Post
by xKime » Thu Nov 22, 2012 10:43 pm
Many of you seem to be using the term "digital" too lightly. There is a third spectrum: "theory." Theory is a fairly neutral faction, and you might alter it depending on your own system or school of thought.
When building your hand, choosing ryanmen waits over penchan waits is fairly normal, and it is a basic theoretical procedure that both, digital and occult players adhere to under neutral conditions. However, sometimes occult players may go off-theory because they "feel" the less attractive wait is going to work better; or digital players may notice an increase in EV because while the wait is only half as good it grants two extra han, that the penchan part is too dangerous to discard against a particular opponent, that the current point difference prevents it, or so on. This is an over-simplification to make this explanation easier to understand; some decisions in-game are not this evident, and you will resort to one of the three factions. Sometimes two of these might overlap.
Sure enough, theory is based on simple logic. Many aspects of digital playing are not as evident until someone researches them for that particular ruleset. But it does not mean that (succesful) occult players ignore logic (and theory) altogether. Tsuchida Koushou is an example of an occult player that actually has got good results. During most of your hand, it is normal to play according to theory and only going astray from it in specific situations; what you do in such situations will characterize your style. However, a winning strategy must be linked to whatever discard you choose.
In other words, discarding random tiles every turn (because you "felt" it was the right choice) is NOT occult either. If that was the case, any beginner player would be called an occult player. It is just atheorical. In other words: baseless, weak play.
Also, simply choosing ryanmen waits over lesser waits do not make you instantly a digital player. Calculating, to the best of your abilites and based on actual statistical data (for THAT ruleset!), EV, Agari %, Houjuu %, Average placement movement value, and such, is the real digital way. Nowadays, this data (and how to calculate it) is available fairly easily, thanks to the many mahjong researchers out there. Mii, HAZ, Totsugeki Touhoku, etc. An even better approach, is researching relevant data yourself! All tenhou logs from the highest level table are publicly available.
Put short: if you make random moves, you are neither digital nor occult, just weak. If you make logical moves, you are just a theory-player. In order to be either, occult or digital, you need a higher level of dedication to your game, which I have yet to see in the playing style of many members around this thread.
As for me, I use theory , which I have adjusted based on the information I collected from valuable sources (researchers like mii, totsugeki and HAZ, and professional or proficient players like Kawamura Akihiro, Kajimoto Takunori and high ranked tenhou players).
I am not lazy enough to call myself occult, nor dedicated enough (or talented enough with numbers) to go fully digital.
Sure, much of this "theory" has a digital background, but that doesn't mean all of it does. I am by no means a "digital" player; I don't calculate anything about my hands. I just find a valid strategy or discard order based on the information I collected, and try my best to apply it, in order to minimize flaws. Like ASAPIN says: look at your hand, the discards, round number and point differences and that will give you the answer to any discard.