It’s always nice to visit bars that have a dartboard. Having a round or two of darts and a few drinks can take your mind off stress, but doing this regularly can get boring. So before you head out for a game with your friends, there are a whole bunch of good dart games that you can use while drinking.
That said, what are the best darts drinking games you can play with your games? Hot Shots, Hot Shots Deux, Hot Shots Tres, Dear Beer, Last Man Standing, and Fifty-One by Five. In this article, we’ll talk about the games we mentioned and their corresponding rules so you and your friends can have fun while drinking.
Though these games require a bit of an investment which you could have spent on drinking with your buddies, all of them are good fun. You can take your pick or try all of them. The goal is to have fun while drinking!
without further ado, here’s the list of the 6 best games that you can play with your buddies while enjoying a drink. Enjoy!
Hot Shots
This is a great game for two or more players. Here are the things you need:
- A dartboard
- At least 6 darts
- Tequila or Vodka for shots (or any other liquor, you choose)
- Glasses for shots
It’s best played when there are two to four buddies. If there are four, you can have two teams. Here are the simple rules for the game:
- To start, a player from each team gets a throw. The dart closest to the bullseye is the winner. The loser/losing team drinks a shot.
- Then the actual game starts. Each team gets to throw three darts. They must hit a treble, double, or single of any number between 15 and 20. If they don’t, they get to drink a shot!
- If a team throws their three darts and they land in the single, double, and treble of a number, say 20, then that number is “closed out” for the rest of the game.
- After a number is closed out, if a dart lands on that number, the person/team who landed there drinks a shot!
- You can end the game whenever you feel like ending it, when all the numbers get “closed out”, when the liquor runs out, or one or more players are too buzzed to see the board.
Hot Shots Deux
This is yet another great game for two or more people. Each player plays as an individual. For this game, you will need:
- A dartboard
- One dart for each player
- Four shot glasses
- Liquor of your choice. To make it even more bizarre, select 4 different types of liquor, one type for each shot glass. However, beware of the effects of mixing drinks!
This is how you play:
- Each shot glass represents a number on the dartboard, for example, say 2, 6, 8, and 14.
- Each player throws just one dart. If the dart lands on one of the numbers chosen beforehand…you guessed it, they drink a shot representing that number!
- The game finishes when you run out of the liquor of your choice or are too sozzled to stand.
Hot Shots Tres
Here is another exciting drinking game using darts. You will need:
- A dartboard
- Darts, one for each player (or you can share)
- Shot glasses, maybe one for each player (or you can share!)
- Liquor of your choice
Each player gets a chance to throw one dart. Depending on where the dart lands, he has to follow the instructions. The instructions are as follows:
- If the dart lands on any number from 1 to 5, the thrower drinks half a shot.
- If the dart lands on any number from 6 to 10, the thrower drinks a full shot.
- If the dart lands on any number from 11 to 15, nominate who should drink half a shot.
- If the dart lands on any number from 16 to 20, nominate who should drink a full shot.
- If the dart lands in the outer bullseye, the thrower is lucky, does not need to drink a shot!
- If the dart hits the bullseye, everyone, except the thrower, drinks a shot!
The game ends, as usual, when one or all are too drunk to see the board or when there’s no more liquor.
Dear Beer
This is a great beer game that even two people can play. However, the more the merrier!
You will need at least one beer can for each player. Of course, keep plenty of beer cans available to replace beer cans that get empty! You will also need steel tip darts. One dart for each player.
The game is simple. The players are seated in a circle, with their beer can on the ground close to their feet. Each player then gets a turn to throw a dart at someone’s can.
- If a dart hits a can but does not puncture it, the owner of the can must take a sip of beer.
- If a dart hits a can, does not puncture it, but the can falls over, the owner of the can takes a sip of beer.
- If a dart hits a can and punctures it, the owner of the can must drink the full can.
- If the thrower misses the can completely, he has to take a sip of his beer.
- To make it more exciting, if the dart hits a person instead of the can, the thrower has to bear the expense of transporting the injured party to the hospital and footing the bill. (Caution: Darts, especially steel-tipped darts, can be dangerous. Use with caution, especially if you are drunk.)
The game ends when you run out of beer, people are fed up with the game, or if someone gets injured. In the last case, your rush the injured party to the hospital!
Last Man Standing
While not strictly a drinking dart game, this one gives the winner a good amount of money to buy drinks for the others. Any number of people can play.
At the start, you decide what the stakes are going to be. The bigger the stake, the better. For example, you can decide on a $5 or $10 stake to enter the game. Each player puts his/her stake into a cup and the winner will take the whole pot.
Before you start the game, decide the order in which the players will play. Use any method to decide the order in which players would be playing.
At the start of the game, each player gets 5 lives. The first player then throws his three darts. Let us say he scores 31 points.
He can then ask the second player to score higher or lower. Suppose he says “Lower”, then the second player throws his three darts. If the second player scores higher than the first player, he loses a life (because he had to score lower), and then the next player throws his darts.
However, if the second player scores lower than 31, he tells the third player to score higher or lower. Suppose the second player asks the third player to score “Higher”. Then the third player follows the same pattern as the first player.
Once a player loses all his lives, he is out of the game. Ultimately, you will have one man standing who gets the pot and could buy the others drinks.
Fifty-One by Five
Once again, this is not a drinking dart game but rather a great variation on the regular game that will get you out of the rut.
The aim of the game is that the first player to get to 51 wins. No more, no less. It has to be the exact number which is 51.
The rules are easy to understand:
- All 3 darts must score to calculate your actual score.
- Add up the score of your 3 darts and divide by 5, if not divisible by 5 you receive 0 points, if divisible by 5, add that to your score.
For example:
- 20, 5, 1 = 26 gives you 0 points (26 is not divisible by 5)
- 20, 20, 5 = 45 gives you 9 points
- 1, 1, 3 = 5 gives you 1 point
- 17, 18, 15 = 50 gives you 10 points
- 60, 60, 1 = 121 gives you 0 points
- 5, 20, miss = 0 (all 3 darts must count) 0 points
Final Thoughts
Darts can be a fun game, but adding the alcohol element makes it a bit more exciting. Playing darts requires some skill and a lot of focus and concentration. Adding the alcohol element just adds a bit more spice. As the players start getting buzzed, they will find it difficult to focus which adds to the fun.
A word of caution: darts are not toys. They can be dangerous, so use with caution, especially around drunken men. Have fun!
