Sixes Drinking Game

Six cups, one die - fill it, roll it, and pray for empties.

Also known as: Six Cup · Roll for It

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Players 3-8

You need1 die, 6 cups, drinks

DrinkBeer or mixed

Intensity

Time15-30 min

Play Sixes online

Sixes might be the simplest drinking game ever built around a single die. Line up six cups, number them one through six, and start rolling. Roll a number whose cup is empty? Pour some of your drink in and pass the die - you are safe. Roll a number whose cup is full? That one is yours now. Drink it, put it back empty, and roll again.

That is the entire game, and it is diabolical. Early on the cups are empty and everyone is smugly pouring. Then the table fills up, the odds flip, and suddenly every roll is a loaded chamber. There is zero skill, zero memory and zero mercy - which makes Sixes the perfect warm-up game, the perfect background game, and a genuinely terrible game to be unlucky at.

What you need & setup

Line up six cups in a row in the middle of the table and number them 1 through 6 (marker, coasters or just position).
Gather 3-8 players, each with their own drink for pouring.
Agree on a standard pour - two fingers of beer per fill is the classic calibration.
Hand the die to the birthday-est person at the table; play moves clockwise.

How to play Sixes

Number the line

Set six cups in a clearly ordered row - cup 1 on the left through cup 6 on the right, or numbered with a marker if your table tends to drift. Every cup starts empty. The row is communal territory: nobody owns a cup, and everybody is one roll from owning all of them briefly.

Roll and match

On your turn, roll the single die and find the matching cup. This is the whole decision tree of Sixes: the die decides, you obey. There are no choices, no bluffs and no take-backs, which is exactly why it works while everyone is talking over each other.

Fill the empties

If your number's cup is empty, pour a standard shot of your own drink into it, and your turn is over - pass the die left. Filling feels like winning, and early in the game it mostly is. But every cup you fill is a landmine you are planting for the whole table, including future you.

Drink the fulls

If your number's cup has anything in it, that drink is yours. Finish it, return the cup empty to its spot, and here is the twist - you roll again. Unlucky streaks in Sixes are self-perpetuating: drink cup 4, re-roll, hit cup 2, drink that, re-roll. The table's job is to enjoy this immensely.

Ride the odds

The game breathes. When one cup is full, you are 5-to-1 safe. When five cups are full, the die is basically a sentence. Because drinkers re-roll and refillers pass, the table naturally oscillates between calm pouring phases and one player getting absolutely flattened. That rhythm is the entire show.

Play until the pitcher says stop

There is no win condition - Sixes runs until the group moves on, which is its charm as a background game. For a finale, play Last Call: go around once more, and anyone who rolls a full cup on the final lap drinks it plus gives one out. Then retire the row with honor.

Roll outcomes

Roll	What happens
1-5	If that numbered cup is full, drink it; if empty, fill it
6	All six cups full? Drink them... just kidding: fill or drink cup six

The rules

Six communal cups, numbered 1-6, all starting empty.
One die, passed clockwise; roll once on your turn.
Roll matching an empty cup: pour a standard measure from your drink into it, then pass the die.
Roll matching a full cup: drink it all, replace it empty, and roll again.
You keep rolling until you hit an empty cup to fill.
Pours are fixed size - no strategic splashes or overfills.
Cups must return to their numbered spot immediately after being drunk.
Knock over a cup, you refill it from your own drink and drink one of the others (house classic).
No player may decline a full cup; the die's word is final.

Variations & house rules

Loaded Six

Cup 6 is the danger cup: it gets a double pour when filled, and whoever drinks it also hands out two sips to the table. One cup carrying extra weight changes the emotional value of every single roll, and the table learns to dread the six together.

Mystery Row

Players pour whatever they are drinking - beer, cider, wine, seltzer - so every full cup is a surprise cocktail decided by history. Chaotic-neutral and very funny, but set a no-liquor rule up front; mystery cups only stay fun when the worst case is a beer-wine hybrid.

Speed Sixes

Two dice circulate on opposite sides of the table simultaneously, each running the normal rules on the same six cups. Collisions - both dice calling the same cup - make both rollers split it. Doubles the pace, halves the downtime, and turns a background game into a main event.

Countdown Sixes

Start with all six cups full instead of empty. The game inverts: rolls mostly hit full cups early, and the tension comes from racing to be the player who empties the row. Last cup's drinker wins the round and assigns a victory sip. Shorter, sharper, great as a closer.

Point Sixes

Alcohol-free scoring version: filling a cup (with water) scores one point, being forced to 'drink' scores minus one, first to five wins. Genuinely playable with kids at a barbecue while the adults play the standard version with the exact same cups. Efficient.

Pro tips

Use small pours. Sixes streaks are real - someone will drink four cups in two minutes at some point tonight.

Keep the cups strictly in numbered order; half of all Sixes arguments are about which cup was cup 3.

Play with beer or cider only in the communal cups, and keep spirits in your own glass, out of the game.

A lazy susan or tray under the cups saves your table and speeds up the drink-and-replace cycle.

Feeling the night? Pour water on your fills - the game cannot tell and neither can anyone else.

Watch for the five-full-cups state: pause there, top up waters, and let the doomed roller brace themselves.

Where Sixes fits on the shelf

Sixes lands mid-table for intensity (5th of 9 dice games), rated 3 out of 5.
The sweet spot is 3-8 players - enough for chaos, few enough that every turn matters.
A typical session runs 15-30 min - a solid middle act for the evening.
Browse the full dice drinking games shelf to compare all 9 games side by side.

A little history

Sixes is one of those games that seems to have always existed - a folk creation of college kitchens and camping trips with no credible origin story attached. It is plausibly a descendant of older pour-and-forfeit tavern games, and its structure independently resembles chance games played wherever cups and dice coexist. Names vary by region - Six Cup, Roll for It - and so do the pour rules, suggesting it was reinvented many times over.

Drink responsibly: Sixes can chain several full cups onto one unlucky roller, so pour small, keep the communal cups beer-or-lighter, and normalize water fills. If someone drinks three cups in a turn, hand them water and the role of cup-referee for a round. See our safety guide for pacing tips and alcohol-free versions.

Sixes FAQ

What happens when you roll a full cup in Sixes?

You drink the entire cup, return it empty to its numbered position, and roll again immediately. The re-roll is the game's signature cruelty: with several full cups on the table, one unlucky player can chain three or four drinks in a single turn. Your turn only ends when you finally roll an empty cup and pour your fill.

What do you do when all six cups are full?

The next roll is guaranteed to hit, so the roller simply drinks whatever they roll - there is no special all-full rule in the classic game, just certainty. Some houses add a flourish: rolling a 6 with all six cups full means choosing any cup to drink and any player to drink a second one. Either way, the logjam clears itself within a roll or two.

How much do you pour into each cup?

Set a fixed measure before the game and hold everyone to it - about two fingers of beer, a quarter cup at most. Consistent pours are what keep Sixes fair, because every full cup is a penalty someone will eventually pay. Overfilling to sabotage the table sounds funny exactly once, then it is your number that comes up.

How many players does Sixes work with?

Three to eight is the honest range. With two players it functions but feels like taking turns being punished; with four to six it hits its ideal rhythm of pours, panics and re-roll disasters. Beyond eight, the wait between turns outlasts the fun - run a second row of six cups and a second die instead.

Is Sixes a skill game at all?

No, and that is a feature. There are no decisions after the die leaves your hand, which makes Sixes impossible to be bad at, ideal for mixed groups, and perfect for playing while conversations, music and other games happen around it. Anyone chasing strategy should graduate to Liar's Dice or Mexicali; Sixes is here for luck and noise.

Sixes Drinking Game

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What you need & setup