How to Play Mahjong!

Mahjong is a game with almost as many ways to play as there are tables to play at. Originating in the late 1800s as an evolution of traditional Chinese money-suited playing card games, nowadays there are dozens if not hundreds of regional varients, fractalizing further to suit the preferences of individual groups or families. At Rainbow Dragon, we play a variant of Hong Kong Mahjong with a custom pattern list that takes inspiration from Taiwanese, Chinese Competitive, Japanese, and American Jewish rulesets.

If you’re totally new and planning to join one of our in-person meetups, don’t worry if none of that made any sense; we will gladly teach you! If you’re interested in learning Hong Kong Mahjong on your own time, we recommend this amazing interactive visual guide by Emily Han:

https://themahjong.guide/

Below you’ll find a full reference for our scoring rules, including visualizations for every single pattern. You can also download the quick-reference guide we use at our events here:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1C1T6Fl_emFqkPzrqQxSyGTz0jbKFiY8v/

rNorth Wind

Tiles

Numbered Tiles

  • Characters (1-9)
    1 of Characters 2 of Characters 3 of Characters 4 of Characters 5 of Characters 6 of Characters 7 of Characters 8 of Characters 9 of Characters

  • Circles (1-9)
    1 of Circles 2 of Circles 3 of Circles 4 of Circles 5 of Circles 6 of Circles 7 of Circles 8 of Circles 9 of Circles

  • Bamboo (1-9)
    1 of Bamboo 2 of Bamboo 3 of Bamboo 4 of Bamboo 5 of Bamboo 6 of Bamboo 7 of Bamboo 8 of Bamboo 9 of Bamboo

Honor Tiles

  • Winds (East, South, West, North)
    East Wind South Wind West Wind North Wind

  • Dragons (White, Green, Red)
    White Dragon Green Dragon Red Dragon

Bonus Tiles

  • Flowers (Plum, Orchid, Chrysanthemum, Bamboo)
    Plum (Flower) Orchid (Flower) Chrysanthemum (Flower) Bamboo (Flower)

  • Seasons (Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter)
    Spring (Season) Summer (Season) Autumn (Season) Winter (Season)

Patterns

1 fan

  • All Sequences (Hand contains only sequences and a pair)
    1 of Characters2 of Characters3 of Characters 3 of Circles4 of Circles5 of Circles 6 of Circles7 of Circles8 of Circles 7 of Bamboo8 of Bamboo9 of Bamboo Red DragonRed Dragon

  • No Orphans/All Simples (Hand contains only suited tiles numbered 2-8)
    6 of Characters6 of Characters6 of Characters 3 of Circles4 of Circles5 of Circles 8 of Circles8 of Circles8 of Circles 2 of Bamboo3 of Bamboo4 of Bamboo 7 of Bamboo7 of Bamboo

  • Valued Honors (Hand contains a triplet of dragons, your seat wind, or the round wind)
    Red DragonRed DragonRed Dragon, East WindEast WindEast Wind, etc.

  • Pure Double Sequence (Hand contains two identical sequences[1])
    1 of Circles2 of Circles3 of Circles 1 of Circles2 of Circles3 of Circles

  • Mixed Seqential Triplets (Hand contains three sequential triplets in all three suits)
    1 of Characters1 of Characters1 of Characters 2 of Circles2 of Circles2 of Circles 3 of Bamboo3 of Bamboo3 of Bamboo

  • Mixed Straight (Hand contains the sequences 123, 456, 789 in all three suits)
    1 of Characters2 of Characters3 of Characters 4 of Circles5 of Circles6 of Circles 7 of Bamboo8 of Bamboo9 of Bamboo

  • Rainbow (Hand contains characters, circles, bamboo, winds, and dragons. Cannot be Seven Pairs or Thirteen Orphans)
    1 of Characters2 of Characters3 of Characters 4 of Circles4 of Circles4 of Circles 6 of Bamboo7 of Bamboo8 of Bamboo North WindNorth WindNorth Wind Red DragonRed Dragon

2 fan

  • All Triplets (Hand contains only triplets and a pair)
    3 of Characters3 of Characters3 of Characters 5 of Circles5 of Circles5 of Circles 8 of Bamboo8 of Bamboo8 of Bamboo North WindNorth WindNorth Wind East WindEast Wind

  • Half Flush (Hand contains all one suit with honors)
    1 of Circles2 of Circles3 of Circles 5 of Circles5 of Circles5 of Circles 6 of Circles7 of Circles8 of Circles North WindNorth WindNorth Wind Red DragonRed Dragon

  • Mixed Triple Sequence (Hand contains the same sequence in all three suits)
    1 of Characters2 of Characters3 of Characters 1 of Circles2 of Circles3 of Circles 1 of Bamboo2 of Bamboo3 of Bamboo

  • Mixed Triple Triplets (Hand contains the same triplet in all three suits)
    1 of Characters1 of Characters1 of Characters 1 of Circles1 of Circles1 of Circles 1 of Bamboo1 of Bamboo1 of Bamboo

  • Pure Seqential Triplets (Hand contains three sequential triplets in one suit)
    1 of Circles1 of Circles1 of Circles 2 of Circles2 of Circles2 of Circles 3 of Circles3 of Circles3 of Circles

  • Pure Straight (Hand contains sequences 123, 456, 789 in one suit)
    1 of Circles2 of Circles3 of Circles 4 of Circles5 of Circles6 of Circles 7 of Circles8 of Circles9 of Circles

4 fan

  • Seven Pairs (Hand contains exactly seven pairs)
    6 of Characters6 of Characters 5 of Circles5 of Circles 8 of Circles8 of Circles 2 of Bamboo2 of Bamboo 7 of Bamboo 7 of Bamboo East WindEast Wind Red DragonRed Dragon

  • Full Flush (Hand contains only all one suit)
    1 of Circles2 of Circles3 of Circles 5 of Circles5 of Circles5 of Circles 6 of Circles7 of Circles8 of Circles 9 of Circles9 of Circles9 of Circles 4 of Circles4 of Circles

  • Three Little Dragons (Hand contains two dragon triplets with pair of the third[2])
    Green DragonGreen DragonGreen Dragon Red DragonRed DragonRed Dragon White DragonWhite Dragon

  • All Orphans (Hand contains only 1s, 9s, and honors[3])
    1 of Characters1 of Characters1 of Characters 1 of Circles1 of Circles1 of Circles 9 of Bamboo9 of Bamboo9 of Bamboo North WindNorth WindNorth Wind Red DragonRed Dragon

6 fan

  • Four Little Winds (Hand contains triplets of three winds with a pair of the fourth[2])
    East WindEast WindEast Wind South WindSouth WindSouth Wind West WindWest WindWest Wind North WindNorth Wind

  • Three Big Dragons (Hand contains triplets of all three dragons[2])
    Green DragonGreen DragonGreen Dragon Red DragonRed DragonRed Dragon White DragonWhite DragonWhite Dragon

  • Fully Concealed Triplets (Hand contains all triplets and a pair and is also Fully Concealed[3])

8 fan

  • Four Big Winds (Hand contains triplets of all four winds[2][3])
    East WindEast WindEast Wind South WindSouth WindSouth Wind West WindWest WindWest Wind North WindNorth WindNorth Wind

  • All Honors (Hand contains only honor tiles [2][3])
    East WindEast WindEast Wind South WindSouth WindSouth Wind Red DragonRed DragonRed Dragon White DragonWhite DragonWhite Dragon North WindNorth Wind

  • Thirteen Orphans _(Hand contains one of every 1, 9, and honor tile, with one pair)
    1 of Characters9 of Characters1 of Circles9 of Circles1 of Bamboo9 of BambooEast WindSouth WindWest WindNorth WindGreen DragonRed DragonWhite DragonWhite Dragon

1 fan bonuses

  • Fully Concealed (Hand contains no open melds)

  • Mountaintop (Winning with the draw after a kong, flower, or season)

  • Robbing a Kong (Winning with the tile added to an open triplet to form an open kan)

  • Under the Sea/River (Winning with the final draw or discard of the wall)

Flowers and Seasons

If you win, you score for your drawn flowers and seasons as follows:

1 Fan

Each flower or season that matches your seat (East is 1, South is 2, etc.)
Plum (Flower) or Spring (Season), Orchid (Flower) or Summer (Season), etc.

2 Fan

A complete set of either flowers or seasons
Plum (Flower)Orchid (Flower)Chrysanthemum (Flower)Bamboo (Flower) or Spring (Season)Summer (Season)Autumn (Season)Winter (Season)

Scoring

The person discarding the winning tile pays the whole number of points, and everyone else half; for self-drawn winning tiles, everyone pays the whole. The correspondence between fan and whole number of points is as follows:

0 Fan

2 Points

1 Fan

4 Points

2 Fan

8 Points

3 Fan

16 Points

4 Fan

32 Points

5 Fan

48 Points

6 Fan

64 Points

7 Fan

96 Points

8 Fan

128 Points

9 Fan

192 Points

10 Fan

256 Points

11 Fan

384 Points

12 Fan

512 Points

A hand can score no more than 12 Fan. This ruleset is designed to be played with a 0, 1, or 2 fan limit, which you can think of as being relaxed, standard, or challenging. Talk with your table about what’s right for you!

parsnip

r1 of Characters r2 of Characters r3 of Characters r4 of Characters r5 of Characters r6 of Characters r7 of Characters r8 of Characters r9 of Characters

1. 1 extra fan for a third identical sequence, 2 extra for the fourth
2. This hand does not count the fan given by Valued Honors.
3. This hand does not count the fan given by All Triplets.