Jansou雀荘 Question

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York1jm
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Jansou雀荘 Question

Post by York1jm » Thu Dec 09, 2010 2:55 am

Hey guys,

Well I am planning to take a trip to Japan for a few weeks towards the end of January and I just had a few questions. Since, I plan on going to a jansou I wanted to make sure I understood exactly how it worked. Also I intend to go to a rate mahjong parlor, probably 0.5. I have been trying to do some research looking at various Japanese sites at how Jansous work, but I would just like some one to explain it to me a bit better.

-I understand how the rates work 0.3 means 1000 points is equivalent to 30 yen, 0.5 50 yen and 1.0 100 yen. What I don't understand is do you purchase your 25,000/35,000 points when you enter the jansou at that rate, then you are to give a 30,000/40,000 return at the end of the game and what ever you are below that amount you also pay that as well?

-So example: you buy your 25,000 points at a 0.5 jansou and the uma is 5.10 and the game fee is 500yen. So you pay 1250 yen for your points, then at the end of the game you end up with 15,000 points, so again you pay 750 yen as you are 15,000 short of the return, plus you pay the 1000 yen uma, also the game fee which is 500 yen. So in total for this game you pay 3,500 yen. Is this how the Jansou operates or is it some other way? Also if this is the way it occurs, what happens if you are over the return rate? I see that normally the most you could make is 60,000 as most Jansous seem to end the game if someone reaches 60,000 points.

-Also as I intend to go to a Jansou does anyone have any recommendations? I will be around Nara, Osaka, Kyoto visiting old teachers and friends for my first week or so, then I plan to head up to Tokyo for about a week. So if anyone could recommend some good Jansous around those areas it would be very helpful, thanks. I have looked around at http://jan39.com/, but I just wanted some recommendations from people who have went to great Jansous.

-Sorry, I do have a side question. I was wondering where I could find one of those Mahjong study sessions in Japan. They always seemed rather interesting and I think they would be a useful learning experience. Are there ones for amateurs to go to or do you need to be a pro? Thanks again.

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Re: Jansou雀荘 Question

Post by Tom Sloper » Thu Dec 09, 2010 2:33 pm

When you go into a jansou you will bring 3 friends with you, right?
Are you fluent in Japanese?
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Re: Jansou雀荘 Question

Post by York1jm » Thu Dec 09, 2010 3:24 pm

I was planning on just going on my own, however I do have friends that would probably go too. I have studied Japanese now for 4 years, it is pretty good. Studied in Japan for 1 year, 2 years ago. Communicating as never been much of a problem. I use my Japanese with the Japanese students here in China, we understand each other well enough. Also I learned Mahjong through just Japanese source material ie: games or books.

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Re: Jansou雀荘 Question

Post by Tom Sloper » Fri Dec 10, 2010 12:18 am

They don't do pickup games, at least not with gaijin. Take 3 mahjong friends with you to the jansou.
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Re: Jansou雀荘 Question

Post by Nameless » Fri Dec 10, 2010 1:54 pm

Have you tried emailing Jenn or Garthe? They work in jansous so they might help you if they're not too busy.

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Re: Jansou雀荘 Question

Post by York1jm » Fri Dec 10, 2010 3:48 pm

Tom Sloper: That is a shame if I can't do a furii game, I really don't want to go there and just rent a table and play with friends.

nameless: No, I have not tried to e-mail them, but they appear to be rather busy lately though. Also just seeing if anyone else has heard how it works. Thanks for the advice.

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Re: Jansou雀荘 Question

Post by deJENNerate » Tue Dec 14, 2010 5:14 am

Hi York~

I'm sorry about my delay in replying to your thread. There are a few options, but it really depends on your Japanese level.

Every parlor is different. There are a few high-rate places that don't allow foreigners to play pick-up games, but those aren't the kinds of places you want to go to anyway...

If you have a pretty firm grasp on Japanese, you can play at most parlors. In Osaka I recommend Jan-Q. They took good care of Garthe and I when we visited. If you're in Tokyo or if you're not extremely confident about your Japanese but you can get around, a no-rate parlor like Shibu-ton would be better.

If your Japanese is not passable enough for gambling, you can still play if you have a friend that can play and you can communicate with, as long as they speak Japanese.

Every parlor is different, but generally you pay for your losses at the end of the game. Some parlors require a deposit so that you won't get stuck with no cash. The tables calculate the payouts automatically, so you just look at the screen, pay what you owe and either continue the game or stop playing.

Study sessions might be hard to swing. The only ones that I know of are for people in our league only but there might be some others. Again that will change depending on your Japanese level. If you let me know some more details then I think I can help you more (^^ Maybe Garthe and I can have a live English study-session since we haven't had time for the Ron2 sessions lately~

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Re: Jansou雀荘 Question

Post by Tom Sloper » Tue Dec 14, 2010 7:01 am

Jenn's the real expert, so "what she said."
I didn't mean to pessimistically say that no foreigner can ever walk into a parlor and get a pickup game. But you have to be quite fluent in the language, AND quite knowledgeable in the rules of the game, otherwise you could be disappointed or otherwise have a bad experience.
York, I may be guilty of having assumed too much (that your language skills or your game skills weren't up to snuff) when I wrote my previous response.
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Re: Jansou雀荘 Question

Post by York1jm » Wed Dec 15, 2010 5:29 am

Jen: Thanks for the reply. No need to apologize I know that you are very busy. I will probably check out both the of Jansous you mentioned, I looked at their websites and read over the rules, they seemed pretty standard. Although for Jan Q did you go to the one in nishinakajima or to the one in nipponbashi? I like the rules better in nishinakajima, I will probably head to that one in Osaka. I am rather confident that I can walk into the Jansou and play. I have studied Japanese now for 5 years, studying for use in History. Lived in Nara for a year. Of course my Japanese I am sure could be better, I don't believe it will be a problem though.

As for the studying session, I just thought that they seemed very interesting and I am sure I could learn a lot about how to be a better player through them. I thought the only ones would be for the league, but I was not sure. Although an English study session would also be fun. I would have time, I am heading up to Tokyo mainly just to head to Todai. I talked with some representatives during a study abroad fair here in Beijing and a history professor from Todai at my university here in Beijing. I am going to just head to the University, possibly book a tour while still in Kansai. Kinda annoyed I can't book one for abroad, but ah well. I am Planning to try and head to Grad school there. Before I do go to the Jansou though, I intend to try to brush up on fu calculation, I used to know it better, but being I China I have only been playing online so have not had to do it a lot. Also plan to work on strategy on some Japanese sites that I use.

Tom: No, your last comment was fine. It is good to reminded exactly of what I am trying to do. It something you don't just do, "Oh I am gonna go to Jansou." I need to make sure that I am ready for it. It serves as a good reminder. I do believe it should be okay though, but I do still intend to brush up on some things before I go. Thanks.

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Re: Jansou雀荘 Question

Post by deJENNerate » Mon Dec 20, 2010 4:40 pm

Tom: I think that you're right. You do have to be pretty fluent. Also in the past 5 years or so more parlors have allowed foreigners in than before. Thanks to Ryan, Garthe and Ben more and more parlors understand that we know how to play too (^^
Sorry if it sounded like I was undermining you. I went back and read all the posts later and realized that some of the stuff I wrote in my reply had already been touched upon. When I originally wrote it I read only the first post and brushed past most of the others.

York: Garthe and I went to the Jan-Q in Osaka as well. It was nice, but on the 2 weekdays that we went, there were only 2 other customers and actually not too sure if they were even just customers. If you have any problems, just email Garthe or I and we should probably have time to join you once. After that you'll be good to go on your own.
Generally other players will score for you anyway if you're slow at fu. They might get it wrong once in a while, but it's something we all dealt with when we started out. Sometimes in pick-up games it's better to keep the game going than take time with each hand.
With the Japanese level you described it should be fine, but it's normal to be nervous the first time you go so it wouldn't hurt to bring a friend. A lot of times they'll let you play on the same table as your friend too.

In Kyoto I recommend visiting Byodouin by Uji-station. It's not in the city of Kyoto, but it's on Uji-river (scene for a lot of parts of the Tale of Genji). Byodouin is the temple on the back of the 10-yen coin and Uji is famous for green tea. Since it's a bit out of the way from the normal Golden Temples, etc, it's not very crowded and the river is amazing. They do the U-bird fishing there (sorry dunno the English).

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Re: Jansou雀荘 Question

Post by Tom Sloper » Mon Dec 20, 2010 11:59 pm

deJENNerate wrote:1. Tom: I think that you're right. You do have to be pretty fluent.
2. Also in the past 5 years or so more parlors have allowed foreigners in than before. Thanks to Ryan, Garthe and Ben more and more parlors understand that we know how to play too (^^
3. Sorry if it sounded like I was undermining you.
1. Absotively.
2. Good to know! When I went into parlors, 11+ years ago, I was usually the first one they'd ever seen in there. And when I went to Kojima-san's parlor with Martin and Dicky Rep in '02, we managed to get in by dint of our having bunches of mahjong tchochkes with us from the WCMJ, together with my so-so Nihongo and my having been there before (which I was able to say with my so-so Nihongo).
3. No, no! Not at all. I was more concerned that I'd given my message an incomplete statement of facts, that needed clarification.
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Re: Jansou雀荘 Question

Post by York1jm » Wed Feb 09, 2011 9:51 am

Hey Guys,

Well now that I have been back in China for a while I guess I should give everyone a little update on how going to the Mahjong Parlor went. Well I decided to only go to Shibuton, but I did go there twice. The staff and other players were very friendly and helpful. The first day I went I played for 7 hours and played about 5 Hanchan sessions. I was amazed when I left and said to myself, "what time is it? ...Its been 7 hours?" I lost the first game because of bad decisions and adjusting to the speed of play. By the second game I finally started getting the hang of it. 2nd game I got third place, 3rd game 2nd place and was only 100 points away from first, 4th game I got 3rd place because I was stupid and dealt an obviously risky tile to stay in tenpai and dealt into a mangan thus knocking me down to 3rd from 2nd place, and My last game got first place and won by quite a bit thanks to my tanyao, dora 4, pushing my lead even higher.

The Second day, in a word, went bad. I played 6 games for about 6 hours. I lost my first game that day, got Second for the 2nd game, 3rd place for the Third game and then the last three I lost all of them. Although one nice thing about the second day I played was being in Tenpai for a Su Ankou, but sadly didn't come to me. Also it seemed like for those last 4 games nothing would come to me at all. Also tons of 3rd turn Riichis, just aggravating. Although I did make one really dumb move. For one game, my starting hand was 2 away from a ryanpeikou. I chose to tell Mahjong, "NO you gave me this starting hand, you give me my ryanpeikou!!!" Well, of course this did not happen, I even destroyed a tenpai in order to try and make it become that hand. Yeah, that is not a good thing to do, but it was a terrible tenpai anyway, would have been only a riichi if I would of declared it and I would have had to.

So it was a lot of fun and a learning experience, it was great when I knew I completely read through some peoples hands. I remember during the first day I can tell that my 3, 6, 9 of wans will be his winning tile, but I am just sitting there going to myself, "Can't go into tenpai...damn!" Then some one else dealt the 9 wan(which was the dora) and he won.

As a last note, the Automatic Mahjong tables were awesome, I didn't know that the ones they had also automatically set the Dora indicator and gave you your starting hands, that was really cool!

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Re: Jansou雀荘 Question

Post by Tom Sloper » Wed Feb 09, 2011 5:08 pm

automatically set the Dora indicator and gave you your starting hands
So the 3rd tile from the back end of the wall was already flipped? And the machine rolled dice, broke the wall, and dealt tiles to each player?
Hadn't seen that before. So there must be 8 instead of 4 holes in the tabletop where rows of tiles come up.
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Re: Jansou雀荘 Question

Post by Barticle » Wed Feb 09, 2011 7:38 pm

Yup, here's a quick video... (blink and you'll miss it!)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jhVfSVUT7yA

I don't see any dice in the bubble so perhaps they're virtual?

Here's another vid showing one with the tabletop removed.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GefGOWQKl1o

It still builds a four-sided wall but the sides are shorter than normal (two 10's and two 11's). All the wall tiles are in stacks of two too, so the dealer must have to draw their 14th tile.

Anyways, glad to hear you had fun, York. :) Too bad about the yakuman tenpai!

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