A game to play with double nine dominoes

To Play

With three to six players each player draws seven tiles. With more players each player draws five dominoes.

The player with highest double goes first and lays that double.

The object of the game is to create one line of dominoes. Instead of matching dominoes laid next to each other you must make them add up to ten. So if the two ends of the line are a six and an eight then you can lay a two or a four.

At the beginning of the game the leader might lay the double nine. The next player would have to lay a one. Lay the tile so the 1 is not on the end.

The Matador Tiles

There are six Matador tiles in the game. these are tiles that add up to ten themselves; 9-1, 8-2, 7-3, 6-4, double five and double blank. You can lay a Matador at any time during the game. One of their uses is to unblock the game. When a blank is laid you can only lay a Matador tile against it and there are more blanks than Matador tiles so they are worth keeping if you want to keep the game open.

Other Rules

If a player cannot lay a tile or has a Matador that they do not wish to lay then they must draw from the boneyard. The player keeps drawing until she can go or until there are only two tiles left in the boneyard. Then she can pass.

Once there are only two tiles in the boneyard a player that cannot go may pass. In this case the player must play a matador if they have one.

If all the players pass then the round is blocked.

Winning and scoring

A player that manages to lay all their dominoes cries out "domino" and they have won.

The player who wins scores the total of all the unplayed pips in the other players' hands.

If the game is blocked the player with the the least amount of pips wins and scores the difference between their pips and each of their opponents'.

The first player to get 200 points wins the round.