An attempt at a complete verion of the ruleset for the Sichuan (river) style of mahjong.
The initial write out is still in progress!
The three suits are:
- tiáo (bamboo)
- tǒng (disc)
- wàn (the character for 10,000)
When a tile is discarded, a player must call its number are suit. For example: "sān wàn".
A couple of the suits have special names that can optionally be used:
- dàbīng (大饼) - 1 tǒng
- xiǎojī (小鸡) - 1 tiáo
A game begins with the construction of the wall. After shuffling the tiles, the wall is four two-story rows arranged in a square, more-or-less of equal length (don't worry too much). The face of a wall faces each player.
Winner (first to exit) on the last round rolls to start. If it's the first round, all players roll and the highest starts.
Tiles are taken clockwise, play proceeds counter-clockwise.
The person who starts rolls the dice again to decide where to start taking from the wall (X). Starting at the person who rolled and counting to their right determines which wall to start from. From the left end of that wall, to the right, count X segments of the wall. From the Xth segment, the rolling player takes two segments worth of tiles (a 2x2 stack). Then the player to their left (clockwise) takes the next 2x2 stack, and so on for three sets of 2x2. Then the rolling player takes one final tile, and then so do the rest of the players in the same order, bringing the number up to 13 each. The rolling player then starts the game by taking the next tile from the wall to start play.+
- This last step is usually abbreviated with the rolling player taking both the last available tile off the end and then one over from it--the tile they would have taken later anyways.
Tiles are taken clockwise, play proceeds counter-clockwise, starting with the rolling player above.
The object of the game is to make four sets of three and one set of two. The sets of three (or four, see below) may be straights or flushes (in the poker sense); the set of two must be a pair of the same suit.
A player can only make hands with two suits. (Sometimes the decision of which two suits to keep must be made early on.)
The general flow of play is that a player draws a tile from the wall (temporarily bringing them up to 14 tiles, and the ability to win) and discards a tile into the central pile. Only this tile is available to players for special plays.
A player can always take a winning tile that has just been discarded (including pèng or gàng) to complete their sets, whether it is for a straight, flush, final pair--anything to win.
Special plays (with the except one play around gàng, see below) occur when a tile is discarded that is usable by another player in a flush. The flow of play then continues from the player taking the discarded tile (meaning that some player can be skipped, sometimes multiple times).
If a discarded tile completes a flush of three, and the player chooses, they may call out "pèng" and take the just discarded tile. They must then lay down the set of three for display to the rest of the players. Since they have just taken a tile, they must discard one to bring the total held number to the correct level (e.g. 10 hidden + 3 down = 13).
A gàng (four card flush) has a few more rules around it.
If you hold a hidden 3 tile flush and somebody discards the fourth tile in the set, you may call "gàng", take it, and display the set.
If you have a 3 tile flush that is already down and you draw the fourth tile from the wall, you may call "gàng", take it, and add it to the displayed set.
In both cases on a gàng, you then take a tile off of the "back" end of the wall, opposite from where tiles are normally taken. Then, if you have not won, you discard a tile and play continues as normal from you.
Seven pairs is also a win condition.
Somebody "wins" when they complete their sets. Payment is made (see below) and the game continues with the remaining players. A game continues until no more winners possible--there are no more tiles to play from the wall or discard pile.
Games may have no winners or three winners.
Once somebody has won/exited play, they no longer pay under any circumstances.
A win is announced with the phrase: "huòle" (获了).
The long-term winner would probably be considered the person who leaves with the most money at the end of the night. However, there is also a "winner" for every game: the person who completes their hand first and exits.
Scoring/paying occurs every time somebody wins, until no further winners are possible.
For the discussion of scoring, let's start with the assumption that the base payment is "1". For the actual payment/tally, some people use chips, poker cards, or real money, others just keep score on paper.
The base that we'll start out with is that if you win on taking a tile from the wall, you get paid (1) by all players; if you win by taking the tile a player is discarding, you get paid (1) by the discarding player, and nobody else.
Now for the modifiers.
- All sets are a flush is 2x.
- One gàng is worth: 4x; two gàng 8x, etc.
- If you win on taking the tile off the back after gàng, I believe it's 8x (from all)?
- Seven (pairs) is worth 2x.
As part of developing a good strategy, it's worth noting that it may be rather more lucrative to not be the first player to exit with what one can quickly put together, but rather to develop one's hand and collect excessive bonuses from the remaining players. On the other hand, getting out first is safe, even if the payoff is small...
- I have no idea what to do about a gàng that you start with at the beginning of a game--do you have to call it to get points?
- Can there be hidden gàngs, or do you need to announce them to get the bonus points?
- When you win, do you need to display the winning tile?
- What other modifiers are there?
- Are points added or multiplied?
TODO
Another great resource is: http://www.jasonpym.com/blog/2013/11/23/sichuan-mahjong/ .