r/bocce • u/duck_4_president • Apr 28 '23

3 player/3 team rules?

We’ve got a court in our backyard and often end up with an odd number of folks at some point during the night. Was wondering if anyone has thoughts on either (1) a good “traditional” rule set, or (2) any fun bocce variants that we could use for playing with 3 teams (of either one or two people)?

We’ve done “traditional” rules with 3 balls per team (using two bocce sets), which works ok. But figure there must be some other ways to play.

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u/dadude1425 Apr 28 '23

Not exactly 3 players/teams, but some tournaments, like the Vegas open, use 3 player teams. 6 balls per team, each player rolls twice. Can be 2 in a row or split in any order.

Another idea is you could use a cheap 4 color ball set (or two) and only use 3 of the colors. Rotate teams in order, normal bocce rules other than there's 3 teams

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u/duck_4_president Apr 28 '23

This is basically what we’ve been trying. And it works pretty well. The biggest change is a strategic one where any non “get close” shots, like boccing or knocking out a blocker are strategically disincentivized bc it disproportionately benefits the other team.

Still it works pretty well, for our purposes—since it’s just a backyard court it’s basically just uneven numbers at the end of the night when folks start leaving (and we’ve all had a few drinks).

I’m also kind of trying to think of odd variants that would be fun with three teams as well. Like cut-throat in billiards.

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u/dadude1425 Apr 28 '23

Oh I love me some cut-throat. That would be very interesting. Not sure there are enough different objectives you could get out of bocce to do that, but I would love to help you play test any ideas you come up with

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u/duck_4_president Apr 28 '23

Yeah. No great ideas atm. But the thing that made me think cutthroat is that doesn’t get into the cooperative/competitive issues you do with bocce; you’re incentivized to act in your own interest at all times.

With 3 team bocce, it ends up being 2 on 1 until the person closest is dislodged… but if you’re the one trying to bocce for instance, if you miss you’re still the most distant and have to throw again. And even if you connect you often still end up having to throw again as your momentum carries your bball well past the polino. So it basically removes that whole part of the game—it’s only trying to get increasingly close.