Introduction
White Horse is a simple parlor betting game where most of the outcome of each round is determined by an auction mechanism. Players start each round by bidding on five playing cards, each of which confers a unique advantage in the game. After the auction phase, each player rolls on their turn until the bank is depleted. The winner is the player who bankrupts all of his competitors.
Also Known As
White Horse is also known as Schimmel or Bell and Hammer.
House Rules
Most K.R. Engineering games have a variety of options or “house rules” that can be turned on and off by the game owner to change how the game plays. These options can include changing the winning criteria for a game, adding new rules or disabling other rules, or just placing time limits on how long you can be away before the game skips you. It is often helpful to know what house rules you are playing with when you sit down at a game. You can touch the game logo on any K.R. Engineering game to see a list of which options are enabled and which are not.
For owners/administrators wishing to change these options, please see the Administration section of this article.
Getting Started
If you are new to owning a K.R. Engineering game or have upgraded from an older game version, then you may have questions about your new table. Please see this FAQ for answers to some of our most common beginner questions.
Bug Fixes and Upgrades
Most owners of K.R. Engineering games are entitled to free upgrades to newer versions of the game. If a new update is available, then following the updating instructions for your game will result in a new copy of the most recent version being sent to you by the update server. This process is not automatic. You must request an update manually.
If you are having problems with your game, please search this knowledge base or contact us for product support. If the problem you are having has not previously been encountered, a new game version will be released with a fix as soon as possible, and you may qualify for a bug bounty.
DISCLAIMER: The appearance and feature set of games are subject to revision between versions as the capabilities of Second Life change over time. Please see the detailed ChangeLog for your particular game before upgrading. By upgrading. you are agreeing to accept any and all changes that have been imposed on the updated version of the game.
Joining the Game
Most K.R. Engineering games can be played simply by right-clicking on a chair and choosing “Play.”
K.R. Engineering games can be played on a variety of themed furniture objects, and the “chairs” may not always look like chairs. For example, on the Chess theme, the “chairs” are the giant chess pieces. If you are unsure what is a chair and what isn’t on a particular theme, that’s okay! You can right-click and select “Play” on any part of a theme and it will automatically place you in an available chair, even if you didn’t click on a chair specifically.
Important: K.R. Engineering games use a rezzing system. This means that the game (buttons, dice, cards, game boards, etc) is a separate object from the furniture/rezzer/theme. You must right-click on the theme to play, not the game itself, as you cannot sit on the game pieces (such as dice, game boards, cards, etc). You must sit on the furniture around the game to play, not the game pieces.
While most game themes include furniture that you can sit on, there may be some exceptions. The Pocket theme, for example, cannot be sat on, as it has no chairs. Instead, you can join a game on a Pocket theme by clicking the MENU button on the game.
Game Play
All players who wish to play must be seated before the game can begin. Once all players are seated, someone may press the Start button to begin. Once the game has started, new players may not join and must wait for the next game. At the start of the game, all of the players are dealt an identical amount of playing tokens (your ‘money’ for the duration of the game).
At the start of each round, players are required to contribute to the bank. If at the start of any round a player is unable to make their contribution to the bank, they are considered broke and are eliminated from the game. Any tokens that they have remaining automatically go into the bank.
Phase 1: The Auction
At the start of the auction phase, the first of the five playing cards will be presented for bidding. To bid, players can simply click on the Gavel (the wooden hammer) on the table. Each time the gavel is clicked you will bid 1 more token than the current high bid, making you the high bidder. After there have been no bids for 5 seconds, the table will chime, indicating ‘Going once.’ After 3 more seconds of no bidding, the table will chime again, indicating ‘Going twice.’ and after 3 more seconds, the current high bidder will receive the card and the winning bid amount will be deducted from their account and placed into the bank. This means there must be a total of 11 seconds with no new bids before the auction will finish. The next card will then be placed up for auction and bidding proceeds as before until all five cards are sold.
Each player may bid on as many cards as they wish, including all of them or none of them.
Phase 2: The Lottery
Once all the cards have been successfully won at auction, phase 2 begins. In this phase, each player rolls on their turn and the dice decide how tokens are redistributed, starting with the player who holds the White Horse (or theme equivalent) card.. Each of the 8 die have 5 blank sides each, so it is quite common to see a lot of blanks each roll. In fact, it’s uncommon to see a lot that are not blank as each die only has a 1 in 5 chance of landing with a picture up.
Rules for the lottery phase:
- The “on” player is the player who rolled the dice, UNLESS the Hammer or Bell dice are showing (or their theme equivalents).
- If only the Hammer die is showing (of the two), then the player holding the Hammer card is considered the “on” player.
- If only the Bell die is showing, then the player holding the Bell card is considered the “on” player.
- If both the Hammer and Bell are showing, then the player holding the Hammer And Bell card is considered the “on” player.
- If the first six dice are rolled as blanks, then the “on” player must pay 1 token to the holder of the White Horse (or theme equivalent) card.
- If the first six dice are NOT all blank, then the “on” player collects the amount represented by adding up the first six dice up from the bank.
Phase 3: The Inn
If at any point during phase 2 the bank owes the “on” player more than it has, then the game immediately moves into phase 3. Phase 3 proceeds much the same as phase 2, with each player rolling on their turn, but now the rules are slightly different.
Rules for the inn phase:
- The rules for the “on” player are identical to phase 2.
- If the first six dice are rolled as blanks, then the “on” player must pay 1 token to the BANK.
- If the first six dice are NOT all blank, then the “on” player collects the amount represented by adding up the first six dice up from the bank, so long as the amount is less than or equal to the bank’s assets.
- If the first six dice are NOT all blank, BUT the amount rolled is more than the bank has, then the “on” player must pay the difference between the amount rolled and the amount the bank has to the player that holds the Inn (or theme equivalent) card.
Winning the Round
The round is over under one of the following conditions:
- A roll is made such that the amount rolled is EXACTLY EQUAL to the amount the bank has, thus bringing the bank assets to 0.
- Someone rolls all non-blanks on the first six dice. In other words, someone rolled 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 at the same time. At this point, they automatically receive everything in the bank and the round is over.
Winning the Game
The game is over when there is only one player who is able to pay their ante for the next round, thus making all other players in the game broke.
Analysis of Playing Cards
Card 1: The White Horse
This card is fairly benign, and doesn’t usually fetch a lot at the auction block, even though it is the game’s namesake.
- The holder of this card always goes first in phase 2.
- The holder of this card receives a token from another player if all blanks are rolled.
Card 2: The Inn
This card is one of the most sought-after cards at the auction block, as it can be very devastating in Phase 3.
- The holder of this card gets paid potentially large amounts of tokens every roll in Phase 3.
Card 3: The Hammer
This card is moderately sought-after at the auction block and usually fetches a decent price.
- This card makes the holder the active player (and thus receiving or paying on any transactions) whenever the hammer die is rolled without the bell die.
Card 4: The Bell
This card is moderately sought-after at the auction block and usually fetches a decent price.
- This card makes the holder the active player (and thus receiving or paying on any transactions) whenever the bell die is rolled without the hammer die.
Card 5: Hammer and Bell
This card is moderately sought-after at the auction block and usually fetches a decent price.
- This card makes the holder the active player (and thus receiving or paying on any transactions) whenever the hammer die is rolled in conjunction with (at the same time as) the bell die.
Customization
For information on switching out tables and themes, please see this FAQ entry. For an overview of the theme/table administrative menu, please check out our Game Rezzer Administration article. For detailed information on customizing animations and camera views, please see our Player Experience Customization article.
Gaming.SL Live Integration
Gaming.SL Live (also known as Gaming.SL or G.SL) is gaming platform and services system developed by K.R. Engineering, which brings a variety of enhanced features to games in Second Life that are not possible with Second Life alone. In addition to the features described in this article, G.SL can integrate with your table in the following ways.
Leaderboards
Gaming.SL connected games have a grid-wide top score database that allows players to compete and have a pervasive record of their high scores. These high scores can be viewed by using a Top Scores display board in Second Life or by accessing the Top Scores page on the Gaming.SL website. Scores can be filtered down by region, specific game tables, dates, and other criteria.
In addition to recording high scores, games keep a running tally of the total number of times players have won on a game. This information can be viewed on a Top Winners display board in Second Life or by accessing the Top Winners page on the Gaming.SL website. Winners can likewise be filtered by region and other criteria to see a more specific list of winners.
On supported games, players will also be assigned a rank that compares their performance to other players who have played the same game. Players can improve this rank by playing well against other players. Rank information can be viewed on a Top Ranked display board in Second Life or by accessing the Top Ranked page on the Gaming.SL website.
Achievements
Gaming.SL includes support for Achievements in participating games, where-in you can unlock trophies by performing miraculous or mundane feats of gameplay. Achievements are awarded automatically and announced in Second Life when they are unlocked. Players can check their own achievements by visiting the Achievements page on the Gaming.SL website.
Jackpots
Gaming.SL supports the option to have ongoing recurring Jackpots where players can win cash prizes just for playing, no purchase necessary! Visit the Jackpots page on the Gaming.SL website to see the current jackpot standings, and who you need to defeat to win a prize. Prizes are based on ranking on a leaderboard that is erased during each jackpot period. Players must play during each period to be eligible to win during that period.
Licensing
Gaming.SL connected games utilize a licensing system that allows scores, ranks, winners, and other attributes to persist between rezzes of the same game, regardless of location in Second Life. This licensing system also allows games to have COPY permissions while still offering instancing control.
Public Games
Games that use Gaming.SL Live can also optionally be specified as a PUBLIC game by the game’s owner. This will display the game on the Gaming.SL Live Games page, including game status, options, and location, and a button to let a user teleport straight to the game to play. All games default to PRIVATE unless explicitly changed by the owner of the game.
Privacy
See the Gaming.SL Live page for more details on the Gaming.SL Live system, as well as our comprehensive Privacy Policy detailing the information we collect and how we use it.
Administration
To access the game’s administrative menu, simply click and hold your mouse button down on any part of it for two seconds. A menu will pop up on your screen displaying current settings and providing options to change them. (In slow simulators, this may take slighter longer than two seconds, just hold the mouse button down until you see a menu.)
On certain rezzer versions, depending on where you click, you may open the REZZER’S administrative menu instead of the GAME’S administrative menu. This is okay! If you are in the rezzer admin menu, you can switch directly over to the game admin menu by pressing the “Game ↗” button. Likewise if you open the game menu by mistake, and wish to switch over to the rezzer menu, you can simply press the “↙ Rezzer” button.
Some elements of the administration menu are accessible only by the owner, while others can be accessed by anyone who is considered an administrative user, either explicitly added or implicitly through the Group Admin feature.
There are too many options to fit in a standard dialog window, so the window has been divided into pages. You can use the <<< and >>> buttons at the bottom of the admin menu to change which page of options you are currently viewing. If you don’t see the option you want, it’s on another page!
Rezzer Options
Many options that were formerly in the game admin menu have been moved to the table/theme/rezzer admin menu. These are options that are game-independent, such as admin users, branding, sound volume, and updating. These options are now set on the table/theme/rezzer and apply automatically to whatever game is being played on that table or theme. For details on accessing the rezzer admin menu and what options are in it, please see the Game Rezzer Administration article.
Owner-Only Options
- Indicators: A menu for changing the color of the turn indicator lights on the game board.
- Color: An alternate way to access the color/theme menu for the table. This is the same as pressing the Color button on the table top.
- Cards: Access the card customization menu. See the ‘CUSTOM CARDS’ section below for more information.
Administrative User Options
- ↙ Rezzer: This button will directly open the rezzer’s administrative menu instead of the game’s menu.
- Players: Access the player management menu to skip or evict players from the game.
- Abandoned: Select this button to change the number of seconds the table waits to reset an abandoned game after all players have left.
- Timeout: Select this button to change the number of minutes the table waits for something to happen before timing out and resetting.
- Quiet: Enable quiet mode, reducing the amount of chatter that the game will send to local chat.
- Chatty: Disable quiet mode.
Additional Questions
If you have more questions, please use the search tool on our main page to browse our many helpful articles and FAQ entries. If you can’t find the answer you’re looking for, you can contact us for assistance.
ChangeLog
You can find the ChangeLog for White Horse by visiting this article.