Claiming another player's discard

Claiming another player’s discard

After a computer player (or another human player) has discarded his tile, it stays visible in the discard slot during the time determined by the Discard delay setting specified in the Preferences dialog box. As long as the tile is visible, you can claim the discarded tile to complete a set in your hand. Valid claims (e.g., whether and when you can claim a Chow) are determined by the rules. E.g., normally you can claim a tile for a Chow only from a player on the left (in Four Winds the player just "above" you), except when you can use the discarded tile to go out, in which case the tile can be claimed from any player. Traditionally there are no other claiming restrictions, but many rules specify non-traditional claiming rules.

Precedence of claims

If two or more players claim the same tile for different sets, the precedence of claims is as follows: Chow, Pung, Kong and Out, the last being the most powerful. E.g., if one player is claiming the tile for a Chow, and another for a Pung, the player claiming for a Pung will get the tile.
Note: If over-claiming is allowed, there might be restrictions for claiming. E.g., a time limit may be set, after which a claim for Chow is considered guaranteed and accordingly cannot be superseded by another player's claim for a Pung. For more information, click the related topics below.
If two or more players claim the same tile for a Chow, the player who would have played first (after the discarder) receives the tile.
If two or more players claim the same tile for going out, the precedence is resolved by using the claiming rules specified on the Claiming option page (under the Rules section in the category tree of the Preferences dialog box).

.To claim a tile:

Click on the discarded tile, or hit the SPACEBAR (the default key configuration for claiming a discarded tile). If the penalties for faulty declaration of Out are enabled, the Tile Claimed dialog box appears. Your claim is validated after you close the dialog box. If the penalties for faulty declaration of Out are disabled, Four Winds first checks, whether your claim is legal, and displays the Tile Claimed dialog box only for legal claims. Otherwise, a message box informing about an illegal claim is displayed.
Click one of the buttons (Chow, Pung, Kong, or Out) of the Tile Claimed dialog box. Or click Ignore, if you want to change your mind and cancel the claim. Note that most rule presets specify a penalty for false claims (normally 100 points for each false claim, paid to the winner of the deal). Canceling a claim is normally not considered a false claim, but you can specify otherwise by using the options on the Penalties option page. There is a label in the Tile Claimed dialog box, which tells you whether the penalties are on.
Notice, that if you can use the tile to go out, you must click Out. If you can complete your hand with a discarded tile but choose Chow or Pung instead of Out, you may well get the tile but you cannot go out after having melded the resulting set, but rather need to discard one of your tiles and continue the game.
If you have more than one option to compose a set (e.g., several possibilities to compose a Chow, or in case of having clicked Out in the previous dialog box, a possibility to decide whether to compose a Chow or a Pung, or a Chow or a Pair), another dialog box is displayed, where you can specify your claim in details.
If you confirm the claim, the discarded tile is zoomed out from the discarder’s discard slot and zoomed in on your Melded Tiles row along with the other tiles in your hand composing the completed set.

Note: Four Winds 1.x allowed human player to go out on a discard, even if he did not choose Out in the Tile Claimed dialog box. (E.g., the player could click Pung in the Tile Claimed dialog box, make his meld and then click the Out button on the status bar). This is no longer supported. (However, if you claim a tile for a Kong and get a supplement tile which lets you complete your hand, you are allowed to go out.)

Tip: The mouse and keyboard operation can be customized. The default configuration for claiming is described above, but you can use alternate methods, if you wish. For more information, see Configuring game controls.