Sept 6, 2007
Gemma's Journal #14
So, I'm in a bit of an in-between stage of my column. My next plan for my column is that I'll follow the progress of some new students of Mahjong to see how they fair. Hopefully we'll get their comments on the game and learning, and also your comments on my teaching method. It would be even better if I can motivate more people to spread the word as well! My new group of Mahjong players are a mixed bunch with two speaking no Asian languages and one with a good grasp. It'll be interesting I think to see their different reactions and what exactly interests different backgrounds with respect to Mahjong.
However, I've had to come back to the UK briefly and my three new students are waiting for me in Taipei. Therefore I've had to come up with some 'filler' entries... Sorry!
I thought that I would share with you my feelings on the All-Pairs hand. It's been really getting to me recently. I despise it. I can never pull it off, and if I lose big, I can almost guarantee it was a hand where I was trying for All-Pairs. I've summarised my All-Pairs experiences as folows:
1) I get quite a few pairs at the beginning so I become excited and think; "Yay! It's half started for me. Let's try!" But yeah, so I try and try and watch all those tiles that I could have Bumped (pon/peng) to give myself an All-Sets hand go by at the beginning but I'm still feeling confident. There is always a moment when I realise that this was a disastrous decision and it all goes pete tong. (Non-Brits that's your research project for the week! "Pete Tong")
2) Actually the whole thing goes pretty well until the last pair where I manage to obtain multiple "pairs" in my discard pile instead of in my hand.
3) I get nothing that will remotely help me and find that I can't get out of it because of "sacred discard" (furiten) etc...
To add to it all, I don't know whether it's because I'm so stressed out by this hand now, but for some reason in the process of trying to obtain this hand I mess it up by throwing a tile someone else needs. Perhaps I'm just not concentrating...
Then the few times that I do manage to pull off this hand, I'm never satisfied with the reward. Points-Stress ratio is just not good enough! For the days shaved off my life in those five minutes I need more!
Above all, is it just me or does this hand just not fit well with the other hands? I mean I like the way I can make links between hands and I rarely go all out for one particular hand and usually have ideas that I can do with it depending upon the tiles that I draw. The All-Pairs hand I just don't seem to have so many options. It just refuses to work with other hands. It sits there like a thorn in my side. It doesn't look that hard so why do I mess it up! It doesn't even fit in the normal scoring system!
I hate it so much.
I dislike it when other people pull it out on me. I never see it coming. I always predict something else. I make my discard. And there it is opposite the table. I've looked over past games to try and get the patterns from the discard so I can level up on this but no progress.
I hate that hand so so much.
I'm sure someone must like it though! So people go ahead and tell me that I'm wrong. Someone enlighten me. Someone prove to me that the devil did not add the All-Pairs hand to torment Mahjong players! Or, perhaps you have a hand that you equally despise. Share your woes!
10 comments:
- "Above all, is it just me or does this hand just not fit well with the other hands?"
With chi-based hands, your chances of success depend on your ability of multiplying waits inside your hand. Connectivity is the deciding factor.
With pon/pair-based hands, your chances of success depend on your ability to take advantage of the possibility of claiming tiles from all three opponents. Range is the deciding factor.
- "I get quite a few pairs at the beginning so I become excited"
How many few? 3, 4 or 5?
You might try this evaluation method. It's not perfect, but it's a good start if you don't have a feel for those types of hands.
Some additional advices:
1- You want your last pair/pon to be unexpected and useless for your opponents. For instance, the wind of a player going for tanyao (All Simple). You need to learn how to "read" discard piles.
2- There is no point of wasting pon opportunities if your best chance is Toitoi (All Pon). Either you go for All Pon right from the start or never. Decide early.
3- Most yaku require chi-based hands. Having too many pairs while not enough for All Pon/7 Pairs is suicide. Don't allow yourself to be stuck between those two categories for long.
4- Once you have decided to go for a pon/pair-based hand, you cannot change your mind and try to switch back to a chi-based hand.
5- Each time you make a pon, say 777, or even better a concealed kan, 7777, you limit or destroy completely all the outside chi requiring this tile : 789. Therefore, you can expect your opponents to discard sooner or later the two neighbouring outside tiles : 8s and the 9s.
I am just a beginner, so you might want to take my advice with a grain of salt.
The "seven pairs" hand seems to be there for when your tiles don't seem to be good for anything else: that is, it exists to make otherwise bad tiles good for something.
I wouldn't try for it with fewer than 5 pairs. Exception: if I have 4 pairs and it looks rather unlikely that my tiles are good for anything other than 7 pairs.
Here's a seemingly unrelated question--How often do you fold your hands?
To me, the most useful part of 7-pairs has to do with defense. I wind up giving up and playing defense for most of the hands I play. Because of this, 7-pairs is a very useful hand for me because I can use 1/9/honor tiles that an opponent isn't likely to win on. If I'm not sure I want to fold entirely, it's also easy to drop one pair that's safe and hope I draw another one in the next few rounds.
7-pairs is also a useful hand since its a lot harder to read what someone is waiting on, or if they're waiting at all. General defensive tricks like throwing a suji (a 7 to a 4 or a 9 to a 6) or using a "wall" as Garthe explains in the next column don't work with 7 pairs so you can easily make a tricky wait.
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