Sevens Out
Quick Pitch
Sevens Out is a push-your-luck dice game where players roll two dice repeatedly, accumulating points from the totals.
Hook
Keep rolling, keep adding your totals to your running score — until you roll a 7. The moment you hit a 7, your whole turn score disappears and it's the next person's turn. So the question is always: how long do you dare keep going? You've got 23 points banked from this turn. Roll again? One in six chance of losing it all. The tension between greed and caution is what makes Sevens Out so endlessly replayable.
Equipment Needed
- 2 standard six-sided dice
- Paper scorecard (one per player)
- Pencil or pen
Setup
- Each player tracks their own score
- Determine a target score (typically 100 or 150 points)
- Determine play order
- First player rolls first
Rules
Objective
Be the first player to reach the target score by rolling dice totals without rolling a 7.
Turn Structure
- Roll two dice
- Check the total:
- If you roll anything except 7: Add the total to your turn score and decide to roll again or stop
- If you roll a 7: Your turn ends immediately, you score 0 points for this turn
- Continue or stop: After each non-7 roll, choose to:
- Roll again: Risk the turn total
- Stop and score: Add your turn total to your overall score
- Pass the dice to the next player
Scoring
- Non-7 rolls: Add the total to your turn score
- Rolling a 7: Lose all points from current turn (score 0)
- Stopping voluntarily: Add turn score to overall score
Example Turn
- Roll: 3+4 = 7 → Seven out! Lose all points from this turn. Turn ends.
Another example:
- Roll: 2+5 = 7 → Turn total = 0, turn ends
Another example:
- Roll: 3+2 = 5 → Turn total = 5
- Decision: Continue or stop?
- Roll: 4+4 = 8 → Turn total = 13
- Decision: Continue or stop?
- Roll: 3+3 = 6 → Turn total = 19
- Decision: Continue or stop?
- Roll: 2+3 = 5 → Turn total = 24
- Decision: Continue or stop?
- Stop and score 24 points
Expert Player
Tips
- Seven probability: Rolling a 7 with two dice occurs once in every 6 rolls (about 16.7%)
- Risk/reward: Each additional roll you take has a 16.7% chance of losing everything
- Early game: Be aggressive with rerolls to build lead
- Mid-game: Lock in moderate totals (15-20 points)
- Late game: When close to target, secure conservative rolls (10-15 points)
- Expected value: Rolling again when you have 20+ points is mathematically risky
- Psychological pressure: After a big roll, the urge to roll again is strong—resist it
Variations
- Low number loss: Rolling a 2 (snake eyes) ends your turn instead of 7
- Multiple bad numbers: Any roll of doubles ends your turn (instead of just 7)
- Seven is good: Variant where rolling a 7 scores 7 points instead of ending turn (removes push-your-luck element)
- Minimum threshold: Must score at least 25 points per turn to score anything
- Combo scoring: Certain combinations (like doubles) score extra points
Learn More — History & Origins
History & Origins
Sevens Out is an American folk dice game that evolved from the broader family of push-your-luck dice games. It simplifies the core tension of Craps — where 7 is both the most likely roll and the one that ends your point — into a standalone game without Craps' complex betting system. The 7 appears more often than any other two-dice total (six combinations out of thirty-six) precisely because it sits in the middle of the distribution, making it the natural choice as a "danger number" in any dice-based risk game.
Cultural Context
Sevens Out thrives in informal settings because the rules fit in a single sentence and the decisions are immediate and visceral. Unlike strategy games where good decisions require careful thought, Sevens Out presents a question everyone already understands intuitively — "is it worth the risk to roll again?" — and lets players answer it with stakes on the table. The game is often played for small amounts of money, but even without stakes the social pressure of watching someone push their luck too far is entertaining for everyone at the table.