(CR) Saki Zenkoku-hen (National Tournament Arc)

[Flower]

Originally Posted by ices

Please refresh my mind. Did we already have a flashback about saki and her family situation? or how she develop her rinshan kaihou power?

Not much is shown in terms of specifics about the family situation in terms of why, but the broad outlines of the current state of affairs is touched on mostlyat the beginning and ep of season 1.

Following that, early on in season 1 (ep 3 maybe?) a flashback is shown of Teru and Saki speaking together and Teru describing the rinshan yaku, which Saki immediately takes a shine to.

[Eclipze]

Funny enough, I just rewatched season 1 episode 1. Saki mentions it there:

Nodoka: Plus-minus zero 3 times in a row...was it on purpose?
Saki: When I play...It always ends up like that.
Nodoka: Why do you play that way?
Saki: Whenever I played mahjong with my family, I wouldn't get any candy if I lost. But if I won too much, they'd get angry at me. Before I'd realized it, I'd begun to play that way.

I totally did not remember the candy part to be honest.

[iSuckAtWriting]

Would there be less fuss over Saki's skills if someone went Saki OP, don't nerf Teru so she can check her plz?

Anyway I've been avoiding The Nationals until they finish, so I have to ask if the writers got their shit together and know how to tell a story again. One of the big beefs I had with Side-A was it went through the motions of a full-fledged story for its main cast compared to the original show, where it only shows a few key moments, then refreshes its games with the specifics of their training or story or whatever. The backstory in the Toki and Ryuuka mini-arc in Side-A was placed so well it made up for being scarce. It was like the show remembered why the series was so good in the first place, so I ask if The Nationals keeps remembering what the series has done right. But, since the Saki and Teru drama has been hinted at since the series' inception, maybe it'll be enough story to not need careful placement, but I could be wrong.

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by mhazaru

Yeah, I agree. The Mighty Ducks thing is pretty old too Kiyosumi as a whole really isn't an underdog team anyway. They have the sister of the high school champion, Saki, an awesome leader in Hisa, the middle school champion Nodoka, and they've been coming in #1 every time so far in the series. Hisa even busted down another team to end a match early.

That does that set up a weird situation for the viewer though. Like some others have already done in this thread, it can be hard not to root for the opponents now, seeing as how they're actually in the underdog position vs. Saki. It's not like in S1 where Koromo was the trash talking 'boss' and rooting for Saki was pretty universal.

The way I like to view Kiyosumi is that they're a bit of a dark horse team. In other words, they're a very talented team that's new to "the big stage" because they've only been recently formed. So while they have a talent edge on the vast majority of their competitors, even at the Nationals, they're still not as well-established as many of the other schools here. So they're sort of an upstart challenge to the established order in high school mahjong in their world.

Speaking as a pro sports fan, dark horse teams are very exciting. They represent a real change in the sport, so they can be fun to follow. Every sports fan likes saying things like "I remember what the Bulls were like just when Jordan was starting to make them a great team - Those were heady days if you lived in Chicago!"

So even though they're not underdogs, I find it easy to route for Kiyosumi because they (hopefully) represent an exciting changing of the guard.

I will say though that they might be harder to root for if/when they're defending a title in a 2nd Nationals appearance. But given Ritz's writing pace on this franchise, I don't think we have to worry about that for quite some time...

[Kinematics]

Originally Posted by Eclipze

Remember, she purposely played into Kyoko's hand to let her win - in that sense, she is literally like a puppet master, bending the game (and players) to her will.

While I spoke of that in one of my earlier posts, I'd want add a caveat by noting that just because Saki played the manipulator there doesn't make her a puppetmaster.

That play wouldn't have worked if Kyouko hadn't switched over to a quick 3-player mahjong style, and the purpose of it was to stop Kasumi, not just to give Kyouko the win. The fact that Saki deliberately played into Kyouko's hand could also be said to indicate that Saki herself would not have been able to win before Kasumi in that round.

So overall it's not, "I control who wins and who loses", it's more, "Even if I can't win, I can still play in such a way so as to minimize the damages." Think back to Yuuki's match, when Jindai played into Suzu's hand in order to stop Yuuki's win streak. Same thing.

Edit: Well, same principal. In the case of Yuuki's match, Suzu had declared riichi, so Jindai could give her the win directly. In Saki's match, it was a bit more indirect.

[raincrow]

Oh, dark horse fits them really well. Good call They really are unknown outside of Nodoka, who is the one that's been garnering all their initial attention. They've definitely got a lot of momentum now given all their wins.

I think its also Miyamori's first tournament, right? I don't know how famous they are, but I figured with Toshi as their coach they must have some amount of fame. That lady just seems like she's got a famous past in the mahjong world. Anyway, I'm not sure if they're more underdog or dark horse.

[tjalorak]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

The way I like to view Kiyosumi is that they're a bit of a dark horse team. In other words, they're a very talented team that's new to "the big stage" because they've only been recently formed. So while they have a talent edge on the vast majority of their competitors, even at the Nationals, they're still not as well-established as many of the other schools here. So they're sort of an upstart challenge to the established order in high school mahjong in their world.

Dark horse is a good way to put it as, to the mahjong media and public, the only famous player they have is Nodoka from Inter-Middle. None of their players have proved themselves in Inter-High, not even the Individuals, as this is the first year their team and its component players has played any official matches.

I wouldn't say they have a significant talent edge though (other than Saki, 1 of the 3-5 monsters running around). More like a talent ... equivalence. We knew this already though since they defeated Ryuumonbuchi, a team that made it deep in the Inter-High tournament last year, in the prefectural finals. And you can see it in the overall performance in the QF - no team seemed to be beyond the rest and all the spots are still up for grabs.

Originally Posted by mhazaru

I think its also Miyamori's first tournament, right? I don't know how famous they are, but I figured with Toshi as their coach they must have some amount of fame. That lady just seems like she's got a famous past in the mahjong world. Anyway, I'm not sure if they're more underdog or dark horse.

Yes. Toshi is well-known. In Achiga-hen, she successfully scouted, recruited, and coached Harue Akado for the Fukuoka Corporation team before Harue became the Achiga Coach.

Miyamori would be a dark horse. They have very good players, coached by a very good player and coach herself. There are no underdog teams in the QF.

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by mhazaru

Oh, dark horse fits them really well. Good call They really are unknown outside of Nodoka, who is the one that's been garnering all their initial attention. They've definitely got a lot of momentum now given all their wins.

Thanks.

To fully appreciate Kiyosumi, I think it's important to remember how they're viewed by the wider mahjong world in-story.

We viewers all know how well-balanced with fantastic high-end talent (Saki, Nodoka) they are. But to many of their opponents, and to the media, they're a mystery team. They're "Nodoka and friends". I find it highly amusing that Nodoka is the focal point of media attention for her team when the real scary player on Kiyosumi is Saki.

So we get to see a young rising superstar take the mahjong world by storm and almost entirely by surprise. That's fun and exciting, in my view!

I think its also Miyamori's first tournament, right? I don't know how famous they are, but I figured with Toshi as their coach they must have some amount of fame. That lady just seems like she's got a famous past in the mahjong world. Anyway, I'm not sure if they're more underdog or dark horse.

Yeah, it's hard to say with them. You can also take Eisui's response to them either way.

Originally Posted by tjalorak

I wouldn't say they have a significant talent edge though (other than Saki, 1 of the 3-5 monsters running around). More like a talent ... equivalence.

Saki is what makes the difference, yes. I think Nodoka, Hisa, Mako, and Tacos have the makings of a pretty good team, but nothing special.

Put them against most other Nationals teams 2nd through 5th best players, and I think it's a pretty even match-up that could easily go either way (I say this based strictly on this anime and Achiga-hen, though, I hasten to add). But here's the thing - If the 2nd through 5th match-ups are basically a wash, then it all comes down to the Aces, and that's where Kiyosumi has a real edge on almost everybody. Basically, Kiyosumi has just the right amount of talent/strength to enable Saki to put them over the top. Barring something like Tacos completely melting down against Teru, anyway.

[Requiem-x]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

To fully appreciate Kiyosumi, I think it's important to remember how they're viewed by the wider mahjong world in-story.

We viewers all know how well-balanced with fantastic high-end talent (Saki, Nodoka) they are. But to many of their opponents, and to the media, they're a mystery team. They're "Nodoka and friends". I find it highly amusing that Nodoka is the focal point of media attention for her team when the real scary player on Kiyosumi is Saki.

When will people learn to see beyond the breasts? But yeah, Kiyosumi is supposed to be the dark horse in all of this, it doesn't look that way to us because they have the destroyer of souls as their captain.

Originally Posted by Triple_R

Saki is what makes the difference, yes. I think Nodoka, Hisa, Mako, and Tacos have the makings of a pretty good team, but nothing special.

Hisa is doubling as coach in an enviroment where all the other coaches are pros, and she's doing a pretty good job so far, specially considering how delicate the two big point rakers (Nodoka and Saki) can be about certain issues. That sounds special to me.

[tjalorak]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

We viewers all know how well-balanced with fantastic high-end talent (Saki, Nodoka) they are. But to many of their opponents, and to the media, they're a mystery team. They're "Nodoka and friends". I find it highly amusing that Nodoka is the focal point of media attention for her team when the real scary player on Kiyosumi is Saki.

Well, they're a mystery team, but they're only really viewed as Nodoka and friends by the media. Several teams have been paying very close attention to them due to Kiyosumi defeating Ryuumonbuchi. This includes: Shiraitodai, Rinkai, Eisui, Himematsu, Senriyama, Achiga, and Miyamori. That is, uh, a considerable number of the top teams to say the least.

But here's the thing - If the 2nd through 5th match-ups are basically a wash, then it all comes down to the Aces, and that's where Kiyosumi has a real edge on almost everybody.

That's the thing. There are 3-5 Monsters still available in the tournament, and they're spread out among the teams. Now, they may misfire like Jindai or play badly just as Saki could if she gets rattled, but... the potential is there. Every team will have that 'something special' - esp. in the finals IMO - so yeah, Kiyosumi will need Saki for equivalence.

I guess you could say that Saki is extra special even among Monster Aces because well, she's the protagonist and Ritz has been hinting pretty heavily that she has hidden depths. That's pretty meta though.

Originally Posted by Requiem-x

Hisa is doubling as coach in an enviroment where all the other coaches are pros, and she's doing a pretty good job so far, specially considering how delicate the two big point rakers (Nodoka and Saki) can be about certain issues. That sounds special to me.

Speaking of Hisa, how is she doing this well? I mean, don't get me wrong, I love that she's being a badass strategist and coach and sure, having Saki on your team is extremely helpful, but this is her first official high-school tournament run and she's seriously outcoaching a bunch of teams with their own pro coaches or great strategists and great players.

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by tjalorak

Well, they're a mystery team, but they're only really viewed as Nodoka and friends by the media. Several teams have been paying very close attention to them due to Kiyosumi defeating Ryuumonbuchi. This includes: Shiraitodai, Rinkai, Eisui, Himematsu, Senriyama, Achiga, and Miyamori. That is, uh, a considerable number of the top teams to say the least.

At least going by the anime alone, and what I can recall of it off-hand, I'm not really seeing this "very close attention". On the whole, Eisui and Miyamori seem to be paying more attention to each other than to Kiyosumi. Himematsu isn't giving me the vibe of fearing Kiyosumi any more than they do Eisui and Miyamori. Heck, Nodoka was almost treated like an after-thought by her competitors in her match. I certainly don't remember getting the sense that much scouting had been done on Hisa or Mako. So IIRC, that's at least 3 out of 5 getting little attention - Over half the team.

Achiga is paying close attention to Kiyosumi for personal friendship reasons (i.e. Nodoka connections), so they're a special case.

As for the other schools you listed - What has either of them done or said that makes you think they're paying very close attention to Kiyosumi? And remember - Anime-only here.

That's the thing. There are 3-5 Monsters still available in the tournament, and they're spread out among the teams.

Yes, and so if you're one of the 3-5 most talented teams in the tournament (by virtue of having one of the 3-5 Monster Aces), then that means you have a talent advantage over the vast majority of your competitors (given the number of rounds and total number of competing teams).

Speaking of Hisa, how is she doing this well? I mean, don't get me wrong, I love that she's being a badass strategist and coach and sure, having Saki on your team is extremely helpful, but this is her first official high-school tournament run and she's seriously outcoaching a bunch of teams with their own pro coaches or great strategists and great players.

I think Hisa is doing pretty well as a coach/strategist, but what makes you think she's "seriously outcoaching" a bunch of teams? Genuine inquiry, not a rhetorical question. Perhaps you're right and I've missed/forgotten something.

[Xeiros]

Originally Posted by panzerfan

Well... Saki feels very human to me when she's out of the table, but when Saki's playing, she feels more like this force of nature... a kami really. She feels like one of the patron kami of the shrine wearing flesh as her suit.

Ritz portrays all of the Monster players that way. That is to say when these players are featured, they just win. Period. You don't get their thoughts or see them analyzing what they should discard or whether breaking their current pair is a good idea. Why? Well it has a lot to do with the fact they're essentially cheating if you were to think of the game realistically.

Go and watch Teru's match in Achiga again. Go watch Koromo vs. Saki and the other two characters that don't matter again. Not once do you ever get any insight into how any of these monster level players think. That's the problem with giving them special abilities that couldn't possibly make sense in real life. There's no logic there. What? Saki knows exactly what tile her next dead wall draws are going to be? How? Did she somehow cheat and look? No! She has a magic super power! Oh. OK.

You know how in Akagi a number of the people he plays along with himself at times outright cheat? Those cheats are grounded in reality. They make sense. It's oh he won the hand because he jacked a red dragon from the one dudes discard pile while everyone else was distracted.

How about that one chick in Shiraitodai whose ability relies on her drawing exactly the tiles she needs to have a hand that needs the exact tile some other player needs to discard in order to get into tenpai the contents of whose hand should be unknown to her outside of hints via their discard pile. It's utterly ridiculous and could never feasibly happen in real life, but that's the point.

[Kinematics]

Originally Posted by Requiem-x

Hisa is doubling as coach in an enviroment where all the other coaches are pros, and she's doing a pretty good job so far, specially considering how delicate the two big point rakers (Nodoka and Saki) can be about certain issues. That sounds special to me.

Actually, wow, yeah. It didn't stand out so much in the regionals, because I don't think any of the teams has coaches (Nagano apparently isn't that great at attracting pros to their schools). In the nationals, however, the only one I can think of offhand without a coach is Eisui, and they're a rather special case what with gods possessing them. Hm. And Shiraitodai also doesn't have a listed coach, though I have a hard time believing a major school like that doesn't have an actual coach.

Still, the vast majority of teams have professional coaching. All the skills that Hisa needs to be a good coach are in a lot of ways just as impressive as Saki's skill at the game itself.

Diplomacy and contacts. Connections with Fujita-pro, the ability to banter with her on an equal level, to the point she could actually request personal assistance in a training session where she sent Saki and Nodoka to Mako's shop. Getting on good terms with all the other major Nagano teams, and using that to bring them all together at the training camp.

The ability to analyze the weaknesses of all her team members, and more importantly, figure out ways to overcome those weaknesses. Understanding the psychology that leads to the weakness, and breaking that down (eg: Saki playing on the computer to reduce her reliance on being able to feel the tiles and sensing her opponents).

The ability to recognize very minor quirks that disproportionately affect people's play, such as Nodoka's dependancy on Eto-pen, and Saki's socks. With preparation and motivation to do so, I'm sure she could turn that against people as well.

Pimpin'. Cause Hisa can seduce anyone.


Basically, if this were a manga like Akagi, Hisa would be the one who could 'read' anyone, from the subtlest behavioral ticks, separate the real tells from the fakes, and use that info to manipulate people at the table. That leads directly to her hell wait play style. I'd love to see a match between her and Akagi himself.

In Saki, that degree of the psychological game is largely brushed past. The supernatural powers are flashier and get more attention.

[raincrow]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

We viewers all know how well-balanced with fantastic high-end talent (Saki, Nodoka) they are. But to many of their opponents, and to the media, they're a mystery team. They're "Nodoka and friends". I find it highly amusing that Nodoka is the focal point of media attention for her team when the real scary player on Kiyosumi is Saki.

Figuring that they had enough trouble linking Teru and Saki together, I don't really have much faith in their media crews I think Nodoka gets fame just because she's a middle school champion.

Originally Posted by tjalorak

Speaking of Hisa, how is she doing this well? I mean, don't get me wrong, I love that she's being a badass strategist and coach and sure, having Saki on your team is extremely helpful, but this is her first official high-school tournament run and she's seriously outcoaching a bunch of teams with their own pro coaches or great strategists and great players.

So, I absolutely love Hisa to death. She's a huge reason as to why I love the series. But, sometimes I feel she's skittering on that Mary Sue line. When Hiroe started giving her crap during their match, I thought it was sort of needed to keep Hisa a bit more believable and relatable (to knock her out of that super perfect thing), but Hisa got over her nerves pretty quickly so it didn't really have any effect IMO.

Part of it is that we still don't really know much about her past. For all we know, maybe she's had tons of practice at leading a team before in her past, or heck, maybe even her folks or whatever just taught her their stuff well if they were players too. It's really open ended at the moment.

[Eater of All]

I don't really understand what happened during East 4.... I can see that Saki baited the 8-man from Toyone, but how does that relate to Kasumi's ability? Kyouko and Toshi made some comments about how the pin drought doesn't extend to the dead wall, but Saki drew man/sou anyway, so what weakness of Kasumi did Saki exploit?

[Kinematics]

Originally Posted by Eater of All

I don't really understand what happened during East 4.... I can see that Saki baited the 8-man from Toyone, but how does that relate to Kasumi's ability? Kyouko and Toshi made some comments about how the pin drought doesn't extend to the dead wall, but Saki drew man/sou anyway, so what weakness of Kasumi did Saki exploit?

There are 3 suits for 4 players. Kasumi's power turns it into 2 suits for 3 players, and 1 suit for 1 player.

There's some random variation based on the dice roll value and calls, but generally you get 72 total draws during a match (18 draws each -- 3 rows of 6 discards).

Kasumi's power gives her -all- the tiles for a given suit. That's 36 total tiles that no one else can get (9x4).

Assuming she got 10 suit tiles on the initial draw, that leaves 26 tiles to be drawn from the wall. However Kasumi herself will only draw 18 (and some of those may be honor tiles as well), so the remaining 8+ have to go -somewhere- that the other players can't reach.

The thought was that she stuffed the 'leftover' tiles that the other players weren't allowed to draw in the dead wall. That would heavily tilt the proportion of tiles you could get from the dead wall in favor of the forbidden tiles. If that were the case then Saki drawing from the dead wall should generally cause her to draw those forbidden suit tiles, which would be useless to her since she wouldn't have any others of that suit from normal draws.

Since Saki -could- draw normal tiles from the dead wall, that means Kasumi's power didn't stack the extras into it. It's conceivable that the extra tiles are at the tail end of the normal draw wall, but that no hand would ever reach it because Kasumi would win before haitei.

[Flower]

When Kasumi allows herself to be... umm... occupied (cough) than that means she gets a large number of tiles of one suite while no one else gets any tiles from that suite.

But that skewed tile distribution does not extend either to the dead wall or deeper into the mountains - that is, the furthest or last area where all the players draw from.

What this means,though, is that all the other three players have only the other three suites and honor tiles. It is this that allows Saki the higher ease than usual to compile kans, as Kyouko rightly discerned.

So the weakness that Saki exploited was simply that Kasumi's control over the tiles does not extend to the area of the dead wall. She exploited the area that was not part of her control.

[Eater of All]

Originally Posted by Kinematics

There are 3 suits for 4 players. Kasumi's power turns it into 2 suits for 3 players, and 1 suit for 1 player.

There's some random variation based on the dice roll value and calls, but generally you get 72 total draws during a match (18 draws each -- 3 rows of 6 discards).

Kasumi's power gives her -all- the tiles for a given suit. That's 36 total tiles that no one else can get (9x4).

Assuming she got 10 suit tiles on the initial draw, that leaves 26 tiles to be drawn from the wall. However Kasumi herself will only draw 18 (and some of those may be honor tiles as well), so the remaining 8+ have to go -somewhere- that the other players can't reach.

The thought was that she stuffed the 'leftover' tiles that the other players weren't allowed to draw in the dead wall. That would heavily tilt the proportion of tiles you could get from the dead wall in favor of the forbidden tiles. If that were the case then Saki drawing from the dead wall should generally cause her to draw those forbidden suit tiles, which would be useless to her since she wouldn't have any others of that suit from normal draws.

Since Saki -could- draw normal tiles from the dead wall, that means Kasumi's power didn't stack the extras into it. It's conceivable that the extra tiles are at the tail end of the normal draw wall, but that no hand would ever reach it because Kasumi would win before haitei.

Thanks; so Saki didn't really exploit Kasumi's weakness - she just happened to reveal some of its mechanics in the middle of her pwnage?

[The Green One]

Kasumi's ability created greater Kan potential for Saki since being restricted to two suits made it far easier to get quads, 4 of a kind, which allowed her to run wild like that. Kasumi's power was really exploited more of that it was a liability she couldn't turn off which resulted in Rishan Kaihou hell for the others.

[Kinematics]

Originally Posted by Flower

So the weakness that Saki exploited was simply that Kasumi's control over the tiles does not extend to the area of the dead wall. She exploited the area that was not part of her control.

Actually, it should be the opposite of that -- Kasumi's control does extend to the dead wall, else players would be able to get 'her' suit from there when they shouldn't be allowed to have any at all. The very fact that it extends to the dead wall means that Saki is perfectly safe pulling from there for her own hand; she won't pull completely useless tiles (ie: Kasumi's suit).