Mahjong Score Cards Download

[Gene Honnette]

Americanmahjong, also spelled mah jongg, is a variant of the Chinese game mahjong. American mahjong utilizes racks to hold each player's tiles, jokers, and "Hands and Rules" score cards. It has several distinct gameplay mechanics such as "The Charleston",[1] which is a set of required passes, and optional passing of the tiles.

American mahjong is played with four players using mah jongg tiles. The goal of the game is to be the first, by picking and discarding, to match one's tiles to a specific hand from the annually distributed scorecard published by the National Mah Jongg League (NMJL) and American Mah-Jongg Association (AMJA).[2] Scoring is done by matching the points assigned to each pre-determined hand on the annually distributed NMJL card & AMJA card.

Joseph Park Babcock, a representative of the Standard Oil Company in Shanghai, was importing mahjong sets to the United States in great numbers by 1923. To increase interest in the game in the United States, he wrote and published new rules that became the American standard. When the National Mah Jongg League, Inc. published a volume of "Official American Rules" in 1935, the American style further morphed into a very distinct form.[3]

American mah jongg tournament standards and rules were established in 1986, when the National Mah Jongg League and Mah Jongg Madness jointly conducted their first annual Mah Jongg Tournament at Sea. This tradition of championship tournaments at sea continued for over 34 years. Now there are American mah jongg tournaments conducted throughout the United States, and consist of players from America and Canada. Mah Jongg Madness conducts more than a dozen tournaments a year and an annual NMJL cruise culminates in the National Mah Jongg Convention in Las Vegas every March.

Tournaments are now played according to the Standardized National Mah Jongg Tournament Rules, which were codified and published in 2005.[4] In 2011, Mah Jongg Master Points (MJMP) were established to post an individual's tournament scores. The MJMP website formulates the scores (awarding bonus points to the top 10 winners of an event), and ranking the individual players. There are 10 ranks for players, based on the accumulation of these points.[5]

The total number of mahjong tiles in the American mahjong is 152, as shown below. American Mahjong sets are notably different from Chinese Mahjong sets, and can be identified by the usage of several additional tiles, Arabic numerals, and English words.

The three types of dragons are: Red dragon, Green dragon, and White dragon (also known as soap), four tiles of each type, 12 tiles in total. Among them, the red dragon is even used to replace the red "中" "middle", and the green dragon is even used to replace the green "發" "wealth", avoiding the use of Chinese characters.

For the convenience of American players, English words "Red", "Green" and "White" are usually written on the tiles, stating which dragon it is. Besides, some will say letter "C" (for "中" in Cantonese Romanisation), "F" (for "發" in Cantonese Romanisation), "P" or "B" (for "白" in Cantonese Romanisation).

For the convenience of American players, English words "Spring", "Summer", "Autumn", "Winter" and "Plum.B", "Orchid", "Chrys", "Bamboo" are usually written on the tiles, stating which flower it is. Besides, some will say Arabic numbers 1 to 4.

The NMJL publishes an official instruction book every few years called Mah Jongg Made Easy. The most recent version was published in 2020. The book, a Visual Companion Guide for American Mah Jongg (VCG) by Dara Collins and Donna Kassman contains graphics and explanations to learn to play, improve strategy, and incorporate Best Practices. The VCG is based on the most up-to-date official rules found in Mah Jongg Made Easy, as well as includes updated rules from annual bulletins, letters to the League, and calls to the League and is available on Amazon.

The players roll dice to determine East. The highest roll is designated as East. Each player then stacks a row of 19 tiles, two tiles high in front of them (for a total of 38 tiles). Then the East player will decide the opening position with two dice, and each person will take 13 tiles in hand (14 tiles for the East player). After the tiles in hand have been sorted, if the East player has a completed hand, he/she wins instantly. Otherwise, the Charleston -- exchange 3 tiles with other players -- will be conducted. It takes three stages:

On the last pass of each Charleston (first left, second right), a blind pass is permitted. This means a player can take one, two, or three tiles that were passed to him/her and, without looking at the tile(s), can pass it/them instead of tiles from his/her hand. Each pass still includes three tiles.

Following the Charleston passing, an optional pass take place. Players have the option of passing zero, one, two or three tiles to the player across from him/her. The two players agree on the number of tiles to be passed.

The minimum score for a winning hand is 25 points. In the case of calling Mahjong (winning), the player who discarding a tile from which another player calls mahjong must pay twice the number of points, while the other player pays only the number of points. In a self-draw, the other three players pay twice as the points.

Full disclosure: A preview copy of Boba Mahjong was provided by Sunrise Tornado Game Studio. Some art, gameplay, or other aspects of the game may change between this preview and the fulfillment of the Kickstarter, should it fund, as this is a preview of a currently unreleased game.

Deal five to each player to form their starting hand, and then make three piles of one card each in the center. If any of those piles are a card with a 0, place that card on the bottom of the deck and draw a new card until all three piles are not 0. If you had to do that, shuffle the deck.

When creating a set, you may use three cards from your hand or two cards from your hand and one card from anywhere in one of the mixing piles. After creating the set, choose one card to keep in your scoring area, and discard the remaining two cards to any mixing pile (in any order; you can split cards across piles). If any mixing pile is empty, you must discard to that pile first. If you choose not to keep any 0s, remove them from the round rather than placing them in mixing piles.

Once a player has five cards in their scoring area, the round ends after their opponent takes their turn. Then, you move on to scoring. To score, you may choose up to six cards in your tableau. That set of six cards is scored (as any good boba tea should be) along four dimensions:

American Mahjong, sometimes called Maahj, is an offshoot of the traditional Chinese game of Mahjong. In the 1920s, Joseph Park imported Mahjong sets into the US, and Americanized the classic ruleset with tailored modifications.

These rules went on to be the American standard for decades to come, even resulting in the formation of the National Mah Jongg League (NMJL). Now, American Mahjong is played in households and tournaments across the globe, even having a cult following in certain provinces of China.

American Mahjong is a 4-player game, seated around a square table. All modifications to the rules of classic Mahjong seek to streamline the more complicated parts of Mahjong, resulting in a more fast-paced game.

The Wind and Dragon tiles do not have ranks. The Wind tiles describe the 4 cardinal directions in Chinese characters, 東 for East, 南 for South, 西 for West, and 北 for north. The Dragon tiles are described by their color, and include the Red 中 (center), Green 發 (wealth), and White tiles, sometimes illustrated with a blue frame, known as the 板.

Finally, the Joker tiles are the most distinct difference in American Mahjong. The jokers act similarly to how they work in Poker, and can act as a substitute for any other tile in Pungs (3 identical tiles), Kongs (4 identical tiles), Quints (5 identical tiles), and Sextets (6 identical tiles).

In American Mahjong, the goal is to assemble a winning hand as listed in the score book. These winning hands generally consist of combinations of sets, each consisting of 2 or more matching identical tiles. The accepted sets are listed below:

East commences the game by discarding a tile, and the turn then passes to the next player in anticlockwise order. The next player then draws a card from the wall, continuing where the wall break left off. This turn sequence repeats unless a player claims a discarded tile with a call.

A player may call a discarded tile if it can be used to complete a Pung, Kong, Quint, Sextet or any other combination of an exposed hand. Exposed hands are hands that include sets that have been revealed.

Due to the nature of calling in American Mahjong, a player must reveal the set completed with the claimed tile, exposing part of their hand. Calls can also be used to win by completing a winning hand. The turn then passes to the calling player, skipping other players who may have had a turn.

The gameends when a player calls Mahjong after assembling a winning hand. Since winninghands consist of 14 tiles, that means one can only win at the start of theirturn during the draw or claiming discards.

Scoring is done based on the American Mah Jongg cards. Certain hands are granted higher score values, and hence receive more during the payout after winning. Furthermore, depending on the conditions of the win, the losing players may need to pay double or even four times the value of the hand.

Due to the unique properties of the Joker tiles, American Mahjong cannot be played with Chinese or Japanese Riichi Mahjong sets. The alternative is to use a simulator, which is freely available online. A popular simulator is linked in the External Links section of the guide.

American Mahjong was designed to be played by 4 players.However, the rules are adaptable to be played with any player count from 2onwards. It should be noted that games might be longer or shorter based on theplayer count.

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