Gambling Guide

Petals Around the Rose is a lateral thinking mind game traditionally played with five dice.

It is played by computer program or with physical dice that are rolled by a Potentate of the Rose, a person who knows the secret of the game. For each roll of all dice, there is a single numerical solution. The players then attempt to arrive at this solution. If they do not, the Potentate of the Rose will tell it to them, and it is their task to figure out the solution for the next roll.

There are three, and only three, rules:

1. The name of the game is "Petals Around the Rose".
2. The name is important.
3. The answer is always an even number.

When a person discovers how the answer is computed, they become a Potentate of the Rose themselves.

A claim that often accompanies these instructions is that the smarter an individual, the greater amount of difficulty the individual will have in solving it. If such a statement is true, it may be attributed to the fact that "smarter" people tend to be more knowledgeable in a wide range of information which they may unnecessarily attempt to draw upon to solve the puzzle.

The solution is therefore relatively simple; the 'rose' is the center dot on any dice that has one, and the 'petals' are all dots around it. The die faces without center dots, including 2, 4, and 6, do not count, and colors have no relevance. Adding the sums of the petal dots yields the final number.

Alternately, one may sum the faces of odd dice, and then subtract the number of them. Thus, in a roll of 1,3,4,5,3, the odd faces sum to 12. There are 4 odd dice, so the solution is 12-4, or 8.

Much akin to magic tricks, however, an integral part of the puzzle is that those who have solved it are urged to keep the solution a secret.

External links

• The prettiest online version of Petals Around the Rose
• The oldest version of Petals Around the Rose
• Another online version of Petals Around the Rose
• Bill Gates' experience with Petals around the Rose
• Helpful online version of Petals Around the Rose
• Online version of Petals Around the Rose