Beginner's Guide to Huangyan Reckoning Mahjong

Huangyan Reckoning Mahjong (Huángyán Májiàng 黄岩麻将) is a four-player tile game from Huangyan District in Taizhou, on the coast of Zhejiang Province, where huángyán literally means "yellow cliff" for the ochre rock along the local coastline. It has two signature features that set it apart from most other variants. First, every hand ends in a full four-way settlement: the winner collects from the losers, and the three losers also pay each other based on the quality of hand each one built. Second, the closing stretch of every hand is a danger zone. Once the wall thins out, one careless discard can make a single player pay everyone's losses alone. Those two ideas, the four-way reckoning and the endgame cliff, are what the English name "Reckoning" is trying to capture.

Tiles to Play Huangyan Reckoning Mahjong With

You need one standard 136-tile mahjong set. The tiles break down into three numbered suits (Dots, Bamboo, Characters), each running 1 through 9 with four copies of each rank, for 108 suit tiles. On top of that you get 28 honor tiles: four copies each of the four Winds (East, South, West, North), plus four copies each of the three Dragons (Red, Green, White). Huangyan Reckoning uses no Flower or Season tiles, so if your set includes them, set them aside before you shuffle. Tiles numbered 1 or 9 in any suit, along with all Winds and Dragons, are called terminal and honor tiles, and they score extra points when you use them in Pongs or Kongs.

Basic Rules of Huangyan Reckoning Mahjong

Every turn runs through the same short loop:

1. The active player draws one tile from the wall.
2. The active player discards one tile face up into the center.
3. Other players have a brief window to claim that discard.
4. If no one claims, the turn passes to the next player, who draws.

Play moves counterclockwise when viewed from above the table, so the turn always passes to the player seated on your right after you discard. When a tile hits the center, the other three players get a split-second window to call for it, and claims must be announced immediately. If you hesitate until the next player draws, the discard is gone. Win beats all claims; Pong and Kong beat Chow. Only the player seated immediately to the discarder's right can call Chow, since that player's turn comes next anyway. If two players could win from the same discard, the closest one in turn order takes priority: first the discarder's right-hand neighbor, then the player across from the discarder, then the player to the discarder's left.

How to Setup Huangyan Reckoning Mahjong

Determining The Dealer

At the start of every match, all four players roll two dice in turn. Whoever rolls highest takes the dealer seat and plays as East. The second-highest roll takes South, seated on East's right. The third-highest takes West, across from East. The lowest takes North, seated on East's left. If two players tie, whoever rolled first wins the tiebreak. The dealer keeps the seat as long as they win the hand; on any hand where the dealer doesn't win, the dealer rotates to the player on the old dealer's right.

Setting Up The Wall

Shuffle all 136 tiles face down in the middle of the table. Each player pulls tiles toward themselves and builds a wall segment 17 tiles long and two tiles high, so each segment holds 34 tiles. Push the four segments together into a closed square of four 34-tile walls. The total wall holds all 136 tiles.

The Dead Wall (Yellow Cliff)

The last 16 tiles of the wall, counting backward from the tile that would be drawn last, are reserved as the Dead Wall. These 16 tiles are never drawn during normal turn-order play, and the hand ends the moment the live wall runs out and the Dead Wall would be the next draw. Huangyan players affectionately nickname the Dead Wall the Yellow Cliff (huángyán 黄岩), after the district the game comes from, because reaching it is where every hand can fall off the edge. The Dead Wall does have one job during play: Kong replacement draws come from it. When a player declares any Kong, the replacement tile is pulled from the Dead Wall end of the wall. Nothing is added back to the Dead Wall to compensate, so each Kong shrinks the Dead Wall by one tile (down from 16). Kong replacements do not count against the live wall's tile count either, which matters for the Live Tile Stage threshold below.

Breaking The Wall

Say you're the dealer and you roll a 7 on two dice. Count yourself as 1, your right as 2, across as 3, left as 4, then repeat (you're 5, right is 6, across is 7). A roll of 7 lands on the player across from you, so their wall segment is the one to break. Take that same total (7) and count 7 stacks into that player's wall from the right end of their segment, moving left. Break the wall between the 7th and 8th stacks. Dealing begins from the right side of the break.

Dealing The Hand

Tiles go out in three rounds of four, plus a final single tile. In the first round, the dealer takes four tiles from the break (two from the top of two adjacent stacks), then the player on the dealer's right takes four, then the player across takes four, then the player on the dealer's left takes four. Repeat this cycle for rounds two and three. At that point each player holds twelve tiles. For the final round, each player takes one more tile in turn, and the dealer takes one extra after that, finishing with 14 tiles in the dealer's hand and 13 in everyone else's. The dealer then discards one tile face up to start play, returning their hand to 13. From there on, every player's hand sits at 13 tiles whenever the turn is on someone else, and briefly climbs to 14 during their own draw before the next discard.

Placing Your Ante

Each player begins the session with a personal reserve of 60 points. A full session is three matches, and at the start of every match each player puts 20 points from their reserve onto the table in front of themselves as their table ante. That 20-point stack is the chips in play for the match. Every payment during the match flows in and out of it. If anyone's stack reaches zero, the match ends on the spot, everyone re-rolls dice for new seats, and the next match begins with a fresh 20-point ante from each player's reserve. Three matches at 20 each is why the starting reserve is set at 60.

Getting a Tile

Calling Tiles

Which claim you can make depends on your hand and your seat relative to the discarder.

Pong means claiming a discard to form a set of three identical tiles. You must already hold the other two in your hand. Any player can Pong any discard regardless of seat. Say "Pong," flip your two matching tiles face up alongside the claimed tile in front of you, then discard one tile from your hand. Play resumes from your seat.

Kong means holding four identical tiles as a single group, and Huangyan Reckoning recognizes three ways to build one. An Open Kong is built by claiming a discard when you already hold three matching tiles in hand; call "Kong," flip all four face up in front of you, then draw one replacement tile from the end of the live wall before discarding. A Concealed Kong is built from four tiles you drew yourself. Declare it on your turn, place all four face down in front of you to signal the Kong without revealing its identity, then draw a replacement and discard. An Added Kong is built by adding a fourth tile to a Pong already on the table, using a matching tile you hold or just drew; you must be on your own turn to declare it, and once declared, you draw a replacement and discard. Whenever you declare any Open Kong or Added Kong, before you take the replacement draw, any opponent who could win from that specific Kong tile gets one brief window to call Robbing the Kong. If they do, they win on the Kong tile itself and your Kong fails. A Concealed Kong cannot be robbed, since no one sees what it's built from.

Chow means claiming a discard to form a run of three consecutive tiles in the same suit (for example, 4, 5, and 6 of Dots). Only the player seated immediately to the discarder's right can call Chow, since that player's turn comes next. Say "Chow," flip the claimed tile along with the two matching tiles from your hand face up, and then discard.

Win (also called Hu) means declaring victory on a tile. You can win by drawing the final tile yourself (a Self-Draw) or by claiming any player's discard. Win beats every other claim. Announce "Hu" the moment the tile hits the table and reveal your full hand for scoring. One detail worth flagging: you can claim a discard to complete your final pair only when that pair finishes a full winning hand. You cannot claim a discard just to build a pair mid-game.

Arranging Your Tiles

Keep your 13 concealed tiles face down in front of you, sorted however helps you think (most players group by suit and rank). Tiles you've claimed for Pongs, Open Kongs, Added Kongs, or Chows sit face up in a separate row next to your concealed hand, and they're locked in place for the rest of the round. A Concealed Kong is declared face down so opponents know the Kong exists but cannot see which tile it's built from.

Discarding a Tile

After drawing (or claiming and resolving a call), discard one tile face up into the center of the table. Shed tiles that don't help your hand while avoiding the tile that would finish an opponent's hand. The balance sharpens as the wall shrinks. Huangyan Reckoning has no Sacred Discard rule, so you are free to throw tiles that a previous player has thrown, and you can arrange your own discard pile however you like. There is no obligation to keep rows tidy.

Reaching the Edge of the Cliff (Live Tile Stage)

Huangyan Reckoning takes its identity from what happens in the last stretch of the wall. Once the wall has been drawn down to the point where only 30 tiles remain (counting the 16 tiles of the Dead Wall as part of that 30), the hand enters the Live Tile Stage. This is the point where discard decisions stop being about shaping your own hand and start being about not blowing up your table stack.

What is it? The Edge of the Cliff (Live Tile Stage) is the final window of play before the Dead Wall (Yellow Cliff) draws the hand to a close. It is the stretch where a special penalty applies to discarding certain tiles, and where the word Live becomes literal: a Live Tile (shēngpái 生牌) is any tile that no player has discarded yet during the current hand. Once a tile has been thrown even once, or has been claimed for a Pong or Chow off someone else's discard, it stops being Live for the rest of the hand.

When does it begin and end? It begins the instant the total tile count (including the 16 Dead Wall tiles) drops to 30 remaining. It ends either when a player declares Hu, or when the live wall is fully drawn and the Dead Wall is reached, whichever comes first. Kong replacement draws come from the Dead Wall and do not count against the live wall's tile count, so declaring a Kong during the Live Tile Stage does not pull the hand closer to the cliff.

Where does the danger come from? From your own discards, not from anyone else's. During the Live Tile Stage, if you throw a Live Tile and an opponent wins on it, you are solely responsible for the entire payout during the "reckoning" / payment phase. Throwing a tile that has already been discarded or claimed earlier is always safe under this rule.

Who enforces it? Everyone at the table. When play reaches 30 tiles remaining, one of the players should announce "Live Tile Stage" so no one discards blindly. From that point, every player watches the discard area carefully before throwing.

Why does it exist? Huangyan Reckoning is a discipline game. The rule rewards players who track what has been discarded and punishes players who stop paying attention once their own hand gets desperate. It is the reason the variant carries the nickname Reckoning: the back end of the wall reckons with everyone at the table, and especially with the careless.

How do you survive it? By discarding only tiles that have already been discarded or claimed from the moment the stage begins. If your hand holds no such tile to safely discard, you can declare a Concealed Kong to draw fresh from the Dead Wall, hold for a Self-Draw win, or accept the risk with eyes open.

Live Tile Liability Penalty (diǎnpào 点炮)

When a player discards a Live Tile during the Live Tile Stage and an opponent wins on that discard, the discarder triggers the Live Tile Liability Penalty (diǎnpào 点炮). The discarder takes on full responsibility for every chip that moves this round. Here is exactly what that means, step by step.

First, the liable player's own score for the hand locks at zero. Any pongs, kongs, honor pairs, or doubles they had built up count for nothing.

Second, the liable player pays the winner's full collection alone. Normally three losers each contribute to the winner's payout. Under the Liability Penalty, the other two losers pay nothing to the winner, and the liable player covers the winner's entire collection by themselves.

Third, the liable player also pays all of the non-winner settlements that the reckoning would produce. Normally, after the winner collects, the three losers settle with each other based on the quality of their own hands (see the Scoring section). Under the Liability Penalty, those non-winner settlements still get calculated as if nothing happened, but the liable player pays every single one of them out of their own stack. The other two losers neither pay nor receive.

In short, the Liability Penalty turns a four-player settlement into a one-player settlement. The discarder absorbs what would have been three separate losers' losses and three separate losers' payments to each other. One bad discard during the Live Tile Stage can empty a 20-point ante in a single hand.

Exception: If your hand consists of only Live Tiles at the time of discard, this does not trigger Liability (diǎnpào 点炮).

Winning in Huangyan Reckoning Mahjong

A winning hand is 14 tiles arranged as one pair (your "eyes") plus four other groups. Each of those four groups is a Pong, a Kong, or a Chow. You win by either drawing the 14th tile yourself (a Self-Draw win) or by claiming another player's discard (a Claimed Win, also called Hu).

End of Hand

A hand ends the moment one of three things happens. The first is a declared win: a player announces Hu, reveals their 14 tiles, and the hand stops immediately. The second is a Yellow Cliff Draw, which happens when the live wall is drawn down to the Dead Wall and nobody has declared Hu. On a Yellow Cliff draw, no one pays anyone for the hand, the reckoning is skipped, and the dealer loses the seat regardless of who was sitting. The third is the Liability penalty resolving, which is itself a special form of declared win where the liable discarder pays everything alone.

On a declared win, the table then moves through the reckoning in a fixed order. Every player reveals their tiles (winner first, then the three losers). Each player's base points and doubles are tallied using the scoring tables below. The winner's collection is paid first, followed by the three non-winner pair settlements. Table stacks are updated. Any player whose stack has reached zero triggers the end of the current match, which means the current hand was also the last hand of that match. If no one has busted, the dealer either keeps the seat (when the dealer won) or rotates to the player on the old dealer's right (when anyone else won, or when the hand ended as a Yellow Cliff). Then the next hand deals.

End of Game

A game consists of three matches. A match ends when any player's table stack hits zero, at which point everyone re-rolls for seats and re-antes 20 points from their reserve for the next match. When the third match ends, the session is over. At session end, each player's remaining points (whatever they still have on the table plus whatever was never anted out of their reserve) are their final session score.

Points and Payout in Huangyan Reckoning Mahjong

Initial Points

Each player starts the session with 60 points in their personal reserve, enough to ante 20 in each of three matches. At the start of every match, each player moves exactly 20 from their reserve to their table stack, which brings the total chips in play for that match to 80 points (20 from each of the four players). The match continues, hand after hand, until any player's table stack reaches zero or would drop below zero, at which point the match ends immediately. No player ever draws from their personal reserve mid-match to cover losses. A stack can empty, but it can never go negative and it can never be refilled from reserve except at the start of the next match. This means each match is capped at 80 points moving around the table, and a losing player's loss for the match is capped at the 20 they anted in.

Winning Hand Payout Formula

Huangyan Reckoning calculates every player's score at the end of every hand, not just the winner's. Two formulas do all the work. They look the same, but the inputs are different.

Winner's score (completed hand):

Winner Total = (Winner Base Points) × 2^(Winner Doubles)

The winner tallies every base-point item and every double on their completed 14-tile hand, sums the base points, then doubles that sum once for each double earned.

Non-winner's score (partial hand):

Non-Winner Total = (Non-Winner Base Points) × 2^(Non-Winner Doubles)

Each losing player tallies every base-point item and every double that is already present in whatever pieces of a hand they managed to build before the hand ended. An unfinished hand can still score base points for honor pairs, concealed triplets, open triplets, quads of any kind, and certain doubles (like Half Flush). The non-winner who built the most structure before play stopped ends up with the highest non-winner score, which matters in the next step.

Scoring Opportunities

All players can score the structural elements in their hand for base points, and sometimes for multipliers, based on the types of pairs, triplets, and quads they have built. Winners can additionally score for the type of wait they won off of, and for whether the winning draw met a special condition. Even a non-winner with a Half Flush and a couple of Terminal Triplets often outscores a messier non-winner by a wide margin, which drives the second wave of payments below.

These are the named shapes and situations that only count for a winning hand, because they describe how the winning tile completed the hand:

• Single Hook (Single Wait) means your final group is the pair itself, so you were waiting on one specific tile to complete your eyes.
• Middle Hook (Middle Wait) means your final group is a sequence and you needed the middle tile of it (the 5 in a 4-5-6, for example).
• Side Hook (Edge Wait) means your final sequence is 1-2-3 or 7-8-9 and you needed the 3 or the 7.
• Kong Draw means you declared a Kong and the replacement tile you drew finished your hand on the spot.
• Robbing the Kong means you won on the exact tile an opponent tried to add to an existing Pong to make an Added Kong.
• Fisherman's Win means you Self-Drew the very last legal tile from the live wall before the Yellow Cliff ended the hand. It is called a Fisherman's Win because the original Chinese (海底捞月) means "fishing the moon from the bottom of the sea."

Who Pays Whom

Once every player has a score, payments happen in two waves.

Wave one: the winner collects. If the dealer wins the hand, each of the three non-dealers pays the dealer the winner's full score. If a non-dealer wins the hand, the dealer pays the full winner's score and the other two non-dealers each pay half the winner's score. The winner's side is now resolved.

Wave two: every pair of non-winners settles with each other. This is the part first-time readers usually trip over, so read it twice. The three non-winners form three pairs (A-B, A-C, B-C). Every one of those three pairs settles independently based on the difference between the two players' non-winner scores. The lower-scoring player pays the higher-scoring player the difference, divided by 2 if both of them are non-dealers, or divided by 1 (no division) if one of them is the dealer. That means every non-winner both pays and receives in the same hand, depending on who built more.

Put another way: if East (dealer) wins and West scored 10 as a non-winner, South scored 4, and North scored 6, then in wave two West receives from both South and North because West built more than either, and North receives from South because North built more than South. Three pair-wise transactions happen, independent of what the winner collected in wave one. Nobody gets skipped.

Full worked example. East (dealer) wins with a 20-point hand. The three non-winners tally their own: South scores 28, West scores 6, North scores 12.

• Wave one (winner collects): South, West, and North each pay East 20 points. East receives 60 total.
• Wave two (non-winner pairs settle, all three are non-dealers, so every difference divides by 2):
  • South vs. West: difference 22, divided by 2 = 11. West pays South 11.
  • South vs. North: difference 16, divided by 2 = 8. North pays South 8.
  • West vs. North: difference 6, divided by 2 = 3. West pays North 3.

Four payments total in one hand, one to the winner and three between players. South finishes the hand up (28 - 20 + 11 + 8) = +27 before East's 60-point collection is subtracted on East's side, West finishes down (- 20 - 11 - 3) = -34, North finishes down (- 20 + 3 - 8) = -25, and East finishes up +60. The numbers balance.

Second example with a non-dealer winner. North wins with a 12-point hand. East (dealer) scores 20 as a non-winner, South scores 28, West scores 6.

• Wave one (winner collects): East (dealer) pays North 12, South pays North 12/2 = 6, West pays North 12/2 = 6. North receives 24 total.
• Wave two (non-winner pairs settle; two pairs include the dealer, so those differences divide by 1):
  • East vs. South: difference 8, divided by 1 = 8. East pays South 8.
  • East vs. West: difference 14, divided by 1 = 14. West pays East 14.
  • South vs. West: difference 22, divided by 2 = 11. West pays South 11.

Four payments total in one hand, one to the winner and three between players again. Every player either hands tiles across the table or receives them, and the math always balances to zero.

Winning Hand Scoring Table

This table lists every item a winner can score when announcing Hu. Values marked "pts" are base points that add together before the formula applies. Values marked "×N" are multipliers representing doubles (×2 is one double, ×4 is two doubles, and so on up the ladder), applied after base points are summed. A winning hand with 10 base points and one double is worth 10 × 2 = 20. A winning hand with 10 base points and three doubles is 10 × 8 = 80. Big Four Winds sits at 13 doubles (2^13 = 8,192), a game-ending hand no table stack can absorb.

Non-Winner Scoring Table

This table lists every item a non-winner can score on their partial hand at the end of the reckoning. Non-winners cannot score items that depend on the winning tile itself (Single Hook, Middle Hook, Side Hook, Self-Draw bonus, Kong Draw, Robbing the Kong, Fisherman's Win). Non-winners also cannot score Pinfu, since Pinfu is defined relative to a completed winning hand.