Peter Gao

I am a code writer, pickleballer, video gamer, manga reader, and graphic design dilettante. I love and suck at Riichi Mahjong.

This is the Dealer’s Choice Tonpuu ruleset from CY, inspired by the original Jewel League [1] [2] in Japan. It’s a 4-player shuugi riichi mahjong ruleset.

Overall Rules

These are the rules that commonly affect gameplay.

  • Starting points: 25,000
  • Strict Tonpuusen: East-only and no South extension.
  • Placement-only battle: if on, raw points do not influence post-game exchanges (i.e., results are dictated by oka+uma only)
  • Ari-ari: kuitan and atozuke are on.
  • Abortive draws are on.
  • Kiriage Mangan is on.
  • Agariyame and tenpaiyame are on for every dealership unconditionally.
    • I.e., any dealer can choose to pass after winning/being tenpai at draw, without being the last dealer, and without being in first place.
    • Passing resets the honba count.
  • Tonshaaba: 1z3z are both round winds.
  • Called Game at 55,000 pt: any player reaching 55,000 pt ends the game instantly and receives 1 chip from each other player.
  • All kan dora are revealed immediately.
  • Riichi with no draws left is allowed.
  • Basengo: honba bonus is 500 per player.

  • Riichi with less than 1000 points is allowed, but you must win the hand or you tobi (ryukoku also counts as tobi)

  • Special Tiles:
    • 1 purple 3m3p3s: +1 han and +1 shuugi
    • 1 blue 7m7p7s: +1 han and +1 shuugi
    • 1 gold 5p: +1 shuugi
    • 1 platinum 5s: +1 shuugi
    • 1 cyan 5m: +1 shuugi
    • 1 5z pocchi and 1 7z pocchi: both are wildcards if drawn after riichi; also gives +1 shuugi (whether used as wildcard or not)
      • discarding 5z7z pocchi during riichi is not allowed: a player must either call tsumo or kan after drawing 5z7z pocchi.
        • if discarded by mistake, the player must take the tile back and make a valid decision (no penalty).
    • 1 6z pocchi: wildcard if drawn while tenpai with open hand; also gives +1 shuugi (whether used as wildcard or not)
      • a discarded 6z pocchi counts only against 6z furiten.

Abilities Catalog

Choose 3 abilities to assign to the gold 5p, platinum 5s and cyan 5m. You can also assign abilities to the purple 3m3p3s, blue 7m7p7s and pocchi tiles.

  • Ura-dora kaiji:
    • When you win with this tile, flip the ura-dora even if you are not in riichi
  • Han o tsukeru:
    • Grants 1 dora when your winning hand is strictly less than mangan (4 han 30 or equivalent), or a bump to the next multiple of mangan at the lowest han otherwise (e.g. mangan -> 6 han haneman, haneman -> 8 han baiman etc.)
  • Chippu Zoka:
    • Grants x1.5 shuugi to your winning hand, rounded up
  • Agari han-su o chippu ni kasan:
    • Grants +X shuugi where X = number of han of your winning hand
  • Yaku-ka:
    • Grants 1 han yaku and 1 chip
  • Naki Menzen:
    • When this tile is a part of your hand, you are eligible for closed yakus even with an open hand
    • This includes being able to riichi even with an open hand, but not immediately after making a call
    • Called Sananko / Suuanko do not exist under this rule
  • Tako Riichi:
    • When you riichi with this tile in hand, reveal this tile from your hand and immediately reveal ura-dora
    • You may draw and discard twice during a single tsumo turn, sequentially. Ippatsu can only be applied to the first draw
    • You cannot open riichi if you choose to double draw
  • Kokan:
    • Choose either:
      • -1 han +3 chips, or
      • -1 chip +3 han

Suggested Configurations:

  1. Han o tsukeru + Chippu Zoka + Agari han-su o chippu ni kasan
  2. Naki Menzen + Tako Riichi + Kokan (fan favourite)
  3. Ura-dora kaiji + Yaku-ka + Naki Menzen

Order of Operations

When counting final hand value/score and shuugi to be awarded, you would generally resolve all hand han value first, then assign chips to tiles, before determining the final chip count of the hand

Example 1: I win a 2han 40fu, 1 shuugi hand with all 3 special tiles.

  1. Han o tsukeru bumps it up to 3han 40fu
  2. Agari han-su o chippu ni kasan increases the number of shuugi from 1 -> 4
  3. Chippu Zoka further increases the number of shuugi from 4 -> 6

Example 2: I win a 4han 30fu, 3 shuugi hand with all 3 special tiles.

  1. Han o tsukeru bumps it up to 6han 30fu
  2. Agari han-su o chippu ni kasan increases the number of shuugi from 3 -> 9
  3. Chippu Zoka further increases the number of shuugi from 9 -> 13.5 ~= 14

Yaku Changes

  • Open Riichi is on. Reveal the entire hand.
  • Kansai Chiitoi is on and gives extra value based on the number of quads (2 of the same pairs):
    • 1 quad: +1 han
    • 2 quads: +3 han
    • 3 quads: yakuman
  • Nagashimangan is a special win that is worth haneman.
    • this means honba, etc. are applicable to a nagashimangan win.
  • Regarding yakuman:
    • kokushi can ron off ankan
    • yakuman may stack (except with kazoe yakuman)
    • 13-sided kokushi, 9-sided chuuren, daisuushi, suuanko tanki, and suukantsu are double yakuman
    • Suukantsu can now be won in a special way, right after calling the 4th kan and drawing the final rinshan tile:
      • if the rinshan tile completes the hand, the win is resolved normally (where suukantsu is a yaku, not a special win)
      • if the rinshan tile does not complete the hand, then the win is resolved as a special double yakuman that does not stack with anything else. I.e., the winner gets no chips from color tiles, cannot stack other yakuman, etc. This is similar to nagashimangan ruling.
        • if the 4th kan was ankan or kakan: this is a special double yakuman tsumo
        • if the 4th kan was a daiminkan: this is a special double yakuman ron dealt in by the player who contributed to the daiminkan (this is not tsumo pao, so it’s only 20 chips)
      • the player may choose to not win and continue the game
        • Note that the suukaikan abort is disabled when all kans are made by the same player, so the game can continue
    • the following local yakuman are on and are each a single yakuman
      • Shiisanpuutaa/Shiisuupuutaa
      • Renhou
      • 3-quad kansai chiitoi
    • Regarding pao:
    • pao is on for daisangen, daisuushi, suukantsu, and rinshan (in the case of rinshan, pao pays the full amount).
    • pao is responsible for covering the full shuugi amount (i.e., pays 3x shuugi in the case of tsumo)

Shuugi

Each shuugi chip is worth 5,000 points.

  • besides the special tiles, each of ippatsu and ura is worth 1 chip.
  • Yakuman shuugi is 20 chips if ron, and 10 chips each if tsumo, for each count of yakuman.
    • Kazoe yakuman is 10/5
  • Tobi: 1 chip
    • in the case of multi-ron and multi-tenpai at draw, pay to all players that won/were tenpai.

Oka and Uma

Dynamic Oka (20) and uma (50/20) are paid together in chips:

Placement Points

4th place

  • Under 5,000 points -> pay 11 chips
  • Under 15,000 -> pay 10 chips
  • 15,000 or more -> pay 9 chips

3rd place

  • Under 5,000 -> pay 5 chips
  • Under 15,000 -> pay 4 chips
  • Under 25,000 -> pay 3 chips
  • 25,000 or more -> pay 2 chips

2nd place

  • 35,000 or more -> receive 4 chips
  • 25,000 or more -> receive 3 chips
  • 15,000 or more -> receive 2 chips
  • 5,000 or more -> receive 1 chip

1st place

Receive the difference from the above amounts.

Alternatively, for a fixed Oka+Uma system:

  • 13/3/-5/-11

Penalties

Chonbo penalty is 3000 all.

  • false pon, chii, kan, riichi calls that are NOT corrected before the next draw receive are chonbo. (No penalty if corrected)

Dead hand penalty applies to the following scenarios:

  • false ron and tsumo calls.
  • kuikae
  • taahai and shouhai

Optional Rules

  • Each shuugi chip is worth 10,000 points instead of 5,000
  • Raw points also contribute to post-game exchanges (instead of “placement-only battle”)
  • Special abortive draw: before the dealer’s first discard, every player agrees to abort. This abort does not increase honba.

House rules

At my place, I usually play with these modifications/clarifications:

  • If you are in riichi, you can peek at adjacent players’ hands (even if you can kan)

Updated: