Senet
BGG rank
BGG #11,849
BGG rating
5.8

Senet

Rules assistance for Senet

Plain-language explanations of turns, card effects and disputed situations, with official source references and saved question history.

  • 2 players
  • 30 min
  • 6+
  • Complexity 1.4/5

For 2 players

Rules assistant for Senet

What would you like to know?

Answers come from the official rulebook, with the page to check.

Senet is a board game for 2 players, 30 minutes per game, and ages 6 and up. Its main mechanics are Race, Roll / Spin and Move, and Lose a Turn.

Expansions

Similar games

About the game

Senet is an ancient Egyptian board game similar to backgammon. Each player has 5 pawns which travel around a 3 by 10 board in an S shaped path. Movement is dictated by the throw of 4 sticks (black on one side and white on the other) which can produce a 1,2,3,4, or 6, (5 is not possible) depending on how they land.. As in backgammon, the objective is to bear all of one's pawns off first. A couple of interesting differences is that there are safe and trap spaces on the board. Also, players may block each others' progress as in Parchisi. Senet sets are usually constructed from various woods and are often quite beautiful. Senet is one of the oldest boardgames but unfortunately it fell out of use for a few thousand years and no ancient rules set has been discovered. Undoubtably another tragic loss resulting from the Library of Alexandria burning to the ground. As a result scholars has made several educated guesses as to the rules. The most popular versions are in the files section. It may be a relative of Aseb and The Royal Game of Ur.

Publishers

  • (Self-Published)
  • Parker Brothers
  • Juegos Crone
  • Fundex
  • Cadaco
  • (Public Domain)
  • Copp Clark Publishing Company
  • Mitra

Questions and answers

Senet supports 2 players according to the catalogue. This is the publisher’s listed player count, so the game is designed for exactly that number of participants. Variants for other group sizes, if any, are described in the rulebook of your edition, so check it before setting up a different configuration.