A very long, very tiring, game of frisbee for several discs and somewhere between two to six dozen players.

The Rules

Get several discs. I think three red and three blue discs would be optimal, but different numbers and styles can also be made to work. Gather your rather large crowd in a large, fairly open area. Pick two smallish regions, about 100 feet apart. Designate one area "red" and the other "blue"

The game starts with all red team players and red discs in the red area, and the blue team and its discs in the blue area. A designated player (with a very loud voice) screams "go!" (or "commence to start!" or "fjords!" or whatever), discs become "live", and teams can leave the area.

Gameplay is similar to ultimate frisbee, as regards vertical space, fouls, double-teaming, and so on. However, the allowed motion is a little more complicated; any disc is always either "alive" or "dead".

A live disc cannot be carried. A team member holding a live disc must come to an immediate stop, and cannot move until throwing the disc. A live disc becomes dead by hitting the ground, coming to rest on non-ground terrain, or being caught by the opposing team.

A dead disc cannot be thrown, though it can be carried, handed off, or dropped by the owning team. A dead disc is made live again as soon as it is held by an owning team member in that team's region.

A point is scored when a disc comes to rest in the opposing team's region. I'm not sure how to handle this precisely, so I'm imagining two variations.

In one variation, suitable for games with one or two discs per team, a member of the scoring team loudly announces the point. The scoring disc is then dead. The first team to reach a predetermined score (three or five, I think) wins.

In another variation, good for games with three or more discs per team, discs are simply left in the opponent's region. A dead disc may never be dropped in the opponent's region. This has the advantage that honest confusion over scores cannot happen, but has the disadvantage of requiring more discs. This is probably the only way to play the game in an area where players can't really shout across the entire field.

Game Design Goals

Other variations may be significant improvements. Try out lots of different stuff, see what works better, and tell me! It will probably be best to keep the following points in mind:

The game should be playable with a group of honest players and no referee. It should be designed so that conflicts are simple, and arise rarely.

The game has lots of players in lots of different places, making communication difficult. The game should be designed so that players can determine if they have just won or not with minimal communication. More importantly, a player who knows the rules but doesn't know what's happened for the last hour should know if a particular action will break the rules.

The game should be at least somewhat tactical, fairly exhausting, and slightly silly.

Get a Game Together

I really want to play this game. It'd be great! Email me if you're around Madison campus and you'd like to play. If enough people (at least two dozen) are interested, we'll try to put a game together. Also, suggest improvements or variations on the rules.