A standard set of Chinese dominoes has 32 tiles. But not all games are played with such a set. Sometimes two sets are combined creating a set of 64 dominoes. There are also dominoes paper decks. They come in different sizes, but you can find a deck of 84 or even 105 domino cards. In these sets, all 21 unique values are represented 4 or 5 times each.
But sometimes tiles are removed from the deck to reduce it. This was already mentioned in the connecting game Kko-li-but-i-gi. All doubles from [3:3] to [6:6] were removed from the deck, and a set of 24 tiles remained. But it was a Korean game, in no Chinese game a double [6:6] will ever be removed.
Deck composition for Ding Niu
In the game Ding Niu (頂牛, Bull Fight), all military tiles except [6:3] and [6:2] are removed from the deck. In particular the removed tiles are the following: [1:2], [1:4], [2:3], [2:4], [2:5], [3:4], [3:5] and [4:5]. Note that all tiles with sixes were kept. Thus, 24 tiles remain. And half of the deck are doubles.
The deck becomes even more asymmetrical. For example, excluding doubles, there is a single “two” in the entire deck. Two “fours”, three “threes”, four “fives”, six “ones” and eight “sixes”. Since Ding Niu is a connecting game, this asymmetry plays an important role. And each digit gets its own uniqueness. Note that all the tiles in this reduced deck are duplicated, except for the already mentioned [6:2] and [6:3]. As a trivia – these two tiles together are called the “bull pair” in another, unrelated game, Mo Hua Hua (抹花花). Probably the oblique two and oblique three resembled the horns of bulls on a massive, six-pointed, bulls body. We will see this pair again in the future.
Rules
Bullfighting is played similarly to Jie Long (please read the basic rules of Jie Long first if you haven’t done so already).There are four players, each gets six dominoes. You can add dominoes to the both sides of the layout. Due to the asymmetry of the deck, the game is interesting in itself. But there are also differences in scoring. And be warned – the rules for calculation are not simple. And for starters you may ignore those.
Points calculation
The calculation of points is simplified on the one hand – there is a winner and three losers. The winner gets six chips, second place pays him one chip, third place – two, and the fourth place, that is, the player with the most points – three chips. If two players are competing for first place, the preference is given to the “lower hand”, whereby the first player is considered the lowest hand. Interestingly, if the next places are also contested, i.e. two players scored the same number of points, then this time the advantage is given to the “upper hand”.
I will explain with an example. Suppose Adam played first, then Boris, then Valentine, and then George. That is, the lowest hand is Adam. Boris and Valentine scored 5 points each, and Adam and George – 10 each. Since Boris has a lower hand than Valentine (he is second in line, and Valentine is third), he gets first place, and Valentina – second. Adam and George compete for third place, but since George is the upper hand, he takes third place and Adam falls to fourth. Boris receives 6 tokens, Valentine pays 1, George – 2, and Adam – 3. Paradoxically, if Boris and Valentine scored 15 points each, then in this case, Adam would beat George, as a lower hand. It’s a bit of a convoluted system, but it only occurs if players have the same number of points. As in the case of Jie Long, you can simply count the points on paper without such complex calculations.
Blocking or SuanZhang
A feature of the Ding Niu is 算含 SuanZhang – a special type of blocking when the layout is blocked and no (or no specific – see below) non-double tile can be laid out. The rules of Ding Niu’s blocking are much more complicated than in European domino games. First, since there is asymmetry in the game, it is not enough to count, as in European dominoes, that six “fives” are already laid out on the table (excluding doubles), so the layout is blocked. You need to remember what all four types of SuanZhang look like: Ones, Two-Three (their number is odd, so blocking with two-two or three-three is impossible), Fours and Fives. Examples of blocked layouts in the photo (note that it is easiest to block with fours).
I will leave as an exercise for the reader why is it impossible to block with six-six. In fact, there are even more difficult types of SuanZhang – when it is obvious that it is impossible to add fours or fives. If you are curious, I show what a SuanZhang looks like, in which it is impossible to add any more fives:
The only remainding tiles with fives are [5:1], but since all “ones” are out (four are already on the table, and the remaining two are left on [5:1]), it is no longer possible to add fives. This is a special type of SuanZhang – Smothered Fives. This is not a typical blocking as in European dominoes, because the game could continue with other tiles by European rules. But in Ding Niu that’s a block.
Similarly, here is an example of the “Killed Four” SuanZhang:
What happens next after a player makes a SuanZhang situation in Ding Niu? If the player who blocked the layout won, that is, he has the least points, then all payments are doubled and he receives 12 chips instead of 6. But if he lost, he pays 12 chips to the winner, and the rest of the players pay nothing.
SuanZhang in the Ding Niu can happen almost at the very beginning. Let’s say someone has laid [6:4], if another player immediately lays [6:4], adding six to six, then it is a SuanZhang, since all two fours (excluding doubles) have already been played.
Unfortunately, the rules of Ding Niu are not clearly written on Chinese resources. Therefore it’s not entirely clear whether it is possible to add doubles [4:4] in this case. But there is a strong impression that the players can add their doubles, but it is considered that the player who placed the second [6:4] has blocked the layout and all the SuanZhang penalties or bonuses are applied to him, not to the players who played their doubles. I drew this conclusion from the photo of SuanZhang Two-Three, in which doubles were attached on both sides.
The rules for scoring points, and especially for SuanZhang in Ding Niu, are quite difficult for beginners. But the Chinese themselves recognize this. In fact, they enjoy these rules. In these difficulties, they see the beauty of the game.
Sources
Rules on BaiDu – Chinese online encyclopedia
Chinese Dominoes GuPai 