To Court the King

To Court the King is a dice-based board game designed by Tom Lehmann for two to five players, first published in German by Amigo Spiele in 2006 under the title Um Krone und Kragen, meaning around crown and collar, before Rio Grande Games released an English-language edition. Play centers on repeatedly rolling and re-rolling a pool of dice in order to claim character cards, each of which grants a distinct special ability that can be used on later turns; the core mechanic has drawn frequent comparisons to Yahtzee because of its shared push-your-luck dice re-rolling structure. Players race to be the first to roll seven identical dice, an achievement that unlocks access to the king and queen character cards, and the game is ultimately won by whichever player holds the king once a final competitive round of dice rolling has been resolved. The full game includes sixty character cards covering nineteen distinct characters, twelve dice, a set of character overview reference cards and a starting player marker, and a typical game runs about forty-five minutes with only minimal setup.