Mahjong tiles explained
Light Mahjong’s American wall has 152 tiles. The rack names them in the words this table uses — Bam, Crak, Dot, winds, dragons, Flower, and Joker — and the count of each kind is what makes a tile alive or gone.
The three suits
Twenty-seven suited kinds come in fours, 108 tiles. The American rack calls them Bam, Crak, and Dot. Bam is the bamboo suit, Crak is the character suit, and Dot is the circle suit. Each runs from 1 to 9.
A pung of 4 Bam is three 4 Bam tiles, not three tiles that merely share a number. The same number in another suit is a different tile: 4 Bam does not match 4 Crak or 4 Dot. Consecutive numbers matter only when a line on the card asks for them, and even then they are specific ranks in a specific suit, such as 6, 7, and 8 Dot. The number series never wraps. Nine, one, and two is not a run.
Winds and dragons
Four winds — East, South, West, and North — have four copies each, 16 tiles. Three dragons — Red, Green, and White — have four copies each, 12 tiles. The table’s voice sometimes calls the white dragon soap. None of these match a suited tile, and they do not match each other: a Green dragon is not a Red dragon, and East is not South.
Winds here are ordinary tiles in a line, not a seat bonus. Being the East player does not make the East wind in your rack more valuable by itself. Whether you want East winds depends entirely on the line you are building, such as Four winds garden (a flower pair and a pung of each wind, worth 30) or Quiet crossroads (a pair of each wind plus the same number paired in every suit, worth 50, and concealed).
Flowers
Eight tiles are unique pictures: plum, orchid, chrysanthemum, bamboo, spring, summer, autumn, and winter. On the American table every one of them is labeled Flower, because the rules treat them as one group. A flower pair is any two of the eight. A flower pung is any three. There are only eight, so the card never asks for more flowers than the set contains; the largest flower group printed is a kong.
Flowers are not set beside the rack, and they are not worth a point each. If a line wants flowers, those flowers occupy slots in the fourteen tiles like anything else. This is different from solitaire on the same site, where a flower pairs with a flower and a season pairs with a season for removing tiles, and different from Hong Kong play, where flowers are replaced and can add fan.
Jokers
Eight jokers complete the wall: 108 suited tiles, 16 winds, 12 dragons, 8 flowers, and 8 jokers. A joker is not a copy of a specific tile until it sits inside a group of three or more, where it stands for the natural tile that group is made of. In a pair or a single it stands for nothing, so those groups are always natural. You cannot pass a joker, you cannot call a joker someone has discarded, and you can later exchange a real matching tile for a joker that is face up in an exposure.
How many are left
Four is the whole supply of any Bam, Crak, Dot, wind, or dragon. Once you can see four of them — in your rack, in exposures, and in the discard rows — no further copy will arrive. Flowers do not work that way: you are not waiting for “the fourth plum,” because any remaining flower picture matches. Jokers are eight, and exposures show when one of them is tied up representing something else.
| What the rack calls it | How many kinds | Copies | Tiles | Matches |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bam, Crak, and Dot, 1 through 9 | 27 | 4 | 108 | Same suit and same number only |
| East, South, West, North winds | 4 | 4 | 16 | The same wind only |
| Red, Green, and White dragons | 3 | 4 | 12 | The same dragon only |
| Flower | 8 pictures | 1 each | 8 | Any flower with any flower |
| Joker | 1 | 8 | 8 | Stands in for a group of 3 or more |
That is the full 152. If a guide to another mahjong says 144, it is counting the set without jokers, which is what Hong Kong and Riichi use here. American play adds the eight jokers and then treats flowers as tiles inside the hand.
How those tiles move in a hand is how to play mahjong. Which groups you are allowed to call is in the rules. What a finished line pays is scoring.
Questions
How many mahjong tiles are used here?
152. That is four each of 27 suited tiles, four each of four winds, four each of three dragons, eight flowers, and eight jokers.
Do the flower and season pictures match each other?
Yes. Plum, orchid, chrysanthemum, bamboo, spring, summer, autumn, and winter are all named Flower on this American table, and any of them matches any other. They stay in the hand.
Can a joker stand in for a pair?
No. A joker can fill a pung, kong, quint, or sextet only. Pairs and single tiles have to be natural tiles. A joker also cannot be passed in the Charleston.