The card changes every year, and most disagreements at the table come from players working off different years. Four things are worth confirming in the first two minutes, before the walls go up.
Why the card carries a year
The National Mah Jongg League prints a new card every spring. The previous one does not stop being a good description of the game. It stops being the game. Lines are retired, replaced, and rescored, and the card is the only place those changes are recorded.
The structure is what makes the mix-up possible. The sections sit in the same order, the hands are written the same way, and either card looks familiar at a glance. You have to read the lines to notice that the two cards disagree. What changed in the 2026 card walks through this year's differences.
The four checks
| Check | Where to look | What it costs to skip |
|---|---|---|
| Current year | The year printed on the card | Two different games at one table |
| Joker permissions | The notation on the lines you play most | A hand called that was never legal |
| Flower section | Which lines include flowers, and how many per line | Scores that come out wrong, usually late |
| Optional passes | Second Charleston, courtesy pass | An argument in the middle of the passing |
1. Everyone has the current year's card. Ask before the first deal, not after the first dispute. If someone is working from last year, you are not playing the same game, and discussion will not fix it, because each of you is right about your own card.
2. Read the joker rules out loud. Joker permissions are the most misread part of any card. Some lines forbid jokers outright, some allow them anywhere, and some restrict them to particular positions. Reading them aloud costs half a minute and settles the question before anyone has a hand to defend. The jokers page sets out how that notation is written.
3. Check the flower section. No section of the card turns over more from one year to the next. Whether a line wants flowers at all, and if so how many, is worth confirming even when you are sure you know.
4. Agree on the optional passes. The second Charleston and the courtesy pass are both optional, and both start arguments when players assume their own table's habit is the rule. Decide once, at the start, and the passing goes quietly.
When the table is on different years
This is not a case where one player is right and another is wrong. It is a case the game has no answer for, because two cards describe two different games.
An order that works:
- Find the most recent card in the room. The year is printed on it.
- Play that one. Everyone, not only the person holding it.
- If nobody has the current card, choose one and say out loud that today's game runs on it.
- Do not switch cards mid-session. Half a game on one card and half on another is worse than either.
In a regular group this almost never comes up. It appears at mixed tables: a visitor, a new player, a second set arriving with someone else's cards in it.
What these checks do not cover
They keep the table on one rulebook. They do not make anyone quicker at reading it. Knowing which lines are still live with the tiles in front of you is a separate skill, and it comes from playing rather than from a checklist. The card page has the fuller picture of how the sections fit together.
They also do not settle a table where someone refuses to move off an old card. At that point the disagreement is not about mahjong.
Two minutes, once per session, and most of the avoidable disputes disappear.