How to play
How to play Outlaw Mahjong
Outlaw Mahjong is played with the 108 number tiles of Chinese mahjong, but you don't need to know mahjong to start. Each turn you play up to 6 tiles, the best hand among them scores at once, and Water Margin heroes on your flower rack bend the rules in your favour. Beat the score targets of eight antes to win the run.
A run in four steps
Play tiles
Pick 1 to 6 tiles from your hand and play them. The game finds the best hand among them and scores it immediately. Tiles that are not part of that hand are still played, but they add nothing.
Swap tiles
Throw away tiles you don't want and draw new ones from the wall. Plays and swaps are both limited each blind, so every swap is a choice.
Beat the blind
Every ante has a small blind, a big blind and a boss blind. Reach the target score before your plays run out. Bosses are corrupt officials who add a rule, such as weakening a whole suit. Clear the boss of the eighth ante to win.
Shop and recruit
Between blinds you spend coins in the shop: recruit heroes for the flower rack, buy formations that level up a hand, and silk-bag tricks that change your tiles.
How scoring works: chips × mult
Each hand starts with base chips and mult. Every scoring tile adds its number (1 to 9) to the chips, then its enhancements, then any hero that reacts to it. Tiles still in your hand and heroes that boost the whole play come next, and the score is chips × mult. Heroes trigger from left to right, so a +Mult hero placed before a ×Mult hero is worth more.
Mahjong hand table
All 9 hands, taken straight from the game's rules. Values are for level 1; every formation you use raises one hand by a level. Rarer hands are worth more.
The building blocks
Every hand is made of these. A meld (元) is a chow or a pung, and the two count the same; a pair is also called the eyes (将).
Chow
Three in a row, one suit.
Pung
Three identical tiles.
Pair
Two identical tiles.
High Tile
散张1-tile handOnly the highest-ranked tile scores.
5 Chips1 Mult
Per level: +10 chips, +1 mult
Pair
对子2-tile handTwo identical tiles.
10 Chips2 Mult
Per level: +15 chips, +1 mult
Meld
一元3-tile handOne meld: a chow (three in a row, one suit) or a pung (three identical tiles).
20 Chips2 Mult
Per level: +15 chips, +1 mult
Two Pairs
两对4-tile handTwo different pairs.
25 Chips2 Mult
Per level: +20 chips, +1 mult
Meld + Pair
一元带将5-tile handA meld plus a pair that shares no tile with it.
35 Chips3 Mult
Per level: +25 chips, +2 mult
Three Pairs
三对6-tile handThree different pairs.
85 Chips3 Mult
Per level: +30 chips, +2 mult
Two Melds
两元6-tile handTwo melds that share no tile: chow + chow, chow + pung or pung + pung.
60 Chips5 Mult
Per level: +35 chips, +3 mult
Kong
杠4-tile handFour identical tiles.
100 Chips8 Mult
Per level: +50 chips, +3 mult
Five of a Kind
五同5-tile handHiddenFive identical tiles (only possible with a copying trick).
140 Chips12 Mult
Per level: +50 chips, +4 mult
Hidden hands stay off the in-game table until you first play one.
Pure: one suit for +4 mult
Two Pairs, Meld + Pair, Three Pairs or Two Melds all in one suit: +4 Mult.
Pure is not a hand of its own, so levelling Two Melds also levels Pure Two Melds. Pair, Meld, Kong and Five of a Kind are one suit anyway and never count as Pure.
Pure Two Pairs
25 Chips6 Mult
Pure Meld + Pair
35 Chips7 Mult
Pure Three Pairs
85 Chips7 Mult
Pure Two Melds
60 Chips9 Mult
Why there is no plain flush
With only three suits, a hand of thirteen random tiles holds six of one suit about two times in three, so a plain flush would be almost free. Instead one suit is a bonus on a real hand: Two Pairs, Meld + Pair, Three Pairs or Two Melds all in one suit get +4 mult. It is a flat bonus rather than double, because one suit makes pair hands far rarer than meld hands (Three Pairs drops from 26% to 3.3% of hands, Two Melds only from 24% to 7%), and doubling would leave Pure Three Pairs cheaper than the more common Pure Two Melds.
How it differs from Chinese mahjong
Classic Chinese mahjong is a four-player game in which you race to complete a full winning hand. Here you play solo against score targets, and small groups of tiles score the moment you play them. Pairs, chows, pungs and kongs keep their familiar meaning. Honor tiles are not in the deck, and the flower tiles became the heroes.