Mahjong rules at the American table
These are the mahjong rules Light Mahjong enforces on its American table. They describe this game’s original hand card, not a yearly card from a publisher, and not the Hong Kong or Riichi tables in the same lobby.
The object
Be the first to hold one complete line from the Light Mahjong Card 2025 and declare Mah Jongg. A line names every group in the hand and prints a point value. Groups are a single, a pair, a pung (three), a kong (four), a quint (five), or a sextet (six). Matching the shape of a different game — four melds and a pair, a yaku, three fan — does not win this table.
The card is original to Light Mahjong. It is not an NMJL annual card and it does not reproduce one. Open Card during play to see the lines at full size. Follow this hand keeps the line you chose next to the rack.
Seats, walls, and the deal
Four seats play. Dice name East on the first hand. Each player’s wall is 38 face-down tiles, 152 in all. East breaks the wall with a roll, and the deal begins at that break. At the usual pace the table builds the walls and deals for you. Manual setup, under the table’s pace controls, is there when you want to stack the wall yourself.
The deal is three rounds of four tiles to each player. East then takes two more tiles, and each other player takes one. East has 14 tiles and will discard one before drawing. The other hands have 13 and will draw when play reaches them. After the hand, East passes to the right for the next deal. The winner does not keep East. Scores are not reset.
Charleston and courtesy
Passing happens before the first discard. The first Charleston is three tiles to the right, three across, and three to the left. Players then vote on doing it again. A single “no” cancels the second Charleston immediately; the table does not wait for every remaining vote. Unanimous agreement runs a second Charleston left, across, then right.
Jokers cannot travel in any pass. On the last pass of the first Charleston (the leftward one) and the last pass of the second (the rightward one), a player may blind-pass: contribute fewer than three tiles from the rack, with the shortfall forwarded from the tiles just received. The contributed tiles plus the blind tiles still total three. If all four players blind-pass three, nothing is exchanged on that pass and the ceremony ends: East discards, and a courtesy pass that has not happened yet does not happen.
The courtesy pass follows. Each player offers zero, one, two, or three tiles to the player across. The two players across from each other exchange only as many tiles as the smaller offer. You may offer nothing. Jokers still cannot be offered.
Draws, discards, and calls
East’s first action is a discard from the 14 tiles dealt. Every later turn, moving to the right, is one draw from the wall and one discard. Nobody is put on a clock.
After a discard, the other three players answer. They may pass, call the tile into an exposed group, or declare Mah Jongg when the tile completes a line. Mah Jongg takes priority over every exposure. Between two exposure calls, the seat nearer to the discarder in turn order — right, then across, then left — receives the tile.
An exposure has to be a pung, kong, quint, or sextet, it has to include the discarded tile, and the card has to still contain a line that can use that group along with groups the caller has already exposed. A joker may be part of that exposure. A discarded joker itself cannot be called, even if it would have finished a hand. There is no chow.
The caller then discards, and play continues to their right. Players skipped by the call lose that turn. No replacement tile is drawn for a kong, quint, or sextet. Adding one would change the size of the hand, and this table does not do it.
Until the caller discards or exchanges a joker, they may adjust the group they just exposed — for example, grow a pung into a kong using tiles still in the rack — as long as the called tile stays in the group and the card still allows the result.
Jokers
Eight jokers are in the set. A joker stands for any tile inside a group of three or more. It cannot be used in a pair or a single, so a line made only of pairs never contains one. Jokers stay out of the Charleston and the courtesy pass.
On your turn, you may exchange a matching natural tile from your rack for a joker in any exposed group on the table. The group has to contain a real copy of that tile, not a stack of jokers with nothing to name them. Redeeming a joker from another player’s exposure can complete your hand, and that completion is paid as a self-pick. Redeeming a joker from your own exposure only rearranges tiles you already held; if that hand was finished by a called discard, the discarder still pays the discard rate.
Concealed lines and a draw
Quiet path, Three-suit pairs, Quiet crossroads, and Dragon thread are concealed. You may not have an exposed group and still declare one of them. You may declare Mah Jongg on the discard that completes a concealed line; that declaration does not leave an exposure behind, because the hand is over.
If a player needs to draw and the wall is empty, the hand ends with no winner. Payments are zero. Nothing is set aside as a dead wall before that last tile.
The tile pictures and the copy counts are in mahjong tiles explained. Worked payments are in mahjong scoring. The same sequence, told as a first game rather than a rule list, is how to play mahjong.
Questions
Can I call a discard to make a sequence?
No. A call has to complete a pung, kong, quint, or sextet that fits a line on the card. Consecutive numbers are collected in the rack. If the only button you see is Pass, the discard is not a legal claim for you.
Does East pay more just for being East?
No. Payment depends on how the hand was won. The player who discards the winning tile pays double the value in use, and the other two players pay that value once. On a self-pick, each of the other three pays double. East is not charged an extra share for the seat alone.
Are flowers removed from the hand for points?
No. Flowers stay in the rack and are used as tiles inside a line, usually as a pair, pung, kong, or single. Any flower matches any other flower. They do not add a separate score by sitting beside the rack.