How to play Mahjong

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I am writing this blog urgently, because some friends will come to my place to play Mahjong in a few weeks. Hope they could finish theoretical study before practising, Besides, i am going to prepare ‘Chongqing xiao mian’ for players to maintain their energy.

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Mahjong is the most popular game in China, especially in Sichuan. If you know how to play Mahjong ,then you have masted a skill of social in China.

Let’s play Mahjong:

Players: 4 players

  • 136 tiles, including 36 characters, 36 bamboos, and 36 circles, which are in turn divided into four sets of numbers 1-9 in each suit. There are also 16 Wind tiles and 12 Dragon tiles. (Many sets also include 8 bonus tiles: 4 flowers and 4 seasons, but these are not needed in the basic game.)
  • 1 pair of dice,to determine the deal
  • 4 racks (optional)
Goal

To get a “Mahjong”, which consists of getting all 14 of your tiles into four sets and one pair.

A pair is two identical tiles. A set can either be a “pong”, which is three identical tiles, or a “chi”, which is a run of three consecutive numbers in the same suit. A single tile cannot be used in two sets at once.

Setup

Determine a starting dealer. In Chinese tradition, the four wind tiles are shuffled face down and dealt to the players. Players then sit according to their tile, and sit clockwise in the order North, West, South, East, and East starts as dealer. Modern players may simply roll the dice to determine the dealer.

All tiles are shuffled together, and each player builds a wall of face-down tiles in front of herself, 17 tiles long and 2 tiles high. The result should be a large square wall of tiles in the center of the table.

The dealer rolls the dice and counts that many tiles from the right edge of her wall, and separates the wall at that point to begin dealing tiles from the left of that spot and going clockwise. Each player receives 13 tiles, with the dealer starting with an extra 14th tile.

Each player then arranges her own tiles so she can see them and other players cannot. Racks are often used for this purpose. The dealer then discards one tile, and play begins to the left of the dealer.

Play

Before your turn, you must give other players a few seconds to claim the most recently discarded tile.

First priority goes to any player who can claim the discarded tile to complete a Mahjong. A player who can do this claims the tile, then reveals the winning hand of 14 tiles.

Failing that, any player can claim the discarded tile to complete a pong. The player says “pong”, and then reveals the two matching tiles that match the discard. For example, if the discarded tile was the 7 of bamboo, and the player had two more bamboo 7s on the rack, that player would call “pong”. When calling pong, a player turns the completed pong (with all three bamboo 7s, in this case) face-up, discards a different tile, and the turn passes to their right.

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If nobody claims the discarded tile but it completes a chi for you, you may claim it at the beginning of your turn by saying “chi”. You then must turn your chi face-up, revealing the completed run (e.g. 5,6,7 of bamboo) as in the pong example above. You then discard a different tile and play continues as normal.

If the discard does not complete a set for you, then on your turn you draw the next tile from the wall (going left). Unless this gives you a Mahjong, you then discard a tile face-up.

Note that at all times, only the most recently discarded tile can be claimed.

Gang

“Gang”, which is four of the same tile (like an extended pong). The same rules for claiming a discarded tile apply, but any player completing a gang immediately draws an extra tile before discarding.

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Stop and Win

When you are going to win, you have to say ‘Stop‘ which means after saying ‘Stop’ you can not change any tile and only wait for the last tile to win the game.

Either get the last tile by your self, we call it (zi mo) or get it from one of players.

(The hansd ends when somebody declares Mahjong and reveals a complete 14-tile hand of four sets and a pair.)

Scoring

When you get the last tile by yourself (ZiMo), each of other three players should give you 2 scores, in total 6 scores.
Above is the basic rule of playing Mahjong, different areas in China have different rules. So please be prepared and get ready to play with us.
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(Reference: https://www.thesprucecrafts.com/how-to-play-mahjong-411827 )

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