Mugs

A betting game by Richard Smith 2007

Overview This all-reader (join in any time) is a variation on Howard Bishop's 'Punters and Gatherers'. The main difference is that the players pick the events to offer odds on rather than just choosing odds. Unlike the picture to the left, it is VERY EXCITING, HONEST!! The game runs over 6 turns, the final turn being betting only.

A Round

In each turn, each player receives £3000 stake money.
He may place up to 3 bets on events offered last turn by the players or the GM.
He may offer up to 3 new events to bet on. These may be single bets or multiple odds for an event (see initial bets for examples). These events should not be resolved before the next deadline (else void) but must be completed by the estimated game end (e.g. December 31st 2008). Events very close to the deadline will have a "void after" date.
If a player chooses not place or offer any bets, or NMRs, he is considered to have passed the round and does not get £3000.
Players may offer the same events as other players.
Bets offered are valid for one turn only, but events can be re-used.
The GM supplies some starting bets and will 'top up' the bets offered if there are not enough.
Winning bets are paid to the punter's winnings pot including returned stake money (so this is not reusable). Lost bets simply result in the stake transferring to the bookie's winnings pot.

Example Orders

Bets made:
1) Stake £1000 on Dave's Southampton FC to get promotion ini 2007-8 5/1
2) Stake £1000 on Pete's Alien life official detected by December 31st 2007 at 100/1

Bets offered:
1) Barack Obama to be the next president of the USA 20/1
2) Tiger Woods to fail to win a major in 2008 5/1

Money

Stake money and winnings are recorded separately. Only stake money can be used for betting, though this can include money held over from previous turns.

e.g. Dodgy Dave had £500 stake money left over from the previous round. He has won one bet of £1000 6-1 as a punter, and lost one £500 bet at 3-1 as bookie. So at the start of the turn he has £3500 in stake money and his winnings balance is +£5000.