Not quite, Masonite
All the dice can ‘count’ - the bit about odd numbers is on the right track, though. Now think of the name of the game again.
I got it! I got it! It took me about 5 minutes or so, after reading the whole article and one of the spoilers in the thread. I so want to do this to people now. 
TimeWinder’s puzzle was pretty cool, too. Here’s another one, I think it was pretty popular, but just in case anyone hasn’t heard of it…
Ask people to do exactly as you do. Tap the tip of each of your fingers, starting at your pinky, one after the other, and say Johnny each time. Then slide your finger along the curve between your index finger and thumb, like a ski jump, say “WHOOPS!” as you do this, touch the tip of your thumb and say Johnny again, then go backwards through the ski jump saying “WHOOPS!” again, then tap the tip of each finger saying Johnny each time. So it sounds like: “Johnny Johnny Johnny Johnny WHOOPS Johnny WHOOPS Johnny Johnny Johnny Johnny.” After doing this, casually fold your hands so your fingers are interlocked, and tell them it’s their turn. It usually takes people a while to catch on to the hand folding as being part of the action they have to imitate. Then once they do get it, they’ll groan, roll up the nearest newspaper and give you a good thwapping.
Jolly good fun!
That can’t be it, since I don’t see how your method can get the right answer with the 3-3-5-5-5 roll, how could two dice get you 16? Or the 3-5-5-5-6 roll with 14. As a “cheat” hint, all dice can count, but not all dice always do count.
I’m going to try this out on my D&D group the next time we game. Having 5 d6s around won’t be a problem.
Okay, I’m a Mensan, very good at math and it took me forever and reading all the spoilers to finally get this. Pretty cool.
Another (somewhat similar) game is the magazine game that we had so much fun with at parties. I won’t put it in spoilers because the similarity only relates to it being very simple and yet frustrating if you aren’t in the know. You take 9 magazines and lay them out on the floor in three rows of three like a tic-tac-toe board. Your “assistant” leaves the room and then you have someone choose one of the magazines. You call the assistant back in and then using a yardstick or long pointer you point to a magazine and ask, “Is this the one?” You point to the magazines one by one until you get to the correct one and of course your assistant says that, yes, that is the one. You don’t have to point to them in any certain order or anything. The whole secret to it is when you point to each magazine you are telling the position of the chosen magazine. For example, if the chosen one is the center one then you point to the center of all the magazines. If it is the top right corner one then that is where you point on each magazine. We really hammed it up saying we were psychic and had to have everyone picture the chosen magazine in their heads. We’ve had people insist on me and my assistant not looking at or speaking to each other. Of course, it still works as long as you can point. Then we worked it out so that I could sit down and just by placing my right hand in a certain place on my lap my assistant could tell which magazine to pick. It is so much fun when the answer finally dawns on someone and then they become the assistant. It really frustrates the others.
I can’t wait till my kids are old enough to torture with all these games. heehee
Bah!! After far too long looking confused I suddenly realised that I was looking at the wrong sides of the dice. I was looking at the side uppermost and not the side facing me. It would be different with real dice of course.
Copper_Moon THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU. Someone did this to me a few years ago with PLAYING CARDS (which is totally sadistic, by the way, since you can make it look like the numbers have something to do with it.) and I couldn’t figure it out.
I have SO got to try the Petals game with my gaming group, though.
(Got it in about a minute. Good game.)
You’re quite welcome DogMom! Actually I first learned it with cards and it can be much more misleading that way because you have the person you are trying to dupe shuffle and cut the cards leading them to believe that the face of the cards is important. Boy, now I’m itching to have a party so we can have fun with this again.
You know I figured out the Petals Around a Rose game (after a long while) but couldn’t understand what in the world it had to do with the name. I had to have my sister tell me since she figured it out very quickly. I was actually figuring out the answer in a longer more convoluted way than necessary.
Tried out “Petals” on DogDad last night.
I told him only that:
- The name of it was “Petals around the rose”
- The total of each roll would be even or zero.
Then I rolled the dice, (4-1-5-6-3-1 for those playing along at home), said “six” AT THE SAME TIME HE DID.
Yes, ladies and gentlemans, he got it on the first roll.
Just to confirm, I rolled again, and he gave the right answer, and told me HOW he arrived at that number, and by golly if it wasn’t correct.
First roll. About 1/2 a second to get it.
I have NO idea how he does it. (And no, he’s never heard of it before.)
I got it in about 5 minutes. That’s good for me. I tend to overthink puzzles like this. If it weren’t for the name hint I’d be factoring in the phases of Mercury by now.
That took me FOREVER! Seriously, I just spent half an hour reading and re-reading the damn thing. Then, as I was about to do a google search for the solution, I read it one last time and- bam, epiphany.
I can’t believe that it took me so long. And that NONE of the spoilers helped me. I felt rock dumb there for quite a while…
Huh. Good trick, though. It reminds me of Cahoots, in that it’s a good game to baffle a large group of people. In Cahoots the leader picks one person and explains that it’s a guessing game wherein the group will decide on an item while the selected partner is out of earshot, then will come back into the room and the leader will go through a list of visible items in the room, finally suggesting The Item, than partner in cahoots will say yes, that’s it. The deal is that the leader will mention the item directly after mentioning an item belonging to the first person mentioned.
“Is it Joe’s glove?”
“No.”
“Ted’s glasses?”
“No.”
“This straw?”
“No.”
“Joe’s shoelace?”
“No.”
“Barb’s coffee mug?”
“Yes!”
Obviously it would last a lot longer and include a lot more “guesses.” Great to play with kids.
ZJ