Taiwanese Mahjong · 1 tai

Seat Wind (Men Feng) in Taiwanese Mahjong: Tai, Examples and Odds

In Taiwanese mahjong, a Seat Wind pung (門風, men feng) is worth 1 tai: when you win, you have a pung (three identical tiles, or a kong) of your own seat's wind. The dealer is East, the dealer's right is South, across is West and the dealer's left is North — so each player's seat wind is different.

The rules for Seat Wind

• A pung or kong of your seat's wind: claimed, self-drawn, exposed or concealed kongs all count
• A pair doesn't count: a wind used as the pair scores nothing
• Someone else's seat wind is worth nothing to you: West punging East scores nothing unless it's the East round
• The rest of the hand is free — chows and pungs allowed, no need to stay concealed

How to find your seat wind

The seat wind follows the dealer, not a fixed chair:

While the dealer repeats, seat winds stay the same; when the deal passes, everyone's seat wind moves. The old South player becomes dealer and East, and the old dealer becomes North. Your own flowers follow your seat wind too; see Own Seat Flower.

How Seat Wind is scored

The tai below are computed live by the same scoring code the game uses (dealer and dealer-streak tai are added on top).

Common combinations:

How it relates to other hands

• Round Wind: a pung of this round's wind, 1 tai, scored separately from the seat wind.
• Own Seat Flower: the flowers matching your seat wind (East: Spring and Plum, South: Summer and Orchid, West: Autumn and Bamboo, North: Winter and Chrysanthemum), 1 tai each. When your seat wind changes, so do your flowers.
• Little Four Winds: three wind pungs plus a wind pair, 8 tai. On this site a seat-wind pung inside it still adds 1 tai.
• Big Four Winds: pungs of all four winds, 16 tai, already includes seat and round wind — not added again.

Seat Wind odds

Four normal-level computers played 12,000 hands on this site's table (the deal rotating, so seat winds rotate too). Of the 11,677 wins:

• 8.0% included a seat wind pung — 930 wins.
• Those wins averaged 2.5 tai for the whole hand, against 1.6 tai for all wins.
• The round wind showed up in 8.3% — about the same, since both need just one wind pung.

Playing seat-wind tiles

• A pair of your seat wind: pung it when it comes — tai for free, no loss of speed.
• Other players' seat winds: they may be holding a pair to pung, so discard them early if you don't need them.
• Seat wind = round wind: one pung is 2 tai, worth waiting a little longer for.
• Two already discarded: only the last copy is left to draw, so there's no need to hang on to the pair.

To practise, open a table of online Taiwanese mahjong — the computers play with you and count the tai for you.

Seat wind in other mahjong styles

• Japanese mahjong calls it the "seat wind" (jikaze), a yakuhai worth 1 han (Japanese mahjong yaku list)
• Hong Kong mahjong: seat wind, 1 fan (Hong Kong mahjong fan list)
• Chinese Official (Guobiao): "Seat Wind", 2 fan (Guobiao mahjong fan list)

FAQ

How many tai is a seat wind pung?

In Taiwanese mahjong a seat wind pung is worth 1 tai. If it is also the round wind, add the round wind's 1 tai.

What is my seat wind?

It depends on where you sit relative to the dealer: dealer East, dealer's right South, across West, dealer's left North. Check again whenever the deal passes.

Is the dealer's seat wind always East?

Yes. Wherever the dealer sits, the dealer's seat wind is East, so a dealer's East pung always scores seat wind.

Does a pair of my seat wind score?

No. The seat wind needs a pung or kong; as the pair it scores nothing.

Related hands

Round Wind 1 tai A pung of this round's wind is 1 tai: how to tell the round wind, how it stacks with the seat wind, and why a pair scores nothing. Little Four Winds 8 tai Three wind pungs with the fourth wind as the pair — an 8-tai big hand. Examples, how round and seat wind count, and how it differs from Big Four Winds. Big Four Winds 16 tai Pungs of all four winds — a 16-tai big hand. Examples, what's already included, and how it differs from Little Four Winds.