It can be so frustrating when you can’t get four people together to play a game, so when a friend came back from Taiwan saying she’d played a two-person game I was interested to learn how.
The night markets of Taipei have many ways of playing two-person mahjong. Players sit opposite each other with just two parallel stacked walls between them. The play is fast and a winner soon declares. In some versions there’s no scoring, you just play to win. In some there’s no honour tiles, only suits. In the version we chose there’s limited scoring and just one suit (usually characters or wan). But as it also has the three dragons and four Winds it creates a play not too dissimilar to Chinese Competition Rules but faster, simpler and almost as much fun. Most importantly, you can play anywhere, with anyone and with no complexity.
So I will set out here how to play this version so you can try it out too. There are many similarities with the rules I usually play, but in case you’re just starting out I will describe each element.
what you need
All the character tiles, 1-9, 4 sets (36 tiles)
All green, red and white dragon tiles, 4 sets (12 tiles)
All East, South, West, North Wind tiles, 4 sets (16 tiles)
2 dice
Setting up
Place all the tiles face down on a table between two players sitting opposite each other. Wash the tiles by moving them around so they sing. Then each player arranges the tiles into two rows of 16, stacking one row on top of the other in front of them.
Both players throw a single die, the highest score is the dealer. The dealer then throws a single die and counts that score across the table, starting with themself. A throw of five, for example will end back at the dealer making the wall in front of them the one to be broken. The second die is then thrown and the total of the two dice determines at what point the wall is broken. In our example if the dealer now throws a six they count 11 tiles in from the dealer’s right. A small gap is made by moving the 11 tiles slightly to the right and the dice are placed on top of that block. This is the replacement wall.
Starting with the dealer tiles are taken from the remaining wall, four at a time, in turn until the players have 12 tiles each. The dealer then takes two more tiles and their opponent takes just one tile. At this point the dealer has 14 tiles and the other player has 13. Each player looks at their tiles and the dealer discards one of their choice, placing it face up in the centre to start the game.
The aim of the game
Players use their tiles to make four sets of three and a pair. Each set can be either a set of identical character or honour tiles (pung) or a run or series of the character tiles (chow). The pair can be any two identical tiles. It is possible to have a set of four identical tiles (kong) in which case the player declares it (puts it out on the table in front of them) and takes a tile from the replacement wall. Each player takes a turn and play continues until one player wins (hu) or all the tiles from the wall have been taken and neither player has won.
How to play
As each player has a turn they choose either to pick up the other players discarded tile or to take the next concealed tile from the wall. A player can only take a discarded tile if they already have two of the three tiles necessary to make a set. If they do that player takes the two tiles they have and places them face up in front of them before adding the discarded tile to make a set whilst declaring pung or chow. Any discarded tile only remains in play for that one turn. When play moves on it is only the last discarded tile that can be selected, all previous tiles are no longer available.
Scoring
After one player declares hu they reveal all their tiles and they score their hand. There is a base score of 50 and extra points (fan) can be earned from the content of the hand. These extras are added together, multiplied by 100 and this is added to the basic 50 points.
Points scored
1 Fan
Zi Mo. Winning tile is taken from the wall.
Dan Diao. Wins when there is only 1 tile left concealed in the hand.
Bian Zhong. Wins with the single possible edge tile of a chow.
Zhong Zhang. Wins with the middle tile of a chow.
Men Qing. Only the winning tile is a discarded tile, the rest are concealed.
2 fan
6. Ping Hu. Hand has only character tile chows
7. Shuang An Ke. Hand contains 2 pungs that were made without using a discard.
4 fan
8. Bu Qiu Ren. No begging: a hand made with no discarded tiles and Zi Mo.
6 fan
9. Pung Pung Hu. A hand where every set is a pung.
10. Cou Yi Se. Gather together: all the tiles are of one type except for one set.
11. Quan Qiu Ren. All begging hand: every element is made by taking a discarded tile.
8 fan
12. Hai Di Lao Yue. Fishing for the moon: wins with last tile on the wall.
13. He Di Lao Yue. Catch fish in the river: wins with the last discarded tile.
12 fan
14. Greater than 5. A hand where every tile is numbered 6-9
15. Less than 5. A hand where every tile is numbered 1-4.
16 fan
16. 3 Pungs A hand that contains 3 concealed pungs.
24 fan
17. Qing Yi Se. A flush: a hand made only with character tiles.
64 fan
18. Zi Yi Se. All Honours: a hand where every tile is a Wind or Dragon.
19. Si An Ke. 4 Pungs: every set is a concealed pung.
20. Xiao San Yuan. Little 3 Dragons: 2 Dragon pungs plus a pair of Dragons.
21. Xiao Si Xi. Little 4 Winds: 3 Wind pungs and a pair of Winds.
88 fan
22. Da San Yuan. Big 3 Dragons: 3 pungs or kongs of Dragons.
23. Da Si Xi. Big 4 Winds: 4 pungs of Winds.
The fact that this game has a published scoring system sets it apart from the many other variations of two-player mahjong I have come across. If you are happy to just play to win you can try the version that uses all the suits but no winds, dragons or flowers. The terminal tiles, that is the 1 and 9 of each suit are also removed to leave a manageable 84 tiles in play, with 2 walls 21 tiles long, double stacked. The game is set up and is played as above but I’m yet to find a set of scoring rules.
Maybe a trip to Taipei’s night markets is needed. Meanwhile, if you try out these games I’d love to know what you think.
