Push or fold: a checklist that works

A riichi stick hits the table, and your next discard decides what your hand is for. Fold one that should push and you throw away a win you had earned. Push one that should fold and you pay for someone else's. A short checklist tells the two apart before your turn comes round.

Both mistakes cost points

Pushing means playing on for the win and cutting whatever the hand needs, safe or not. How to fold taught the safe option, and safe isn't free. A folded hand still pays its share of a tsumo, and noten payments (what you pay at a draw when you aren't tenpai). In the site's fold prices from Tenhou's top room (Houou), a non-dealer who folds cleanly against a non-dealer's riichi loses 1,120 points on average from turn 8. The dealer loses 1,890, and a non-dealer folding against the dealer's riichi loses 1,750. Those analyses count turns from zero, so turn 8 is your ninth discard.

Dealing in costs more. A non-dealer's riichi declared at turn 8 that wins by ron averages 5,869 points, and a dealer's averages 8,179. That's about five clean folds for one deal-in, and it's why a weak hand folds.

The other mistake is quieter. In the same logs, a chase riichi (declaring after someone else has) on a two-sided wait (ryanmen) wins 48% of the time and deals in 16%. Weigh that against the fold price, and an average chase, one that pays about 7,300 when it wins, comes out about 3,300 points ahead. Fold it and nothing records the loss: no ron, no stick, no line in your stats. The omission bias post explains why that fold feels free.

So at every riichi, ask one question before you look at the tile: is my hand worth it?

Five questions, in order

Ask them top to bottom. Most decisions end at the first or the second.

1. How far am I from tenpai? Count your shanten. It's the biggest input, and it can end the checklist on its own.
2. If I'm tenpai, what's my wait? Two-sided or wider is a good wait. A one-sided wait (a kanchan, the middle wait; a penchan, the edge wait; or a tanki, the single wait) or a pair wait (shanpon) is a narrow one, what earlier lessons call a bad wait. Count the copies left, as Mahjong waits did. A two-sided wait down to 4 tiles plays like a narrow one.
3. What's my price? What the hand pays on a ron, played the way you'll play it. A closed hand chasing a riichi usually declares too, so count riichi's han. What a hand pays has the payments.
4. Who declared, and am I the dealer? The dealer's riichi pays 1.5 times as much. As dealer, your own fold costs the most, and it gives up the deal.
5. How many safe tiles do I hold? With three by the middle of the hand, or two late, a fold reaches the draw, and Defense before the riichi showed how to hold the first one before anyone declares. With fewer, folding means pushing worse tiles, so weigh the push properly.

The turn moves the line too. The later it gets, the fewer draws your wait has left, so a narrow wait needs more behind it, as the fold price post's dealer rule shows. In the last turns, a tenpai also collects noten payments, which The last turns prices.

The score matters most in All Last. If a deal-in drops you a place and a win doesn't lift you one, fold, unless your own win is what stops theirs from passing you. All Last decisions works through both cases.

The attacker doesn't have to be a riichi. An open hand with three calls is tenpai 88% of the time at turn 8, in the open hand tenpai data. Treat it as Defending against open hands did, as a riichi without the stick.

The baseline: your shape decides most hands

Questions one and two give you a starting answer. Value, seat, and safe tiles move it from there.

Your hand	Baseline	Why
Tenpai, two-sided or wider	Push, even when cheap against a non-dealer	Two-sided wins 48%, deals in 16%; wider does better
Tenpai, one-sided, pair wait, or 4 tiles or fewer	Push from about 2,000 against a non-dealer, about a mangan against the dealer	Wins 32%, deals in 21%
1-shanten	Fold, unless it's wide and pays: then one dangerous tile	Needs a draw before it can win
2-shanten or worse	Fold	Two draws behind a hand that's already tenpai

Two-sided tenpai: push. Value barely matters here. Against a non-dealer's riichi, a two-sided chase beats folding on even the cheapest hand in the game, and against the dealer's riichi a two-sided 2,000 still clears the higher bar. As dealer, push a two-sided tenpai against a non-dealer's riichi. The only reasons to fold are a tile that's plainly the wait or a score that can't take the deal-in.

Narrow tenpai: it needs a price. Against a non-dealer's riichi a narrow chase needs a hand worth about 2,000 to break even. Against the dealer's, the fold price post's rule wants a mangan, and the push-or-fold calculator sorts the hands below that by tile and turn. Tenpai against a riichi works through these lines.

1-shanten: one tile, if it's good. A good 1-shanten, wide and worth something, can push one dangerous tile. If the next discard would be a second, fold. A plain 1-shanten folds at once. 1-shanten against a riichi shows which hands count as good, and the few wide enough to play like tenpai.

2-shanten or worse: fold. You need two good draws to reach tenpai and a third to win, while the riichi player needs one. A mangan doesn't close that gap: it still has to reach tenpai, and every dangerous tile on the way can pay for the riichi instead.

An older shortcut pushed when two of three held: tenpai, a big hand, and a good wait. The Houou numbers replaced it. A narrow tenpai against a non-dealer's riichi needs about 2,000, not a big hand.

One note on timing. The shuhari post keeps players below Mahjong Soul's Master rank folding against every riichi while they learn to fold cleanly. It starts the two-sided push at Master and saves narrow pushes for Saint, where you can read the tile you cut. Learn the checklist anyway: it shows which of your folds cost the most.

Say your wait and your price

The checklist only works if you run it before your fingers pick a tile. So make one habit of it: against a riichi, say two things before every discard, your wait and your price. Out loud at home, under your breath at a parlor.

East 2, turn 8. You're South. West, a non-dealer, declared riichi two turns ago, and their discards include an 8s but no 4p. You draw the 5s.

Cut the and you're tenpai on 3p and 6p. Run the questions. Tenpai. Two-sided, up to 8 tiles. Riichi and pinfu: 2,000 on a ron. A non-dealer declared, and you aren't the dealer. Two safe tiles, the 8s pair, one short of what a fold wants by now. Say it: "Two-sided, 2,000." Against a non-dealer's riichi that line pushes. Cut the 7p, a middle tile with no suji, and declare.

Had the draw been useless, the hand would sit at 1-shanten on 16 tiles, worth 2,000. That's a plain 1-shanten, and it folds. Saying "two-sided, 2,000" keeps a good hand from folding on reflex. Saying "kanchan, 1,000" keeps a cheap one from pushing out of pride.

The calculator turns the checklist into a chart. Run your close calls through it after each session.

Practice

Say the wait and the price before you pick.