Rinshan kaihou

Rinshan kaihou

Type	Yaku
Kanji	嶺上開花
English	Dead wall draw
Value	1 han
Speed	Varies
Difficulty	Hard

Rinshan kaihou 「嶺上開花」 is a standard yaku, where a player wins with the rinshanpai, or the replacement tile after forming a kantsu. As such, this yaku is only accessible via kan calls. As the player wins with the tile draw from the dead wall, every instance of this yaku is won by self draw (tsumo) and never by discard (ron).

Meaning

Rinshan kaihou literally means "flowering 「開花」 on the range 「嶺上」". In a sense, the dead wall is treated or viewed as a "mountain", where the winning tile after the kan draw symbolizes as a "flowering" effect.

Kan procedure

Main article: Kan

When calling kan, a player must draw an extra tile; and that tile comes from the dead wall. This is the rinshanpai 「嶺上牌」. If the hand is completed with this tile draw, then this yaku is awarded. It is quite possible for rinshan to be the only yaku for the hand. Usually, players already have other yaku.

Setting up rinshan kaihou

Like any hand, this yaku requires tenpai to even have a chance of winning. While the hand retains a tile for a timed kan call, the hand would at best be at 1-shanten. As such, the fourth tile for kan counts as an extra tile. If that tile is in the hand, it actually takes up one tile space, that could be used for normal hand development. Therefore, tenpai is acquired upon a needed tile draw.

Tenpai, with chance for rinshan: Example

Draw: Waiting for:

The 5-man draw places this hand in tenpai with a tile needed to be discarded. In order for this hand to proceed to tenpai, either kan must be called or one of the hatsu is to be discarded. If after the kan, a dead wall draw of 7-sou awards rinshan kaihou. Otherwise, the unwanted rinshanpai may be discarded and riichi be called.

Compatibility

Main article: Yaku compatibility

^ Ippatsu requires riichi to be of any use.

RCH

DRI

IPP

SMO

TAN

PFU

IPK

ITT

YAK

SDJ

SDO

TOI

SNA

SNK

CHA

JUN

RPK

SSG

HRO

HON

CHN

CHI

RIN

HAI

HOU

CHK

RIN

Rinshan kaihou is generally compatible with any hand, that can accommodate kan calls. This rules out any yaku dependent on all sequential tile groups, namely both pinfu and ryanpeikou. Other yaku, such as sanshoku and ittsu, are also sequential based, but they have room one triple tile group to be upgraded for a kan call. By definition, chiitoitsu requires every tile pair to be unique; so kan calls cannot be performed here. chankan, haitei, and houtei all require winning from a different location than a kan replacement tile (another player's kan, the live wall, and another player's discard, respectively) and so cannot combine with rinshan. Finally, a kan would interrupt a chance for ippatsu.

With haitei

Rinshan kaihou cannot be combined with haitei, a yaku for calling tsumo on the final tile from the live wall. When winning on the replacement tile after a kan, tsumo is not called on any tile from the live wall, but on a tile from the dead wall. However, the last tile draw indicated by the haiteihai is defined as the last tile to be drawn from the live wall, not the dead wall.

Sekinin barai

Main article: Sekinin barai

Some rule systems impose a liability payment, called sekinin barai or pao, on the discarder of a kanned tile in the event of a rinshan kaihou win.

If this rule is in effect, whenever a player starts his turn by calling kan on a discard, the discarder is liable for the entire price of the caller's hand until end of turn. If the caller calls tsumo on the replacement tile after the daiminkan, payments occur as if he called ron against the liable player. If the caller continues to make ankan or shominkan on the same turn, then wins on a replacement tile, payments again occur like a ron against the liable player. When the caller discards a tile, the discarder of the kanned tile is no longer liable.

External links

• 嶺上開花

Rinshan kaihou in Japanese Wikipedia