Rule presets - Wilmington Advanced 12-Tile Rules

This rule preset represents a modified "12-tile" Mah Jong game that incorporates the abundant varieties of patterns in modern 13-tile Chinese Mah Jong, the more restrictive and relative fair rules from the 16-tile Fujian or Taiwan Mah Jong in governing the playing of the game, and some new and unique creations.

In general, it tries to make Mah Jong more of a game of strategy. The points awarded to each pattern tend to proportionally reflect the difficulty of making the pattern and encourage players to reach more ambitious hands. In addition, a fairly high minimum point setting (15 points) is used in order to guarantee that collecting high scoring hands is not frequently spoilt by going out on too easy hands.

Defensive considerations are also emphasized. E.g., the discarder of the winning tile is not only the sole loser of the hand, but is also penalized by paying 50% more on the loss. The rule also lends some protection to a poorly endowed hand by allowing going out with some unique but not too difficult patterns, such as All suits, Dragons and Winds (12 pts) combined with some common patterns like a value triplet (e.g., any Dragon triplet, or triplet of player's own Wind, which are worth 2 pts), going out on a self-drawn tile (1 pt), etc.

The rationing of one imaginary "joker" to each player (implemented in Four Winds by giving each player 1 joker in the dealt hand) increases tremendously the flexibility in directing the hand to form patterns for winning. Players with good and flexible strategy, in both offense and defense, for each hand is usually rewarded accordingly.

The rules were developed by Dr. K.F. Lin of Wilmington, Delaware, USA, an avid recreational Mah Jong player and his frequent playing partners, Drs. Kang Lin, Ming T. Shu, Ming H. Hung, and Mr. Victor Chang. The rule has evolved over a period of 7 years, from 1994 to 2001, to reach the present form.

Tiles	140 (regular tiles + 4 jokers, one for each player in dealt hand)
Initial points	500
Limit points	600
Restrictions for the winning hand	A minimum of 15 points required.
Claiming rules for going out	Multiple winners
Passing of the deal	When non-dealer wins and on draws, excluding continued deals
Rule of Ready	None
Dead hand rules	None
Payment	To winner only; Wilmington Advanced 12-Tile scheme
Discards	Per player, no extended discard information
Specialties	No Dead Wall; Missed Discard (Absolute, conditional); patterns emphasized; high minimum point requirement; pre-dealt jokers; simple point scoring without doubles or settling tables; All Kongs accepted as concealed triplets
Scoring	Point-based (no settling table)
Basic tile points	None
Scores for basic sets	Pung/Kong of Dragons (2 pts), Pung/Kong of Own Wind (2 pts), Pung/Kong of Wind of the Round (2 pts), Pung/Kong of Double Wind (3 pts)
Scores for Flowers and Seasons	Not used
Scores for patterns based on Chows	Same Chow from all suits (9 pts), Two identical Chows (3 pts), Two identical Chows twice (80 pts), Three identical Chows (15 pts), 123789 of the same suit (2 pts), 123789 twice of the same suit (120 pts), 123789 of twice of two suits (40 pts), 3 Chows of 1 suit, step 3 (12 pts)
Scores for patterns based on Pungs and Kongs	Triplets 111 and 999 of the same suit (3 pts), Triplets 111 and 999 of the same suit twice (100 pts), Two Pungs/Kongs and a pair of the same number (3 pts), Three Pungs/Kongs of the same number (15 pts), 2 Pungs of a Chow set (15 pts), 2 Pungs and a pair in sequence of 1 suit (3 pts), 3 Pungs/Kongs in sequence of 1 suit (15 pts), 4 Pungs/Kongs in sequence of 1 suit (240 pts), Two Kongs (5 pts), Three Kongs (40 pts), Four concealed triplets (80 pts), Little Three Dragons (40 pts), Little Three Winds (3 pts), Big Three Winds (30 pts)
Scores for patterns based on the whole hand	Exposed hand (5 pts, implied 1 pt for self-drawn), Concealed hand (3 pts), Fully concealed hand (7 pts), Chow hand (no traditional value pairs allowed; 2 pts), Pung hand (12 pts), No fives (2 pts), All 2's, 5's and/or 8's (80 pts), All Simples (2 pts), Terminal or Honor in each set (9 pts), Terminal in each set (15 pts), All Terminals and Honors (80 pts), Terminal 1(9) in each set (160 pts), Head number in each set across 5 (40 pts), Head number in each set across 4 (60 pts), Head number in each set across 3 (120 pts), All of three "numbers" (60 pts, Pung hand implied), All of three numbers (60 pts), All of two "numbers" (160 pts, Pung hand implied), All of two numbers (200 pts), All suits, Dragons and Winds (12 pts), Two suits only (2 pts), One Suit with Honors (12 pts), One Suit only (80 pts)
Scores for miscellaneous patterns	Pair of 2's, 5's or 8's (1 pt), Fives of all suits (2 pts), Four same in a two sets (3 pts), Four same in three sets (9 pts), Four same in four sets (80 pts), Five same in a two sets (15 pts), Five same in three sets (30 pts), Five same in four sets (60 pts)
Scores for winning	Fully exposed hand (7 pts), Self-drawn last tile (1 pt), Out on a pair (2 pts), Out on a one-chance Chow (2 pts), Out on last of a one-chance Chow (3 pts), Out on last of a multi-chance Chow (9 pts), Out on 5 in a Chow 4-5-6 (1 pt), Out on the last tile of the Wall (3 pts), Out on the last discarded tile (3 pts), Out on a supplement tile (3 pts), Out by robbing a Kong (3 pts)
Rounding	To nearest whole number.
Penalties	Faulty out: The offending player pays 40 pts to each of the other players and cannot go out during the rest of the deal. False claims: None; Insurance penalties: None
Limit hands	Classical: Four Kongs (400 pts, going out immediately allowed), Three Great Scholars (80 pts + components), Little Four Winds (200 pts + components, One Suit and Honors implied), Big Four Winds (400 pts + components, One Suit and Honors implied), All Honors (240 pts + components), All Terminals (300 pts + components), Nine Gates (300 pts + components), Thirteen Orphans (160 pts); Serpents: None; Pairs: None; Special ways of going out: Heavenly Hand (120 pts + components), Earthly Hand (120 pts + components, only from East's discard), Thirteen Discarded Orphans (300 pts); American hands: None; Miscellaneous: None.