Coming From Behind

Last edited March 25, 2011.

Coming From Behind by Chris Schumann is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.

In most mahjong variants, many hands are played during each game to determine the winner. Zung Jung is no different. In home games, 16 hands is common. At the World Series of Mahjong, you play for a certain amount of time, and 9 to 12 hands in each match is common.

To win a match, you must be in first place at the end. If you have a comfortable lead, go out as fast as you can. Do not be above going out with nothing. Often you will want to improve your standing, so here's a bit of math to help you decide how big your hand needs to be to do just that.

Zung Jung 3.3 has a standard score (what I call "par") of 25 points. If you go out with 25 points, you get 75 (you always get triple your score), 25 points coming from each other player. That means you've gained 100 points on each of them. So, if you need 100 points or less to climb a place, just divide by four to find out how many points you need.

If the gap is over 100 points, there is a bit more math. Let's say you're 400 points out of first place. If you draw the winning tile yourself, again divide by four: Each player goes down by your score, and you go up by your score tripled. You need 100 points.

If you want to be able to go out on any discard, you need 125 points: You go up by 125*3 or 375, but the leader only goes down by 25 points.

If you go out on a discard of the leader, the other two players pay you 25 points each, leaving a 350-point gap with the leader. If you score 75 points, you get 225 points (75*3), and the discarder pays 175 (75*3-50) points, which is a 400 point swing. Now you could go for one suit only, which is much easier than three consecutive pungs. It's also typical to have a multiple wait with that hand, giving you more chances to catch your target discard a winning tile. To recap:

1. If you need 100 points or less, divide the spread (S) by four. 100/4 = 25.

2. To go out on a discard not from the person you want to gain on, you need (S-25)/3. (400-25)/3 = 125.

3. To go out with a self-drawn win, you again need S/4. 400/4 = 100.

4. To go out on a discard by your target, you only need (S+50)/6. (400+50)/6 = 75.

You can use the formulas backwards too. A 35-point hand from your target's discard gets you (35*6)-50 or a 160 point gain on him.