“Yachty or Naughty”
Tabletop Party Game
“Yachty or Naughty” is a push-your-luck party game that I created for 2-6 players. For ages 8 & up, it is a quick, easy to pick up game that takes about 10 minutes to play each round.
The first player to 15 points in a round becomes The Captain for the next round, and the player with the least points becomes the Sailor and has to carry out the consequence that the group chose before the round started. Fun hats are involved to identify the Captain and the Sailor.
I designed the components with a fun nautical theme and had them printed by The Game Crafter.
Creating Yachty or Naughty
I grew up playing a lot of card games with my family. As an adult, I like to hang out at breweries with my friends. It's popular to bring your own games to breweries, and many breweries even have their own shelf of used games. The most popular card game I see at breweries is Uno. Uno is an easy game to play with a mixed group, but doesn't offer much strategy or depth.
My goal with Yachty or Naughty was to create the perfect game to play with friends at a brewery. It needed to be simple to learn, easily scale to a wide player count, and invoke a party atmosphere.
Components
Draw Deck: 39 Cards
Consequence Board: 1 Domino Board
SOS Tokens: 15 Chits
Six-Sided Dice: 5
1 Dry Erase Pen
1 Pink Sailor Hat
1 Yacht Captain's Hat (Optional)
Cards, Board, and Chits are all UV Coated and water resistant. Perfect for breweries!
Gameplay
The Captain (who gets to wear the Captain's hat) writes down a consequence on the dry-erase board. If they are having a tough time coming up with one, they can turn the board over to see some suggestions. The consequence could be something silly, or challenging, or embarrassing.
Everyone collects 1 SOS token and play begins with The Captain and continues clockwise. To begin a turn, the active player flips over the top card of the draw deck. This will be either a 1, 2, or 3 point card and will have anywhere from 1-3 dice placement spot on it. The player then rolls the available dice. If any of the dice show a number matching the dice placement spots on the card, the player takes that die and places it on top of the card. A new card is flipped from the draw deck and placed next to the first card. The player can choose to roll again, or collect any cards that have dice on them, adding those cards to their point total.
Before a player can collect any cards on their turn, the next player gets a chance to steal. If the player before you chooses to pass, you could either continue where the previous player left off (thus leaving them with no points) or let them collect the points and you start your own turn afresh.
Once a player is able to collect the cards, they are immediately added to that player's point total. If the total is 15 points or above, the round ends immediately. That player is now The Captain and gets to wear the Captain's Hat. The player at the table who has taken at least 1 turn and has the least points is The Naughty Sailor. They must carry out the consequence and wear the pink Naughty Sailor hat for the next round.
If at any point none of the rolled dice match any available dice placement spots on the cards, the player busts and must forfeit their SOS token. If they no longer have their SOS token, the round ends immediately and that player is the Naughty Sailor for the next round.
After The Naughty Sailor carries out the consequence, the next round begins with The Captain writing down a new consequence on the board and beginning their turn.
The game ends after one player has carried out the consequence 3 times (making them the Ultimate Naughty Sailor), or until everyone stops having fun.
Previous iterations
Final Thoughts
Designing a board or card game is the ultimate test for understanding a user and paying attention to their needs and wants. A typical brewery goer is looking for a quick and easy game to play while drinking a couple beers with mixed company. Maybe they are playing with someone they know well, or maybe a stranger they just met there. Games give the user something to do if conversation lacks, but also shouldn’t be too complicated where there can’t be other conversation in between plays. It can easily be set up and learned, and quickly wrapped up and put away if the group needs to go. But, it is also enough strategy to be interesting, with a silly twist that’s sure to invoke laughter and a good time.