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Rio Grande Games

Published

Read Time

8 min read

BGG community rating

7.6/10

· 97,107 raters
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Dominion 2nd Edition: How It Plays, What Changed, Who It's For

BGG community

7.6/10

97,107 raters

Dominion is the 2008 card game that invented deck-building, and this 2016 second edition is the version to get. Every player starts with the same ten weak cards and buys their way to an engine, with the deck itself serving as the score pad. It suits 2–4 players who want real strategy inside a 30-minute box.

Players

2–4

Best at 3 (1,000 votes)

Playtime

30 min

Complexity

2.3/5

5,359 votes

BGG rank

#146

#142 Strategy Game

Age (BGG poll)

10+

201 votes

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How we made this guide: we read the publisher's rulebook cover to cover and cross-checked it against community data and published coverage. We haven't played this copy at a table — where we take a position, it's reasoned from the rules and the numbers, and we show our working. Every rating shown is attributed. How we build guides →
Dominion Second Edition board game box showing game title, rules text, card illustrations, and Rio Grande Games publisher logoDominion board game display showing box, card storage organizer, and various game cards including treasure, victory, and kingdom cardsSeven black game cards displaying character classes with artwork, titles, resource costs, and action descriptionsTap to enlarge
In This Guide
  • What Works & What Doesn't
  • The Verdict
  • What It Is
  • How It Plays
  • The Game You'll Actually Play
  • Tensions Worth Knowing
  • Player Count
  • Strategy: What Actually Wins
  • Honest Limitations
  • Buy, Skip, or Upgrade

What Works & What Doesn't

What Works
  • The original deck-builder, still the genre benchmark — Spiel des Jahres 2009 winner, 7.6/10 across 97,107 BGG ratings
  • Genuinely variable setup: 26 kingdom cards, 10 chosen per game, so the strategic puzzle resets every session (rulebook, p. 3)
  • Teaches in minutes (ABC turn structure) yet sustains real depth — BGG weight 2.3/5
  • 30-minute playtime matches the box claim; BGG lists 30 minutes flat
  • Organizer tray and labelled inlay make setup and teardown fast (rulebook, p. 2)
What Doesn't
  • Attack cards (Witch, Militia, Bureaucrat) can feel harsh for a family-weight game — Moat and set selection mitigate, but the friction is printed in the box (rulebook, p. 3)
  • Meeple Mountain's reviewer, while still enjoying it, found a recurring frustration that cut down their plays over time
  • Moderate language dependence per BGG's poll — cards carry real in-game text, so some tables will need a crib sheet

The Verdict

Dominion is the game that invented deck-building, and the 2016 second edition is the version to buy: same engine, cleaner card layout, and a handful of adjusted card effects over the 2008 original (per Wikipedia's edition history). It plays in about 30 minutes, teaches in five, and the 26 kingdom cards in the box mean the table rarely sees the same puzzle twice. Skip it only if your group hates any card that says "each other player…" — the attack cards are optional, but they're part of the box's personality.
Action cards from Dominion showing various player abilities and effects
Action cards from Dominion showing various player abilities and effects

What It Is

Donald X. Vaccarino's design won the 2009 Spiel des Jahres and essentially created a genre; the BoardGameGeek community still rates it 7.6/10 across 97,107 votes, with a complexity weight of 2.3/5, as of early 2026. The box holds 500 cards — treasures, victory cards, curses, and 26 distinct kingdom cards — plus a trash mat and a plastic organizer tray with a labelled inlay that the rulebook asks you to sort once and never shuffle (rulebook, p. 2).
It's 2–4 players on the box, ages 13+, though BGG's community age poll lands at 10+.

How It Plays

Everyone starts with the same sad deck: 7 Coppers and 3 Estates. Ten kingdom piles are chosen for the game — randomly via the blue-backed randomizer cards, or from recommended sets — and sit alongside the always-present base piles to form the Supply (rulebook, p. 3).
A turn runs ABC: play one Action card, play any number of Treasures and buy one card, then discard everything and draw a fresh hand of five, shuffling when the deck runs out (rulebook, p. 4). Bought cards go to your discard pile, so every purchase is an investment you won't see until your deck cycles.
The game ends when the Province pile empties or any three Supply piles run out; players count the victory points on every card in their deck and the highest total wins (rulebook, p. 4). Estates are worth 1, Duchies 3, Provinces 6, and Curses −1 (rulebook, p. 3).

The Game You'll Actually Play

The signature mechanic is the deck itself: your deck is both your engine and your score pad, and every card you buy makes it better at one and worse at the other. A Province is 6 points that does nothing but clog a hand — buying victory cards early feels productive and quietly strangles your buying power until scoring. That tension is the whole game, and it never stops being sharp.
Dominion's box, card storage, and sample gameplay cards displayed
Dominion's box, card storage, and sample gameplay cards displayed
The kingdom mix dictates everything else. Witch and Militia in the Supply means curses and hand-size attacks are coming and someone should look at Moat, the reaction that makes you immune when revealed (rulebook, p. 3). A board with Chapel (or Remodel and Mine, both of which trash cards) rewards a lean deck; a board without trashing rewards raw treasure velocity.

Tensions Worth Knowing

Two unlucky buys can collide: the default turn allows exactly one Action and one Buy, so a hand holding both Smithy (+3 cards, no +Action) and Militia (no +Action) forces you to waste one of them. Village — +1 card, +2 Actions — exists precisely to rescue hands like that.
Somebody at your table will trigger the end earlier than others want. Because unfinished engines score nothing, the player already holding Provinces wants three piles gone now, while the player still assembling their deck wants two more turns — and the player who can buy the last Province controls that argument.
Attack timing is the other flashpoint. Militia makes each opponent discard down to three cards, which lands hardest on the player who just drew their whole engine; expect the table to negotiate house attitudes toward attacks early.

Player Count

The box says 2–4 and means it: the rulebook scales victory piles (8 copies at two players, 12 at three or four) and curses (10/20/30) to match. The BGG player poll crowns three players as the sweet spot (1,000 votes) — enough opponents that attacks matter, few enough that downtime stays short. Groups of five or six aren't supported by this box alone, but Big Box II bundles the second edition with Intrigue Second Edition plus extra base cards for 5–6 players (per Wikipedia).
Dominion Second Edition box back showing game overview and card examples
Dominion Second Edition box back showing game overview and card examples

Strategy: What Actually Wins

The per-turn economy is the whole puzzle: one Action, one Buy, one hand of five. Meeple Mountain's strategy guide and The Thoughtful Gamer's tips piece make the same opening point — read all ten kingdom cards before buying anything, because the winning build is written on the table, not in a formula.
Our reading of the card maths agrees, with one worked example: Market gives +1 card, +1 action, +1 buy, +1 coin, so chained Markets cost you nothing to play and effectively upgrade your whole turn — whereas Smithy draws cards but ends your Action phase dead. A deck of Markets and Villages plays its full hand every turn; a deck of Smithies and Militias plays half of it.
Thinning is the concept new players miss. Every trashed Copper or Estate raises the average value of a five-card hand, which is why the box ships a dedicated trash mat (rulebook, p. 2) and why Remodel — trash a card, gain one costing up to 2 more — converts Estates into real economy. Buy one terminal action, one trasher, and treasures until the deck draws itself; then start buying Provinces before the pile race turns against you.

Honest Limitations

Interaction is kingdom-dependent and can be sharp: with Witch, Militia, and Bureaucrat available, some tables will find the take-that harsher than the pastoral box art suggests, though Moat and the option to simply pick friendlier sets both soften it. Meeple Mountain's reviewer, while still calling it a fun game, admits a recurring frustration is what thinned their plays over the years — a reservation worth noting even if they don't outvote 97,000 BGG raters. And per BGG's language-dependence poll, the cards carry moderate in-game text, so mixed-language tables will need a crib sheet.

Buy, Skip, or Upgrade

Buy it if you want the foundational deck-builder in its definitive form: fast, deep, and genuinely different every session. Skip it if your group wants direct conflict every game or dislikes building an engine that only pays off at the final count. Own the 2008 first edition already?
Don't rebuy the box — Rio Grande sold update packs covering the second edition's changed cards (per Wikipedia), which is the cheaper path. And when the base game's 26 kingdoms finally feel explored, the expansion line (Adventures, Dark Ages, Empires, Intrigue and Hinterlands second editions, per BGG's listings) is where the system goes next.

Rules Answers

11 cited

Every answer below is grounded in the official rulebook and shows the exact passage it rests on — verified against the publisher's PDF, not paraphrased from forums.

Setup & Components
2 answers

Every player begins Dominion with a deck of 3 Estates and 7 Coppers, shuffled face down. This is your whole deck at the start — you improve it by gaining better cards during the game.

“Each player takes 3 Estates and 7 Coppers and shuffles them face down as a starting deck.”— Dominion rulebook, p. 3

The starting player is chosen randomly. If you play multiple games in a row and the previous game was not a tie, the winner of the previous game goes last, and the player to their left goes first.

“Randomly choose a starting player. If you have just played a game of Dominion and it was not a tie, have the player who won the previous game go last (the player to their left goes first).”— Dominion rulebook, p. 4
Turns & Actions
4 answers

No. Using up your Actions is optional — you can hold an Action card you are able to play and simply decide not to play it. There is no penalty for ending your Action phase with Actions still available.

“Using up your Actions is optional; you can have an Action card left in hand that you can play, and decide not to play it.”— Dominion rulebook, p. 4

No. You may play any number of Treasures from your hand, in any order, and hold back any you don't want to spend. You only get coins this turn for the Treasures you actually play, but buying never uses up the Treasure cards themselves — you keep them.

“First you can play any number of Treasure cards from your hand, in any order.”— Dominion rulebook, p. 5

Each turn has three phases in a fixed order: Action, then Buy, then Clean-up — remembered as ABC. In Action you may play an Action card, in Buy you play Treasures and buy cards, and in Clean-up you discard everything and draw a new hand of 5 cards.

“Players take turns. Each turn has three phases: Action, then Buy, then Clean-up, which you can remember as ABC.”— Dominion rulebook, p. 4

You take all cards you have in play — both Actions and Treasures — plus any cards left in your hand, and put them all into your discard pile in any order. You then draw a new hand of 5 cards, shuffling your discard pile under your deck first if your deck has fewer than 5 cards, and play passes to the player on your left.

“Take all of the cards you have in play (both Actions and Treasures), and any remaining cards in your hand, and put them all into your discard pile.”— Dominion rulebook, p. 5
Scoring & Endgame
2 answers

The game ends after a turn in which either the Province pile is empty or any three Supply piles are empty. You finish the current turn first, then everyone counts up the victory points on all their cards, and the highest total wins.

“The game ends after 3 piles are empty or the Province pile is empty; then players count up the on all of their cards, and the player with the most wins.”— Dominion rulebook, p. 4

Yes. Any Supply pile counts toward the three-empty-piles end condition, including Kingdom card piles, Curses, and Copper. The alternative end condition is the Province pile running out on its own.

“or any three or more Supply piles are empty (any piles at all, including Kingdom cards, Curses, Copper, etc.)”— Dominion rulebook, p. 6
Edge Cases & Disputes
3 answers

You can still play Witch for its +2 Cards even when no Curses remain to hand out. When Curses are being given out and the pile is running low, they are distributed to the other players in turn order.

“When the Curses are gone, you can still play Witch for +2 Cards.”— Dominion rulebook, p. 14

Throning a Throne Room lets you play one Action card twice, then another Action card twice — it does not let you play a single Action card four times. Actions played via Throne Room do not use up your Action plays for the turn.

“If you Throne Room a Throne Room, you may play an Action card twice, then may play another Action card twice; you do not play one Action card four times.”— Dominion rulebook, p. 14

Each Merchant you play gives you the coin bonus when you play your first Silver that turn, so two Merchants both pay out on that one Silver. But if you play more than one Silver, the bonus only applies to the first Silver played.

“If you play more than one Merchant, each gives you + when you play that first Silver; but if you play more than one Silver, you only get the + for the first Silver.”— Dominion rulebook, p. 13

Sources & Further Reading

The key facts and claims in this guide are grounded in the retrieved, verified sources listed below.

  1. 1
    Dominion Rulebook (PDF)High-authority source

    www.riograndegames.com

  2. 2
    Dominion on BoardGameGeekHigh-authority source

    BoardGameGeek

  3. 3
    Dominion Game Review – Meeple MountainHigh-authority source

    meeplemountain.com

  4. 4
    Dominion® - Rio Grande Games : Rio Grande GamesHigh-authority source

    riograndegames.com

  5. 5
    Dominion Strategy Guide – Meeple MountainHigh-authority source

    meeplemountain.com

  6. 6
    Dominion (card game) - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org

  7. 7
    10 Strategy Tips For Dominion - The Thoughtful Gamer

    thethoughtfulgamer.com

  8. 8
    Dominion Second Edition

    martinfowler.com

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