Guangdong style

Assessment

Confidence

documented a published ruleset or rule description exists and is cited

Evidence

partial sources agree on some points but disagree or say nothing on others

Cross-comparison

What each source was read to say, set side by side. The numbers are the sources above.

• [1] Guangdong Style (廣東十三張麻將) is described as popular in South China AND TAIWAN, based on HKOS but using a large number of 'New Style' winning conditions and an additive scoring system. Its timeline reads: 1970s, New Style became associated with gambling in HK and a 'back to basics' variant called Clear Chapter or HKOS was adopted, winning conditions shrunk and fu removed; 1980s, New Style conditions were added back and fan were removed in favour of an additive system, and Guangdong Style was born
• [15] although Guangdong is a mainland province, Guangdong New Style has more in common with variants coming out of Hong Kong, and Taiwan post-1990s; it never uses Joys or Treasure Tiles, almost always allows multiple winners on a discard, and almost always uses discarder-pays-all
• [1] Re-read: the timeline now dates Clear Chapter / HKOS to the 1950s, New Chapter to the early 1980s, and Guangdong Style ('fan were removed in favor of an additive system') to the late 1980s. Its evolution chart puts New Chapter in the 1970s and Guangdong Style in the 1980s. It adds that a Taiwanese developer, IGS, made a 13-tile Guangdong Style video game for GameTower in the 2000s.
• [2] Guangdong mahjong was once the plain Clear Chapter game; hands were then added in stages, 'first 六獨, then 十八番 and 無奇不有', and lately Japanese and Taiwanese hands. 六獨 = 平, 斷, 不, 門, 缺, 將 (all chows, no terminals, fully concealed self-draw, concealed, missing a suit, 2-5-8 pair), plus 偏坎獨 (edge, closed and single waits). Games: 明星三缺一's 13-tile Guangdong mahjong, 神來也.
• [16] New Chapter (新章) re-added hands to HKOS in three kinds: classical doubles, classical fu elements promoted to one fan (edge, closed, single waits), and new hands (一般高, 三色同順, 將眼, 缺一門 ...). It is 'only a general name', 'each house has its own', 'with no official standard'; many versions exist, 'among them some that use the additive method'. It 'was popular for a while only among university students', and some of its hands passed into Japanese and Taiwanese mahjong. No dates.
• [3] A Taiwanese online game: 'Hong Kong mahjong is also called Guangdong mahjong'. Its fan list mixes classical hands, New Chapter hands (清龍, 三同刻) and Japanese-named ones (二盃口, 純全帶么). So in Taiwan '廣東麻將' can name an exponential, fan-minimum game, not the additive one.
• [17] DISAMBIGUATION: the World Mahjong Tour's 'Guangdong Mahjong' is mainland Guangdong's 推倒胡 (push-to-win): no chows, a joker tile, 'buying horses', fan 2 to 88. It is a different game from this node (see Tui Dao Hu).
• [1] Revision history (read 2026-09-25): the Guangdong page's timeline gave Clear Chapter / HKOS the 1970s up to revision 26 (16 March 2026). Revision 27 (24 August 2026) changed it to the 1950s. The 2026-09-18 observation quoted the older wording, so it came from a copy older than the page it was attributed to. The HKOS, Guangdong, HKNS and GMCR pages have been written and repeatedly revised by essentially one editor (wiki user 'murve'), so across this branch they are one voice, not several. The HKOS page's edits of 24 September 2026 changed only its payout box and the 'still popular today' paragraph; its 1950s and 1970s dates were already there by 27 August.
• [4] Read at the source (live page). Hands include classical ones (大四喜 40, 清一色 10, 碰碰和 5, 平和 3), New Chapter ones (清龍 7, 花龍 5, 一般高 1) and many with the Chinese Official (MCR) names and definitions: 推不倒, 組合龍, 七星不靠, 全不靠, 三色三步高, 妙手回春, 和絕張, 全帶五. '無番和', a hand with no fan, scores 5. There is no passing-a-winning-tile rule, and when two can win on one discard the one nearer the discarder takes it
• [5] Calls the game 廣東麻雀 'also called 新章', made of Clear Chapter hands plus 六獨, 十八番 and 無奇不有, with some players adding Japanese and Taiwanese hands. Its sources are a Hong Kong fan table (astropeople.net, captured 2012) and the 神來也 game's scoring page (captured 2016); it carries MCR-named hands such as 組合龍, 推不倒 and 三色三步高 from the latter
• [1] Re-read on 2026-10-12 at revision 29 (14 September 2026, user Murve), the same revision as the 2026-09-25 reading. The timeline dates Clear Chapter to the 1950s, New Chapter to the early 1980s and the switch to additive scoring to the late 1980s. It says those additive rulesets became Taiwanese Mahjong, Guangdong Style Mahjong and 'a bunch of Mainland variants', and that development slowed after MCR but continued in Taiwan. The game is described in the past tense, and no source is cited for any date
• [6] The chart's ref 8 repeats the Guangdong page's timeline: Clear Chapter in the 1950s, the 3-3 system in the 1970s, New Chapter in the early 1980s, and in the late 1980s the removal of fan in favour of an additive system, giving Taiwanese and Guangdong Style Mahjong. It names no mainland variants at that step
• [7] The wiki tabulates Let's Mahjong! as New Chapter, 'the transition from HKOS to Guangdong Style', and says it is not Guangdong Style because it uses a fan system. It also doubts that NEW18 was ever standardised. It gives no publication details for the ruleset
• [2] Re-read as raw wikitext on 2026-10-12. The lead and origin section call 廣東麻雀 the Clear Chapter (清章) game, with New Chapter formed by adding 六獨, 十八番 and 無奇不有. It says present Hong Kong play is really 'new-style Clear Chapter', with a 3-fan minimum and play to the last tile, and cites 簡而清《開檯》 ch. 1 §2, ISBN 962-17-4906-9, for this
• [8] Sloperama's variant catalogue has no Guangdong entry. Its Cantonese games are Hong Kong Old Style, with few special hands, and Hong Kong New Style, with many, and both double. Its Tui Dao Hu entry rests on the maque.games page
• [9] A June 2004 magazine piece on 广州正联's online game. It says Guangdong rules stand apart from the push-down families and are generally called 鸡平和, simplified from traditional 老章 and the most popular way to play in the Pearl River Delta. It does not say whether fan add or double
• [10] QQ Game's rules open with the four schools text (鸡平胡, 推倒胡, 新章, 老章) and call 鸡平胡 the most widespread in the Pearl River Delta. Chows are allowed and the dealer repeats on a win or a draw
• [11] Same four schools introduction, calling push-down the most popular game in Shenzhen and Dongguan; pung and kong only, no chow
• [18] A third-party '广东麻将' on QQ Game (2016): push-down rules, a ghost (wild) tile, and horses bought by the winner each hand that double the score when they hit
• [12] Tencent's 欢乐麻将 广东麻将 has a wild 赖子 tile, and chicken hands may win only by self-draw. Ordinary hands may win off others only by robbing an added kong. The top hands are thirteen orphans, big three dragons and big four winds
• [13] Says Guangdong mahjong has four schools, 鸡平胡, 推倒胡, 新章 and 老章, with 鸡平胡 the most popular, and that its history is harder to trace than other regional games'
• [19] The Guangdong section names four main schools, 鸡平胡, 推倒胡, 新章 and 老章, and calls 鸡平胡 the most widespread, built on chicken hand, all chows and the cap
• [14] Report of the March 2007 Guangzhou launch of 网络三缺一's Guangdong mahjong hall, with the game's rules introduction: four main schools in Guangdong, 鸡平胡 the most widespread in the Pearl River Delta, push-down the most popular in Shenzhen and Dongguan, with no chows, self-draw, kongs and horses

Reading it

The Mahjong Wiki, re-read at revision 29 (14 September 2026), keeps its account. Guangdong style is Hong Kong Clear Chapter with New Chapter hands added in the early 1980s and fan replaced by additive scoring in the late 1980s, and the page now says that switch also produced 'a bunch of Mainland variants'. The chart's other citations are by the same editor and repeat the timeline, and the HKOS scoring page calls its representative New Chapter ruleset a fan game. Chinese Wikipedia independently supports an additive, uncapped New Chapter game on 144 tiles with two flower sets. On the mainland, though, 'Guangdong mahjong' names other games. A 2007 rules text, later copied by QQ Game, Tencent and Chinese National Geography, lists four schools: 鸡平胡, 推倒胡, 新章 and 老章. 鸡平胡, the most widespread in the Pearl River Delta, doubles its fan under a 3-fan cap on 136 tiles without flowers, and a 2004 magazine derives it from 老章. Tencent's current 广东麻将 is push-down with jokers and horses. Sloperama lists no Guangdong game. So additive scoring belongs to the New Chapter branch only, and nothing read dates it to the 1980s. Still wanted: 簡而清's 1986 《開檯》 (ISBN 962-17-4906-9), the archived Hong Kong and Taiwanese rulesets, and Baidu Baike's entries.

Looked for, not found

• Official rules No body issues rules for Guangdong style or for 鸡平胡. The HKMA's 香港麻雀 (locally 廣東牌) is the Clear Chapter game on another node, and the Guangdong MCR is a wiki proposal on its own node
• Law No statute prescribes rules for this game in the PRC, Hong Kong, Macao or Taiwan; parlour licensing in Hong Kong is recorded on Hong Kong old style
• Historical Nothing written while the late-1980s additive game was played was found. The oldest text read is a 2004 magazine article on 鸡平和, and the 1986 《開檯》 is in print only (wanted from an earlier pass)
• Forum Zhihu, Tieba and Reddit refuse automated readers, and no forum thread on the Guangdong game was located or read
• Organisation No Guangdong body publishing on the game (a provincial 棋牌 association or a mahjong club) surfaced in the web search; the HKMA's rules index is recorded on the Hong Kong nodes
• Collection No museum or library record of a Guangdong-specific set; the game uses an ordinary 136- or 144-tile set

Known, not yet read

Sources that look worth having but could not be read for this entry. If you can reach one, it can be read and added. Every variant’s list is gathered on Missing sources.

• Guide astropeople.net, 《廣東麻將番數計算表》 (Guangdong mahjong fan table), captured 21 April 2012 — One of the two sources behind Chinese Wikipedia's hand list, and apparently a Hong Kong one: a check on how much of the list is Taiwanese game rules.
  Where: https://web.archive.org/web/20120421035143/http://www.astropeople.net/mahjong/mahjong.html. Tried: The Wayback Machine refused connections from this environment during the pass (2026-09-28); the live site is gone.
• Commercial 神來也13張廣東麻雀, 算分方式, as captured 1 April 2016 — The older version of the live scoring page read here, to see whether the MCR-named hands were there in 2016.
  Where: https://web.archive.org/web/20160401125628/http://www.godgame.com.tw/13mj/?op=rule_guide&topic=list2_3. Tried: The Wayback Machine refused connections from this environment during the pass (2026-09-28).
• Commercial IGS / GameTower and 明星三缺一 help pages for their 13-tile 廣東麻將 tables (2000s) — The commercial rulesets behind the Taiwanese '廣東十三張' in the 2000s; would date the additive form in Taiwan.
  Where: Not located; the games' old help pages may survive in the Wayback Machine. Tried: Searched for in the previous pass; not found.
• Guide ezmjtw.tripod.com, Taiwanese 廣東十三張 rules page — A Taiwanese player's rules page for the 13-tile Guangdong game, found in search.
  Where: ezmjtw.tripod.com. Tried: The domain no longer resolves, and the Wayback Machine holds no capture of it.
• Rulebook 簡而清, 《開檯》 (Hong Kong: 博益, 1986), ch. 2 §3, pp. 27-28, and ch. 1 §2 — Kwan's source for 六獨: it would date New Chapter to before 1986. Chinese Wikipedia cites ch. 1 §2, giving ISBN 962-17-4906-9, for present Hong Kong play being 'new-style Clear Chapter'. Kwan's ninth edition (1988) carries ISBN 962-17-0088-4.
  Where: Print. Tried: Not online.
• Encyclopedia Baidu Baike, 「广东麻将」 (item 4143465) and 「鸡平胡」 (item 107367) — The mainland's general reference on Guangdong play: may give the four schools, the rules of 鸡平胡 and some history or dates that the game sites copy without sources
  Where: https://baike.baidu.com/item/%E5%B9%BF%E4%B8%9C%E9%BA%BB%E5%B0%86/4143465 and https://baike.baidu.com/item/%E9%B8%A1%E5%B9%B3%E8%83%A1/107367. Tried: 广东麻将 answered 403 on 2026-10-12, the site's own refusal of automated readers, as in earlier passes; 鸡平胡 was not tried for that reason. Both surfaced in the general search

Where it was searched

Every place the search checklist names for this variant’s languages, and what each gave, including nothing. The last full pass was on 2026-10-12.

Names searched: Chinese 廣東麻雀, 广东麻雀, 廣東麻將, 广东麻将, 廣東十三張麻將, 廣東十三張, 13張廣東麻雀, 新章, 新章麻雀; English Guangdong Style, Guangdong Style Mahjong, Guangdong mahjong, Cantonese Mahjong, New Chapter, New Chapter HKOS, Guangdong New Style.