Game Procedures

  1. Place 38 tiles face down adjacent to each wall (19 tiles on the bottom, 19 tiles on top of the bottom row).
  2. Players take turns to roll the dice. The high roller is the dealer (known as the East).
  3. The East (dealer) rolls the dice again to determine where to “break” the dealer’s wall. Rolling the dice is mandatory in breaking the wall (it’s akin to cutting a deck of cards before you deal to prevent cheating).
  4. The roll of the dice by East is counted by the double stack of tiles on East’s wall starting from the right side of that wall. Leave the counted tiles on the wall and push the rest of the tiles to the center of the table. Be sure that the right side of the pushed-in tiles is center-most and the left side of the line of the tiles is farthest from the center of the table. Mark the left side as the side not to pick or deal from.
  5. East takes 4 tiles from the right side of the line of tiles in the middle of the table and places those tiles face down in front of his/her rack (hand holding side of the wall).
  6. The order of play is counterclockwise from East (to the right of East). The next three players pick 4 tiles each. The East begins picking again, 4 tiles at a time, until all players have 12 tiles. Then the East picks the first and third tiles from the top row of the pushed-in tiles. Each player starting from the right takes one tile (top to bottom, bottom if there is no top). No player may rack or look at their tiles until all tiles have been dealt.
  7. As a pushed-in wall is used up, a new wall to the left (clockwise) is pushed in to be dealt or to be picked from. (Tip: No tiles left? Go left)

RACK YOUR TILES AFTER DEALING (DEALER 14, PLAYERS 13)

  1. Organize your tiles by their suits.
  2. On the official Mahjong Card, scan the titles that indicate the pattern of hands beneath them.
  3. Choose a section labeled by that title based on the pattern in the hand you were dealt. Sometimes your hand pattern matches a specific hand pattern in a section, and other times you have a hand that seems to go in a section but no specific hand in that section.
  4. Choose all the tiles that belong in that section and put all the other loose tiles aside to be passed during the Charleston. You may pick more than one hand to play and later eliminate that hand when more tiles seem to fit another pattern.
  5. Begin the Charleston (3 steps passing 3 tiles at a time). (ROLLOR (two Charleston passes))
  6. When the Charleston and Courtesy passes are over, count your tiles. Everyone should have 13 tiles except for the East, who has 14. If any player does not have the correct number of tiles, players must start the set-up process from the beginning again (e.g. mixing tiles, setting up walls, etc.)
  7. East begins the game by discarding a tile face up and announcing the name of the tile. The player to the right may call that discard or pick a concealed tile from the center pushed-in wall. Always pick from the right side of the wall. If you call a tile, place the entire group it belongs to on the top of your wall face up. If you pick from a concealed tile, place that tile in your hand on your rack immediately. Next, discard a tile to end your turn, placing the tile face up and announcing the name of the tile.
  8. If a player picks up (calls) a discard, that player interrupts the order of play. The new order of play is to the right of the person who is last to discard. The other players may lose their turn. Be sure to verbalize that you want a discarded tile before the next player picks and racks or picks and discards.
  9. Never pick ahead before someone has discarded a tile. Only the last discarded tile may be called for an exposure (group) that is placed on the top of the wall. If someone begins to pick a concealed tile from the wall in the center of the table, they may not put it back and cannot decide to call the last discarded tile.
  10. When discarding a tile, the discarder verbally announces the name of the tile being discarded and then places the tile on the table face up. Once you have verbalized the name of the tile, it must be discarded.
  11. Practice is important. Come each week or there are Online sights for practice: realmahjongg.com, myjongg.net, I love Mah.

The Charleston (series of passes to get a better hand)

The Charleston is a series of three passes used to discard unwanted tiles and hopefully gain beneficial tiles. It is a procedure that is performed after the tiles are dealt but before the game of Mah Jongg begins. During these passes, 3 tiles must be passed at a time.

There are 2 Charleston’s and a Courtesy Pass. During the Courtesy Pass, 0-3 tiles may be passed. Nick name for Charleston “ROLLOR” (Right, over, left, left over right).

The first Charleston is mandatory. The second Charleston is optional. The Courtesy Pass is optional. There is no Charleston if you have less than 4 players.

First Mandatory Charleston: (must pass 3 tiles each pass)

R (right)
O (over)
L (left) On this left, you may blind pass or Stop the passing.

Second Optional Charleston: (must pass 3 tiles each pass)

L (left)
O (over)
R (right) On this right, you may blind pass or Stop the passing.

The Courtesy Pass of 0-3 tiles is across (O for over)

YOU MAY NOT PASS A JOKER DURING THE CHARLESTON AND COURTESY PASSING.

What is Blind Passing or Stealing?

If you do not have 3 tiles, you may pass less from your hand and take the additional tiles concealed from the pass going to you. You may not look at the tiles passed to you until after you have passed the tiles from your hand and the additional tiles from the passed tiles that went to you. Blind pass occurs on last left of first Charleston or last right of second Charleston. If every player wants to steal, then the East must forgo the steal and be the first to pass the three tiles.

At the end of the Charleston and Courtesy Pass but before East discards a tile:

Count the number of tiles you have in your hand. If you do not have the correct number of tiles, throw in all the hands, face down, mix the tiles, and begin setting up the walls and doing the Charleston again. Once East discards, everyone should have 13 tiles. Anyone without the correct number of tiles is dead.

Important Joker Points

–There is a total of 8 Joker tiles–

  1. Jokers are like wild cards; they may comprise or be used entirely in free standing Pungs, Kongs, Quints, or Sextets. In other words, use as many jokers as you want in an exposure.
  2. You may NEVER EVER use a joker in a pair or a single or unlike groups.
  3. You cannot pass Jokers in the Charleston. Return the pass and ask for another tile.
  4. Redeeming: You must wait until your turn (in other words, first pick a tile from a concealed or discarded tile) then claim Jokers from an exposed group. You may not redeem from an exposure that made your hand declared dead. You may redeem from exposures before your hand was declared dead.
  5. Only tiles from your hand (not the table) can replace a joker in an exposed group.
  6. You may discard Jokers when it is your turn, but you cannot pick up a discarded Joker. No exceptions allowed for this rule.

Charleston Refresher

“ROLLOR” stands for:

Right Over Left (the first Charleston)
Left Over Right (the second optional Charleston)

  1. The Charleston is 3 passes of 3 tiles at a time.
    • First Charleston: Right, Over, Left (with a steal possible for this Left only)
    • Second Charleston: Left, Over, Right (with a steal possible for this Right only)
  2. A player may steal (some or all tiles) from a pass coming to him/her if he/she does not want to pass three tiles from his/her hand on the last step in a Charleston (of 3 steps). A Courtesy pass (Over) occurs when the Charleston passes are over. The players decide how many tiles to pass during the courtesy exchange (none to 3 tiles at a time) with both players agreeing on the minimum number of tiles to be passed.
  3. A steal is a blind pass from some or all the tiles being passed to you.
  4. Stopping all passes my occur after the first Charleston’s left to skip the second Charleston.

Rules associated with the number of players in a game.

Four players are required for an official game that may be played during a tournament, HOWEVER:

  • If you have 2 players, there is no Charleston or Courtesy passing. You may also play 2-player Siamese Mah Jongg.
  • If you have 3 players, there is no Charleston or courtesy passing in a tournament, but you may devise a system to have tiles passed by the absent player if you want to have unofficial Charleston and Courtesy passing (two popular methods: Deal to all players and have the present players pick blindly from the absent player’s hand. The absent players wall is set up normally OR Deal to three players and have the absent players wall arranged with 7 sets of three tiles and the rest of the wall tiles remains up against the absent player’s wall.) Jokers may be passed during the Charleston in these methods so they cannot be used in a tournament.
  • If you have 5 or six players, the fifth and sixth players sit out with better’s wheels. After the Charleston and Courtesy passing are completed, the fifth and sixth players secretly guess which player they think will win the game based on the hands they observe to this point. They mark the Better’s wheel with their choice and place it face down. The wheel indicates the position of the players at the table (North, south, east, west). If their guess coincides with the winner, they also win the game and are entitled to the money or points won in that game). When the game is over, one extra player at a time is rotated into the next game taking the place of the player who was East. This is not allowed in a tournament.

Scoring and Betting:

There are many ways to score and bet. The National Mah Jongg League has rules established for scoring and betting. Tournament rules may vary slightly from these rules based on the judgement of the moderator at a tournament.

Scoring (one option)

Object of game:

To make Mah Jongg or to prevent someone else from making Mah Jongg.

Scores are adjusted by assigning a " value " to each Mah Jongg hand on the card:

Person making Mah Jongg adjusts by adding values:

  1. If a Mah Jongg hand is displayed without jokers, double the value. Example: value is 25. No jokers make the value 50. Exception: Hands in the section labeled Singles and Pairs do not double in value as they are always played without jokers. Person making Mah Jongg is only player to declare the hand “joker less”. The East with a heavenly or earthly hand doubles the score as it is considered to be made by oneself.
  2. If a person making Mah Jongg picks a tile from the concealed tiles (Or uses this tile to redeem) and then makes Mah Jongg, double the value. Example: If the value was 25, the person picking the winning tile from the concealed tiles gets a value of 50. Therefore, if the Mah Jongg has no jokers and is picked from the concealed tiles, the value is doubled and doubled again or 4 times the value of 25 if the hand has a value of 25 on the card.
  3. If a person making Mah Jongg picks the winning tile for Mah Jongg from a (exposed tile) discard, the value does not double. Exception: If a person picks an exposed tile and then redeems a tile and then calls Mah Jongg, the value does double.
  4. A heavenly or earthly hand made by the East during the Charleston, doubles the value of the Mah Jongg as it is considered making it yourself.

Person not making Mah Jongg adjusts by subtracting values:

  1. If a player discards a tile and it is used by another player for Mah Jongg, the discarding player goes down double the value made by the Mah Jongg winner. Example: If the value was 25, the discarding player goes down 50.

Exception: If a player discards a tile and another player calls it, uses a different tile to redeem a joker, and then after redeeming the jokers calls Mah Jongg, the discarding player does not go down double. All players go down the value of the winner’s Mah Jongg.

  1. Therefore, if a player discards a tile and it is used by another player for Mah Jongg that has no jokers displayed in that Mah Jongg, the discarding player goes down 4 times the value (double and double again). Example: If the value was 25, the discarding player goes down 100.
  2. All other players go down by the value assigned to the winning player’s hand.

Example: the winning player makes a “joker less” hand with a value of 25 by picking from concealed tile the value doubles and doubles again to 100. Everyone goes down by 100. OR the winning player goes down by the making a “joker less” hand with a value of 25 by picking from an exposed tile the value only doubles to 50.

  1. A tile is called for exposure. A player puts up the exposure but continues his turn by then redeeming a joker and then calls Mah Jongg. The exchange of the joker gave the player Mah Jongg and not the exposed tile. This makes the move a self-picked Mah Jongg and all players subtract double the value of the hand.

Wall games:

All tiles have been exposed, and no one has declared Mah Jongg. No one scores.

 

Penalties

 

  1. If a player discards a tile and mislabels the tile but another player needs that mislabeled tile to make Mah Jongg, the player discarding the tile will go down 4 times the value that the Mah Jongg that another player would have won and no player will be able to call Mah Jongg. All hands become dead. Example: If the value of hand was 25 but no jokers made it 50, the player mislabeling the tile would go down 4 times 50 or 200 points.
  2. If someone declares a player’s hand dead in error, when the game ends for everyone, the person who made the incorrect declaration of another player being dead loses 50 points.
  3. During the Charleston with a blind pass or steal, a player may not look at tiles being passed to them before they steal them and pass them to another player. Remind the player peeking at the passed tiles, that all passes are blind pass and that person cannot look at the passed tiles during a pass.
  4. If someone declares Mah Jongg in error placing the tiles on the wall and another player throws in his/her hand and then starts to throw in unused wall, the person calling Mah Jongg in error gets a zero and the person throwing in the unused wall is minus 25 points for each of the other 2 players player who through in the wall. New rule 2019. Only if wall is thrown in.
  5. If someone declares Mah Jongg in error and 2 players throw in their hand, the erring declarer pays double the value of the incorrect hand to the one player whose hand is intact.
  6. If there are 3 dead hands which did not result from Mah Jongg in error, the surviving player throws in their hand, and nobody gets paid.
  7. If a player errs in declaring Mah Jongg and another player throws their hand in and throws in a concealed wall, causing all hands to stop playing as a result, the player who erred in declaring Mah Jongg pays 25 per person to the other players still in the game. The erring player gets zero points, and the other players get 25.
  8. If a player gives a discard that the opponent needs for Mah Jongg, the discarding player goes down twice the value of that opponents score.
  9. If a player picks and discards out of turn and another player needs that tile for Mah Jongg, the player who picked out of turn gets a “0” and pays the winning points for the Mah Jongg to each of the other players at the table. (New rule in 2020).