Stage 1 · pool stays open
Free: the pool closes after five seconds at Stage 2. Members reach Stages 3 and 4, where it barely opens at all.
Tiles you can see on the table (discards + exposed melds)
Generic tiles only. This drill teaches counting, not the official card's exact combinations or point values — the current NMJL card is always the final authority. Your own hand is assumed known to you, so it is not part of the "unseen" count. Difficulty adapts to your last round: ace it to climb, stumble and it eases off.
Why the count is a real skill
- Every tile type is finite. Each number tile, wind, and dragon has exactly four copies in a set. A Joker is one of eight. Once you know how many you have seen, the rest is subtraction.
- Dead tile = all four are visible. When every copy of a tile is already in discards or melds, nobody can use it to complete a set. That tile is safe to discard and useless to chase. Spotting it early saves a wrong turn.
- The inside ends, 3 and 7, carry the most information. In any run-based hand, a missing 3 or 7 most limits what your neighbors can build next to it. Players who watch 3s and 7s are watching the tiles that most change the danger of everything around them. The math is the same for every tile; the habit of checking the constrained ones is what pays off.
- Joker count is its own read. Eight Jokers in a set. Each one that surfaces tells you less wild help is left for the big hands. A Joker you have seen is a Joker nobody else can draw.