Japanese Mahjong Thread
By popular demand, this shall be AnimeSuki's mahjong thread. Feel free to ask questions or stage games from here.
This is going to be rather haphazard at first given that I've got finals later this week, but here are some helpful topics for the beginner and expert alike. I'm going to edit it through the day today. Rules Setup There are 4 players to each Japanese mahjong game. The players sit at each side of a square table, designated as a house, which come in four flavours ordered as such - 北 西東 南 The houses are the Ton (東), Nan (南), Xia (西), and Pei(北). The order is read from the 東 and proceeds clockwise (i.e., after 東 discards a tile, 南 is the second house to draw). The dealer, or person who gives out the tiles and draws first, is always the 東 house. There are two types of rounds. In a tonpuusen, each player gets one chance at dealer, with the houses rotating clockwise after someone who is not dealer wins. If the dealer wins, he/she has an option to exercise renchan, which is where the dealer donates 100 points to the point pond to remain as dealer for another round. A hanchan is basically two tonpuusen back to back, but in the second tonpuusen the round wind tile rotates to the next house in the sequence (usually 南). By convention in English-speaking communities, instead of referring to the houses as "Ton House" or "Nan House" we just call them East, South, West and North. This is to reduce confusion since each house has an associated wind tile which is called by the names Ton, Nan, Xia, Pei. Tiles Japanese mahjong is played with 136 tiles rather than 144, meaning unlike Chinese, Hong Kong, and other variants there are no flower bonus tiles. The tiles are all arranged in 4 walls of 2 stacks consisting of 17 tiles, and are placed in front of the players. Tiles are organized into four suits: Pin (circles), Sou (bamboo), Man (characters), and the Honour tiles. The formal name for Man tiles is Wan, and they are used interchangeable. Honours are officially called juhai but more often than not they're called either fanpai or yakuhai, which actually refers to a specific subset of juhai and specific han, which will be discussed later. Where can I play? Tenhou.net http://tenhou.net/0/?L7447 http://arcturus.su/tenhou |
I've got this book: The Red Dragon and the West Wind, which focuses on Chinese and American Mahjong but also discusses Japanese-style Mahjong. I've not yet found a book in english that focuses on Japanese-style rules.
So any book recommendations for Japanese rules would be appreciated. My son happened to trip across a year 1924 wooden tile set of mahjong from China ($1 garage sale) -- so we're mucking with that before we decide whether to shell out the big bucks for a modern set. |
There are no good Japanese mahjong books in English, nor strategy guides for that matter. This is because there are very few cultural centers for Japanese immigrants that maintain traditions from the first immigrants - people forget the game or have no opportunity to play and introduce new people. Since the vast majority of people who play in English-speaking countries are Chinese or Jewish, very little material has been published in English for that sort of material.
Dutch is a different story, though. :heh: |
$1 for something as ancient as that? *Faints*
I myself has only picked up on Chinese mahjong after begging my friends to teach me how to play. Such an addictive game too as once I got the hang of things we just carried on playing for 10 hours straight. The japanese version seems to have a lot more rules than the chinese version (making it more complicated with the amount of hands allowed) and quite a nightmare of a scoring system too...I still need to learn it myself but there's noone to teach me this time round :heh: |
That website is pretty good...you don't have to sign up for much and there's a good number of players.
I've been searching for a english site that lets you play Japanese rules of MJ...which I could never find :heh: |
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Typically, the more complex the rules are, the less of a factor luck is and so the "easier" the game is. In my view - Chinese Classic: 90% skill, 10% luck Chinese Modern: 75% skill, 25% luck. Japanese Classic: 50% skill, 50% luck. Japanese Modern: 40% skill, 60% luck. Hong Kong: 10% skill, 90% luck. Hence, why I prefer the "Japanese Classic" style of mahjong (pre-Red 5's, Head Bump versus Double Ron) seen in Akagi and Tetsuya. It allows for all players to have a random chance of winning, and their skill make up the difference from there. Japanese style is the most balanced between rules/luck. Quote:
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The only advantage MahjongTime offers over Tenhou is in-game chat, which is why #mahjong was founded. Quote:
You're playing against real people in Tenhou. |
http://www.reachmahjong.com
Should be able to get you started if you don't know how to play yet. Everything else will be experience. |
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*oh great now I forgot what I really wanted to ask* edit Oh right, umm, 1. Is there a difference in value between the three 1-9 sets? 2. Is there a basic hint as to what I need so as to not be forced to fully conceal the hand and call riichi to win with a 1 toitsu 4 set? |
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Thanks Cats, I have some smaller tile graphics stored away somewhere.
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Hong Kong almost has no rules. :heh: When there are fewer rules, there's more possible winning hands so the game becomes more unpredictable and one has less control over the flow. In terms of winning, I think of HK as just a step up from slot machines. :cool: Quote:
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You can Riichi if your hand is completely closed (no calls), you have enough points, the game isn't in its last round and you're in Tenpai. You can't Riichi any other way, the hand must be completely closed. Quote:
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Also what comes into play are a lot of special rules such as those which determine how one should play a hand when sitting in "x" wind of "y" round so potentially there is a lot of chaos and additional information to remember ie if you are sitting in east seat and the round is east and you have a pon of east tiles then that is 2 fans added to the winning hand. HK style doesn't allow for a combination that consists of pons and chows in different suits so that again makes it more difficult to play and a winning hand of only chows of different suits are given 1 fan (meaning you are still missing 2 for a winning hand). And I don't think there are more possible winning hands in HK mahjong than Japanese mahjong...the options available to HK players aren't that many when you play with the "3 fan minimum" rule so there is hard to win with quick, cheap hands unlike the Japanese counterpart. It is a little unfair to say that it is pure luck and lol at the slot machine comparison :rolleyes: |
Increasing the fan requires more skill and patience, but the game as a whole becomes easier since it becomes a lot more predictable to figure out what people are aiming for.
Example, if we set the minimum fan to 13, what would everyone be aiming for? :) Quote:
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I dunno if it's cause of "Saki" that has brought Japanese Mahjong to light, but I've been caught up in this world a little bit over late 2007/early 2008, when trying to fansub a anime series called
"Lengendary Gambler Testsuya" We got ep 1 and 2 tl'ed, edited and TS'ed but after months of searching I couldn't find a TC'er who was incredbly knowledable about the game and could interpret between the two languages. Then luck had it, I find a TC'er but no longer have a translator, we we have all the raws and kara and scripts and I've made a .pdf file explaining the rules "Mahjong for Idiots" basically xD Page 1 is here: http://img132.imageshack.us/img132/6880/mjp1copy.th.jpg (was needed for myself as well tbh, lol - Feel free to criticise M Terek if there are some off points, although this had been run past another professional Japanese Mahjong player when i was designing this page) - But at present that project is stalled, it may resume if I find the "one" to help get us back on track someday. Quote:
Anyways, I played a children's version of this (Pahjang?) - using the Disney set back in October xD Gave me a simple rundown of what this game is about, on a basic level in terms of concept, it's not too dificult ^^ .. Just when they start using all kinds of 'sets' when they wanna 'tsumo' (draw) - theeeeen it begins to get complicated :heh: |
Wei-Hwa Huang's website was what I originally used to learn, but as one would expect there are some errors and it's very out of date. It's still a good reference site, though.
As for Yakitori Online, it went down because the owner wasn't getting loads of cash from would-be Japanese mahjong players. :rolleyes: It wasn't a very helpful website either, partly because most of the "meets" were conducted at ron2. I only attended one of those "meets"...and ended up winning. :heh: |
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And I'm talking about a sensible minimum which seems to be the norm :rolleyes: Quote:
ps...saiGAR 2008? you need a new message change :heh: |
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Especially when one begins hearing fun things like: Tsumo! Rokusen toushi! Tsumo! Baiman! Chii Toitsu Tenpai - To name but a few :) Thanks for the update on the yakitori website tho. ^^ |
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a) What the point payout score is (Usually 30000(30) for 4, 40000(40) for 3) b) What the first place bonus is (Usually +20000(20)) c) Any rank based penalty or bonuses (Ex: Gamedesign uses a +/-10000(+/-10) penalty/bonus. First gets a +20000(+20) bonus, Second +10000(+10), Third -10000(-10) penalty, Fourth -20000(-20)) Calculation is very easy: (Variation a: ) Round your points to the nearest thousand and divide by one thousand. Subtract the payout score (/1000) from that value. Apply any penalties or bonuses. (Variation b: ) Round your points to the nearest thousand. Subtract the payout score from it. Apply any penalties and bonuses. Divide by 1000. |
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Who's playing on Tenhou here? Care to share your current rank, rate, winning percentages and all? :heh:
Maybe we can even arrange a few games or so on Tenhou. ;) |
JP Majong strategy and tactics are similar to Competition Bridge.
You use deduction as a tool to speculate the other competitor's hand and develop a hand accordingly to enheighten chance of finishing a hand while blocking others. You also need to bluff others so they evade in trying to develop a high ranking hand and/or lure them into throwing you winning block. The objective is to end Hanchan with the most points NOT making high hands since there are bonus points given to the top dog at the end of Hanchan. |
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And there is no pattern to the yaku. They are pretty much arbitrary based on things like "having" or "not having" something (Tan yao, chanta, etc), meeting a specific event sequence (haitei, rinshan kaihou, riichi), having a certain set of tiles (the dragons, the prevailing wind, your own wind, etc), or having something that is extremely unlikely (all greens, thirteen orphans, etc). The only thing is you can turn any 4 sets of 3 and a pair into a yaku with riichi, but it must be closed. Once you are dealing with an open hand, you are heavily restricted. |
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With a 3 fan minimum, it becomes very easy to defend. The only open hands that could quality under those restrictions are Hon Itsu Toi Toi, Toi Toi + Fanpai, Chin Itsu or Sanshoku Jun Chan. So, as soon as someone calls something it becomes easy to not deal into their hands. Defense is more important in Japanese mahjong than other gambling games, and that's a cardinal rule tough to drill into people. Especially the "experts". People want to show off with big hands...it's almost human nature. So they get hasty and end up dealing into another person's big hand. :o Quote:
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By far, the most common hand in Japanese mahjong is the Pinfu. It's closed, can be combined well with dora, Tan Yao, Riichi and uradora. Easy mangan or haneman hand for most people, in 4P it's murder to deal into. Next most common hand is anything + Yakuhai. Then Toi Toi comes third. |
Were there actually 5 less tiles in play because of Dora in the middle?
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14 tiles are taken out of play in the "dead wall". The Dora indicator is in the dead wall, so it's counted as one of those tiles.
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What's the dead wall? They serve any purpose?
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The dead wall removes the possibility of "tile counting" since what tiles taken out of the game are random. This isn't the case in other variants which go until all tiles have been exhausted from the wall.
If I recall correctly, 136 tiles -14 tiles (dead wall) -13 tiles x 4 (deal) =17 rounds of 4 draws each. =2 extra draws at the end So if there are no calls, the game goes for 17.5 rounds, ending at the South House. |
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The main exception to this is if a hand is about to end, and you just want to get into tenpai (just one tile away from winning), so that you can grab some bonus points. Quote:
The kokushi musō hand is quite possibly the most special hand in Mahjong. As a yakuman hand, it's one of the two exceptions to requiring the 4-set rule. It's also the only hand where if you go for it, you're basically throwing away your chance at any other hand, so there's no way to bail from such an attempt. The other exception to the 4-set rule, the 7-pair hand, is nowhere nearly as dangerous since, if you have as many as five pairs, three pons will get you into tenpai. Kokushi musō is only the second-rarest hand of all, but even the rarest, the 9 Gates being far less common, is possible to break up into lesser hands with relative ease. Given all of these drawbacks there are only two virtues with a kokushi musō hand: the first is that you're only likely to go for it if you are five tiles or less from tenpai. This would mean that you have a trash hand filled with honors and terminals that'd be useless for anything else. The second advantage is that it's virtually impossible to defend against without ruining one's chance of winning the hand, even if one knows that someone is going for it. That's because the pattern of discards is very difficult to read, and because there's a potential of a 13-tile tenpai wait (if you have exactly one of each honor and terminal). Oh by the way, I managed to get one of these hands a little while ago, and it's an awesome feeling. :p Quote:
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No flowers are mixed in with the other tiles in those variants?
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Tenhou's stats indeed rank the Suu An Kou as the most common Yakuman, followed by Dai San Gen and then Kokushi Musou. The Kokushi is actually a very common Yakuman, it's just harder to get because it is very obvious when someone aims for it.
The rarest Yakuman is the Suu Kantsu, using Akagi rules it is darn near impossible. With JPM it's just near impossible. |
I believe the most rarest yakuman hand is Tenho followed by Chiho since it consists of pure luck.;)
=EDIT= Off course if you have super fast hands and are able to do Tsubame gaeshi then Tenho is simple.:p |
I learned the hard way about
Furi-Ten You cant ron if you are waiting for a tile that you have discarded before. Example: You have 56 Characters, 234 567 88 Circles, 4x white dragon. You have discarded the 4 of characters before. If another player discards the 4 of characters, you cant ron. But you can call tsumo with a previously discarded tile. Dont ask me why they made that rule ;_; Thanks to Basaka and Teiran who explained the rule to me. <3 |
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As I posted before the objective is to end with the most points at the end of Hanchan so evading and trying to stop others from making a hand is a valid and justified option. |
I see Furi-Ten. No wonder. I think I have experience that also. Basically I was doing open hand and had 44 (circles) 88 (bamboo) left on my hand. Someone discard an 8 bam, so I Pon and ended having to discard one of the 4. Later someone discard another 4 Cir, but I cannot Ron it and I didn't have any 1 or 9 also. And I tought the computer was cheating. ^_^
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Minor note about Furi-ten:
Tenhou will sometimes (always?) put you in permanent furiten if you ignore a winning discard by an opponent. You are normally allowed to skip an opponents discard but you cannot declare a win until 1 go around later. |
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