Domino is a family of games played with domino tiles that have an arrangement of dots on one side and are blank on the other. The tiles are arranged to form a line of play and can be joined together end to end or crosswise.
Domino is a great game for developing spatial awareness and colour recognition. It can also help to sharpen fine motor skills.
Rules
In general, domino games involve blocking your opponent’s tiles and scoring points based on the value of their total pips. You can also play domino games of a different character, such as solitaire or trick-taking. Some of these adaptations of card games were once popular to circumvent religious prohibitions against playing cards.
The first player to reach a set amount of points, such as 150, wins the game. Alternatively, a tie may be broken by drawing lots or by determining which player holds the highest double tile. The player with the highest double is awarded a bonus for the next round and has the privilege of seating himself.
Each player draws the number of tiles specified in the rules for the particular domino game being played. The tiles are then placed on-edge before the players so that they cannot see each others’ pips. A player whose hands are full of dominoes can draw additional ones from the stock but must return them to the stock and reshuffle before they begin playing. The initial double tile is often called “the spinner” since it can be played off on all four sides.
Materials
A domino is a small rectangular block of wood or plastic with a line down the center dividing it into two square parts. One side of each part contains a number, ranging from six to blank, while the other is marked with an arrangement of dots resembling those on dice. A complete set of dominoes contains 28 such tiles.
Historically, dominoes were made from animal bone or ivory. They were later shaped from vegetable ivory, a hard and close-grained material extracted from the tagua nut, native to the region of South America.
Today, there are many types of domino materials available. Some are inexpensive and mass produced, while others are more expensive but high quality. Many high end wooden domino sets are considered to be works of art and have hefty price tags that reflect their craftsmanship. These dominoes are often layered in multiple woods and finely crafted with layers of lacquer. They may also be hand painted or carved and are a joy to play with.
Variations
There are many variations to domino games but the basic rules for playing are the same. Typically, a player or team scores the total of all remaining tiles in the opposing players’ hands. This is referred to as the Board count. A tile’s value is determined by the number of spots or pips it has. A domino with more pips is “heavier” and has a higher value than a domino with fewer pips.
Thierry Denoual’s Five-Up is an excellent variation that uses the standard double-six domino set. This variant is based on the Draw game but every Domino has two ends that can be connected with other Dominoes to form chains.
This version allows the player to pick up a sleeping domino when they have no legal move and is popular in many parts of the world. It can also be played with a double-nine or the larger Double Twelve sets that contain a greater number of pips.
Scoring
Dominoes are a type of tile that have an identity-bearing face and blank or identically-patterned ends. The pips on the faces are arranged to match a specific number, from none up to six. A domino can also be a double. The pips on the exposed ends of a domino count for scoring purposes.
Normally, one points for each time that the sum of the ends of two adjacent dominoes is divisible by five or three. The sum of the exposed pips on a domino that is a double counts as either one or two, depending on the game variant and the players’ agreement upon the rules.
When the winning player is determined, the score of the other players’ dominoes is totalled and rounded to the nearest multiple of five. The player whose score is highest after a certain number of rounds wins the game. If the score is tied, the winner is awarded points equal to the value of his or her own dominoes.