The comparison & result
The experiment compared normal kong play with a policy that never declared a kong. Classic does not award a separate immediate payment simply for declaring one; the replacement draw and qualifying win patterns still matter.
This corrects an earlier interpretation that carried the Club sheet’s kong advantage across to Classic. The published Classic result was close to even. A result on one scoring sheet should not be used as a rule for another.
At your table
- Check what the kong changes in your hand and which tiles remain available.
- Keep the risk of releasing or losing a safe tile in the decision.
Check your table’s scoring rules before applying the finding. Read the Taiwanese Classic reference.
How it was tested
Published experiment: 100,000 simulated hands under Taiwanese Classic, normal kong play versus a never-kong policy. The reported difference was within the test’s noise.
The players were software policies, not human participants. This report describes the published experiment; it does not establish the best move for every possible hand or opponent.
Results without a published uncertainty interval should be read as point estimates. Similar results do not prove two choices are equivalent.
Read the Lab’s method and limitationsPublished by Hé Fēn Mahjong. Ask about this finding or suggest a correction.