The games are the reason people show up. A league can run its season on stroke play and standings, but what gets argued about in the car park is who won the 14th and whether that skin should have carried.
This page covers each format twice: what the game is and how golfers actually play it, and how the platform scores it — every setting, what each one changes, and the money math where there is any. Skins gets the deepest treatment because it's the most configurable game on the platform and the one most leagues run every week.
Eight formats. Last reviewed August 2026.
How games work here
Seven things worth knowing before the formats themselves, because they apply to all of them and explain why the settings look the way they do.
Games attach to a round — Not to the event. A three-day event can run skins on Friday, a scramble on Saturday and a Nassau on Sunday, each with its own field, settings and results.
Formats are declarative — A game isn't a block of bespoke code — it's a rule schema with seven axes: scoring unit (hole, nine or round), gross or net, comparison direction, win condition, team structure, payout shape, and optional modifiers. One engine reads the schema and resolves the right scoring behaviour. That's why a new variant is a settings change rather than a release.
One score, many games — Every game in a round consumes the same hole-by-hole scores the players already entered. Nobody keeps a second card for the skins game. Adding a game after the round has started is fine — it scores retroactively from the scores already in.
Scoring is automatic — Calculation triggers when a scorecard is attested, not on a manager pressing "score it". Correcting a score reruns the affected games and rewrites their results rather than layering a second pass on top, so the answer is the same however many times it runs.
Participation — A game is either "Everyone" — the field is auto-enrolled and walk-ups added on the day land in it automatically — or "Choose players", where the commish picks. Team formats lock this: the pairings are the field.
Results are stored per hole — Every format writes per-hole results to one table whatever its shape, so a hole's outcome is auditable rather than inferred from a final total. Carry-state games keep their running state separately, and per-player career totals accumulate as events complete.
Money is bookkeeping — Buy-ins, rakes and payouts are calculated and displayed. The platform never moves real money, holds a balance, or processes a payment.
Skins, in full
Every hole is its own prize. Win it outright or nobody does.
How it's played
A skins game breaks the round into eighteen separate contests. Lowest score on the hole wins that hole's skin — but it has to be outright. Two players tie for low and the skin isn't won at all. That one rule is what makes the game: the player who makes birdie on the 12th and wins nothing because someone else also made birdie is the reason skins gets talked about on the drive home.
The other rule every group settles before teeing off is what happens to a tied hole. Let it wash and the skin simply disappears. Carry it and the value rolls onto the next hole, then the next, until somebody finally wins one outright — which is how a group gets to the 17th with six skins riding on a single putt.
How the platform scores it
Each hole is evaluated as the scores come in. One lowest score awards a skin; a tie awards nothing and, if carryover is on, increments the carry so the next outright winner collects the accumulated value. Handicaps are applied at the hole level, allocated one stroke at a time against the hole's stroke index, so a shot hole is a shot hole whether or not it matters to the rest of the round.
Settings
Scoring — net or gross — Net (default) applies each player's course handicap, allocated one stroke at a time against the hole's stroke index. Gross ignores handicaps entirely — scratch skins, where the best golfer usually wins and everyone knows it going in.
Handicap strokes — full or half — Full (default) gives the whole stroke on each handicap hole. Half gives half a stroke, so a shot hole is worth 0.5 rather than 1. This is the classic fix for a field with a wide handicap spread: the high handicapper stays live without the low handicapper being mathematically shut out. Only meaningful when scoring is net.
Carryover on tie — Off by default: two players tie the hole, nobody wins the skin, and it's gone. On: the hole's value rolls into the next one and keeps rolling. Ties on 5, 6 and 7 mean whoever wins hole 8 outright collects four skins. This single toggle is the biggest change you can make to how a skins game feels — carryover turns the back nine into a lottery.
Buy-in — Per player, and the switch for the whole money layer — $0 means the game is scored but no pot exists. Every assigned participant antes; the field size is read from the game's actual participant list, never typed in.
House rake — Taken off the top before the pot is split, as either a percentage (default 5%) or a flat dollar amount. Zero means none. This is the cut leagues typically put toward the season-end purse, the beer fund, or the club.
Whole-dollar payouts — On by default. Each player's total payout is floored to the whole dollar so no coins change hands, and the dropped change is added to the rake. Chosen over rounding to $5 because flooring only ever costs a player under a dollar, where $5 buckets can shave 20% off a small winner and 4% off a big one.
Which combination gives you which game
| The game you want | Settings |
|---|---|
| Classic net skins — ties wash out | Net · full strokes · carryover off |
| Carryover skins — the pot builds | Net · full strokes · carryover on |
| Scratch skins — no handicaps | Gross · carryover to taste |
| Half-stroke skins — mixed-ability field | Net · half strokes |
| Low and high flights playing separate pots | Flighted into 2–5 handicap bands |
| $20 in, 5% to the club, no coins | Buy-in $20 · 5% rake · whole-dollar on |
| Flat $10 to the organizer | Rake set to flat $10 |
| Scored for bragging rights only | Buy-in $0 — pot and payout columns disappear |
The money, worked through
Eight players at $20 with the default 5% rake, six skins claimed across the round. All arithmetic is done in whole cents — no floating-point money.
| Gross pot | 8 players × $20 | $160.00 |
| House rake | 5% of the gross pot | −$8.00 |
| Net pot | what gets split | $152.00 |
| Skins claimed | 6 holes won outright | 6 |
| Value per skin | $152.00 ÷ 6, floored to the cent | $25.33 |
Then each winner is paid per skin — and, with whole-dollar payouts on, floored to the dollar, with the change joining the rake:
| Exact | Whole-dollar | |
|---|---|---|
| Player A — 3 skins | $76.00 | $75.00 |
| Player B — 2 skins | $50.67 | $50.00 |
| Player C — 1 skin | $25.33 | $25.00 |
| Paid out | $152.00 | $150.00 |
| Effective rake | $8.00 | $10.00 |
Without whole-dollar rounding the leftover cents are handed out one at a time — most skins first — so the payouts sum to the net pot exactly, to the cent. With it on, the $2.00 of change joins the rake, which the organizer settles however they like.
The edge cases, and what happens
Nobody wins a skin all round — Possible in a tight four-ball with carryover on. There's no winner to split to, so the net pot is refunded to every player who anted, and the refund is never rounded — exact stakes come back.
Carried skins that never get won — The last holes tie and the accumulated skins are never claimed. That money doesn't vanish or need a ruling: the pot is divided by the skins actually won, so the unclaimed value spreads across the players who did win, in proportion to what they won.
A player is disqualified or withdraws — They forfeit any winnings, but their buy-in stays in the pot — the standard house rule. In the no-skins refund case above they still get their ante back, because a refund returns your own stake rather than paying out winnings.
A score is corrected afterwards — The game recomputes from the corrected scores. Because carryover state is derived rather than accumulated in place, a change on the 4th correctly rewrites what happened on the 5th through the 18th.
One thing the engine does that the form doesn't expose yet: payout multipliers on a trigger — double the skin for a birdie, quadruple it for an eagle, bonus skins for an ace. The scoring engine implements and applies them; there is currently no field in the game form to set one, so in practice every skin is worth one skin.
Stableford
Points for good holes, nothing worse than zero for bad ones.
How it's played
Instead of counting strokes you score points against par: 5 for a double eagle, 4 for an eagle, 3 for a birdie, 2 for par, 1 for a bogey and nothing for anything worse. Most points wins. The format's whole appeal is that a blow-up hole costs you a single point rather than seven strokes, so nobody's round is over on the 4th. It also keeps pace of play honest — once a hole is worth nothing you can pick up.
How the platform scores it
Points are computed per hole from the same scores everyone already entered, using net by default so a player's handicap strokes count toward the points table. Totals accumulate across the round and the highest total wins. The platform uses the standard points table above, not one of the Modified Stableford variants that pay differently for eagles and penalise doubles.
Settings
Scoring — net or gross — Net (default) computes points off the net score. Gross scores the points table against raw strokes.
Stroke play
Add them all up. Lowest wins.
How it's played
The default format of the sport: count every stroke for eighteen holes, low total wins. Played net it's the fairest way to let a 22 handicap beat a 6 on a given day; played gross it's the tournament format.
How the platform scores it
A running total per player, updated per hole, net by default. Because it consumes the same scores as everything else, a stroke-play purse can run alongside skins on the same round without anyone entering a number twice.
Settings
Scoring — net or gross — Net (default) or gross.
Nassau
Three bets in one round: front nine, back nine, and the whole thing.
How it's played
The oldest side bet in golf. One round, three separate wagers — the front nine, the back nine, and the overall eighteen. Losing the front doesn't cost you the day, which is exactly why it has survived a century: there's always something still live on the 10th tee.
How the platform scores it
One game that internally runs three sub-games. The front-nine bet scores holes 1–9, the back nine scores 10–18, and the overall scores all eighteen, each as its own stroke-play segment with its own standings. The results panel reports all three separately.
Settings
Scoring — net or gross — Applies to all three segments together.
Worth knowing
- The three segments are scored on total strokes, not holes won. Many groups play Nassau as three match-play bets; if that's your version, run Match play instead.
- Presses aren't supported. A press is a new bet opened mid-round by the player who's down, and the platform has no concept of adding a wager after the round starts.
Best ball
Partners, own ball, better score counts.
How it's played
Each player plays their own ball all the way through. On each hole the team takes the better of its two scores. Nothing is shared but the result, so a wild player can go for everything knowing their partner is safely on the green — the format rewards one player being brilliant far more than both being steady.
How the platform scores it
Two-player teams. On each hole the platform takes the lower score from each team and the low team score wins that hole outright; a tie halves it and nothing is awarded. Partners don't have to share a tee time, so a match can run across two groups that never see each other.
Settings
Scoring — net or gross — Net (default) or gross.
Pairings — Built on the round setup board. Participation is locked to them — the teams are the field, so there's no separate opt-in list.
Worth knowing
- Best ball and match play can't run in the same round: both are driven by the pairings, and a round has one team-building surface. A true team-versus-team best-ball match wants a preset of its own.
Match play
Hole by hole, head to head. The score is how many holes you're up.
How it's played
Forget your total. Each hole is won, lost or halved, and the score is the running difference — 2 up, all square, 3 down. Strategically it's a different sport from stroke play: a triple bogey costs you exactly one hole, so aggression that would ruin a stroke-play card is often correct.
How the platform scores it
Opponent pairs, assigned on the setup board. Each matchup is scored as its own independent match within the one game, so a round can run eight matches at once and report each separately. Winning a hole moves you one up and your opponent one down; a tie halves it and nothing moves.
Settings
Scoring — net or gross — Net (default) or gross.
Matchups — Two named players per match, assigned on the round setup board. Any number of matches per round.
Worth knowing
- Every hole is scored. A match that's decided early isn't closed out at "4 & 3" — the remaining holes are still recorded and the final figure is holes up after eighteen.
- Match play can't be split into handicap flights: a matchup already names its two players, so banding the field on top of it adds nothing.
Scramble
Everyone hits, the team plays the best one, repeat.
How it's played
All players tee off, the team picks the best shot, and everyone plays their next from there — repeating to the hole. It's the standard charity and corporate format because it's fast, forgiving, and a beginner can contribute a putt without holding anyone up.
How the platform scores it
Teams of two to four who must share a tee time, since they're physically playing one ball. One gross team score per hole, and the lowest total for the round wins. Gross only — a scramble team doesn't have an individual handicap.
Settings
Team size — Two to four players, all in the same tee-time group.
Everything else — Fixed. Gross, whole round, lowest total, participation locked to the teams.
Worth knowing
- A scramble excludes every other game in the round. Nobody records an individual hole score, so there is nothing for a skins or Stableford game to consume. This is enforced at creation rather than discovered at scoring time.
Alternate shot
One ball, two players, taking turns. Also called foursomes.
How it's played
Partners share a single ball and alternate strikes — one tees off, the other plays the second shot, and so on to the hole, with tee shots usually alternating by odd and even holes. It's the most stressful format in golf, because every shot you hit is one your partner has to stand over next.
How the platform scores it
Pairs sharing a tee time, one gross card per team, lowest total for the round wins.
Settings
Team size — Exactly two, in the same tee-time group.
Everything else — Fixed. Gross, whole round, lowest total, participation locked to the pairs.
Worth knowing
- Like the scramble, it excludes every other game in the round for the same reason: with one shared ball, no individual hole scores exist.
Handicap flights
A league with 4 handicaps and 28 handicaps in the same skins game has a problem no handicap allowance fully solves. Flights split the field into bands that play their own separate game — the same format, run two to five times over different slices of the roster.
How they're built — Each flight is a real game in its own right, linked to its siblings as a group. "Skins — Low" and "Skins — High" each have their own pot, their own carryover and their own winners, and each card names the parent game so a result never reads as a bare "Low".
Bands — Two to five, each with an inclusive handicap range that may be open-ended at either end. Overlapping ranges are rejected — every pairwise combination is checked, not just adjacent ones, since ranges aren't required to be entered in order. Gaps are allowed: a league can deliberately leave a band uncovered.
Assignment — Players auto-assign into the one band containing their index, and a player can only be in one flight of a group at a time, so re-assigning moves them rather than duplicating them. A game set to "Everyone" auto-sorts the whole field, including walk-ups added on the day, into the right band.
Fixed at creation — Ranges can't be edited afterwards, and the add form says so up front. Editing a live flight's boundaries would silently move players between pots mid-round. The rest of the settings — scoring, buy-in, rake, carryover — stay editable per flight, and are allowed to diverge.
One flighted game per round — A second would split the same field again on a different axis, leaving players in unrelated bands across two games. Match play can't be flighted at all, and the team formats can't because their participation is locked to the pairings.
What can run together
Most formats stack freely — skins, Stableford, stroke play and a Nassau can all run on one round off one set of scores. The exceptions are checked when a game is added rather than discovered when it fails to score.
Shared-ball formats take the whole round — Scramble and alternate shot produce no individual hole scores — there is one ball and one team result. Every other format needs each player's own score on every hole, so these two exclude everything else, and each other.
Best ball and match play are mutually exclusive — Both are driven by the pairings, and a round has one team-building surface, so the second one's pairings would be unreachable.
One game per format per round — Unless it's flighted — running the same format twice over different bands is exactly what flights are for.
Stroke play alongside Nassau is allowed — It is arguably redundant — Nassau's overall bet double-counts the full-round result — but leagues genuinely run a stroke-play purse with a Nassau side bet, so it's the commish's call rather than a blocked combination.
Settings at a glance
What each active format actually exposes. A dash means the setting doesn't apply to that format, not that it's hidden.
| Format | Scoring | Strokes | Carryover | Money | Flights |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Skins | Net / gross | Full / half | Optional | Buy-in, rake, rounding | Yes |
| Stableford | Net / gross | — | — | — | Yes |
| Stroke play | Net / gross | — | — | — | Yes |
| Nassau | Net / gross | — | — | — | Yes |
| Best ball | Net / gross | — | — | — | No |
| Match play | Net / gross | — | — | — | No |
| Scramble | Gross | — | — | — | No |
| Alternate shot | Gross | — | — | — | No |
Every format also has a name you can override, so a league's "Thursday Dots" doesn't have to read as "Skins" on the card.
Play something we don't have?
Formats are rule schemas rather than bespoke code, so a variant is usually a configuration question. Tell us what your league plays: hello@foreyourleague.com.