Proto-mahjong › Chinese classical › Shanghai / Hong Kong new style › Mainland regionals › Sichuan 72-tile game
Sichuan 72-tile game
per Dragon Chang
Sources
The documents this entry rests on, as published. Each can be opened and checked; nothing in this part is anybody’s reading of them.
Guide Sloper, Tom. "FAQ 2b: Identifying a Mah-Jongg Variant." Sloperama. canonical checked 2026-09-18
https://www.sloperama.com/mjfaq/mjfaq02b.html
chart’s note Tile counts, hand sizes, flower handling and scoring for roughly 50 named variants. Primary source for most leaf nodes in this chart.
Also cited on: Chinese archaic, Late Qing style, Chinese pre-classical, Chinese classical, Shanghai / Hong Kong new style, Hong Kong old style and 45 more · bibliography #1
Encyclopedia Wikipedia (Chinese). 〈四川麻將〉 (Sichuan mahjong). cross-check checked 2026-10-03
https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%9B%9B%E5%B7%9D%E9%BA%BB%E5%B0%87
AI summary The Chinese article on Sichuan mahjong and its Chengdu rules: 108 suit tiles, no chows, a hand of at most two suits, play on after the first win (血战到底). Tagged as unreferenced.
for this variant A named Sichuan game on exactly the 72 tiles Chang describes, with the ten-tile hand he says some players use.
Also cited on: Sichuan / Hunan / Tibetan, Sichuan bloody rules · bibliography #214
Guide Baidu Jingyan. 〈四川麻将规则及游戏简介〉 (user asdasdk_654), updated 4 February 2012. cross-check checked 2026-10-03
https://jingyan.baidu.com/article/93f9803fceafd8e0e46f55e0.html
AI summary A user-written how-to on Sichuan mahjong rules: 108 tiles, no honours or flowers.
for this variant The standard Sichuan count, against which the 72-tile game is the local exception.
Only cited here · bibliography #221
Guide Sloper, Tom. "FAQ 3: Books About Mah-Jongg." cross-check checked 2026-10-03
https://sloperama.com/mjfaq/mjfaq03.html
chart’s note Identifies Perlmen & Chan in full and lists the other Hong Kong Old Style books: Constantino, Li, Tsui, Lo.
for this variant Who the chart's only source for this game is: a Taiwanese author, reporting a Sichuan game by word of mouth.
Also cited on: WMPA / WMF, Western / British Empire style, Wright-Patterson, AMJA card · bibliography #34
Analysis
Written by an AI model from the sources above. It is a reading of them, not a source in its own right: every figure in it points back to a numbered source, and where the two disagree, the source is right.
Assessment
- Confidence
- single-informant the whole entry rests on one report from one person
- 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.
| Source | Tiles | Hand | Flowers | Scoring | Payout |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| [1] | 72 (bams and dots only) | 7, out on 8 (some players hold 10, out on 11) | none | unknown | unknown |
| [2] | 72 (bamboos and dots only; characters, honours and flowers removed) | 10 | — | fan, capped at 4 ('超叫'), 3 fan '极品'; stakes named by strings such as 1248 or 51248 | discarder pays on a discard win; self-draw collects from every player still in |
| [3] | 108 | — | — | — | — |
- [1] from conversations with author Dragon Chang; a very quick gambling game. Sloperama notes this contradicts the Chengdu account it also carries
- [4] Read at the source. Identifies the informant: 'WONDERFUL TAIWAN MAH JONG, by "Dragon" Shiang-Yu Chang', self-published 2003 (ISBN 957-41-1174-1), with rules for the 16-tile Taiwanese game and the Chinese Official game. Nothing in Sloper's description says the book covers Sichuan; the 72-tile account came from conversation
- [2] Read at the source (unreferenced). 断卡根 (duan qia gen), 'popular in Dayi County and Chongzhou' near Chengdu: Chengdu mahjong 'with the characters removed as well, so the tiles played are only bamboos and dots, and the hand is only 10 tiles'; the core of play is all-simples (断幺). Two, three or four may play; no chows; blood-battle continuation; no win without fan; no need to lack a suit
- [3] Read at the source (via WebFetch). 'Only three suits, bamboo, dots and characters, 108 tiles in all; no flowers, winds or dragons.' Search snippets elsewhere mention that 'a very few places have only dots and bamboos, 72 tiles', but no page carrying that sentence could be read
Reading it
The game exists, but not quite as the chart records it. Chinese Wikipedia describes 断卡根, played in Dayi and Chongzhou near Chengdu, on exactly the 72 tiles Dragon Chang reported (bamboos and dots only) with a ten-tile hand: the '10, out on 11' form Sloper gives as the minority. It is a Chengdu-rules game with the characters removed, not a separate tradition: no chows, play on after a win, scoring in fan to a cap of four. The seven-tile hand Sloper gives as the main form is not confirmed anywhere. The informant is identifiable: Sloper's FAQ 3 names 'Dragon' Shiang-Yu Chang, author of Wonderful Taiwan Mah Jong (2003), a book on Taiwanese and Chinese Official rules; the Sichuan account came from conversation, not from the book.
Looked for, not found
- Law No law bears on the game.
- Historical No history of the 72-tile game was found.
- Scholarship No academic source mentions it.
- Journalism No press account was found.
- Commercial Sichuan app platforms advertise a coming '两房麻将' (two-suit) mode, but no published rules for it were found.
- Forum Zhihu and Baidu Jingyan pages on Sichuan rules turn up in search, but the one said to mention a 72-tile form could not be read.
- Organisation No association rules for the game were found.
- Collection No museum or library record bears on it.
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 知乎. 〈四川麻将技术论·第一章 规则与打法(1)基本规则〉 (zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/22612168) — Search snippets attribute to Sichuan rule guides the line that 'a very few places have only dots and bamboos, 72 tiles'; this is one candidate.
Where: https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/22612168. Tried: HTTP 403 to curl and WebFetch. - Guide Chang, "Dragon" Shiang-Yu. Wonderful Taiwan Mah Jong. 2003, ISBN 957-41-1174-1 — The informant's own book; it may say something about Sichuan even if Sloper does not mention it.
Where: Daja Mahjong ([email protected]), per Sloper; libraries. Tried: Not online.
In the tree
Descends from Mainland regionals, as the source chart draws it.