The topic for today and Thursday is a discussion of the many ways games can end, and some of their ramifications. I intend to talk more about multiplayer games than two-player games, because I think the “end conditions” for two-player games. It’s hard to distinguish a Race from Elimination, for example. But if there are interesting points to be made, it may turn this series even longer.

Each one of these might be thought of as a mini-Pattern relating to a specific part of the game. And they’re important for the same reason that the end of a book or movie is important: you want the tension building to a climax, you don’t want to wait around for a foregone conclusion or think “whoa! it’s over?”

Elimination: I’ve already talked about this pattern, which is generally out of favor in Euro-style games but definitely still alive and well. Most of these games feature either a momentum-building effect (hotels in Monopoly, continent and card bonuses in Risk) or else attrition (Perudo and many others); without one of these factors, the game might drag on without end.

Dominance: This pattern looks similar to Elimination, but victory is achieved when one player controls a certain fraction of the available resources, instead of having to eliminate all opponents. At the point Diplomacy calls the game by Dominance, the dominant player could probably brute-force a victory even against all remaining players. By contrast, in A Game of Thrones, the winning player has to be doing well, but the Dominance victory threshold is well short of the level where the winner could fight off a concerted attack by all opponents.

Race: The winner is the first person to achieve a certain condition. This might be a fixed number of victory points (Catan, Blue Moon City) or to reach a certain goal or destination (Elfenland or even Sorry!). In a common extension of this pattern, the turn is finished up to make sure that all players have the same opportunities. For example, Power Grid is won when a player reaches 21 cities, but if more than one player reaches this number in the same turn, it’s won by the player who has the most. (This is very possible.) Ties are broken, in this case, by the amount of game currency remaining.

Fixed Turns: The game lasts for a predetermined number of turns. The turns may be tracked explicitly, as in El Grande or Risk: Godstorm, or it may be implicit, such as in Carcassone (ends when all the tiles are gone). One advantage of this pattern is that it gives the designer very tight control over the flow and pacing of the game. (And the players won’t be surprised by the length of the game.) The corresponding disadvantage is that the end of the game can be anticlimactic, since its approach is seen all game.

X Through the Deck: This variant of Fixed Turns applies only to card games. You play until the deck is exhausted, then reshuffle it and begin again; the game ends when this has happened some number of times. The world’s best bean-oriented game, Bohnanza, uses this mechanic, and I have used for a couple of my own games as well.

Teaser: The titles for next time include Total Points, Secondary Condition, Variable Fixed Turns, Exhausted Moves, Hybrid, and Unlimited.

Discussion point: Am I on track to miss something? Let me know so I can look good by including it next time. Also, are there any neat intricacies about two-player games that I’ve missed?