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I\'ve recently noticed something (perhaps obvious) and were wondering if you guys agreed this makes sense.

So...

The tile discarded when a player reaches (i.e. the tile turned sideways) is almost always NOT the final wait suit.

i.e. it is usually safe to discard tiles of that suit!

The exception is late game (e.g. third row of discards), when that tile might well be an ura-suji or matagi-suji, particularly when it comes from a suit that hasn\'t yet appeared much or at all in that player\'s pile. The most dangerous tile then becomes the one that appears in both the ura and matagi, e.g. 6 if the discard is 7, since it shows up in both 3-6 (ura) and 6-9 (matagi). Either way, you don\'t need to be as worried late game because there the discard piles will indicate a wide range of furiten tiles and safe tiles.

Midgame or earlier, however, I find that the dangerous wait will usually be indicated by an ura-suji a few tiles before the reach tile. It generally sticks out as the only hand-discard that is not contradicted by a later discard (i.e. if a 3 comes out and then a 7, then that 3 is not an ura-suji) and will often be in the minority suit. Tiles coming after the reach declaration won\'t show any suji but might serve to confirm or deny your suspicions, which is often all you need to send you on your way.

Whether or not you try to nail the wait itself, I\'m finding that looking at the \'reach tile\' to determine a safe suit can often be a lifesaver when you don\'t want to fold. It helps you be more aggressive while still managing your risk. I\'ve also found that when you do try to nail waits, it\'s better to err on the side of caution if possible and avoid the whole 2-5-8 if you suspect 2-5, for example.

Anyone else use this? Especially the reach-tile-equals-safe-suit observation. Not sure if it\'s the kind of thing everyone already knows or not. What do you guys think?

HotelFSR wrote:I\'ve recently noticed something (perhaps obvious) and were wondering if you guys agreed this makes sense.

So...

The tile discarded when a player reaches (i.e. the tile turned sideways) is almost always NOT the final wait suit.

i.e. it is usually safe to discard tiles of that suit!

Anyone else use this? Especially the reach-tile-equals-safe-suit observation. Not sure if it\'s the kind of thing everyone already knows or not. What do you guys think?

Thinking about it (and thanks for pointing it out) ... if you are waiting 2 shan-ten (two off ron)

e.g. you have say ....

2-bam2-bam3-bam, 6-bam6-bam, 4-dot4-dot5-dot, :east:east:east, red-drared-drared-dra

A common situation you arrive in keeping your options open waiting for two of 1-bam2-bam4-bam 3-dot4-dot6-dot (and also 6-bam reducing 223 or 445 down to a pair).

Drawing one of 1-bam2-bam4-bam say 1-bam will result in dropping 3-bam rotated for reach .... you are now waiting on 3-dot4-dot6-dot which is not a bam

Statistically .... you have three suits, odds favour a hand that the suits of the last two sets are not the same suit/honour from your own experiences ... what percentage of the time do you see your last two sets in the same suit?

Obviously, you have hands with flushes and missing suits but the odds still favour two different suits


I believe that you should consider other discard techniques as well (see UmaiKeikis\' defense guide on www.osamuko.com for other discard tactics many of which will provide options for discarding that may be safer)

However, this is still a very useful tip ... particularly if your opponent has reached early in the game or without displaying much useful information in their discards.


Thanks HotelFSR ... I\'d never really thought about the potential of just following suit :woohoo:

I do use all the points covered in that guide, including wait reading when needed (as mentioned in this post).

However, this reach tile suit thing is actually more effective than reading suji in most cases. The best thing to do is combine several techniques, such that you can narrow down the possibilities.

I\'ll make a video explaining things further (and why it works) but I\'ve been very busy as of late.

Be careful with it though ... An experienced player may pick up on you always following suit and may keep a spare tile in the suit until his reach discard then ditch his tile making you think that suit is safe

However, if you combined it with throwing known dead tiles (e.g. fourth wind tile, 1-dot when you can see say 1-dot2-dot3-dot and 1-dot2-dot3-dot and 2-dot3-dot4-dot). Mixing known dead tiles and the reach suit is likely to confuse all but the best readers.

The other problem is that this discard strategy is likely to become invalid on a second reach declaration.

Having said that I am eager to try this strategy out ... it is likely not to have been thought of by many non-pro players