Fives Dominoes
Points are scored for the move, not for going out: leave the open ends adding to a multiple of five and you take the total.
Set of dominoes
Under these rules: Twenty-eight tiles; five are dealt to each player.
Twenty-eight rectangular tiles carrying every combination of halves from double blank to double six.
A set is named after its highest double: the ordinary one is a double-six. Every combination occurs exactly once, and that is what makes the game countable — knowing what has been played, you can work out what is left in other people's hands. Larger sets exist — double-nine with fifty-five tiles and double-twelve with ninety-one — and they are there for a bigger company.
The rules of Five Up
What differs
Every double becomes a spinner. Ends accumulate quickly, and the arithmetic becomes the main difficulty of the game.
The deal
Five tiles each; the rest form the boneyard.
Spinners
Tiles are set against the two flanks of a double first, and only then against its open end.
Once both flanks of a double are occupied, the double itself no longer counts towards the total, though its ends stay open for play.
Scoring
A total of the open ends that is a multiple of five is divided by five, and that is what the player scores.
End of a hand
The remainder in hand is rounded to the nearest multiple of five, divided by five, and subtracted from the score.
Winning
Play runs to sixty-one points. The last hand is played out; if more than one side has passed the threshold, the higher score wins.
Worth knowing
End-of-hand scoring in Five Up is set out by several schemes, and they disagree on whether to count the difference between the remainders or their total, and on what to do with three players. The simple form is written below; the elaborate one is worth agreeing beforehand.
Glossary of terms
- Chipping out
- Playing your last tile. In some forms it scores a point; in others it merely ends the hand.
- Open ends
- The numbers on every free end of the layout. Their total is counted after each move.
- Spinner
- A double the layout may grow from on all four sides rather than only along the line.