INTRODUCTION TO DOUBLES

Doubles is a fun game for anyone looking to spice up Draw Dominoes. In this game, all doubles are spinners. A spinner is a domino that can have other dominoes attached to it on all four sides. This allows for other lines of dominoes to “spin out” from the main line. For this reason, doubles are very special in this game, and the player who starts out with them usually has an advantage.

SET UP

Place the entire set of double 6 dominoes face down on the playing space. Shuffle the dominoes thoroughly. Each player draws one domino at a time from the pile until everyone has the correct amount of starting dominoes. The remaining tiles are placed to the side. This is the draw pile which is called the boneyard.

In a 2 player game, each player should draw 8 dominoes. In a 3 or 4 player game, each player should draw 6 dominoes.

THE PLAY

Play begins with the player who drew the largest double. Discover this by asking who drew the double six and work your way down until you find the person with the largest double. If no one at the table has a double, return all of the tiles back to the center, shuffle thoroughly and redraw.

The player with the largest double plays that domino in the center of the playing space. For the sake of this example, let’s say the double six was played. The next player must play on that six. If they are unable to play, they draw one domino from the boneyard. If that domino contains a six, they must play it. If that domino does not contain a six, they pass their turn.

In Doubles, numbers must be unlocked before they can be played. Looking back at our example game, if there are four dominoes placed on that beginning double six, no other dominoes can be played until another double is on the board. For example, if a player places a double three on a six/three domino, threes become unlocked and everyone at the table may begin connecting to threes. That double three is also a spinner meaning that dominoes can be played on all four sides.

Play continues around the table until one of two things happens:

1. A player plays their last domino

2. All players are blocked and unable to draw from the boneyard. Once the boneyard has two tiles left, players can no longer draw from it.

Once one of these two conditions is met, the round is over. It’s time to tally up the score.

SCORING

If a player successfully plays all of their dominoes, they will earn points equal to the pip value of everyone else’s remaining dominoes.

If the game becomes blocked, and nobody is able to play all of their dominoes, the player with the lowest total pip value wins the round. They earn points equal to the total of all their opponents pips.

Continue playing rounds until one player reaches 100 points. The first player to reach 100 points wins the game.