KENZAN! MAHJONG: THE 50,000-POINT COMPLETION PLAN

KENZAN! MAHJONG: THE 50,000-POINT COMPLETION PLAN The target is at least 50,000 points in one completed match, not 50,000 accumulated across visits. Japanese completion documentation specifies the end of the East or South round. Play through the result screen and check the completion entry afterward. Mahjong opens in Gion from 5-1 and Rakugai from 5-6. In Gion, find the players on Tsurumachi Alley and speak to the attendant to buy playing points. Save before beginning so a poor session does not become an expensive distraction. PICK A SESSION THAT GIVES YOU TIME East-only is shorter. A half game includes East and South rounds, giving each player two normal dealer turns before accounting for repeats. Choose half game if you want more opportunities to build a score; a strong East-only run can also qualify. Neither format guarantees an exact number of hands because dealer repeats can extend a round. Open Tanyao ON permits an open all-simples hand. OFF requires that particular yaku to remain closed. This is a genuine Kenzan setting. Double Binding introduces a two-han requirement during a prolonged dealer run. The KHH guide describes it after five successive dealer wins. Turning it OFF avoids this extra condition during a completion attempt. Do not confuse red fives with ura-dora. Red fives, aka-dora, are visible bonus tiles. Ura-dora are hidden indicators revealed for a riichi winner. KHH's English settings table calls the red-tile option "Uradora," but its description is of red fives. If reading the Japanese menu, 赤ドラ means red dora and 裏ドラ means ura-dora. Treat them as different rules, not interchangeable names. BUILD POINTS WITHOUT NEEDLESSLY GIVING THEM BACK Start with closed hands. Keeping the hand closed preserves riichi, concealed self-draw, pinfu and several other scoring routes. Do not call every available chi or pon: an open hand with no yaku cannot win, even if it has dora. Use two-sided sequence shapes. A 4–5 shape can complete with 3 or 6; 1–2 waits only on 3. Keep connected middle tiles and discard isolated tiles that do not help a plausible yaku. Keep a useful honor pair if it can become a scoring triplet. Riichi plus dora is a practical scoring route. Closed self-draw, pinfu or all simples can raise the value further. Three or four han hands are much more realistic to pursue regularly than a rare yakuman. When dealer, a win pays more and retains the dealership. Protect a promising dealer hand, but do not push every dangerous discard simply because a repeat would be valuable. When ahead, defend. An opponent's riichi turns a cheap unfinished hand into a poor reason to risk a large loss. Prefer tiles already discarded by that opponent. If the lead is secure, winning a small safe hand to finish the match can be better than chasing one more scoring pattern. If you fall behind early, a half game gives room to recover. Look for value in the tiles you actually hold: a flush when one suit dominates, seven pairs when the hand is pair-heavy, or scoring honor triplets when supplied. Forcing a predetermined expensive hand from an unrelated deal usually wastes turns. SCORING VERSUS SETTLEMENT Kenzan's listed placement adjustments are +25,000 for first, zero for second, −10,000 for third and −15,000 for fourth. These affect settlement; they are not hand yaku. The sources checked do not establish a universal shortcut that a particular lower table score plus the first-place bonus will satisfy completion. Aim to finish with a displayed table score of at least 50,000, then verify the completion flag rather than quitting after a temporary mid-match peak. REWARDS AND MATERIALS The prize exchange lists Nada Refined Sake for 600 points, Nara Morohaku for 1,400, Scrap Iron for 500 and Dragon Scale for 20,000. Scrap Iron is useful for the three bat inventions. Purchasing or exchanging points is separate from earning the completion score in an actual match. The next posts explain legal winning hands, the yaku reference, scoring and defense. These are riichi-mahjong rules; optional scoring variants are identified rather than assumed to match every Kenzan menu setting.