Mahjong Tiles - All to Know

Mahjong is one of the most popular games played at online casinos, and it's a truly unique one. But what makes Mahjong so captivating? The answer is simple: playing with Mahjong tiles makes it a whole lot more fascinating.

Many players in South Africa might still be unaware of the intricacies of Mahjong Tiles. For them, we've put together this guide so you don't have to worry about it anymore. We'll cover everything we know about Mahjong Tiles. So, let's get started right away without any further delay.

How Many Mahjong Tiles Are There?

The tiles used in Mahjong games can differ slightly depending on the region. While sets from places like the United States or Southeast Asia might include extra tiles such as flowers or Jokers, generally, you'll find at least 136 tiles, most commonly 144. Some sets even come with blank tiles that can be used to replace any that might get broken or lost.

Understanding Mahjong Tile Categories

There are six main categories of Mahjong tiles: Suited Tiles, Red Tiles, Honor Tiles, Flower Tiles, Animal Tiles, and Joker Tiles.

Suited Tiles

Suited tiles, also known as number tiles, feature both a suit and a rank, typically from one to nine. There are three suits associated with money. Each rank and suit combination usually has four tiles, adding up to 108 suited tiles in total (36 tiles per suit). A suited tile is identified by its rank followed by its suit. The tiles representing 'one' and 'nine' in each suit are called the terminal tiles. You can form melds using these suited tiles.

• Circles: The circle suit is represented by a collection of circles. These symbols in the money suit traditionally represent copper coins, known as 'Cash' in English.
• Bamboo: The bamboo suit is depicted by outlines of sticks, except for the '1 Bamboo', which is usually shown as a bird. In Japan, the '1 Bamboo' is sometimes called the sparrow, though it more commonly represents a peacock. Early Mahjong sets sometimes featured a single string of coins with a red knot instead of a bird.
• Characters: This suit uses Chinese characters to represent its symbols.

Red Tiles

Red tiles are a unique feature primarily found in Japanese Mahjong sets. These tiles don't have four duplicates and instead appear as coloured versions of tiles from other suits. The Red 5 tiles were introduced in the 1970s, following the Red 5 Circle. Red 1s and 9s appeared later, though they are less common than the Red 5s. Red 3s and 7s emerged even after that. In some rare cases, a red-white dragon tile can also function as a wild card if specific conditions are met.

• These tiles can be voluntarily excluded from play.
• When a red tile is introduced into the game, one duplicate of its ordinary, non-red counterpart is removed from play.
• Using these tiles strategically can increase your score.
• Since flower tiles are not as commonly used in Japanese Mahjong, these sets often omit the 'Four Gentlemen' flower tiles to make space for the red tiles.

Honor Tiles

Like suited tiles, Honor tiles are also grouped into melds. However, they do not have a rank or suit. They are further divided into two main categories:

Winds

There are four Wind Tiles:

• East
• West
• North
• South

Dragons

There are three types of Dragon Tiles:

• Red: The traditional Chinese character for center or middle is written on a red tile. In sets intended for English speakers, the initial letter of the Wade-Giles may alternatively be represented by a black letter C in a tile corner. These tiles were absent from one of the earlier sets. Red Dragon, a classic Chinese character, may be seen on several tiles.
• Green: Even in sets where the Character tiles are printed in simplified Chinese, green is a tile with a traditional Chinese green character. Other sets, most notably American, substitute a green dragon for the character or an F in black in the tile's corner to indicate the initial letter of the translation. In the first sets, this tile wasn't present. The classic Chinese character Green Dragon may be seen on several tiles.
• White: Although most contemporary sets use tiles with a blue border like White Dragon to differentiate them from replacement tiles, white is a tile that can be without any marks, like White Dragon. A black letter B could also be included in the tile's center in English sets. These unmarked Japanese tiles are sometimes referred to as "tofu" in some Japanese mahjong groups.

Flower Tiles

In mahjong melds, Flower tiles are not utilized. These are put aside after being drawn, and the player then gets to draw again, but from a dead wall. These tiles frequently include stylized images of flowers in a variety of shades. Yet, there are also additional, non-floral motifs that differ from set to set.

Quarters

If a set has flower tiles, it often has two quartets of them, each with a different label's color and design. In ordinary Chinese sets, one quartet will have blue Arabic numbers, and the other group will have red Chinese numerals. Each quartet has four separate tiles that are each numbered from 1 to 4 or clearly labelled.

• Seats are assigned to numbers such as 1 = East, 2 = South, 3 = West, and 4 = North.
• If the number on the flowers equals the seat number, the winner's score is doubled.
• However, there are advantages to gathering a whole quartet, and in certain versions, gathering all the flowers results in a win right away.
• Several games do not include them or view them as optional, since they provide points for purely random events.

Animal Tiles

The player's seat is immediately matched by the animal tile, which is unnumbered flowers. These tiles are typically found in pairs and feature classic Chinese stories as their topics. If two tiles in a pair or all of the animals are gathered, payment is made right away. Thai and Malaysian sets for four players include four pairs of animal tiles, compared to two pairs in Singaporean sets.

Some of them are the following:

• Cat and Mouse
• Rooster and Centipede
• Caishen and Sycee
• Jiang Ziya and Fish
• Liu Haichan and Jin Chan
• Dragon and Flaming pearl

Joker Tiles

Subject to regional limitations, joker tiles can be used to substitute any suited or honor tile while assembling a hand. Certain variations of Southeast Asian and Chinese mahjong, particularly Shanghainese mahjong, occasionally include four jokers. Also, there are eight jokers in American Mahjong.

Common Unique Jokers:

• Circle joker
• Character joker
• Universal joker
• Red jokers
• Suit joker
• Dragon joker
• Wind joker
• Flower joker
• Honor joker

Rank Restricted Jokers:

• Terminal Joker: Replaces one or nine of any suit.
• 147 Joker: Replaces one, four, or seven of any suit.
• 258 Joker: Replaces two, five, or eight of any suit.
• 369 Joker: Replaces three, six, or nine of any suit.

Conclusion

Remembering everything can be a little confusing, but players can just start with the Mahjong Tiles meaning and then move forward. After reading, the players will be able to somewhat understand Mahjong Tiles as they will only be able to understand it fully when they are playing the actual game at top online casinos.

There are six different types of Mahjong Tiles, and all of them are interesting to know about. They have sub-categories, too, so it’s better to learn about them slowly.