“Duzi He" 笃子胡-- A Chinese playing-card game

Having featured the playing-cards of Nantong, I shall now describe a game played with them. My main sources are the Chinese Baidu and Wikipidia articles , along with Hu Baishen胡柏生 and Du Guoyuan杜国元's  book Nantong long-cards-- Talking about Dazihe (Nantong Changpai-- Hua shuo dazihe 南通长牌-- 话说搭子和). published by The People's literary and artistic publishers  (dazong wenyi chubanshe) 大众文艺出版社. This book will be referred to as H&D.

  The game goes under several names. The Baidu article calls it“Duzi Hu" 笃子胡. H&D call it Dazi hu, 搭子和. This is the name used in Rugao city, also in Nantong.

Equipment: One deck of Nantong playing-cards. Readers without access to such cards can substitute a Mahjong set, or use ordinary playing cards, as explained below

Players This is a game for four people. However only three play each hand. The player who deals the cards sits out. The dealer for the first round is selected by lot. H&D suggest using four playing cards, Ace, 2, 3, and 4. The one who gets 4 will become the dealer, and sit out. The player who drew the ace is the "Banker" 庄家. He plays first, followed by the players who drew the 2 and 3. The deal then rotates counterclockwise.

Deal The cards are shuffled and dealt. The banker is dealt 23 cards, the rest of the players are dealt 22. Once the deal is completed,  The next two cards of the stock are turned up. These are the 将牌, literally "General cards" . The cards are examined.

1) If the General cards are both "Generals", i.e:
  a: The Nine of strings
  b: The white flower
  c: The Red flower
  d: The Thousand children
Then this is called " Double Big General"
2) If the The general cards only contain One "General" , and one other card, then this is called " Big General"
3) If None of the general cards contain Generals, this is called "Small general"

Melds with these cards affect the scoring [...] 

Declarations: The players first inspect their hands. If they contain either
   a) A four-of-a-kind
   b) Sufficient General cards to make a pong or Gong [ see "Melds" ] with the turned up general. E.G. If a 5 of coins was turned up as a General, and a player's hand contains two 5 of coins, He can declare them, and receive extra points.

The former is called 撂龙 Liao Long, the latter  起插 Qi Cha  if it is a pong, or 合子 He Zi  if it is  gong.

Play.  The game is much like mahjong.

The "Banker" inspects his hand, and chooses to discard a card. [or declare a meld] The second player then draws a card from the stock, [declare any melds], and then discards another card. The card discarded does not have to be the same as the one drawn. The process repeats itself, until someone has successfully melded off his hand. This is called 胡

Players can "Pong", but cannot "Chow" [BD]

Melds. 

These melds are similar to that in Mahjong. [H&D]

1) 搭子 tazi /Stacks, also called 顺子 Shunzi / "Smooth"
A "Run". Three cards in sequence, belonging to the same suit. 7,8 and 9 of strings; 4,5,6 of Myriads are examples. The 1,2 and 3 of coins is a special meld, called 文钱Wenqian - “Cash". This meld [...]

对子Duizi  Pair--
Two cards identical and suit and rank. Self-explanatory.

2 )刻子Ke zi ” Cut ones" and 坎 "Kan" -- "Pong" 
In Mahjong, called a Pong. These refer to three cards, identical in suit and rank. E.G.  Three 5 of coins, or three 7 of strings.  Three cards of the same rank, but different suits are not considered a meld. The player can gain the cards by drawing from the stock. If he has a pair of cards, and another player discards the third card, a pong can also be made
A Pong involving the General cards is called 底插-- Di Cha


杠--Gang "Gong"
A four-of-a-kind. Can be obtained through drawing from the stock, or having a pong, and another player discarding the fourth card.

Scoring table:

The column headed "Meld" describes the meld. Each meld is split into two rows. The top row shows what the cards score if they are normal cards; the bottom row if they are General cards. Each of the columns that intersect it show the score each meld obtains, depending on the situation with the General cards.

Meld	Cards	Small Gen.	Big Gen.		Double Gen.
			Not a Pair	Pair	Not a Pair	Pair
碰Peng “Pong” As in mahjong, a three-of-a-kind, produced by capture.	Nom’l	2	4	8	8	16
	Gen’l	4	8	16	16	32
坎 Kan: As above, but present in hand[dealt] , or created by drawing	Nom’l	4	8		16
	Gen’l	8	16		32
打杠 Da Gang “Gong”.  As in mahjong. Can be created by extension of a pong	Nom’l	8	16		32
	Gen’l	8	32		64
提子Ti zi : As gong, but created by drawing	Nom’l	16	24		48
	Gen’l	12	48		96
起插 Qi Cha A Kan, involving the general cards, found in the hand when first dealt.	Nom’l	24		32		64
	Gen’l			64		128
撂龙 Liao Long : A four of a kind [gong] present at the hand when first drawn	Nom’l	16	32		64
	Gen’l	32		128
底插 Di Cha A Kan, involving the general cards, formed by drawing from the stock at play	Nom’l			24	48
	Gen’l			48	96
合子He zi When a player has a pair of cards, that is identical to the general card turned up, that is present at the start of play	Nom’l	64
	Gen’l	128
三龙会齐 San Long Hui Qi  :A Pong, kong, Ti, cha, or kan that involve the red flower, white flower or 1000 children.	和值翻双Score doubled.

The Jokers of the Nantong Deck. 

Play with jokers: Most Nantong decks come with five jokers.  The Jokers are not strictly necessary for play,and are not usually used. They function exactly like "Flowers" in mahjong. If a player is dealt jokers, or receives them from the stock, he exposes them, and draws replacements from the stock. He also gains bonus points. If the jokers are turned up as the general cards, then the scores are doubled. "The jokers can only be used when all four players agree to do so" [H&D]


Winning 

Play ends when a player has successfully melded off his entire hand, or when the stock runs out. A completely melded hand has 23 cards, consisting of a pair of identical cards, plus a number of melds. It can be done one of three ways

1:清胡 Qing Hu  "Clear game" : One pair , and Seven runs.
2 飘胡 Piao Hu  “Fluttering game" : One pair, with the rest of the cards being melded either as"Cut ones", or as "Cash", or some combination of both. [BD]
3: 塌子胡 Ta Zi Hu "Collapsed game" : One pair, plus some combination of runs and trios. 

If the stock is exhausted without anyone melding off their hand, the game also ends. The hands of all the players are exposed, and the scores of each player reckoned. Such a situation is called 黄牌 Huang2 pai - Yellow cards, or 谎牌 Huang3 Pai -- Lying cards.

Scoring
The score of the winner's hand is tabulated according to the table above.
If the player has a "clear game" [i.e. no special combinations or multipliers...


Substitutes:
If the reader has access to a set of mahjong tiles, he can easily adapt them to this game. This is done by removing the winds, flowers, and if desired, all but five of the jokers

  A substitute can also be made using four decks of western playing-cards.  Remove the court-cards of all the suits. Remove the suit of hearts, both courts and pips. Do the same for the remaining 3 decks. The ace to Nine are used to replace the 1-9 of each of the three suits . The Tens of each suit replace the  White Flower, Red Flower and Thousand Children. Add jokers if desired.

二八杠 Two-Eight Gang

This is a simple Chinese game. Its name is Er Ba Gang-- Two-Eight Gang. [[ It is sometimes known as Kuangfeng Paijiu 瘋狂牌九 -- Crazy Pai gow or Tui Tongzi 推筒子-- Pushing "Coins" ( as in the suit of mahjong)

Descriptions are sketchy, but the game is simple enough to reconstruct. My primary source is the Chinese Baidu article An article which describes a similar game, Er-Ba-Gang has also proved invaluable

Equipment: All the tiles from the  suit of "Coins" from a mahjong deck, plus the four white Dragons.  The complete "deck" thus contains 40 tiles.
Makers of mahjong equipment sell sets of majhong tiles that are of the above composition.
  If you do not have such a deck, you can make one using western playing cards. Take the ranks of Ace-Nine in all four suits, then add the four jacks to represent the white Dragons

  A pair of dice is also needed, to determine the deal, as described below.

Players
Players compete against a banker. The sources state either two or three players against a banker.

Staking
Players stake money into a pool. Spectators can evidently bet on the game as well.

Deal
Two cards are dealt at a time. The first The baidu article describes how this is done.  The banker throws two dice. He inspects the number they produce.
The banker deals the first pair to himself if the dice produce 5 or  9
The banker deals the first pair to himself  Player  1 if the dice produce   2, 6, 10
The banker deals the first pair to himself  Player  2 if the dice produce 2 3, 7, 11
The banker deals the first pair to himself  Player  3 if the dice produce 3 4, 8, 12

Play
Players expose their tiles.  They compare it with the banker. If their hand is greater than the banker's (as determined below) they win . The converse is true, If they tie [...]

Scoring 

In summary, the rule is as follows
1. Pairs outrank all hands. A pair of White dragons ( B)  is the highest, followed by the numbers, in descending numerical order.

2. When a hand is not a pair, its value is dictated by the sum of its components, modulo 10 The white dragon counts as zero. Thus, a hand of 8,9 Scores Seven, and a hand of 7,3 counts as Zero.

3. With hands that are of the same sum, the highest ranked hand is the Natural number plus a white dragon. So between 5,B and 3,2 the 5,B wins.

4.When white dragons are not involved, the hand that contains the higher card wins. So between the hands 9,6 and 2,3 (both hands score 5) the former wins

The Chinese sources provide a scoring chart, listing the ranks of all 81 possible hands.


Notes

It appears that this game may be played with Chinese Dominoes. The game also bears similarities to Koo Kiew and Daun Tiga. 

Doll cards part 2: Rules of the game

Doll cards part 2: The game

The admirable website of Andy Polett has this to say about the game played with the cards:

Practically nothing is known about the game played with these cards, still in production, although their use today seems restricted to very limited parts of the country.

 Mr. Polett is not alone in his ignorance. Even in the Chinese literature, precious little has been written on the game. I have only succeeded in finding three descriptions of the game played with the cards. They are

1: The Chinese Baidu article
2: In a response to a question about these cards on the website iask.sina.com (See Here )
3: In a response to a question about these cards on the website zhidao.baidu.com ( See Here) 

This is what I have been able to make of the three sources. The sources might describe regional variants of the game, which I might conflate. Likewise, my less-than-perfect Chinese skills might cause misinterpretations. With those caveats in place, let us proceed. 


I) Deck : One deck of Wawa pai.
If you do not have such a deck, you can make one using four decks of western playing-cards.
I  choose to represent the Eight Chinese characters of the phrase by the letters A- H and the Dolly card as a "J". The "Marked" cards are represented with an asterisk; so the marked 福 (A) is 福* (A*)

II) Players
The game can be played by three or four people. In the case of a 4 player game, the dealer sits out of each round. The role of dealer rotates between players.  However, in one variant ( from the baidu ask), all four players can participate
In any case, one of the players is designated the "banker", and the others play against him.

III) Deal 
As mentioned above, the dealer sits out of each round. He deals 18 cards to the banker, and 17 cards to the rest of the players. Source (3) states a slightly different procedure. After the cards are

IV)Melds
The only acceptable melds are threes-of-a-kind ( three copies of the same card) and fours of-a kind.
So, for instance 福福福 [ AAAA] is acceptable, as is 山山山山. [HHHH]

However the sequence of cards 壽比南山 [ABCD] is Not an acceptable meld, despite being half of the whole phrase. Neither is any fragment of the phrase, like  比南山 [FGH]

V) Declarations 
Before play begins, players make declarations. If a player has a four-of-a-kind in his hand, he places these cards on the table. He then draws a card from the stock. If that card is of the same kind as the one that made the four-of-a-kind, he adds it to the meld, and draws another. The process is repeated until the card can no longer be added to the meld.

VI)Play 
The sources say Play is similar to Mahjong. From this, I infer the following description of play.

 The banker starts play by discarding an unwanted card. The next player can either capture it to make a meld. If a meld is thus formed, then the player who created the meld must place it on the table.
If the cards cannot be melded, the second player must draw a card from the stock instead. [ if no melds are so declared, ] that player finishes his turn by making a discard.

If a trio is found in hand, one is under no obligation to declare it. However, If a four-of-a-kind is formed, the rules mentioned in "Declarations" take effect.

The process repeats with the next player. One can only capture discards from the previous player. By contrast, in mahjong  one may capture discards "Out of turn" .


VII) Winning
is identical to mahjong. In other words, the entire hand must consist of sets of three or more of the same subject, plus a pair of extra cards. One is dealt 18 cards, but a winning hand contains 19 cards. The extra card is procured by capturing another's discard, or by drawing from the stock.

If the stock runs out, and no-one manages to win, then the pointscore of the cards the players possess (as melds, be they declared on undeclared) is counted, and whoever has the higher score wins.

VIII) Scoring 
This part I find the most uncertain.  I will split them according to the Source.

Source (1) states that the scoring works on a card-by-card basis.

If there are no combinations of cards (see below) , the score is reckoned thus: Each plain card in a meld scores 10; Each stamped card in a meld scores 20.
(若没有任何牌型的平胡，则无”坨“的牌每张10胡，有”坨“的牌每张20胡计分)

Like many Chinese games, certain combinations of cards allow the player's score to be multiplied. The combinations are thus listed by source (1)

a) Collecting melds ( see ss. IV)  that when put together make up the phrase 福 如 東 海 or  壽 比 南 山 , plus having a pair of dolly cards. This doubles the score. 

Sample hand: 福福福福 壽壽壽, 比 比 比 , 南南南, 山山山山 plus two dolly cards.
[AAAA EEE FFF GGG HHHH JJ].
In this case

b) "Big dolly sings on stage"  All the melds involved in the winning hand contain a marked card, plus a pair of Dolly cards. 

c)  Vertical letter Shu Xin ( according to baidu article ). All the melds involved in the winning hand do not contain marked cards, plus a pair of Dolly cards.

Source (1) does not speak about how the combinations "Stack up".  For instance, if a hand fulfills conditions (a) and (b)? If the scoring is identical to mahjong, this means the score is quadrupled.

_______

Source (3) speaks of a slightly different set of rules. Instead of going on a card-by-card basis, the scoring is on a meld-by-meld basis. A meld consisting of only plain cards scores 10, and a meld that involves a stamped card score 20. The source also seems to say only four-of-a-kinds are acceptable.

Returning to the sample hand, source (1) will reckon its score 190x2=180 points. Source 3 will reckon its score as 50 x 2=100 points, assuming it did recognize three-of-a-kinds. 

To make a substitute. 

If you do not have access to a deck of Wawa pai, you can make one from eight decks of wstern playing-cards.  Extract the 1, 3, 5, and 7 in the black suits, and the 2, 4, 6, 8 in the red suits from all the decks.  These represent the Characters of the Chinese deck. For the Dolly cards, extract the red Queens from all the decks.  For the cards that possess a stamp, mark the faces of one of the cards with a dot or similar mark. Alternately, you can extract Seven of the cards from a normal deck, and the eighth card from a large-index deck. 

状元筹 Zhuang Yuan Chou -- A Chinese dice game

This post is about a rather charming Chinese gambling game, called 状元筹 Zhuangyuan Chou. A rough translation of the name would be "Scholar's lots",

I had seen images of these tallies some years ago. I was intrigued with these strange objects, each inscribed with the name of a class in the Chinese hierarchy of scholar-bureaucrats. What curious game could be played with these things, I wondered.  One day, ( around Chinese new year in 2013, I think) I went to a Mahjongg shop. After shopping for a while, I inquired about a certain "Zhuangyuan" game. Much to my surprise, the proprietor produced this selfsame set of tallies from a shelf. It was the only set left. Despite the rather steep price of $100, I bought the tallies. This was fortunate. The shop closed down a few years later

The apparatus for this game consists of a set of 63 tallies, or jetons and six dice. We shall first describe the tallies:

The largest tally is labelled 状元, Zhuangyuan (A), and is worth 32 points ( The inscription 三十二注, sanshiliu zhu at the foot of the tally means"32 points" in Chinese）.It is yellow in color, and has an inscription in red. This is the only tally with this value. It plays a special role in the game. 

The next largest tallies are labelled 旁眼, Pangyan (B) and 探花 Tanhua (C) Each is worth 16 points. The former is red, the latter a deep maroon. Like the Zhuangyuan tally, at the feet of these tallies is the inscription 十六注 Shiliu Zhu-- 16 points. 

These are followed by four tallies marked 会元, Huiyuan . (D) In real life, the tallies are a fetching neon green in colour. Unfortunately this colour does not show up well in the scan. Each tally is worth 8 points.

Next in line are eight scarlet tallies, labelled 進士Jinshi(E)   These tallies are worth 4 points each. 

Then there are 16 blue tallies, labelled , 举人,Juren (F)　and worth 2 points each.  

Last in line are 32 white tallies, each labelled  秀才Xiucai (G)  and worth one point each

It should be noted that for each halving in the value of the tally, there is a doubling in the number of tallies. The total value of these 63 tallies is 192. 

***

It is honestly quite hard to explain the significance of the ranks to a non-Chinese audience. You must remember that this game is actually about exams. For over a millennia, the Chinese have had an extremely well-developed (and grueling) system of exams, called the Keju. To say this exam played a significant role in Chinese is somewhat of an understatement. For many, it was the only way to get a job in the civil service, and hence respectable society. The exam has even entered popular myth. Indeed, the Chinese even have a god of exams, Wenchang 文昌. 

To get the rank of highest scholar in the country, 状元 ( Zhuang yuan) was an immense honor, an express ticket into the upper class. Even though the exams were abolished in 1905, till this day, Chinese newspaper reports on more mundane exams ( A-Levels, O-Levels, International baccalaureate) still refer to the top scorers as Zhuangyuan

***

 The rules for this game are based on three sources: C.T. Dobree's The gambling games of Malaya and the Chinese Baidu article on the game. (http://baike.baidu.com/view/360732.html).

The game is simple. Between three to eight persons may play. The only equipment required are six dice, a bowl, and the tallies. At each person's turn, the player drops the six dice into a bowl. He notes the combination of numbers the dice have generated. He then takes tallies from the pool, corresponding to the scores shown in the table below. 

Dice combination.	Take tallies worth.
One 4	1
Two 4s	2
Three 4s	16
Four 4s	32
Five 4s	64
Any Four-of-a-kind, except four 4s	4
A pair of 4s, 5s or 6s	16
The numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6	16
“How Tuck” 巧得= Qiao de *	32
Five-of-a-kind	32
Six-of-a-Kind	192 (GAME)
*A four-of-a-kind; with the remaining two dice adding to the same number as the one repeated. E.G [3,3,3,3,2,1], [6,6,6,6,3,3] [2,2,2,2,1,1]  "How Tuck" is the Cantonese pronunciation of 巧得. In Mandarin it is Qiao De. The term means "Chance gain"

The player then takes the requisite number of tallies from the pool. There are a certain number of niceties regarding the game. 

* When four 4s are scored, the player takes the 32-point tally 状元 and the pair of 16-point tallies  旁眼(B) and 探花(C) from their previous owners

* If a player throws a five-of-a-kind, (other than five 4s) he takes the 32-point tally from its previous owner (if any)

The baidu article agrees with Dobree's description, but adds a few more rules. 

* There is another combination, a pair of 1s, 2, or 3s. The Baidu article tells us that this combination wins you the marker labelled 旁眼. This combination is also nicknamed 大马军-- Big cavalier. 

* A pair of 4s, 5s or 6s wins you the marker labelled 探花. This combination is also nicknamed 小马军-- Little cavalier. 

* If a player throws five 4s,  He  takes the 32-point marker from its previous owner, even if the previous owner has scored a four-of-a-kind. This is in contrast to Dobree's rules, where you win 64 points from such a combination. 

Once all the tallies have been used up, the game ends. The number 192 ( the total value of all the tallies)  is averaged between the number of players. Players who score below  the aforementioned average pay to those who score above average. They pay to the winners the difference between their scores and the average,

***

The inscriptions on the tallies are shown below. The text has been transcribed, Top-to bottom, Right-to left. 

On the Zhuangyuan (A) 狀元/ 四紅巧合獨德五子/五紅奪色六子全

On the Pangyan (B)旁眼/ 大小军馬/分双順淂/ 

On the Tanhua (C) 探花/ 大小军馬/分双順淂

 The author has labored to make sense of the tallies, but could not make any sense from them. The text as engraved seems to be a set of rules for the game, specifying what dice combinations are needed to acquire the tally they are written on.

The text uses a lot of variant characters, so for example 淂 instead of 得(both meaning "To get")  and 収 instead of 收 ("To recieve"). In addition, The third character in the  left-hand row of the Zhuangyuan tally is hard to make out, but based on images of similar tallies online, it is probably奪 

If any reader may decypher the tallies, the author will be most delighted 

***

Below are scans from Dobree's orginial work on the game. Of especual note is the photograph depicting the counters from Dobree's day. Clearly the overall shape of the counters has not changed much in the half century since the book was published. The only major difference is the Zhuangyuan tally, which is made of dark-coloured material