Wiki

Short articles — not a full encyclopedia. Start with these topics.

• Charleston Overview

  How the Charleston pass works in American NMJL before regular play.

• Pattern vs Ranking

  How our Pattern library relates to Rankings articles on this site.

• What is Dora?

  Bonus indicators in riichi that add han when matching tiles appear in your winning hand.

• What is Furiten?

  When you cannot win on a discard because you passed a winning tile you could have claimed.

• What are Han and Fu?

  The two building blocks of riichi scoring — yaku/dora han plus fu adjustments for melds and waits.

• What is Menzen?

  A fully closed hand with no open melds — required for riichi and several yaku bonuses.

• What is the NMJL Year Card?

  The official American mahjong scoring card — pattern diagrams, jokers, and yearly updates from NMJL.

• What is Riichi?

  Japanese riichi mahjong — closed-hand pressure, yaku scoring, and the ready declaration that defines the ruleset.

• What is Shanten?

  How many tiles away your hand is from tenpai — the standard distance measure in riichi strategy.

• What is Tenpai?

  One tile away from a complete winning hand — the threshold for riichi declaration and many defensive reads.

• What is Yaku?

  A short introduction to scoring hands in Japanese riichi mahjong.