MCR scoring explained
MCR scoring looks heavy because there are 81 patterns, but the logic is short: build a legal hand, check that it reaches eight points, then work out who pays what. This guide takes those three steps one at a time.
What counts as a winning hand
A winning hand uses one of these structures:
- Four sets and a pair. A set is a chow, a pung or a kong.
- Seven Pairs (24 points).
- Thirteen Orphans (88 points).
- Knitted structures, built from 1-4-7, 2-5-8 and 3-6-9 spread over three suits.
The eight-point minimum
The whole hand must be worth at least eight points from recognised patterns. A complete hand worth less than eight cannot win, so it pays to plan your route to eight early. Flowers and seasons do not count towards the minimum: they only add points after the hand already qualifies.
Declaring a win below eight points is penalised. In many tournaments the player pays ten points to each opponent and cannot win that hand, but check the rules of your event.
The pattern tiers
The 81 patterns run from 88 points down to 1 point. The official English names are used worldwide, so they are kept here. A few examples from each tier:
| Value | Examples |
|---|---|
| 88 | Big Four Winds, Big Three Dragons, All Green, Nine Gates, Four Kongs, Seven Shifted Pairs, Thirteen Orphans |
| 64 | Little Four Winds, Little Three Dragons, All Honors, Four Concealed Pungs, Pure Terminal Chows, All Terminals |
| 48 | Quadruple Chow, Four Pure Shifted Pungs |
| 32 | Four Shifted Chows, Three Kongs, All Terminals and Honors |
| 24 | Pure Triple Chow, Seven Pairs, Full Flush, All Even Pungs, Upper, Middle or Lower Tiles |
| 16 | Pure Straight, Pure Shifted Chows, All Fives, Triple Pung, Three Concealed Pungs |
| 12 | Knitted Straight, Big Three Winds, Upper Four, Lower Four |
| 8 | Mixed Straight, Reversible Tiles, Mixed Triple Chow, Mixed Shifted Pungs, Chicken Hand, Last Tile Draw, Last Tile Claim, Out with Replacement Tile, Robbing the Kong |
Below eight points sit the small patterns (6, 4, 2 and 1 point). They are the building blocks of most ordinary winning hands. The Scoring Guide in the app lists every pattern with its tiles.
Avoiding double counting
Many patterns overlap, so a few principles keep the count honest:
- Do not count what is already implied. A Full Flush (24) already has no honours, so you do not add No Honors on top.
- Do not regroup. Once tiles are assigned to sets for one way of scoring, you cannot reshuffle the same tiles to claim a different, incompatible pattern.
- Do not reuse the same set for the same pattern twice.
- Take the highest result. When a hand can be read in more than one legal way, score it the highest way.
- Combine leftover sets only as the rules allow. An unused set may be paired once with sets already used to make one more pattern. The official lists say which combinations are allowed.
When in doubt, use a reliable calculator or the official scoring reference rather than counting by memory.
Who pays what
The winner gets eight base points from every opponent, plus the hand value:
- Win on a discard: the player who discarded pays the hand value plus eight. Each of the other two opponents pays eight.
- Self-drawn win: every opponent pays the hand value plus eight.
- Flowers and seasons add one point each to the hand value once the hand qualifies.
Example 1, win on a discard. A 16-point hand wins on player B's discard. B pays 16 + 8 = 24, and players C and D pay 8 each. The winner receives 24 + 8 + 8 = 40.
Example 2, self-draw. A hand has All Pungs (6), a Dragon Pung (2), a Pung of Terminals or Honors (1) and Self-Drawn (1), which makes 10 points. Two flowers add 2, so the hand value is 12. Because the win is self-drawn, each opponent pays 12 + 8 = 20, and the winner receives 60.
Common mistakes
- Calling a win below eight points. Count first, and remember that flowers do not help.
- Double counting, for example adding No Honors to a Full Flush.
- Forgetting the eight-point base payment from each opponent.
- Misreading a wait. Edge Wait, Closed Wait and Single Wait only apply when that wait is the only way the hand could be completed.