Rules
Colour Bet is a bluffing game for 3 to 6 players, like Liar’s Dice played with coloured cards. You see only your own cards, but every bid is about all the cards on the table.
Cards
The deck has 60 cards: 10 each of red, yellow, green, blue and purple, and 10 rainbow cards. Rainbow cards count as every colour. Each player starts with 5 slots and gets one card per slot, face down to everyone else.
A hand
- The first player bids a number and a colour, such as “4 Blue”: a claim that there are at least 4 blue or rainbow cards across everyone’s slots.
- In turn, the next player either raises, with a higher number in any colour, or doubts the last bid.
- After a doubt, every card is shown. If there are at least as many cards as the bid, the bid was true and the doubter loses a slot. If there are fewer, the bidder loses a slot.
- The cards are shuffled and dealt again, one per remaining slot. The player who lost the doubt bids first.
Winning
A player with no slots left is out. The last player with slots wins.
Our version
- On the show, wagers of pieces or slot chips went with each bid, and a doubt started a one-on-one betting showdown where either side could raise or fold. Here a doubt is settled at once and the loser always loses exactly one slot, as in Liar’s Dice.
- The show ended when three players were left and counted pieces; here the last player standing wins, and the others are ranked by how long they lasted.
- Each turn has a 30-second timer. If it runs out you doubt, or open the hand with a bid of 1 of your most common colour.
- Choose 5 slots each (as on the show) or 3 for a quicker game. Against the computer you play with 3 to 6 players (6 on the show); online rooms take 3 to 6.
- If you are knocked out against the computer, you can watch the AI players finish.
- The AI players take turns at three styles: the bluffer sometimes bids colours it does not hold and raises boldly, the cautious player doubts early, and the reader weighs the odds. Easy AI forgets its own rainbows count, medium works out the odds from its own cards, and hard also reads other players’ bids as hints about their cards. They only know what you would know.
- The “Card counter” helper counts your own cards for each colour, rainbows included.
Sources: The Devil’s Plan Season 2 episode recaps (Dexerto, Wikipedia).
Strategy
Count what you cannot see. About a third of the cards you cannot see count for any colour (its own colour plus rainbows). With 25 hidden cards, about 8 of a colour is a fair guess, plus yours.
Rainbows are yours twice. A rainbow in your hand helps every colour you might bid.
Bids carry information. A player who bids blue probably holds blue. Raise in a colour you and the last bidder both seem to have.
Late in a hand, doubt. Each raise has to go higher. Once the number passes what is likely, the next player is in trouble: be the one who doubts, not the one who has to raise.
Fewer cards, more doubt. As slots are lost, fewer cards are in play and the safe numbers drop. Recount before every bid.