How to play — Golf

Golf is the outlier on this site — no teammates, no defence, and a record that opens in 1860. You are assembling six players whose skills cover a course rather than a field.

The board

6 seats: BOMB1 · BOMB2 · IRON1 · IRON2 · SHORT1 · SHORT2. Six seats split by what each player does: two off the tee, two with the irons, two around the green. A board heavy on distance and light on the short game will win the easy weeks and lose the ones that matter, because scoring pressure lands on the putter. A modern skill card can cover another role, but that seat costs 11 points.

The rounds

Each round opens one era of the tour and the players who defined it. Golf careers outlast every other sport here — majors won decades apart sit in the same archive — so the eras overlap in a way team sports never manage.

The season

16 games, then a 4-game playoff gauntlet at 14 wins — 20–0 for the sweep. Sixteen events, then a four-tournament run to close it out: twenty results. Nothing else here asks a player to hold up alone for four rounds, then to do it again across a season.

• 20–0 — the perfect season.
• 17 wins or more — the top tier.
• 15 or more — a strong finish.
• 14 or more — you reached the playoffs.
• 8 or more — middling.
• the rest — the roast comes with the verdict.

What the record holds

The record opens in 1860, earlier than any other sport here, and holds 164 recognised figures. Golf careers outlast every other board: players have won majors decades apart, so the eras overlap rather than succeed one another, and a simulated career is judged on longevity in a way the team sports never are.

What decides it

Majors are how golf summarises a career, and the record makes that count plain — Player of the Year and the scoring award answer the other half, which is who was best week to week. How the ratings work · the full rulebook.

Take a golf board The golf game