns. With forced order the order decides the box. |
History
The American five-dice game first sold in 1956 added several things to the older game Yacht, among them the upper bonus, Three of a Kind, the Small Straight, the bonus for an extra five of a kind and the joker rule. The original 1956 rule booklet let extra fives of a kind be used as jokers in the lower section only; the rule changed when the game's rules were re-copyrighted in 1961.
The forced joker, which sends the roll to the matching upper box first, is the rule of the current official rules. The free-choice joker is the looser rule that rule summaries describe next to it: any box may be used, and the roll counts as a joker only once the matching upper box is filled.