Dominox

Players: Two.

Equipment: Dominox is played on a standard Chess/Checkers board using a standard set of Domino tiles. Only tiles with 0 to 6 dots are used.

Play: One player is designated "white" while the other is "black." At the start of the game, the tiles are shuffled and each player draws 8 tiles, which are kept secret from the opponent.

After this, the players take turn placing tiles on the board, starting with the player who is dealt the lowest numbered double-tile, who must place this a his first move (if no player draws a double-tile in the initial draw, the tiles are reshuffled and a new draw is made). Tiles are placed according to the following restrictions:

1) A tile must be placed such that it spans two squares (i.e., one half of the tile is on a black square and the other half is on a white).

2) No two tiles can share a square.

3) If a tile is placed next to another tile, the number of dots on the touching tile-end(s) must match that of its (their) neighbour. If a tile-end is next to several other tile-ends, only one of these need to match. For example, if part of the board looks like this:

1		3
2		4
	5	4

Tiles that can legally be placed to the right of the 1:2 tile must have either 1 or 3 at the top end and 2, 4 or 5 at the bottom end. This leaves 1:4, 1:5, 3:2 and 3:5 as legal moves for that position.

Diagonal touching is not counted.

If a player is unable to place a tile he must pass. Note that passing can't be done voluntarily, if a player can do a legal move, he must do so.

Regardless of whether the player passed or made a legal move, he ends his turn by drawing a new tile (if there are any left).

When there are no undrawn tiles left and two passes in a row occur (i.e., both players pass), the game ends. At this point, the unfilled areas on the board are scored: Each connected unfilled area on the board counts to the colour that is in majority in that area. If there is the same number of black and white squares, no player gets points for the area. For example, an area with 3 black and 4 white squares counts 7 points to White and an area with just a single black square counts a single point to Black.

Example of play:

						0
						0

White has the double-0 tile and plays it.

						0
						0
						0	5

This ensures that the white top-right corner can never be filled, as the only tile that could legally cover it is the double-0 tile, which has already been used. She draws a new tile to end her turn. Black encloses the two top-right squares to make sure the black square next to the corner can't also be filled.

		0
		0
2	0	0	5

White makes another near-edge play.

6			0
2	2	0	0
			0	5

Which Black again counters.

	6			0
	2	2	0	0
				0	5



1
3

White makes a play for the opposite corner.

5	6			0
5	2	2	0	0
				0	5



1
3

Which Black ignores to make a play for the top-left corner.

5	6	6			0
5	5	2	2	0	0
					0	5



1
3

To avoid Black getting both the black squares next to this tile, white plays her 5:6 tile to the right of it.

Note that this is legal, as each end has a matching neighbour. 2:5 would also have been a legal play to this position.

	5	6	6			0
5	5	5	2	2	0	0
1						0	5



	1
	3

Black now "takes" the top-left corner.

	5	6	6			0
5	5	5	2	2	0	0
1						0	5


4
1	1
	3

And White, in turn, the bottom-left.

The game continues in this fashion until there are no tiles to draw and neither player can make a legal move.

At the end, there are 3 single-square white areas (3 points to White), 2 single-square black areas (2 points to Black), four two-square areas (no points), a 3-square area with two black and one white square (3 points to Black) and a 6-square area with 3 squares of each colour (no points). In total, White scores 3 points and Black 5, which makes Black the winner.

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