Simple Three Player Mahjong

[Mauro]

On Jenn's book, she describes what she calls "Simple Three Player Mahjong", but there are some things missing (or that I don't understand), so I was wondering how that's supposed to work:

- 1 to 8 of characters are removed; how should players build the wall? In the "Original Three Player Game", which also removes 2-8 characters, she says "Walls will be 14 or 15 tiles long (with two tiers)", but I'm not sure if the same works for the simple ruleset, and if so how the wall should be built, since that would be 27 tiles per player, which doesn't work for two tiers, no matter how many tiles in each stack;; should players do 26-28-26-28 walls, or three walls 26 tiles each?

- if four walls are build, what about the dice? Should the missing player be counted while seeing where to break the wall, or should that place be skipped?

- should players use one die, as with the "Original Three Player Game" ruleset which uses the same tiles; or still use two? I'd guess two, since nothing is said, but then again nothing is said about how to build the wall, where some change is needed.

- payments are split equally in caso of tsumo; what about payments that can't be split, like 2900 total (which gives 1450 each, but there is no 50 points stick); should players round up, down, or introduce a 50 points stick?

[Mauro]

Another missing rule: when there is a draw, on tenpai players pays 3000 point s to tenpai players; is this kept, it's reduced to 2000, or is missing altogether?

[Mauro]

Two more:

- honba are 300 points each, in three players that could mean each player has to pay 150 points; should honba be reduced to 200?

- on a tsumo win, the loss is split equally; is this calculated as four players, or as three? For example, 1300 / 2600, in four players that means 5200: is this to be split, or 3900? On this I guess 5200, since the book just says the payment is split, and this would solve the 50 points issue I asked about before.

[Barticle]

Hi Mauro. Certainly these simple rules seem to be missing some crucial details; perhaps the implication is that a basic version of mahjong (for beginners) could omit some normal rules like Honba points and Noten Bappu (otherwise 2000 pts seems sensible for that). With the 2-8 Craks removed, the 108 tiles remaining divide neatly into three walls (18x2) and the roll of two dice can be counted in threes around them. Odd amounts are often rounded up in three-player games, not just to the next hundred but to the next thousand.

I would take inspiration from other sources for Sanma rules, make my own decisions on adapting them, then playtest to see what feels fair/fun. For Tsumo wins you can ignore the payment for the missing north player, or ignore it but add 1000 pts each to both Tsumo payments, or split it equally between the two payers. Optionally 5-Craks tiles can be included too or you can use three each of all tiles instead of four (no kongs). North tiles can be treated as flowers, or always Yakuhai or always guest-winds (never Yakuhai). The starting scores can be increased (e.g. 35k pts) and the points for seven pairs reduced. Chii calls are usually disallowed but could be permitted. With Uma, the adjustment for 2nd place could be negative, zero or positive. Some three-player rules have alternate scoring where you just earn points (like Han) based on your Yaku/Dora with no further calculation.

[Mauro]

Thanks. How do flowers work?

[Mauro]

After a bit of googling, flowers work like nukidora?

[Barticle]

Yes - just declared, removed and replaced, then scored as a bonus.
However, unlike flowers, you can also use north tiles as part of your hand instead.
(With a higher proportion of terminals and honours in play, it would be a shame not to be able to make Kokushi!)

You can flip the fifth tile instead of the third as the initial Dora indicator to allow four additional replacements.

Yup, Nukidora is a common term in three-player.
You can declare "Kita" (the normal Japanese non-mahjong word for ''north'') and score as 1 Han.

[Mauro]

You can flip the fifth tile instead of the third as the initial Dora indicator to allow four additional replacements

What about the kandora? With the indicator as fifth tile, there would be just tiles for two of them, are kandora limited to two with this rule?

[Barticle]

There's another rules decision for you - either build a dead wall of nine stacks (with the initial Dora indicator neatly situated in the central stack) or have the usual seven stacks and just rely on replenishing the dead wall from the back end of the live wall after each kong draw (after two kongs declared you've added one stack for the third Kandora indicator and after two more you've got the fourth). Alternatively when playing with Nukidora you could choose to take their replacements from the live wall instead.

This would not be an issue if you remove one of every tile instead of removing the 2-8 tiles of one suit!