Basic strategy

[Moah]

Hi everyone,

I've been using a very basic strategy until now, and I'd like to improve, and get feedback on how to do that.

My strategy, such as it is: I start by cutting all the terminals that are isolated (because they might prove dangerous later on), then move to honor tiles, then look at what's left, and complete a hand with that.
I make an exceptions if I have a lot of one suit: even if its terminals are isolated, i keep them to try and get a (half) flush.
I reach almost as soon as I can, so I try to keep my hand closed for as long as possible, but if there are less than 20 tiles left, I'll open it to try and get ready.
I also make an exception to keeping my hand closed if i can get a pon of honors, especially if i'm the dealer, where I try to go for fast, cheap hand if i can't do anything else.

Two things in particular that I'd like to know: how do you know when to fold a hand, and start playing defensively, and how do you figure the hands of other players.

So, I bow to the collective wisdom of reach mahjong: please comment, and help me improve.

Thank you,

[Barticle]

Just a quick reply to direct you to some useful resources.

Look for the articles on tile-efficiency, shapes, etc (translated by Kime and annotated by Garthe) from 4 Feb onwards:

http://reachmahjong.com/en/category/columns/page/2/

Then check this old post for links to some very informative articles on discard-reading:

[reachmahjong.com forum] http://www.reachmahjong.com/en/forum/vi ... 379#p50380

[Kyuu]

Sometimes, it's better to actually keep those tiles for particular yaku like chanta, junchan, etc. That's dependent on whether y'have a good shot at attaining that too.

[Moah]

When and how do you decide to fold your hand? I keep dealing into other hands because I keep trying to make mine, or to get to tenpai when we're in the last 20 tiles.

[Iapetus]

In Japan, some high quality tactics discussion recommend beginners to employ a simple offence and defence baseline.

Once an opponent declares riichi:
-If your hand is already in tenpai, then attack immediately (or pursue riichi).
-Else go into betaori.

Do not underestimate this method of judgement, if everyone can execute this perfectly, going up to 3 dan, or even entering upperdan might not be a problem.

When it comes to open hands, you generally want to defend if an opponent has two calls. If they pon the dora, defense is probably a good idea. If their hand looks one-suit, avoid discarding tiles of that suit and live honors.


Also, for beginners, "chanta sucks don't try to make it" works pretty well.