The $20 Draft

A new way to play

Call Out

Spin a topic. Bet you can name eight of them in a minute. Somebody raises you to nine. Somebody else calls you on it, and now you are on the clock with real money on the table. Or play Better Than: no clock, just a claim that you can name more and better ones than a famous name.

Names

Round 1

Topic

Whatever it lands on is the topic for this round.

Name as many as you can
How many
0things
For how much
$0at stake

60
0
of 8

Somebody else holds the phone and taps. Say them out loud.

The vote

Game over

The winner

Call Out

How it works

Two to six people, one device passed around, twenty dollars each. No accounts, nothing to install.

A round

  1. The reel spins and lands on a topic. Car brands. Countries in Africa. Breakfast cereals.
  2. The player who opens makes a claim: how many they can name, and how much of their money they are putting behind it.
  3. Everyone else, in turn, either raises the claim, calls it out, or passes. A raise has to go up on both counts, more things and more money, the same way a raise works in poker.
  4. The first person to call out ends the betting immediately.

The clock (classic)

Whoever holds the claim has to do it. Someone else takes the phone, starts the clock and taps once for every answer that counts. It is an honour system and arguing about whether something counts is half the point.

The money

If somebody called them out and they make it, the caller pays them the full bet. If they fall short, they pay the caller instead.

If nobody called them out, they still have to prove it, but only for a dollar from each player. Which is the reason to call somebody out rather than let it slide: passing is cheap, but so is the payout.

Better Than mode

A second way to play, for topics people actually argue about. After the topic lands, a second spin picks somebody to beat, so a claim sounds like this: I can name five NFL quarterbacks better than Jalen Hurts. The name to beat is always an established starter or a star, never a backup, so the claim has to mean something. The betting, the raises and the money all work the same way.

There is no clock. When a claim is called, the claimer names their picks out loud, taps once for each and the table argues it out for as long as it takes. Then everyone except the claimer votes. A majority carries it, and a tie goes to the name being beaten. Win the vote and you collect the way a made claim does. Lose it, or concede, and you pay.

Winning

The game ends after the number of rounds you picked, or the moment everybody but one person is broke. Most money wins. Run out of money and you are out.