Doubles in the Boneyard

This three-player game was invented by Jose Carrillo and is described on his domino page.

A double-six domino set is used, but the seven doubles are separated from the rest of the set, and are used only to decide who will start the first game. To do this the doubles are shuffled, each player draws one, and the highest double starts. The drawn doubles are then returned to the boneyard here they remain throuighout the match. Subsequently, the winner of each game starts the next.

Each player takes seven of the 21 non-double tiles to form his or her hand. Play is anticlockwise. The first player may begin by playing any tile, and each player adds a tile to either end of the train. The numbers on touching ends must match as usual. A player who is unable to play must pass.

The game ends when a player wins by running out of tiles, or when the game is blocked (no one can play). The winner scores the total of the pips on the unplayed tiles. The first player to achieve a score of 200 or more wins the match.

Blocked games seldom happen because of the lack of doubles, but are possible. A blocked game is won by the player with least pips on his or her remaining tiles, who scores the sum of the pips on all unplayed tiles, including his or her own. In the rare case where a blocked game is tied between two players who have equal lowest scores, the third player loses the number of pips on his or her remaining tiles, and the two tied players draw from the boneyard of doubles to decide who will begin the next game. In the extremely unlikely event of a three-way draw, no one scores and all three players draw to decide who starts next.