Hong Kong Old Style | Overview | Gameplay | Scoring | Penalties & Errors | Resources |
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Initial Points
Because HKOS mahjong is also a gambling game, no initial points are specified. If you are playing casually everyone can start arbitrarily with 500 points.
Criteria
The hand must contain 14 tiles and be composed of four sets and a pair (with the exception of special limit hands). If two players call mahjong for the same discard, the player sitting closest to the discarder in turn order is given the tile. An exception to this is when a player completes a Thirteen Orphans hand the turn order does not matter.
Decide on a minimum number of fan needed before calling mahjong (3 fan is common). When declaring a win on a discard, the player must display his hand first before adding the discarded tile. In case of a self-drawn win, the drawn tile is displayed first followed by his hand.
Miss Win
Should a player fail to declare a winning tile, he/she cannot claim any identical discarded tile until his next draw.
Outline
If the winner wins by self-draw, then all other players pay him however much his hand is worth (or double its worth depending on the variation).
If the winner wins by discard, the player who discarded the winning tile (known as the discarder) is penalized. One common method of penalizing the discarder is forcing the discarder to pay the full value of the winning hand, while the other two players only pay half. Alternatively, the discarder must pay one or two times the value of the winning hand, while the other players pay nothing. Make sure your mahjong group agrees on a method of payment before starting a game.
- Win by a discarded tile: Discarder pays winner double the full score.
- Win by self-drawn tile: All player's pay double the full value of the winner's hand.
Scoring Table
Only the winning hand is scored. Determine which scoring elements apply to the winning hand then add. Use the table to convert the fan into points. However, different sources use different tables.
Value | Hand | Description | Pattern Type |
---|---|---|---|
1 fan | No Flowers and no Seasons | Hand contains no flowers and seasons. | Special |
1 fan | Seat Flower | Hand contains player's flower. | Special |
1 fan | Seat Season | Hand contains player's Season. | Special |
1 fan | All Chows | Hand consists only of chows and a pair of suit tiles. |
Chow-Based |
1 fan | Dragon Pung | Hand includes a pung (or kong) of dragons. |
Terminals/Honors |
1 fan | Seat/Prevalent Wind | Hand includes a pung (or kong) of the player’s seat or round wind. |
Terminals/Honors |
1 fan | Self-drawn Win | Winning on a tile drawn from the wall. | Going Out |
1 fan | Last Tile Draw | Self-drawn win on the last tile of the wall. | Going Out |
1 fan | Last Tile Discard | Win by discard on the discard after the last tile of the wall is drawn. | Going Out |
1 fan | Robbing the Kong | Winning off the tile that somebody adds to a melded pung. | Going Out |
1 fan | Out on Replacement | Winning on the replacement tile drawn after declaring a kong. Counts as self-drawn. | Going Out |
2 fan | All Flowers | Hand contains all flower tiles. Implies Seat Flower. |
Special |
2 fan | All Seasons | Hand contains all seasons tiles. Implies Seat Season. . |
Special |
3 fan | All Pungs | Hand consists all pungs. |
Pung-Based |
3 fan | Half Flush | Hand consists only of honors and suit tiles of one suit. |
Suit-Based |
4 fan | Little Three Dragons | Hand has two dragon pungs and a pair of the third dragon. |
Terminals/Honors |
4 fan | Seven Pairs | Hand is composed of seven pairs of tiles. |
Special |
6 fan | Full Flush | Hand consists only of suit tiles of one suit. |
Suit-Based |
Limit | Four Concealed Pungs | Hand has four concealed pungs and a pair and self-drawn win. | Pung-Based |
Limit | Big Three Dragons | Hand has three dragon pungs. |
Terminals/Honors |
Limit | Little Four Winds | Hand has three pungs and a pair of winds. |
Terminals/Honors |
Limit | Big Four Winds | Hand has four pungs of winds. |
Terminals/Honors |
Limit | All Honors | Hand consists only of honor tiles. |
Terminals/Honors |
Limit | All Terminals | Hand consists only of terminals. |
Terminals/Honors |
Limit | Nine Gates | Concealed hand of 1112345678999 in one suit and winning on any tile of the same suit. |
Suit-Based |
Limit | Thirteen Orphans | Hand made of single tiles of 12 honors and terminals, plus a pair of the 13th. |
Special |
Limit | All Kongs | Hand has four kongs and a pair. | Kong-Based |
Limit | Jade Dragon | Hand is composed of pungs (or kongs) of bamboo tiles and a pung of green dragons. |
Suit-Based |
Limit | Ruby Dragon | Hand is composed of pungs (or kongs) of character tiles and pung of red dragons. |
Suit-Based |
Limit | Pearl Dragon | Hand is composed of pungs (or kongs) of dot tiles and a pung of white dragons. |
Suit-Based |
Limit | Blessing of Heaven | East wins with initial hand. | Going Out |
Limit | Blessing of Earth | Non-east player wins on East's first discard. | Going Out |
The table below is called a fan-laak table. In this one, certain fan values convert to the same amount of points. This helps to limit the scores.
This variation uses:
- Win by a discarded tile: Discarder pays winner double score and the other players pay normal the winner's score.
- Win by self-drawn tile: All player's pay double value of the winner's hand.
Scoring Table | |||
Fan | Points | By discard | Self drawn |
---|---|---|---|
0 | 1 | $1+1+2=4$ | n/a |
1 | 2 | $2+2+4=8$ | $4+4+4=12$ |
2 | 4 | $4+4+8=16$ | $8+8+8=24$ |
3 | 8 | $8+8+16=32$ | $16+16+16=48$ |
4, 5, 6 | 16 | $16+16+32=64$ | $32+32+32=96$ |
7, 8, 9 | 32 | $32+32+64=128$ | $64+64+64=192$ |
10+ | 64 | $64+64+128=256$ | $128+128+128=384$ |
Scoring Examples
Example 1
Consider the following example. East (東) round; South (南) position.
melded pung | concealed tiles | melded chow | melded pung | out on |
Half Flush | 3 fan |
Dragon Pung | 1 fan |
No Flowers | 1 fan |
5 fan | |
Payment | 64 (32 + 16 + 16) points |
The hand has a total of 5 fan. The discarder would pay 32, while all other players pay 16 points each.
Example 2
Consider the following example. East (東) round; East (東) position.
melded pung | concealed tiles | melded chow | melded pung | pair | self-drawn |
Seat Wind | 1 fan |
Prevalent Wind | 1 fan |
Self-Drawn Win | 1 fan |
No Flowers | 1 fan |
4 fan | |
Payment | 96 (32 x 3) points |
The hand is worth 4 fan but was completed with a self-drawn tile. Each opponent would have to pay 32 points each.