Optimal Klackers

Klackers is a game in which players roll dice and then flip down tiles numbered 1 through 9 depending on the sum of the dice. The object of the game is to flip down as many tiles as possible in order to achieve the minimum score (scoring is described below). In this paper, we consider the one-player game and two-player game. For the one-player game, we derive the optimal strategy under which the odds of flipping down all the tiles ("klacking") is about 10% with an expected score of about 11. We also develop a simple heuristic strategy that performs near optimally. For the two-player game, we show that the second player has a limited advantage over the first player.