Oh... wait.

[July]

This just happened to me on Ron2... A second after I called the reach, I thought \"wait a minute...\"

Man, my brain is turned off today.

[Robert]

I could be wrong, but I believe that under JPML rules, you were not in tenpai.

Jenn (or Gemma), we need your help here.

Please go to the rules page and tell me what it says about riichi and tenpai. The rules page is here:
http://www.ma-jan.or.jp/guide/game_rule.php

So... was this chombo?

[July]

Nope... it\'s still tenpai even if there are no copies of your winning tile available.

For instance, if it goes to a ryuukyoku, you can still say \"tenpai\". Thought it\'s not \"tenpai\" in the sense that you can win with it, I guess.

[Senechal]

Robert\'s link points to the explanation given: \"yaku-nashi and keishiki tenpai are accepted, however waiting for a 5th copy of a tile in your hand is excluded.\"

Does having that ankan there count then ?

For one, this was a mid-hand thing. I think the resolution would simply be that the player is no-ten... wait, this is worse than chicken and egg.

[hirohurl]

The way we play in Hiroshima, you wouldn\'t get any points for being \"Tenpai\" at the end of a no-result game because it is impossible for you to finish.

And for going Riichi we might claim a \"Chombo\" penalty... but I need to check that.

[iandstanley]

www.ma-jan.or.jp/guide/game_rule.php

Strangely enough google translate translates Reach as Leach .... it\'s like some bad 1970s comedy :S

[iandstanley]

I\'d agree with this definition.

Tenpai is based upon your remaining tiles ... are you waiting on one tile to go out? It does not take into account already played/discarded tiles

You can even reach by mistake where the only tiles you can go out on are safely discarded. I got caught out by this online whilst learning. It did not occur to me that I would be terminally furiten if I clicked on the now enabled Reachi button

[Ruro]

yea tenpai is the stat when you need only 1 tile to win, and even if you are furiten for it you are in tenpai and you can reach too (that is the furiten riichi), you can reach when there are none of your winning tiles left (all 4 in the pond) that is called kara-ten riichi if i remember correctly. Actually these two type of riichis mentioned above are the biggest bluffs in reach mahjong :)

[Senechal]

This isn\'t kara-ten by definition because the player is the one holding all 4 copies with the closed kan, thus the confusion. If they were spent in any other arrangement, it would (say closed copy straight 55677, the other 3 can be burnt elsewhere), that is kara-ten.

[Poochy]

I\'ve actually encountered a similar situation on Mahjong Fight Club, when I had a 1199 shanpon wait, but the other two of each tile had already been discarded, making it impossible for me to complete my hand. The game still told me I was tenpai (albeit with two warnings, one for each tile that was already gone), and if I remember correctly, the hand ended in a draw and my hand counted as tenpai.

As far as I know, the \"standard\" rule is that even if you\'d need a 5th copy of a tile to complete your hand because of copies of the tile already revealed, it still counts as tenpai, though table rules may vary.

This does raise another question, though: If you had 77888899, does the 8 count as a wait?

[Robert]

There is a difference between waiting on a tile that has already been discarded and waiting on a tile that does not exist in the set of tiles you are playing with (as we all know, a standard mahjong set includes only 4 of each tile).

[Shirluban]

A dead wait, i.e. when all exemplars of you winning tiles are already out, is ok.
If you have and all 6 and 9 bamboos are already discarded or used in melded sets, you are tenpai.

BUT

A hand who needs 5 exemplars of a tile is not ok.
If you have {kong } you are noten.
This kind of hand is not "waiting". The proof: if you add a , completing your last set, you will have :
{kong }
This is NOT a valid hand. Nobody can claim a win with a hand which include more tiles than it exist!

It's like having 5 aces in a poker hand!

[Poochy]

Well, I think I found at least one \"official\" answer to this. I was just playing Fight Club and had the following hand:
Pon: Chi: Pon:

The game declared me as tenpai waiting for with a warning that there were no left. It was the exact same warning as the one I would see if all four had already been discarded.

[Robert]

My guess is, the JPML does not use the JPML rules!!

[Poochy]

And upon further investigation, I found a clarification on the official MFC website: Under Fight Club rules, a wait that would require a 5th copy of a tile counts as tenpai, BUT if all four copies of all the tiles in your wait have been revealed or are in your hand, you are not allowed to Reach on such a wait.

My interpretation of this is: If you have 6789999 and opponents have already pon\'d the 6, you are still tenpai in the event of a draw, but you can\'t Reach on that wait.

(Edit: By the way, Fight Club rules are completely different from JPML rules. Fight Club does have \"Contest Rules\" that are heavily based on JPML A-Rules, but my previous example occurred while playing under default Fight Club rules.)