Keishiki tenpai

Keishiki tenpai 「形式聴牌」, or shaped tenpai, is otherwise known as a tenpai hand with no yaku. Some cases of tenpai also involve waiting for a so-called fifth tile, which is nonexistent. Strategically, players often push for late tenpai hands regardless of yaku state for ryuukyoku to gain small points rather than lose them.

Abiguity

The term is often confused with the "fifth tile" case. Here, a hand waiting for a fourth tile that is simply hidden, discarded, or used by someone else remains a valid tenpai in all circumstances. A hand containing a 1-2 penchan and a previously declared kan of 3-3-3-3 in the same suit, no more threes are available as winning tiles. Because of the prevalence of keishiki tenpai, it is assumed that if the rule is different, it would be announced what qualifies as tenpai or not. As a precaution, it is almost always mentioned.

Example:
Waiting for:

Quirks

• On Ron2, there has been an instance of a person being able to call riichi with a gutshot wait shape for a 6-pin when they have made a closed kan of 6-pin already. The hand was considered noten, but did not trigger a chombo penalty (mainly due to programming assuming no one could do something that could be viewed as faulty). This conforms to the usual keishiki tenpai interpretation that the hand was not in a valid tenpai shape when it came to scoring a drawn hand, but not okay for determining if a player was legally allowed to declare riichi.
• On Tenhou, there have been reports of a hand containing 12s44466688p with a kan of 3s, scored as in tenpai. This does not conform to the usual keishiki tenpai standard. Tenhou staff have confirmed that there was a decision to simplify interpreting if a hand was tenpai due to programming constraints. All hands that conform to keishiki tenpai are valid, as well as a few (such as the current case) that may not be.

Strategy

Players do not necessarily aim for keishiki tenpai until late into the hand. Usually, consideration for such action begins on the third row of discards. Ryuukyoku imposes point gains or losses. Even if minimal, players may find themselves motivated to be on the positive end of the exchange rather than the negative. Plus, tenpai at ryuukyoku also provides a chance for either haitei or houtei to outright win the hand. Finally, players opting for this push for tenpai must also be wary of players already in tenpai, making defense considerations to be noted. With that said, it is preferable to lose points via noten rather than dealing into larger hands.

Rule variation

Some house rules factor keishiki tenpai into ryuukyoku, where hands even in tenpai may not receive tenpai payment. Instead, the points for noten are deducted just because the hand lacks a yaku. However, this practice is generally uncommon.