3-05

Fully Concealed Hand + All Chows combo

As discussed in section 3-03, Fully Concealed Hand and All Chows yield 6 points. Two additional points are needed to complete the hand. What are the best techniques for building the remaining 2 points?

Figure 1

With the tiles shown in Figure 1, you cannot go out even if you pick the winning tile yourself. However, if you pick or , you will be one step toward Mixed Straight. If you do indeed draw or , break your ready hand and discard to shift your hand to gain the needed points.

Furthermore, your hand could end up like the one shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2

By picking the last tile, you will have Fully Concealed Hand (2 pts.) + All Chows (2 pts.) + Mixed Double Chow (2 pts.) + Single Wait (1 pt.) for a total of 8. In order to gain extra points, you must keep an eye out for opportunities to slide chows over to create Short Straights, Mixed Double Chows, and Two Terminal Chows. In Figure 1, gives you Two Terminal Chows and a Mixed Double Chow. Tiles and give you Mixed Double Chows. In summary, there are four tiles that will give you a viable hand. With the tiles in Figure 2, picking and switching to a single wait on a simple tile results in Figure 3.

Figure 3

At this point, you have well over enough points. In fact, you now have earned enough points to go out on an opponent's discard (Concealed Hand (2 pts.) + All Chows (2 pts.) + All Simples (2 pts.) + Mixed Double Chow (1 pt.) + Mixed Double Chow (1 pt.) + Single Wait (1 pt.).

Figure 4

picked

How about Figure 4? If you pick , you may be tempted to discard it in order to preserve your Mixed Triple Chow. However, let's consider this carefully. What happens if you discard and change to a two-chance hand? Tallying up the points, we have Concealed Hand (2 pts.) + All Chows (2 pts.) + All Simples (2 pts.) + Mixed Double Chow (1 pt.) + Short Straight (1 pt.) for a total of 8 points. You sacrifice points, but if you can double the chances of picking the tile by yourself, you should exercise that option.

Figure 5

Figure 5 appears similar to Figure 4, but without a Short Straight the same strategy cannot be employed even if you pick . However, you should bear in mind that if you manage to first pick and later pick , you should follow the above strategy and change to a two-chance hand, realizing that with the extra point, you have enough points to go out with an opponent's discard even without Mixed Triple Chow.

Practice using the above techniques and soon you will find yourself able to increase your chances of finishing intuitively. Each tile can greatly alter the possibilities of your hand. Learn to adjust to the changes, and avoid pinning yourself to a single hand.