Early Game Discards - Riichi Mahjong Strategy

General video about the first few discards of the games, and the order that terminals and honors should be discarded in.

Tile images combined from riichi-mahjong-tiles by FluffyStuff on Github, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

[jimbochoo]

This is great. I've been learning for a few days and I figured out to do pretty much everything you talked about just by thinking about what I'm doing. This video helps me validate what I've been doing.

[jimjimson]

I have been playing for a month or so and had figured out most of this, but the section about the order of discarding guest winds was very interesting. Great video, very informative and concise. Definitely glad to know I'm on the right track!

[alexschalk]

These videos are absoolutely fantastic! Some of the best ones I've found.

[szeltovivarsydroxan]

Whoa, I didn't know you could have a pair of guest wind for Pinfu! I always thought it meant only numbered tiles!

[dxrbkn]

Learning this and the five block rule has made me win a lot more games!

[ChasingForever]

Glad to find your channel. Hope to see more videos like this in the future!

[JongAddict-gnso]

For a non-dealer, getting rid of an isolated East tile is priority. If you delay, the dealer with a single East tile may pair it up by the time you decide to discard. If East already has a pair of Easts and pons, you know to be on the defensive for that hand (sakagiri more often and keep safe tiles for the dealer).

[dramatheurgist]

Nice video!
Keep up your good work.

Would love to see a video on a topic of keeping safe tiles.

[jowilson]

Good video! 1d on tenhou weighing in with my amateurish opinion here haha. Like you said, so much of this is down to style and knowing when to break with the strategies. So I thought I'd share my own.

Personally, I usually find myself cutting the double wind even before terminals, when I'm in a non-round position, but it's purely a gut move based on how many games I've played where the double wind player lucks into the pair draw very early. I'm also more comfortable going for outside hands, so I don't mind the terminals so much.

Also of consideration in my own play is the idea of pretending that you're building a hand that you're not. For instance, I try to look for chances to make it look like I'm going for all simples when I have a yakuhai (discarding isolated terminals and honors for as long as I possibly can even at the expense of shape), or to make it look like I'm building an outside hand when I'm going for tanyao, or for a chance to pretend I don't have honitsu when I do. In the latter two cases, it comes down to looking for isolated tiles to cut from the overall shape, with an eye for the eventual wait I'm creating. Deception is so key to high level play, and there can be a real back and forth of players targeting each other. Information control is paramount once you start climbing.

A mahjong hand is like a bonsai tree that you gradually try to prune into something good, and it's such an art. I just love the game. Anyway thanks for the vid! It's super important to get a handle on this kind of concept, and I'm sure videos like this help a great deal. Not to mention exposing the game to more people!

[Mrtyville]

I am new to playing Japanese Mahjong. I tend to hold on the Winds unless I can get a hand without Terminals for the need of honor tiles since some games I can't manage to get my hands on point scoring dragons, seat wind or round wind.
So I tend to discard tiles that are the least useful in my hand. Like types of which I have 1 or 2 that don't make a pair or sequence. But sometimes if they do, I tend to discard a tile that can add more value but are harder to build like a 8 Sou when I have the following Sou tiles 1, 1, 2, 3, 4 for example.
What Wind I discard usually depends on the discards of my opponents.

[lilwage]

One thing I adopt is, if I have a 1 and a 4 - or a 9 and 6 - of any suit in my hand, I make that 1 or 9 my priority discard above all others if I'm not going for chanta. Reason being that 1s and 9s only ever make runs that the 4s and 6s all would also benefit from, so those central tiles would be stealing from the edge tiles

[felixandersen]

I just got into mahjong, it's a difficult game imo but a lot of fun if you get it right. I guess remembering the different yakus is what I need to practice at the most. Great video btw, I'll be sure to implement it in my games!

Also, have you ever considered voice acting as an argonian in skyblivion? 😂
That is by no means an insult, you have a nice, slightly raspy voice 👍

[ronlevenbaum]

Would appreciate clearer annunciation.

[robertbroniarczyk]

Late but i feel like an important note is that in many rule sets each player discarding the same wind on the first turn can restart the hand right away as such if you have a great starting hand think twice about discarding a wind

[verix]

I already put all of these into consideration, yet I still suck😭😭

[OlgaZuccati]

You discard chun first and haku last because of cream flow.

[JustKiddingNYC]

Could you please share the PowerPoint that you used here? Great video!

[TenrousaAthena]

This is a useful video but your voice is a little hard to hear

Imagine if someone declares Riichi on 1st turn. What you can do to avoid dealing in to that player, especially early in the game?

[mr.horseshoe]

I think honor tiles and winds are gross. I always purge them unless there’s a honitsu chance.