Simple Mahjong

• Use all tiles except the flowers and seasons.
• Shuffle the tiles into a wall and deal 13 to each player.
• The goal is to collect patterns of tiles in your hand:
  • A Pair consists of 2 identical tiles.
  • A Set consists of either 3 identical tiles (called a Pung or Triplet) or a run of 3 sequential tiles from the same suit (called a Chow).
  • A Mahjong consists of 1 pair and 4 sets, for a total of 14 tiles. Get a Mahjong to instantly win the round.
• Starting with the dealer as active player, players take turns:
  • The active player draws a tile.
  • If they have a mahjong, the round immediately ends.
  • Otherwise they discard a tile face up to the middle of the table.
    • Before the turn ends, players have a chance to claim the most recently discarded tile.
    • If the tile completes a mahjong, call out “Mahjong” and reveal your hand to claim the tile
    • If the tile can be use to complete a triplet, call out “Pung” and reveal the other two matching tiles from your hand to claim the tile.
    • If the tile could complete a run and you are sitting immediately clockwise of the player who discarded that tile, call out “chow” and reveal the other two tiles in the run to claim the tile.
    • If multiple players claim the tile, precedence is Mahjong > Pung > Chow, with ties broken clockwise starting from the active player
  • If a player claimed the discarded tile, the turn passes to them, but instead of drawing from the wall, they draw the discarded tile and place it face-up alongside the other pieces of the revealed pattern.
  • If no player claimed the discard tile, the turn passes clockwise.
• After a mahjong is formed, the round ends, and the player with the mahjong earns +1 point.
• It is traditional to play 16 rounds before tallying points.

• Regional scoring variants exist to give bonus points for a mahjong which contains a triplet of dragons or for getting a mahjong without claiming any discards, or …
• Some games play with an extra set pattern called the Kong, which is a quadruplet of identical tiles. After claiming the discard to complete a Kong, draw one extra tile on your turn before discarding.
• If playing wih flower tiles, you may flip them and draw an extra tile as replacement.
• With fewer than 4 players, place a ghost player in between each actual player. The ghost simply draws and discards a random tile whenever they take a turn, and never claims a discarded tile.
• Here is another well-written explanation of the game.

¶ Simple Scoring Variant.

If playing multiple rounds:

• +1 point for getting the Mahjong.
• If you get the Mahjong, you also get +1 bonus point for each of the following conditions:
  • Triplet of dragons
  • Triplet of winds matching your seat
  • No triplets
  • You never took a discard except to finish the Mahjong
  • Each kong (if playing with that variant)