Mahjong For Retards

MAHJONG FOR RETARDS

This is a pretty pathetic guide for noobs too lazy to read the rulebook or watch a two hour video. It should give you a feeble enough grasp of the game to play a hand or two or sorta understand Akagi.

BARE BASICS:

Mahjong is played with tiles. There are three suits of tiles that number 1-9: circles, characters, and bamboo. Additionally there are special honor tiles that do not have numbers that represent the cardinal directions (called wind tiles) and three different colored dragons. There are four of every single tile in the game (four 2 of bamboo tiles, four North tiles, four red dragon tiles, etc.).

Every player is assigned a cardinal direction (called winds in this game), starting with East and proceeding counterclockwise to South, then West, then North, then East again. This is also the turn order. Yes, East and West are reversed, that's just how it works.

You start the game with a hand of 13 tiles, and every time it is your turn you draw a tile and then discard a tile. The goal is to form a winning hand that qualifies for at least one yaku (preferably more).

A winning hand is 14 tiles that consist of four triplets/sequences and a pair, AND your hand must qualify for a yaku. A triplet is three of the exact same tile. A sequence is three numbered tiles of the same suit in order, 234 of circles, 567 of bamboo, etc. Your hand must qualify for at least one yaku on top of needing four triplets/sequences and a pair. A yaku is a specific pattern or requirement your hand must meet in order to count as a winning hand. I seriously cannot stress enough that having four triplets/sequences and a pair is not enough to win. You must also qualify for a yaku. We'll go over those in a bit.

If you have a pair of the exact same tile, and someone discards a third, you can steal that tile and add it to your hand. This instantly makes it your turn and you must then discard. You can steal to complete a sequence too, but ONLY from the person directly to your left (the person who goes before you). If you steal to complete a triplet/sequence, that triplet/sequence is revealed to other players and becomes melded, meaning those tiles are basically locked together and you cant discard any of them and they cannot be part of any other triplets/sequences. On top of this, your hand is now considered open, which disqualifies you from a lot of the most valable yaku (stealing your winning tile does NOT count as opening your hand). Stealing to complete a triplet is called calling pon, stealing to complete a sequence is called calling chi.

When you are one tile away from forming a winning hand (meaning your hand is complete except for a single tile, which could be one of several different tiles), you are in tenpai. When you are in tenpai, you can steal your winning tile whenever it is discarded, even if it does not complete a triplet/sequence. This is the only time where you can steal to form a pair. Stealing your winning tile does NOT count as opening your hand (seriously this is really important). Stealing your winning tile is called calling ron. Alternatively you might draw the winning tile yourself when it is your turn, this is called calling tsumo and it's fine too.

YAKU:

In order to form a winning hand, your hand must have four triplets/sequences (Im just gonna note you can have a combination of triplets and sequences to win, you dont have to choose one) and a pair. In addition your hand has to qualify for at least one yaku. You should look up a full list of yaku, but I'm going to go over the most basic ones here that every noob should know. A lot of yaku require your hand to be closed/concealed, meaning you haven't stolen to form a triplet/sequence (remember stealing your winning tile doesn't open your hand).

All Simples (tanyao): Worth 1 han (big point). Your hand can be open. You get this yaku if your hand does not have any terminal tiles (1 and 9 tiles) or honor tiles (cardinal direction tiles or dragon tiles). This is the easiest yaku to get if you open your hand, and it's also pretty easy to get in combination with other yaku. 1 and 9 tiles have less potential for forming sequences anyway, so discarding them can be a good idea even if you dont go for all simples.

Triplet of Dragons/Winds (yakuhai): Worth 1 han. Your hand can be open. All you need for this is a triplet of dragons or a triplet of wind tiles that matches either the seat you are sitting in, or the prevailing wind (the prevailing wind is always East unless you're playing an East-South match). Getting this one pretty much just comes down to being lucky.

Riichi: Worth 1 han, sometimes more. Your hand must be closed. If you are in tenpai and it is your turn, you can call riichi. Calling riichi locks your hand so you cannot change it anymore. All you can do after calling riichi is wait for any of your winning tiles to be discarded or for you to draw one yourself. If you draw a tile that isnt a winning tile for you, you must discard it. Riichi is basically a reward for keeping your hand concealed and not stealing tiles, giving you an extra han on top of whatever your hand is already worth in exchange for locking your hand letting the other players know you're about to win. For new players, the existence of riichi means that as long as you don't open your hand you don't really have to worry about yaku because you can always declare riichi. Riichi also has an effect on the dora tiles, which I'll explain in a minute.

There are lots of other yaku, and I highly recommend familiarizing yourself with all the 1-2 han yaku, as usually the best way to get big points is to combine lots of cheap yaku together with riichi and the dora tiles.

OTHER STUFF:

Dora: Dora tiles are special tiles that change every game, and they're how you can earn big points even with otherwise shitty hands, or how decent hands become game ending ones. Every game starts with one dora tile. If you're playing Mahjong Soul you can look in the upper left hand corner of the screen to see the dora indicator. The dora tile is the tile one number higher than the dora indicator (if the dora indicator is a 5 of bamboo, then the dora is the 6 of bamboo). Basically, for every dora tile you have in your winning hand, you get an extra han. So if the dora is the 6 of bamboo and you have a triplet of them, that's three han right there. Even a single dora tile in your winning hand more than doubles the value of your hand if you hand would otherwise be worth 1 han (the points system of mahjong is crazy. Suffice to say the value of your hand goes up exponentially the more han you have, especially at lower han), so it's well worth making compromises to make the dora part of your hand. More dora can be revealed throughout the game, and if you win after declaring riichi the number of dora indicators double, potentially making the value of your hand explode.

Kan: Four of a kind is called kan, which is treated the same as a triplet except it has a weird effect on your hand and the game. If you already have a triplet and you draw the fourth or someone discards the fourth, you can declare kan. Declaring kan melds the four together and increases the size of your hand by 1, meaning your normal hand is 14 tiles and your winning hand is 15 tiles. After declaring kan, you get to draw a replacement tile from the dead wall (look it up) and then must discard. The main advantage of declaring kan is that it causes a new dora indicator to be revealed, which can give you (or your opponents) unexpected dora tiles. In general, you should only kan when you draw the fourth tile yourself, as stealing to form a kan opens your hand for no real advantage to you, whereas declaring kan when you draw the fourth tile yourself doesn't count as opening your hand and gives you another draw you wouldn't otherwise have gotten.