Mahjong Bay › Seasonal › Christmas Mahjong
Christmas Mahjong
- 86tiles
- 4layers
- 28free at the start
- 13.3pairs open on a fresh deal, average
- 38%of boards lost by random clicking in my test runs
Eighty-six tiles stacked into a tree: seven tiers on the table, a second tree of five tiers on top of that, a third of three, and a column of four tiles at the tip where the star goes. The flowers on this board are a bauble, a gift, a candy cane and a bell; the seasons are a tree, a star, a snowflake and a stocking. Any flower matches any flower and any season any season, as always.
The tip is a pole: four tiles one on top of another, and only the highest is free. Each one you take uncovers the next, so the pole is four moves that always exist, and it is worth keeping at least one in reserve for the moment you are short of a free tile. The real depth is lower down, in the three stacked tiers over the widest rows, and that part plays like a small Pyramid: clear from the top of the stack, and the base opens.
The trunk is two tiles at the very bottom, free from the start, and the widest tier above them is thirteen tiles across. A careless run gets stuck on 38 boards in a hundred, which puts the tree in the middle of the range: harder than the turkey, easier than the Turtle.
Everything except the eight bonus tiles is the standard set, so a game learned here carries straight over to the plain boards in January.
