2024 Middle Panel

Greetings and salutations from your Bubbe, who knows exactly why you're here. You want to me to talk about the middle panel of the card.

Who am I to say no?

 **Warning: Bubbe may or may not have been consuming hallucinogenics while coming up with some of these ideas!**

 

As with yesterday, I'm explaining my methods. Q means quints, CR means consecutive runs, O means the 13579 section. If a hand has a second variation I will either call it, for example, CR7.1 or CR7.2 referring to the number of suits, or if it's on a different end of the number line I will call it, for example, O2a or O2b.

 

 

Quint section: first of all, thank you, NMJL people, for adding in another quint this year. Last year was so boring.

 

Q1: A pair of Flowers and three consecutive numbers, all in the same suit. This is for when you've been building CR3.1 but you happen to have two or more Jokers... it pays more. Don't forget you'll need a natural pair between the two quints.

 

Q2: This is a two quint/kong hand. No pairs, Jokers can be used anywhere, and any discard can be called for exposure. The kong is a Wind, a "solo" exposure that would not give away that you're playing quints. The numerical design is also brilliant. You put out a quint of any number in any suit, and then the second quint must be in one of the other two suits, in any other number than what you put out. That leaves you literally 16 other options: how is a person supposed to defend that? Of course, that's only if they've already put out the Wind kong... A quint by itself, with no other exposure, makes things very, very ambiguous. Bravo, card designers!

 

Q3: consecutive pair and quint of same two numbers, in two different suits. This bears a close resemblance to CR4. The difference is having the single tiles vs. at least two Jokers; either way, you will need the natural pairs.

 

Q4: Bubbe could not be happier that her junk quint hand is back, two quints and a kong, but this time there is a little twist. This is one of the two times that a Flower quint appears on the 2024 card. The kong is dragons, an exposure which would not, by itself, signal that you were playing quints. The tricky thing this year is that your number quint MUST be of a different suit than your dragon (it says "any two suits").

 

Consecutive Runs:

 

CR1a and b: If you didn't see my first 2024 blog, go back and read it. I am over the moon that somebody is changing things up over at NMJL. We now have a new pattern, the sombrero. Pung, pair, kong, pair, pung (or 3-2-4-2-3, if you're thinking of size). You can choose either end of the number line, 1-5 or 5-9, all in the same suit.

Kudos to my friend Tracy Callard who pointed out that CR1a, with its pairs of 2's and 4's, is going to make the 2024 hands that much harder to make--and vice versa.

Don't worry, our bell curve and step patterns will still show up all over the card.

 

CR2: a two-suited bell curve. It's four consecutive numbers, anywhere on the number line, in suit A: pair and pung ascending to the middle and descending back to final pair. The middle kong is of dragons in one of the other two suits. I guess my visual mnemonic for this one would be dragon bridge: you're climbing up to view this unique dragon kong, then going back down again..

 

CR3.1 or CR3.3: one of the most reliable CR hands. A pair of Flowers and three Kongs, consecutive numbers in either all one suit or one of each of the three suits. Very straightforward, makes an excellent backup hand as I will discuss in a future post.

 

CR4: a variation on the "flag" hands we had a few cards ago. Remember, the components always have to add up to 14: in this case, it's 2 x (1+2+4). A single, pair, and kong of the same 3 consecutive numbers, in two different suits. I mentioned that it resembles Q3, above. It is a good hand to keep in mind when discussing backups.

 

CR5: single-suited, consecutive run step hand. Pairs of the first two numbers, pungs of the next two numbers, and the top step is actually a kong of the matching dragon. The trick to distinguishing this from CR2 is that in CR5, the stairs go in only one direction, UP, to matching dragons, while in the dragon bridge you are climbing up to the "view" of contrasting dragon kong, before descending again. 

If you'll briefly indulge me: CR2 is "sightseeing": you go up the dragon bridge to see a kong of different dragons than usual, then go back down. CR5 is an everyday, one-suited hand: you climb the stairs up to your bedroom where your good old, regular family dragon kong is waiting for you. (Yes, I know I'm getting loopy again...)

 

CR6: stealth Quint!! Another hand I mentioned in my overview. This hand has a lot going on. I love that the run of three single tiles, known in Chinese mahjong as a chow, is featured, but remember, you cannot call for a discard to complete the chow unless it's your final tile. The two pungs are the next number in sequence, in the complementary suits. This hand pays 30 cents, a little bit more than most, because of the three singles and the fact that it's the only hand that involves a quint and two pungs.

 

CR7.1 or CR7.2: The super straightforward consecutive run hand, pung pung kong kong. It can either be in one suit or two, and the basic thing to remember is that the two pungs are the lower ones and the two kongs are the higher ones.

 

CR8: a concealed hand, four pungs and a pair. You have two sets of the same consecutive pungs, in suits A and B. The next number in the sequence is a pair, in suit C. Do not forget that this is a concealed hand. 

 

13579 Section:

 

O1.1 and O1.3: The other sombrero hands. The sequence is always 1 through 9, with the pungs being the 1 and 9, the pairs being the 3 and 7, and the kong in the middle as 5. In the three-suit variation, the 1 and 3 are suit A, the 5 is suit B, and 7 and 9 are suit C. It may be simplest for you to display O1.3 with your own tiles, just to get used to looking at it.

 

O2a and O2b: The hand we see every year, this year it's pung pung kong kong, with the two lower numbers, 1 and 3 or 5 and 7 in pungs of suit A, and the higher numbers, 3 and 5 or 7 and 9, both being kongs of suit B. No pairs required, you can use Jokers for any meld and or call a discard to make any exposure

 

O3a and O3b: Just like last year, think of this hand as a slightly shifted bell curve by moving the Flowers to the other side of the dragons. Your pairs are the low number and the Flowers. Your pungs are the middle number and the dragon. Your center/kong is the highest number. Another way to visualize: the three odd numbers ascend both numerically and in size (the highest is the kong); on the way back down, you have the pung of dragons and then a pair of Flowers (remember that there are NO Flower pungs this year).

 

O4:  three suited hand, three pairs and two kongs. The pairs are the first three numbers (135) in suit A. The kongs of 7s and 9s are the other two suits, in whichever order you prefer. I'm visualizing it as a striped shirt (three pairs in same color), then pants and shoes (kongs) in whichever color order you want.

 

O5: like E4a and E4b, this is a stealth multiplication hand. The hand includes three kongs and two singles, with the singles being the product of the two number kongs, 15 or 35. Each of the melds, the two kongs and the "product," is in its own suit, and the final kong is four Flowers.

 

O6a and O6b: A three-suited stair hand, on the lower or upper of the number line. The pairs are the lower numbers in suit A, the pungs are the upper numbers in suit B, and the kong dragons are in suit C. A trick to keep this hand distinct from CR2 and especially CR5, which also use dragon kongs: remember that the version that uses all three suits is ODD!

 

O7a or O7b:  Remember that this is a concealed hand. It resembles E6, another concealed hand, in that the first combination (pung-pair-pung) is all in one suit. The trickiest thing to remember for this hand is that the other two pungs are of the middle number, in the other two suits. This is another hand that I recommend that you set up with your own tiles so you're familiar with how it looks.

 

 

As I alluded to above, there are quite a few hands in the middle section that are excellent backup hands or can easily switch to something else. It's worth understanding the nuances of each hand: which ones have a pair of Flowers, which ones involve singles? What kind of a difference would having extra jokers make? And what's the story with the dragon kongs?!

 

I think most of you can figure out what tomorrow's article's going to be. See you then!

 

Bubbe