How the computer players play

The computer players are straightforward opponents, not masterminds — and they play by exactly the rules you set. This page covers what they will do on their turn, the one thing people most want reassuring about (no, they cannot see your dominoes), and how to stop waiting for them.

They cannot see your hand

Worth saying first, because it is the thing people wonder. A computer player is given its own dominoes and what is already on the board — the same two things you can see. It does not know what you are holding, and it does not know what is left in the pot beyond the count that is on your screen too.

It also does not get extra tiles, better tiles, or a second look at the pot. It draws when it cannot go, exactly as you do.

What it does on its turn

In rough order of what it cares about:

It plays its heaviest tile it can. Unplayed dominoes are points against you at the end of a round, so it sheds the 12-11 before the 2-1 given the choice.
It looks after its own train first, especially once the train is open to everybody — closing it again is worth a lot.
It covers doubles. If a double is sitting on the board waiting, it will satisfy it when it can.
It avoids stranding itself. It would rather not play a double it has no way of following up, because that leaves it holding the turn with nothing to do.

If it has no legal move it draws, and if it still has none it passes and puts its train up — the same choices, in the same order, the game offers you.

There is one skill level

There is no easy or hard setting to hunt for. Every computer player plays the same way, and they play the same way as each other. They are decent company rather than a real challenge: they will punish you for sitting on heavy dominoes, and they will not out-think you.

They also play consistently. Faced with the same board and the same hand, a computer player makes the same move — so if you are learning, you can try something twice and see what actually changed.

The pause before each move

A computer player waits a couple of seconds before it moves. That is on purpose: without it the board changes several times before you have seen any of it, and you cannot tell what happened.

If you would rather not wait, press Shift + F at the board to switch fast forward on. The computer players then move as soon as it is their turn, and the turn ding is kept for the moment the turn comes back to you rather than sounding for each of them. Press Shift + F again to put the pauses back. It lasts as long as you stay on the board — your next game starts normally.

If you leave mid-game

The computer players take their turns in your browser, so nothing happens while the game is closed. That is not a problem — there is no clock and nothing to miss. Open the game again and it picks up exactly where it was, on whoever’s turn it was.

Scores count the same

A game against the computer is a real game. Rounds end, pips are counted, the running totals build up, and you can look back over past rounds — see Game scores and past rounds. If you beat four computer players over thirteen rounds, that is a genuine win over a genuine game.