Game Play set-up is quite simple. The beer pong game is generally played by two teams with players from each side taking turns to throw a ping pong ball into cups filled with beer.
When the ball lands in the cup, the cup has to be taken away from the table. If both teammates from the same team land two balls in the same cup, the team earns an additional shot.
The first team to sink a shot in all the opponent cups is the winner.
2 or 4 player beer pong
It is common to play the game 1 vs 1 or 2 vs 2. The number of cups and beers is left up to house rules, but it is 1 on 1 is played with 6 while 2 on 2 is played with 10 cups on each side of the table.
Selecting which team starts the game
Eyeshot decides the first team and each team throws a ball by maintaining eye contact with the opponent. If the player hits the cup and the opponent doesn’t, the team starts the game.
If the two players from each side both hit the ball, the shooting is repeated until only one player hits, and the other one doesn’t.
Wrist rule
The rule demands the players to keep their elbow behind the table’s edges when taking a shot. If a player breaks the rule, the shot is counted as a miss.
Re-Racking rule
The rule allows the team to request rearrangement at the start of a turn. It usually takes place when the remaining cups amount to 6, 5, 3 or 2.
However, if a team makes two shots in the same cup, the turn is still considered theirs, and re-rack is unnecessary.
Bouncing rule
The rule states that if the ball enters the cup accidentally, as long as the ball hits the table, someone should remove the cup from the game. In addition, another cup is selected by the defending team and removed together with the first cup.
Although it is allowed to bounce a ball in beer pong, the defender is allowed to swat the ball after the bounce. Defenders cannot interfere with direct shots, but bounces are fair game because they are worth two cups if the shooter sinks the shot.
However, if only two cups remain, the bounce only counts as one cup.
Fingering or Blowing rule
Fingering occurs when a player from the defending team pulls the ball out of the cup. Suppose the ball spins inside the lip of the cup while blowing is when the player blows the ball out when the ball spin inside the cup.
Both fingering and blowing are allowed at the beginning of the game, but extremely difficult to achieve without knocking the cup over.
Fixed cups rule
The rule allows the players to ask for cups to be fixed at any given time during the game. This voids any ability to re-rack the cups during the remainder of the game
Death cup rule
If the defender has not finished chugging their beer, and the shooter makes it in their cup on the table, the opponent automatically loses the game
Table rollbacks or rebound rule
The rule allows players to shoot back with the same ball whenever the rebound rolls back to them, as long as the ball has not hit the ground.
Rebuttal rule
The rule allows the losing team to have a chance to hit the remaining cups after the winning team hits their last cup. The rebuttal is not permitted if the shooting team lands both shots in the last cup on their final turn.
Beer pong rules
- The ball is only allowed to be grabbed after it hits the cup. If any player from the playing side grabs the ball before it hits the cup, the team should select the cup the defensive team needs to remove.
- The opponent may interfere with bounce shots after the ball has ricocheted off the table.
- A bounce shot is worth two cups, one cup the ball lands in and the second is defenders choice.
- Once the ball enters the cup and does not spin inside, the ball should not be interfered with by fingering or blowing.
- The cup is removed from play if it gets hit by a player.
- The ball is rolled back to a team if both players from a team make two shots in the same cup.
- If a cup falls off the table in a beer pong game by a non-player, the cup should be returned to the game and refilled.
- Leaning on the table is only permitted after the shot has been taken. Therefore, nobody part of the player should contact the table while taking the shot.
- No penalty is levied whenever the ball drops in the cup accidentally.