Had a hard time deciding where to put today's column. It was originally just a response to Gemma's column, but then it was getting so long, it seemed like it might just be better to put it in with the columns. Hope I'm not stealing any of your thunder there, Gemma.

So the topic of course, is the All Pairs hand. I have certainly shared Gemma's frustration with it and have complained about its orneriness (ornerity? ornerosity?) quite a bit myself. To review, it's one of only 2 hands in Reach Mahjong which will not be of the normal form: 4 groups of 3 (runs or triples), plus a "head" or pair. This is one of the reasons that it's difficult to see when players are aiming for it and makes it something of a wild card in the Mahjong group of hands. A completed hand will simply be 7 pairs of different tiles. When I say different, I mean that it is unacceptable for 2 of the pairs to be the same tiles, in essence, a concealed quad remaining hidden in your hand. Personally I find this restriction a bit arbitrary and lame, but there it is. Here is an example of a finished hand:

It is surprising how hard it is to complete this hand despite how close one may seem in the beginning. I'll start thinking about it as a possibility with even just 2 or 3 pairs if a lot of the singles I have are outside or honors. And the road to 4 or 5 pairs is often very short. It's that 6th pair to make the hand ready, and the final tile to win that are the real problems. I'll always be waiting for something to match a tile already in the hand so at best I have 3 possibilities for each one of those singles. Let's think about it in terms of how many tiles are available and maybe it will become clear why these last tiles are such big hurdles. If I had just a Peace hand that was one away from ready with two open ended waits, there would be 16 possible tiles that make the hand ready. When my All Pairs hand is one away from ready, I'll have 3 singles waiting to pair up meaning that at best, there are only 9 tiles that could possibly make the hand ready. When I get to ready, that Peace hand is going to have 8 possible tiles for the win and the All Pairs will only have 3. (Of course these numbers will be affected by what's already out on the board but for this situation let's just think of the optimal numbers) So from the get go we know that All Pairs is going to be a harder than normal hand to complete.

So the now the issue: how best to work it into your game. If it's going to be a harder hand to complete, the reward for completing it should be greater too right? How to make it pay off? The most important thing is going to be finding the right tile to wait on, but let's start with one of the other decisions you'll have to make first, namely whether to go for All Triples or All Pairs. Factors affecting this decision will be what kind of pairs are already in the hand, if any of them are triples already, and whether any of them are Lucky Dragons (dora). If I already have 4 pairs with one of the pairs being lucky dragons, I'm going to be a lot more proactive about winning the hand, probably bumping (ponning) tiles the first chance I get and sending myself off in the All Triples direction. If my pairs are more towards the middle, I might consider the fact that other people are probably going to be using those tiles and no matter how long I wait, I may never have a chance to bump them. I tend to dream big, so as soon as one of my pairs becomes a triple, I'm already starting to think about 3 or even 4 Concealed Triples. That silly dream is why I personally end up going for All pairs more because I opt not to bump tiles when they first come out, hoping that I'll draw the last remaining one for the chance at the limit hand. Another big benefit of keeping my hand concealed is that I can Reach when it's ready, and in most games, Reaching allows me a chance at the Hidden Lucky Dragon (Ura-dora) too. My little 1600 pointer can turn into 8000 pretty quickly with a lucky turn there or even become 12000 if I manage to draw it myself. Lots of points to think about and we still haven't even gotten to putting the hand together yet.

So let's say the decision has been made to go for All Pairs. Now we want tiles in our hand that other people are not likely to be using: honors and the end tiles and especially, tiles on the outer side of pairs in our hand. In Reach Mahjong there is a defensive term called a ¡§wall¡¨. a ¡§wall¡¨ is when all 4 of one tile towards the end (2s, 3s, 7s and 8s) are showing, making the end tiles (1s, 2s, 8s and 9s) unusable in runs and also seemingly safe to discard. This concept of a "wall" is very useful in many situations, one of which being here, when we want tiles that other people can't use. For example, if we have a 3 of dots pair in our hand and can see another 1or 2 of them on the board, we know it's going to be difficult for other players to use the 1 and 2 of dots. We can more reasonably expect those tiles to come out or possibly still be in the deck if they're not already out on the board. Also, when things get dangerous because someone has Reached or someone may be quietly Ready to win without Reaching, these tiles will be useful as safe discards.

Finally when we have to decide on our "wait", there are two things to think about. First, same as before, we want to choose something that people are not likely to be using. Second, especially if we decide to Reach, it may be useful to set a trap. Not only is the 1 of dots probably a good wait anyway, but it looks especially safe to other players if there is a 4 of dots in our discards. Remember the Missed Win Rule (Sacred Discard) prohibits winning not only on a tile that we've already discarded, but also on any tile if any of the winning tiles has been discarded. Because players tend to aim for open-ended waits, any tile 3 above or below a tile in our discards will look a little safer to players looking for something safe to discard. So another example would be choosing to wait on the 8 of bamboos because we have a 5 of bamboos in our discards. This defensive concept is called Piano Keys. The idea is, opened ended waits always consist of a combination of 1-4-7, 2-5-8 or 3-6-9, meaning that a 4, 5 or 6 in a player¡¦s discard makes 1 and 7, 2 and 8 or 3 and 9, seem safe, respectively.

As always, working more Hand points into a hand is the best way to make it really pay off. However, a lot of the standard "extra" hands won't be an option with All Pairs. Obviously, anything using runs or triples is out. Sometimes All Simples will be an option, but I tend not to aim for it because middle tiles tend to be more useful for other players. Remember, we want tiles that are NOT useful for other players. Also, a bunch of middle tiles are probably just going to end up falling into runs and it'll be easier to make it a pay off with a Reach/Simples/Peace combination. A Half Flush combined with All Pairs also seems to often come close but it's much harder than it looks to finish. Usually, something will pair up in another suit, and then that has to be discarded, but then everyone notices that a pair of something came out of my hand and then NO one discards anything from the suit not in my discards. So the best way for me to get lots of points out of it tends to be saving those garbage tiles that nobody wants and trying to make one of the pairs the Lucky Dragon (dora).

Looking at my stats on Mahjong Fight Club (Konami), it's definitely in the a-little-short-of-major category, occurring with slightly less frequency than 3 Colored Runs. If you find you go several games without finishing this hand once, you shouldn't actually find that too surprising. However it is harder for other players to read and it's possible for it to turn into a monster with a little luck so you should try working it into your game. The opportunities will come.

Let's get people's opinions. What would you do in the following situations and why?

Remember, no right or wrong answers so give em a shot.

A little tired of reading about hands that you can only dream about? Well before we finish our tour of Fantasy Island (That would be the group of Limit Hands), how about if we return to a hand you'll see almost every other hand or so, Peace. There's a disturbing lack of it in the world today. But at least we can click our tiles together and make a little of it at the Mahjong table. It's second only to Reach and maybe Value tiles, at least in my statistics, so it's definitely something to think about working into your game.

To review, Peace is one of the simplest hands with the most complications. At its simplest, it's just a hand made up of 4 runs and a pair. Then there are the requirements. First remember that the head must not be value tiles. So the dragons will never be part of a Peace hand, and you also won't be able to use the Prevailing Wind tile or your current seat Wind. Next, your wait must be to complete a run and it must be open ended. That means that 12 waiting for the 3, or 57 waiting for the 6 would be unacceptable whereas 23 waiting for the 1 or 4 would be OK; also, a wait such as 5543 waiting for the 5 or 2 would be OK even though you might think of the 543 run as already being complete if another 5 came. In fact, 5554 waiting for the 3, 4 or 6 would also be OK for Peace as long as the tile that completed the hand was the 3 or 6 so it completes the final run. Similary 3456 waiting for the 3 or 6 would NOT be acceptable because the final tile is not completing a run; it's completing the head.

Why these inane complications for a concept so simple you may ask? Well Jenn just revealed the answer to this mystery to me last week! Peace is the only hand in Reach Mahjong worth 20 base points. Alright, the thing is, EVERY hand in this game is worth 20 base points, but every other hand will get some base points added on for triples, bad waits, or using value tiles in the head. Requiring the hand to have no value tiles, a good wait, and the fact that there are no triples means that there will be no extra base points (except of course for Self Draw. This does seem like a point that some nit picker some where would have said precludes Peace from being self-drawn. The Japanese are nothing if not rule adherers. Any comment on this exception Jenn?) So lest you think these are just arbitrary obfuscations designed to confuse the newbies, think again!! I don't doubt Mahjong's desire to confuse the newbies, but there is some reason to the madness.

On to the next subject, putting your Peace hand together. There are a only a million and one combinations that could become your next Peace hand, but let's look at a situation that has come up a lot recently in my hands and that I used to play differently. Let's say I'm one away from ready with a hand like this:

and I draw the 4 of grands; what should I do? I think my first inclination a few years ago I think was to throw the 7 so I now have the two open-ended waits. This is the best option for giving me the most possible tiles to make my hand ready. Any of the 3456 of Grands or the 2345 of Bamboos all make my hand ready. There are certainly situations where this would be the best way to go, for example close to the end of a hand where I just want to get my hand to ready but I'm not necessarily going for the win. The problem is that 16 of the 28 tiles that make me ready complete a run and force me to discard a tile from the unfinished run; I'll be waiting for a single tile to complete my head and that's NOT Peaceful! But there is another way. I can now switch horses in midstream and make the two 7 grands my head and still have the two open-ended waits. I do lose the possibility of being ready on 12 tiles, but in exchange, I have the guarantee that I will at least have Peace in my hand if I draw something that makes me ready. In this situation, it also gives me a better chance of getting Simples too if draw the 6 of dots and exchange it with the 9. This dilemma comes up surprisingly often, fastest-to-ready versus good-wait, and always makes for spirited arguments between me and Jenn.

Instead of scoring examples, let's look at some hands and see if we can get some people's opinions on what they might discard if they were in the given situations. There won't always be clearly right answers here so maybe add a little explanation for why you chose that tile to discard and then we can all call each other crazy appropriately.

Let's have some fun today. Well, dream a little anyway. I've covered nearly all the hands in Reach Mahjong at least once now and that includes the vast majority of the hands that you will ever see in your Mahjong careers even if you should decide to play 20 hours a day for the next 10 years. Limit hands are like Straight Flushes in Poker: they only happen once every few thousand hands or so (OK, I picked that number out of a nether area, anyone have an exact number?), but they're still fun to think about and even go for when opportnity knocks. Taking a look at my Fight Club statistics, the only sort of extensive statistics I have, I've played 359 "Competition Rules" games which probably average around 10-12 hands per game for a total of around say 4000 hands; in all of that, I have a grand total of 3 limit hands, Big Dragons twice and 4 Concealed Triples once. I've played 1501 East Round games which probably average between 5 and 6 hands per game and in that total of say 8000 hands again there are only 3 Limit hands, this time all 13 Orphans. So those 3 are the types of limit hands that actually do come out on occasion. Today, I figured I'd introduce a few so rare I've never actually even seen them: 9 Treasures, All Green, and Big Wheels.

9 Treasures: Limit Hand

9 Treasures is known as Chu-ren-poh-toh in Japanese and it's so rare that it's rumored to be a harbinger of impending death. It's like a Full Flush except that specific tiles are required for it to qualify. The winning combination will be 1112345678999 and one more of any of them. The thing that makes this hand so devilishly impossible as that it must be concealed. (Sidenote: you may notice that if you miraculously get to ready with the very combination above, it's a dream 9 tile wait and this will be a double limit hand in places that allow such things.) And to make it more confoundingly impossible, it's also the kind of hand which falls into the Missed Win trap when unneeded tiles come and complete a normal Full Flush hand but not this special flush. Or before Missed win even becomes an issue, sometimes after 5 or 6 draws in a hand, I'll notice I'm only a few tiles away with a combination like 1112356779 and then check the board and notice that there are already 2 9's on the table so the chance for it is already past. It's the kind of hand that's fun to dream about and then come back down to earth and just go for the Full Flush with maybe a Full Straight for a few more points.
Not only have i never seen it finished, I've only ever seen it ready a total of one time also. And of course that one time it was a victim of the Missed Win, though not maybe for the usual reasons. My starting tiles in that hand were a lot of 1's and 9's with a 123 of grands in there also leading me to believe it would be a good chance to go for an outside hand so my first discard was the 6 of Grands. But before I could really get started, some jerk called Reach on about the 4th draw, and it just seemed best to give up the hand. As he kept drawing and not winning I was was happily discarding the Dots and Bamboos that he kept throwing away. Without noticing, I was collecting a lot of Grands and around the 11th round I looked down to see quite a few Grands. Sure enough, after putting things in order I had 1112345777899 and some blank to be one away from ready. The 9 came on the next draw but what should my wait be but that "#$!$%&#" 6 of Grands I had thrown on the first draw. The hand ended without anyone winning, and I got all kinds of advice on how better I might have played the hand. Well, maybe that's why I wasn't struck by lightning and am still here today.

All Green: Limit Hand

Next let's look at All Green. It's another one requiring a very specific bunch of tiles which is what makes it so rare and also so prone to Missed Win woes. It's called Ryu-i-sou in Japanese and both names mean what they say, the hand only contains tiles that are entirely green. Those would be the Green Dragons (Hatsu) and the 23468 of Bamboos. I must admit I was a little slow in noticing this, but it's true, 1579 of bamboos do have a bit of red on them which is why they don't get to be a part of ALL Green. In fact, with the Green Dragon being nicknamed "a-o" (pronounced "ow") which means blue in Japanese, sometimes I wonder why it gets to be included. There's a weird confusion of blue and green in this country: traffic lights are allegedly red yellow and blue; "blue onions" are green, fruit that's not ripe is "blue"; but maybe that's a discussion for another website. Anyway, some rules will allow All Green without any Green Dragons but most rules require at least 2 for a head though a triple is acceptable also. The remaining groups can be any pair run or triple of 23468 of Bamboos. Of course, runs will only be possible with the 234 and this is where Missed Win rears its ugly head again. Once again, the one time that I've seen someone get this hand to ready, he also had fallen victim by throwing away a 5 when his wait was the 2-5 of bamboos. Because of that 5 his winning 2 was discarded twice but he couldn't win on them because he had discarded one of his winners. This hand is the only one I'm introducing today that doesn't need to be concealed, but somehow that doesn't seem to make it occur any more reguarly. Once again, stories about it tend to be fish tales about the one that got away.

Big Wheels: Limit Hand

Finally we have Big Wheels. It's called Dai-sha-rin in Japanese, and it rounds out today's frivolity by being so rare as to not even be included in most rules. I write about it because a lot of home games do like to include it though it occurs even less often than the other 2 I talked about today. It's a pair each of the 2 through 8 of dots and in keeping with the theme of impossibility, it must be concealed. Also in keeping with today's theme, because it's all one suit like the others, it shares the same tendency towards Missed Win discontent. It's almost not necessary to make it a limit hand because as is, it's probably almost already that many points anyway. Consider that Concealed Full Flush, 2 Double Runs and Simples are guaranteed to be part of the hand with also a possibility of Peace, Reach, Concealed Self Draw and even Lucky Drags. 13 hand points would make it a "Counted Limit Hand" but I'll leave that as the subject for another frivolous column.

You may notice that all of today's hands are some variation on the flush theme. I've heard that these hands used to be divided along suit lines, i.e., 9 Gates had to be Grands, Big Wheels had to be Dots, and All Green had to be Bamboos. I'm just guessing but given the ludicrous impossibility of Big Wheels, somewhere along the line people may have decided to just go with the only ridiculous impossibility of 9 Treasures and changed it so that it was acceptable in any suit. All Green's name was just too suit specific to allow it to use other suits however. They're stilll fairly valuable hands even if one goes for the cheaper options, Full or Half Flushes. In most cases though, I imagine it'll be fun to try going for the glory for a few draws until it becomes obvious that cheaper is the only option. Just like in Poker, it's more fun to win with a Straight Flush and it makes a better story, but a simple straight may get the job done just as well. But every thousand hands or so.....let's look at some examples.

We have a request!! One faithful reader has expressed an interest in hands that are not "hands". Most of the hands I've covered so far involve some specific combination of triples and runs. However, some of the hands are situational, the triples and runs are not as important as what has the current situation in the game. I've covered a couple such hands so far, Reach and Concealed Self Draw. Remember, in both of these hands, the combination of runs and triples in the hand is not important, the hand must simply be "ready". One might consider these hands that are not "hands" because there's no specific combination necessary. There are several such hands but aside from the two mentioned above, they are comparatively rare. This week I'll cover 3 of the more unusual ones, Final Tile Win, King's Tile Draw (Quad Heaven Draw), and Add-a-Quad Win.

Final Tile Win: 1 Hand Point

Of the 3 hands this week Final Tile Win will probably be the most common (Haitei in Japanese). It is sometimes divided into two categories: Final Draw and Final Discard. Like Reach, the only requirement of the contents of the hand is that it be "Ready". The situation is that it is the last tile of the hand. This means that if the last tile drawn completes that player's hand, he can declare Mahjong, even if he didn't have any other Hand Points in the hand (Final Draw). Even if that last player to draw doesn't complete his hand, the last tile he now throws away is just as important. If that tile complete's one of the other players' hands then that player can now go out, even if he didn't have any other Hand Points in his hand up until that point (Final Discard). Of course, it will work together in the usual way with other hands to make for a multi-point hand if there are other points in the hand. Also, players will sometimes steal tiles toward the end of a hand to make their hands ready in case that hand ends in a draw. It can be a nice extra bonus to win on the Last Tile even though one was only going for the ready hand points.

A key point to be careful of with Last Tile is to not run afoul of the Missed Win rule. When that last player discarding is looking for something to throw away, he will often choose something related to a tile that was just discarded. For example, let's say I'm waiting for the 6-9 of dots with a ready hand that doesn't have any Hand Points in it yet. The second to last player discards my 6 of dots but I can't win on it because I haven't Reached, and I don't have any other points in my hand. Because he has just thrown the 6, the last discarder knows that it's a safe tile and unfortunately for me when he throws it, I still can't go out because I am now on a Missed Win. In fact, even if he had thrown the 9, my wait still leaves me subject to the Missed Win rule and would not be able to win on that tile either. Never forget the treachery of the Missed Win; it killed me more than a few times in my early days. Last Tile is unusual, but it's also a cool way to turn what might have been only 1000 points for a ready hand, into a few more for a winning hand.

King's Tile Draw (Quad Heaven Draw): 1 Hand Point

Next let's look at the Quad Heaven Draw. Once again, the only requirement for the hand's contents is that it be Ready. The situation is that a player has just completed a quad and the extra tile drawn from "Heaven" completes his hand. It's fairly simple actually, but some parlors have a special rule regarding this situation that I really REALLY hate, mostly I suppose, because I'm the only person I know to have ever been hit by it. If the player draws the tile to complete his quad himself, then it won't be an issue; the other 3 players will split the points to paid to the winner in the normal manner. However, if I throw the tile that completes a player's quad and the supplement tile that he draws from the King's Tiles is his winning tile, I am "Responsible", and I must pay the entire amount, even though I didn't throw his winning tile. It really ires me not only because I don't see why I should be paying when I didn't throw his winner, but it also takes precedence over the Missed Win rule which is usually one of the most sacred parts of Reach Mahjong. That player had actually thrown away one of his winning tiles and then drew it from Heaven and then I have to pay?!?!?!?!?!?! !"#$%&$%&'%&'($&'"#$%"%&$()%' Graceful loser that I am I may have lost some face with the staff on that one.

Add-a-Quad Win (Robbing the Quad): 1 Hand Point

And last for this week will be the Add-a-Quad Win. Rarer in fact than some of the limit hands I wouldn't be surprised if many readers never get a chance to see it. The situation required here is that a player has bumped some triple and then draws the 4th of that tile to complete the quad. If he adds the tile to make his quad, and that tile completes another player's ready hand that player wins; the player making the quad must pay the winner. In general, concealed quads are exempt, though there is one situation where one can win even when the quad is concealed. When the winning hand is 13 Orphans, most parlors and home rules allow a win even when the quad is entirely self-drawn or concealed.

Because these hands involve situations and not combinations, it will be difficult to make very illustrative examples. But it just feels so empty without examples so let me go ahead and try anway:

Today I think I'll write a letter to myself. We've covered a lot of hands so far. There are only about 10 or so I haven't told you about yet, and for the most part, they will probably not figure largely in your Mahjong careers. So today in light of some recent events, I thought I'd review a couple hands that are comparatively rare but will still be relevant to your Mahjong conquering dreams. At least, one would have been relevant to my dreams had it come to mind at the right moment. How about another look at the two outside hands using some recent real life examples.

Let's begin with the Pure Outside hand, known as "Junchan" in Japanese. Every group must contain a 1 or 9, meaning that only triples of 1's and 9's, and runs beginning with 1 or ending with 9 will be in the hand. It will never contain any honor tiles, and will not use the numbers 4, 5 or 6 in any suit. It is 3 hand points when concealed, and 2 hand points when tiles are bumped or chowed. This is a fairly difficult hand to put together so parts of it will often be exposed like in today's example. There are many ways to make this into a high scoring hand, but today's is one that might not have occurred to a lot of players. It's also a good example of how remaining flexible throughout the hand can help you change course and still pull off a nice winner when you run aground on your first course.

My friend's starting tiles and first draw looked about like this:

It's not a great starting hand, and with 9 different outside tiles, it actually qualifies as a hand that you can say "I give up" and make everyone start the hand over. My friends however, ever the dreamers, never give up a chance at a limit hand, and so off this guy went on a quest for 13 Orphans. After 7 or 8 draws, he had only managed to exchange a couple of the middle tiles and was not any closer at all to assembling the orphans, especially after I'd bumped 3 of the White Dragons. His hand now looked like this:

This hardly looks promising, but 1 of Dots was the Lucky Dragon and when the player in front him threw 8 of Grands he suddenly chowed and decided to go for an Outside hand. Next he drew 8 of Dots and with more cooperation from the player before, he chowed 7 of Dots from him and was now only one away from ready. That player next called Reach, discarding the Lucky Dragon which our hero bumped, and what was his next draw but his winning 7! His winning hand:

Pure Outside Hand(exposed), 3 colored runs (exposed) and 3 Lucky Dragons, was good for 12,000 points. Sure it was a lucky crazy move, but then that's what these games are, putting yourself in a position to get lucky.

Next let's look at an example where I put myself in fantastic position to get lucky and blew it with Mixed Outside hand. To review, this hand is like the Pure Outside hand except that it allows the use of Honor tiles. Concealed it's 2 points but exposed it will be worth just 1. I had had a pretty tough first 3 games at Masters last Saturday and needed a big win in the final game if I wanted to continue onto the next round. We were getting toward the end of the South round of the final game and my last turn as dealer had just been stolen on a 1000 point hand. A little despondent, I felt more like disrupting everyone else's game at that point than trying to win. I started with:

and bumped the White Dragon my first chance when it came out first round. The next round someone threw the South Wind and right away things are starting to look interesting, especially when I draw the West Wind to make a Head. Now I'm now only one tile away from completing this Half Flush hand with two Value tiles, that's 8000 points and gives me a shot at finishing the day in the black and going on to the next round. At some point here, it would have been good for me to notice that the hand also included the Mixed Outside hand, even though for the moment, the five hand points still only make it an 8000 point hand. The defining moment was when the player before me reached and I drew the last South Wind to make a quad. Not only was the "King's Tile" the 3 of Dots but it was also the "New Lucky Dragon" giving me one more point and bumping my hand up to 12,000 points. The Reacher threw my winner on his next draw but without thinking, I just said 8000 points and that missing 4000 would prove to be what kept me from advancing. I finished with -1900, and the cut off was -300.

So not only is an awful story because I didn't advance, but also I know all the guys I work with can't wait to start teasing me about how I could advance in tournaments if only I knew how to keep score. Add to that the fact that I threw an 18,000 point winner to one of the guys I work with when we happened to be at the same table, and the fact that I will undoubtedly make this very kind of mistake again, and....sigh. Well it's enough to drive a boy to Poker. So let Mixed Outside hand never be far from your mind, especially when it is the deciding 4000 points for whether or not you're advancing to the next round in the biggest Mahjong tournment of the year.

Greetings from Vegas!! I'm working! And studying, compliments of Jenn, Kirk (poker buddy) and the rest of the Poker community at Bellagio and the MGM Grand. I have to say that in case any of you thought I was just out here fooling around. Unfortunately, work isn't paying so well this time around, but there are still some more work days ahead so we'll have to see. I'm always intrigued when I can make comparisons between ways to play things in Poker and Mahjong. I just hope all this Poker doesn't take me out of the zone when I'm playing Mahjong, I've been doing so well lately. Ha!

Last time I wrote, I promised the next hands you would see out of me would not be very useful, but maybe I'll put that off for another week. Before we delve into total obscurity, how about a couple hands that might actually still figure into your Mahjong futures? I've only given one column to limit hands so far so let me introduce another one that does come up sometimes along with its little brother.

Little Dragons: 4 Hand Points (2 for Little Dragons, 1 for each set of 3 Dragons)

Let's start off with Little Dragons. I've only seen it a few times, and have yet to see it on Fight Club, but when it hits, it can be a nice payoff. Called Shosangen in Japanese, it's worth two points whether or not any tiles have been bumped or chowed. One qualifies for this hand by getting 2 triples of any of the 3 Dragons and a head consisting of the third Dragon. The other two groups in the hand can be any runs or triples of any suit or honor tile. Because each of the Dragons will always count for a hand point, the hand will always be at least a 4 hand point hand. One of the ways to make it count for more is to mix in the Half Flush. This shouldn't be too difficult as more than half the hand is already given over to Honor tiles anyway. If the remaining two groups are the same suit or are honor tiles, it bumps the hand up to 6 hand points for a score of at least 12000/18000 points. However, the best way to get the most bang for your Dragon's buck is to go for this hand's big brother: Big Dragons.

Big Dragons: Limit Hand

The difference between Small Dragons and Big Dragons is all about one tile, but that one little tile makes all the difference in the world. While the Little version is just two of the triples, the Big version is triples of all three of the dragons. This is another limit hand (like 13 Orphans or 4 Concealed Triples) which means we'll get the most points possible no matter what else is in the hand, 32,000/48,000 points. Again, the remaining two groups can be any kind of run or triple. There's no restriction against bumping or chowing and indeed, it would be pretty difficult to assemble triples of all three dragons without at least one bump. And once that second Dragon has been bumped, suddenly everyone will be extremely wary of discarding any of the last remaining dragons. That last one will almost certainly need to be drawn though there are situations where it will sometimes come out, most notably when a player has reached and must discard anything that is not his winning (or a quad-able) tile. It is a sick feeling to have reached and then see someone bump the second dragon, especially if none of the third remaining dragons are on the table.

Because the Little version is so close to the large version, it's always a quandary deciding whether to go out on the cheap or go for the glory with the Big. It's not an issue if one has somehow managed to get to ready with triples of all three in the hand through bumping or even just drawing. However, the vast majority of the time, at least one or usually two of the dragons will have been bumped and our hero's ready hand will be waiting with two pairs, one of them being the last remaining dragon, and the other being some unrelated non-glorious nothing. If the nothing comes out first, what...do¡Kyou¡Kdo? Well, there are a lot of factors to consider: what everyone's scores are the moment, how early in the hand it is, whether or not someone has reached or stolen tiles so he seems close to going out, etc. Also sometimes people and Mahjong parlors play with an extra reward for finishing a limit hand, so that might also figure into the mix when deciding whether or not to continue trying for the limit hand even after a cheaper winning tile has come out. It's an extremely rare hand, of course, it's a limit hand! But it will spice up the game once in a while, even if someone only manages to finish with the Little version.

Here are some examples

Long time no hands!! I bet you all thought with the lack of new hands columns that I must have finally run out of new hands to throw at you. Not the case! Though it should be encouraging to know that we are at least half way through them all at this point. In fact, it should be even more encouraging to note that the 16 hands I've given you so far plus the two I'm going to give you today make up 3396 of the 3428 hands I've completed in 1544 games of Fight Club so far this year. That's more than 99%! So pay attention for at least this column too, and then you can ignore me in earnest for a few weeks. Without further ado, I introduce to you: One Suit Straight, and 3 Concealed Triples.

One Suit Straight (Full Straight): 1-2 Hand Points

One Suit Straight is called Ikkitsuukan in Japanese but it usually gets shortened to just �gIttsu�h. It is three consecutive runs all in the same suit, plus another group which can be a triple or run, and a head, of any suit or Honor tile. Put another away, this hand must have a 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9 all in the same suit. Concealed it's worth two points, but stealing tiles will knock it down to one point. Like 3 Colored Runs or the Outside hands, this hand will generally be more useful when worked in with other hands, in this case, especially Peace, Reach, Concealed Self Draw and Full or Half Flush. Also like those hands, though unusual, there will be times when stealing tiles is advantageous, most likely when there are some lucky dragons in the hand but no hand point to be able to win with them. Also like 3 Colored Runs, it is often a bit of a crapshoot achieving the hand as usually, the wait will be for the final tile to finish the straight, and after reaching, one may have to win on the tile that does not complete the straight. Another thing that I find strange about this hand is the number of times I come to a crossroads where I must decide whether I'm going to go for this or 3 Colored Runs. An oddity I wonder if anyone else has ever noticed?

Three Concealed Triples: 2 Hand Points

Our other hand for today is 3 concealed triples. It's called Sananko in Japanese and if you remember the limit hand I introduced you to a few weeks ago, 4 Concealed Triples, the concept behind this hand shouldn't be too difficult; it's just one less triple. Just remember, like its big brother, the tiles that make up the triples must all be self drawn. That's the only limitation regarding stealing, so if a tile for the other group or the head (pair) come from another player, the hand is still worth the same 2 hand points, concealed or not. It's an unusual hand, but seems to come up in some interesting situations. First of all, it's one of the saving graces when going for 4 Concealed Triples but another player throws the winning tile before it can self drawn. In such a situation, the hand will at least contain All Triples and 3 Concealed Triples for 4 points making it still a hand worth going out on even though it wasn't the coveted Limit Hand. Another situation I find it useful is when I don't have any hand points in my hand but I do already have 2 triples and my wait is two pairs waiting for one to become a triple. If I Reach on this hand and someone throws my winner, I'll only have the Reach Hand point. If however, I manage to draw my own tile, suddenly I have Reach, Self Concealed Draw, and 3 Concealed Triples for a total of 4 points and another nice hand. These are the two major situations this hand will be useful, the others often being a bit of a boondoggle I find. One final point, when there are already 3 triples in the hand and the final group is a going to be a run, there are those who might reach and there might be a good argument for it, like it's the final hand and one only needs that number of points to win the game. However, in most situations, most players (well, us dreamers anyway) would prefer to wait for one of the tiles in the incomplete run to pair up so that the hand would be ready for 4 Concealed Triples. Dream dream dream.

So how about a few examples:

So now that I've basically told you there's hardly any reason to read my column for the next few hands I bet you're wondering how I'm going to entice you to keep coming back? Great writing!! It goes without saying! Also, I too am interested in your comments, laments, and random stories regarding bad beats or people being catapulted over swimming pools into the adjoining neighbor's yard. Send any of the above to my e-mail.

How are you all holding up remembering all those hands? We've covered quite a few already and I wouldn't be surprised if some of you are wondering how much longer I can keep coming up with new hands to throw at you. Don't worry; after 14 of them now, we're almost halfway through! Hang in there. The hands I'll be covering the next few issues will be comparatively rare, but can make for impressive scores when they're pulled off. Today let's cover two more that are closely related to each other: Mixed Outside Hand, and Pure Outside Hand.

Mixed Outside Hand (Terminals and Honors): 1-2 Hand Points

A Mixed Outside Hand, known as "Chanta" in Japanese will be a hand consisting only of runs or triples and a head that use a 1, 9 or letter tile. It is a bit of a converse to Simples. So 9-9-9 in Bamboos would be a useful group, as would 1-2-3 in Grands. Pairs or triples of Honor tiles can also be used. Concealed, it's fairly rare so it's worth two Hand Points. Stealing tiles from discards will bump it down to one Hand Point. It's a good idea not to steal tiles without good reason. A couple of possible reasons might be; perhaps the tile is almost all gone, or, there are other Hand points in the hand too so it's an expensive hand and worth stealing for. One of the other hands that will often work in well with this hand is Three Color Runs. Because runs all have to be at one extreme or the other, it will often just work out that there's one in each suit. One of the reasons it's so unusual, at least for me, is that I drop stray 1 and 9 tiles early in the hand as a matter of course. At the beginning of a hand I may have 6-8-9 in a suit and discard the 9 without noticing that I have a lot of terminal tiles in all the suits. I've shot myself in the foot right on the starting line. So lately I do try to pay attention as I'm first grabbing all my tiles to see if I have a lot of the terminals and letter tiles. This is good for noticing whether or not you have a good shot at the All Terminals Limit hand too.

Pure Outside Hand (All Terminal Sets): 2-3 Hand Points

Pure Outside Hand is Mixed Outside Hand's big brother and you may be able to guess from the difference in the names that what makes it different is that it doesn't allow the use of Honor Tiles. So all groups and the head must contain a 1 or 9. This is considerably more difficult, so it's a 3 pointer. Though, once again, stealing tiles will knock it down a point to 2. And once again, Three Color Runs is even more likely with this hand as the kinds of groups get more concentrated without the letter tiles. And once again and again, it's one of those things that needs to be noticed early if there is to be any chance of going for it. The Japanese name for this hand is "Junchan".

One thing to note especially regarding these hands, is how bad an idea it might be sometimes to use Reach together with them. If the wait happens to be a "good" one, for example 23 waiting for the 1or 4, there is a huge risk of having to win on the wrong tile. Reaching and then letting the cheaper tile go by without winning will knock the hand into the "Missed hand" category and the only option for winning anymore will be drawing the winning tile. So a hand that might have been huge with 6 points may wilt all the way down to just one point for the Reach.

Here are some examples:

Last week I got to tell you about my absolute favorite hand so I guess this week I have to go to the other extreme and tell you my most hated. It's strange because many pros consider it their favorite. I don't know if it's just because I want to be different or because I'm bitter or what, but this hand bites me more than it feeds me and I just can't forgive it. I HATE Sanshoku. I hate it so much I don't even want it to have an English name. How about 3 Color Runs. That sounds poopy enough doesn't it?

3 Colors (3 Color Run): 1-2 Hand Points

Does the name say it all (Sanshoku dou-jun in Japanese)? You qualify for this hand when you have the same run in all three suits, for example 234 in grands, 234 in dots, and 234 in bamboos. Concealed, it counts as two hand points but stealing tiles will knock it down to one point. I can't stand this hand because when I aim for it, invariably the wrong side of my wait comes and I am disappointed; for example, in the above situation I would perhaps already have the 234 in grands and dots and a 23 in bamboos waiting for 1 or 4 and what comes but the 1. I hate that. Another favorite trick the mahjong gods play on me is giving me, say, 345 grands, 235 dots and 45 bamboos. I have the possibility of the triple run but I have that lame wait in the dots. I generally take the good wait in that situation and after discarding the 5 of dots, of course the 4 always comes and if I go out on the hand someone always points to my discards and mentions what a shame it was that I didn't go for the big hand. God I hate that.

But I suppose rather than try to poison your minds on the folly that is 3 Color Runs, I should try to show how it might be useful and let you discover its orneriness yourself. This is another hand that will often combine well with other hands, mostly Reach, Peace, and Concealed Self Draw. All Simples will sometimes also work itself in there too. It's a little dangerous to steal tiles for this hand because like I pointed out above, what if the other side of the wait comes?!!? If one does decide to bump or chow aiming for this hand it's a good idea not to until it's a sure thing. i.e., either bumping the 3rd run, or the final wait is only one tile and not open-ended. There might be other reasons to try to steal tiles without it being certain yet, but they'd better be good. There's nothing worse than going for it, then drawing the wrong side of the wait, and having to wait for the winner as a "Missed Win.

3 Colors (3 Color Triples/Quads): 2 Hand Points

Having covered 3-Colors in the first half, let's now cover 3 Colors. Lest you think I'm hitting the bottle again, let me explain, there are actually two kinds of these 3 color hands. The second one is "3 Color Triples", the first one was Runs. In Japanese, their names both start out with the word Sanshoku but the second word is different. In fact, the triples version is so rare, that the name Sanshoku has generally just come to mean the runs version, and if someone wants to talk about the triples version he'll use the full name, Sanshoku Doukou. I've probably only seen this hand 2 or 3 times in my Mahjong life so it's not likely to play large role in anyone else's life either. Its one advantage over the other version of 3 colors is that it is still worth 2 points even when tiles are stolen. This hand really only occurs by accident. The only time I might ever really decide to go for it actively would be if I happened to have at least 2 of the same number in each suit; I'd probably start bumping as soon as any of them came out. The times I've seen someone steal 2 suits of the same number, I've actually seen people throw number in the last suit a lot. I think some people really want to see someone win with this hand and are actually willing to help sometimes.

Let's look at some examples.

Oh how I've waited. Today I finally get to declare my true love, my favoritest of favorite hands, a thing more beautiful than Yosemite and my girlfriend put together. (Now we'll see if she's really reading this).

So far I've given you some one pointers that will let you score some small hands. You can also put them together to score bigger hands. I've also given some higher point hands which will let you make the big score with just a couple of them in your hand. But these are just base hits, little jabs. What if you're swinging for the fences to hit that grand slam, that one knock out punch that leaves your opponents reeling, mouth agape in awe. That's when you need the uninspiringly named "Limit Hands", known as "Yakuman" in Japanese. Another translation, though not much more inspiring, would be "full" or "complete" hands. You can't get anymore points out of a hand than these. They are extremely rare, some more than others, and because of that they are worth a lot of points. If you hit someone with one of these, chances are you're going to knock him out of the game in one fell swoop. A few of them, I have yet to see in my 5 years of Mahjong, so ignoring them for the moment, let's start with the more commonly occurring ones, All Terminals and the love of my life, 4 Concealed Triples.

All Terminals (a.k.a. 13 Orphans): Limit Hand

All Terminals is called "Kokushimusou" in Japanese and it's probably the most well known of the Limit Hands. It's one of those random words that people who don't even play Mahjong know, so that when I say I play Mahjong they start blurting out "Kokushimusou" and "Men-tan-pin" with knowing grins to let me know that they have no idea what they're talking about. It is the other hand in Mahjong like "7 Pairs" that bears no resemblance to the normal form of a hand in Mahjong. A winning hand will have one each of the Honors, 1 and 9 tiles plus one more of one of them to make a "head" (or "eyes"). Generally, when this hand gets "Ready" you will have your head already and be waiting for one remaining terminal or honor not in your hand. However, if you managed to get one each of the 1's and 9's plus one each of the Honors before you established your head, you would then be waiting for any one of those 13 tiles to make your head, the dream 13 tile wait, and depending on who or where you're playing, it will be worth double the most amount of points possible! How crazy is that?!

There are of course several problems finishing a hand like this. For one, just getting all those tiles together is surprisingly difficult. Those Honors which were the bane of your existence when you were trying to get Peace and Simples will seem to never come. If they do, they'll be the ones you already have. Also it becomes clear pretty quickly what you're trying to do as you throw away one useful middle tile after another. You'll make for an easy target from someone who has nothing more than Simples in his hand but knows that it's only a matter of time before you throw his middle of the road winning tile. Still, there's nothing more satisfying than showing your hand and asking for the most points possible. "What? You don't have that much? Well I'll just take the rest of your points and your money too then." So I almost always go for this hand when I have at least 9 of the terminals already in my hand. If it's toward the end of the game and I'm probably losing anyway, I may even go for it starting with only 7 or 8. If the hand ends up not going anywhere, I have a hand full of pretty safe tiles so I can probably throw pretty safely if someone declares Reach. And every once in a while you get some idiot who buries his head in his hand and has no clue you're going for anything until you say "Ron" and ask for all his points. Unfortunately, that idiot would be me, and if I miss the cut to move up to the next league tomorrow, losing to this hand 2 months ago will be the reason.

4 Concealed Triples: Limit Hand

And now perfection: 4 Concealed Triples or "Suu Anko" in Japanese. It was the first limit hand I ever completed so it's always had a special place in my heart. It's like its little brother, 4 triples, except that all the triples must be made from tiles you've drawn. Bumping tiles immediately precludes being able to go for this hand. You'll find that you end up going for this hand when you started out going for normal 4 Trips and also 7 pairs. A note to be careful of here, the triples must really all be self drawn. That means that if you are one away with two pairs waiting for one more of one of them to finish the triple, you still have to draw that final tile. If another player throws the winner, it will be a much cheaper hand, still fairly expensive, but not the home run you were swinging for, more of a ground rule double. If you did manage to get 4 triples into your hand and you have a singleton waiting for one more to complete your head, this special wait will again qualify the hand as a double limit hand depending on what rules you are playing. Most Free Mahjong Parlors, however, don't allow double limit hands so as amazing as it is, you'll still just get the normal most points score. (Sidenote: I don't know why I used so many baseball terms writing this. I HATE baseball!)

Another note about these two hands: until a year ago, I thought 4 Concealed triples was the most common Limit hand. Yet I still have not finished it once on Fight Club and I have finished All Terminals several times. I think the reason for this is the tables on which we play live games. It is a common complaint that in fact they do not shuffle the tiles very thoroughly, so that when the "walls" (or deck so to say) come up out of the table, tiles that had been grouped together in the previous hand will often be near each other in the wall. This leads to a higher occurrence of pairs in starting hands which will thus lead to many players opting to go for 4 Concealed Triples more often than they normally could. The more random distribution of tiles in the computer generated Fight Club certainly seems to lend itself better to the scattering of tiles needed for All Terminals. Just another little side note and excuse for why I have yet to finish my favorite hand on Fight Club.

Let's look at some examples. Also regarding examples from now on, I will provide both the score as if the hand was won by the non-dealer and dealer.

What to cover, what to cover....there's still so much. In my last episode I jumped in to the wild and crazy world of multi-point hands with the two kinds of flushes. I was debating jumping into the total absolute lunacy of "complete hands" which give more points than anything you've ever imagined and which would have included my absolute favoritest of hands. But I think first I'll take a step back to some hands which are related, but which will figure more prominently in your hand repertoire. These hands are not the most most mostest of points, but will often play a part in hands which eventually add up to a lot of points.

All Triples: 2 Hand Points

First, we'll start with "All triples", known as "Toitoi" in Japanese. Not a lot of trickery involved in the name here, it is sort of just the opposite of Peace. If you remember, Peace is all runs plus the head. All Triples is just that, 4 triples, plus a head. Bumping is allowed and it doesn't change the value of the hand at all.

By itself as a two pointer, it is indeed pretty cheap, and hardly worth the trouble. However, you'll find that the times you tend to use it will be when you have pairs of value tiles which can add to your hand points as you bump them, or also when one of your pairs is the Lucky Dragons. This will turn the otherwise probably 2600 points or so, into 8000. It's a pretty straightforward hand so there's not a lot to explain. Just remember that to make it really worthwhile, you'll probably want to have a couple Value Tiles groups or Lucky Dragons. Half flush also works in nicely with this hand to give you a surprisingly large number of points, if you can pull it off.

7 Pairs (All Pairs): 2 Hand Points

Our second hand for today is "7 Pairs" (the Japanese is Chiitoitsu) and represents a bit of a departure from the traditional hands that we've talked about so far. All of the examples I've given until now have had the same basic format: 4 groups of 3 tiles in triples or runs, plus a two tile head. This hand is nothing like that in that it's 7 groups of 2 tile pairs, or 7 heads, if you will. It's a bit of a wild card in the Mahjong group of hands, and it can often be a cool trick because it's difficult for other players to figure out what you're doing.

Of course, because there is no mechanism for "bumping" pairs, this hand will always be concealed. Also, because of it's structure, your wait will always be a singleton in your hand waiting for it's twin to complete the pair. Because you can choose any tile to be this last remaining pair to complete, you'll want to choose something that seems likely to come out, especially if you're going to declare Reach. For example, a good choice would be a 1 in a suit in which you've thrown away a 4 (players will think that because of the 4, you don't have 2-3 waiting for the 1 or 4 so that the 4 must be safe and they throw your winner). Honor tiles are also good in this situation because they are generally useless unless someone can make a triple with them. Because of this fact, players will often save them as "safe" tiles to throw when someone declares Reach. 7 pairs can also be combined with a number of other hands including Simples, Full or Half Flush and of course, Reach and Self-concealed draw. So even though the hand by itself is only worth 2 hand points (1600 or 2400 real points), it can quickly become an 8000 or even 12000 point hand if combined with other hands.

The reason I present these hands together today, is that I often find that I'll be shooting for one and then by accident I will get the other. For example, on the way getting all triples, you'll have been collecting pairs as that is what triples must start out as, yes? Sometimes you might manage to get 6 completed pairs before you managed to finish your triples. Likewise, you may be collecting pairs when first one and then, oops, 2 or your pairs became triples. Now you're only one away from all triples. So the key is to be flexible with your doubles and triples as they come and react in the way that the tiles seem most likely to keep coming.

Let's look at some examples.

So I took a look at my Fight Club stats the other day, and as luck would have it, 5 of the 6 hands I've covered so far are my most used hands, by quite a large margin. Of course it's not luck, but rather, all part of my greater plan. Let's take a look:

Reach	45%
Value tiles	37%
Peace	25%
Simples	23%
Concealed Self-draw	22%

Only 5 hands and he's already up to 157%? What is he smoking, you ask? Remember, these hands are not necessarily mutually exclusive. The idea is to put as many of these as possible all into the same hand. I must say, I was a little surprised to see Concealed Self-draw so high up there. I really am one lucky son-of-a- Well anyway

It gets me thinking, where to next? Should I continue with the cramming-points-into-your-hand theme or should I move on to the cool-looking-hand theme. While winning is important, looking good doing it may be almost as important, if not more so. So this week, I'm going to leap from the simple boring world of 1 point hands to the wild exciting lunacy of 3 and 6 point hands. Besides, if I were to continue on the other theme, I'd have to do my most detested hand and I don't want to give it that much credit yet. So today we'll cover the two kinds of flushes.

Half Flush: 2-3 Hand Points

First we have the Half Flush, known in Japanese as Honitsu and worth 3 points. A half flush contains only Honor tiles and one of the suits. If a hand starts short-suited and also contains a couple of Value tile pairs, you'll probably want to start shooting for the Half Flush. "Bumping" (pon) and "Chowing" are allowed, but taking tiles from other players will drop the hand's value down to 2 points. However, because of the difficulty of accumulating all those tiles in the same suit, this hand tends to be unconcealed. So in order to make it worthwhile, you'll probably want to have at least one Value tile group and maybe another or at least one Lucky Dragon. One of the problems with Half Flush is that it soon becomes clear what you're aiming for and players will become much tighter with the suit that doesn't appear in your discard pile. Letter tiles will also be less forthcoming.

Full Flush: 5-6 Hand Points

The biggie for today is the Full Flush, Chinitsu in Japanese, and worth 6 points! Like many of the hands that allow bumping and chowing, it loses a point in value when tiles are bumped so then it's only worth 5. It is like the Half Flush but without any of the letter tiles; it is entirely composed of just one suit. Pretty straightforward you say? Well not so fast. Besides the fact that you're trying to accumulate a lot of the same kind of tiles, another thing that will make this hand difficult is figuring out what you're waiting for at the end. With the way tiles get grouped together, you may sometimes miss tiles that complete your hand.

Let's look at some examples and I'll give the points as if they were for the dealer to give an idea of how to make these hands really pay off:

The thing to note in this last example is the huge number of tiles which could have completed the hand. It's not just 5-6 waiting for the 4 or 7. It's really 1-1-1-2-3-4-5-6-6-6 waiting for the 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, or 7, a think of beauty, if you can find it. Get out your tiles and try regrouping them by hand to see how each of those tiles finishes out the group.

Last week I began a theme on hands that go well together with other hands. This week I'll continue on that theme with 2 more hands in the same vein. However, these hands are not like the hands we've seen so far where you want to build certain combinations of groups or use certain tiles. These are more like situations: Concealed-self-draw and Reach. They are both possible any time a hand is one away from being basically completed. Another way to say it is that any combination of 4 groups of 3 and the 2 tile head will qualify for these hands.

Reach, of course, is where Japanese ¡§Reach Mahjong¡¨ gets its name. It is the "men" in the oft heard scoring phrase "men-tan-pin" (Menzen Reach (Concealed Reach), Tanyao (All Simples), Pinfu (Peace) in Japanese). It is what sets girls' hearts a-racing in the spring. But figuring out how to use it is almost as hard as figuring out what is going on in said girls' hearts. The concept is not so difficult; it's really just like calling ¡§uno¡¨ in the popular card game. You're essentially warning everyone that you're only 1 tile from completing your hand and now you can go out if you draw or anyone discards your winning tile. The problem is that not only are you announcing to the world that you are armed and dangerous, precluding any chance of sneak attack, but having done so, you are now committed to that attack. You've thrown down the gauntlet. You've declared war.

>Jenn's Note> You literally do 'throw down the gauntlet'. To declare 'Reach', you need to turn your declaring tile perpendicular to the rest of your tiles and throw out an extra bet of 1,000 points. After this declaration, you are no longer allowed to change the contents of your hand except for Quads.

Peace: 1 Hand Point

Peace (Pinfu in Japanese) is fairly easily achieved though it has some peculiarities which may make it difficult to understand at first. At its simplest, it is merely 4 runs and the "pair" (head). The complications come first with the tiles you're waiting for to complete the hand. The remaining uncompleted run must be an open ended wait. For example, 4-5 waiting for the 3 or 6 would be acceptable, where as 3-5 waiting for the 4 or 1-2 waiting for the 3 would not be. Note also that 4 completed runs plus one tile waiting for its pair to create a "head" is also not acceptable. Another complication is that the "head" may use Honor Tiles, but may not Value Tiles. And finally, it is completely concealed, meaning that only your final tile is allowed to be taken from another player, the rest must be entirely concealed within your own hand.

Double Run: 1 Hand Point

Since Peace is so complicated, let's make this week's other hand an easy one, Double Run (Iipeikou in Japanese). It is simply two of exactly the same runs in the same suit. This must also be part of a completely concealed hand, so no stealing allowed! Let's look at some examples.

Value Tiles: 1 Hand Point

Value Tile (yaku-hai in Japanese) is probably the simplest and easiest to create of all the hands. It is simply a hand including one set of 3 of the same value tiles in your hand. It is also immune, meaning that you may steal (chow, bump, kong) any of your hand�fs tiles from other players�f discards including the value tiles themselves. Value tiles consist of the 3 Dragon tiles: Red, White and Blue; the current wind for the round: east or south; and your seat wind for the current hand. A set of 3 of any of those tiles would constitute a value hand. Remember, all Value Tiles are Honors but not all Honors are Value Tiles!

All Simples: 1 Hand Point

Also known as an Inside Hand or Two thru Eight (tanyao in Japanese) is also quite simple. It is just a hand consisting entirely of tiles between 2 and 8. In other words, it contains no 1, 9 or Honors. In most games it will also be immune, meaning again you can steal from other players as they discard.