It is your first night
The First-Night Checklist
Somebody invited you to play American mah jongg. You said yes, and now it is Tuesday and the game is Thursday, and you are wondering what exactly you have agreed to.
You are not bad at this. American mah jongg is almost always taught too fast, by someone who loves the game so much they have forgotten what it was like not to know it. That is the whole problem, and it is fixable in an evening.
Get the first-night checklist
Put in your email address and we will send you the three-page checklist straight away. No waiting, nothing to confirm.
Free. Leave any time with one click. Your address goes nowhere else.
What is on the three pages:
- The night before. The four things worth knowing cold, and the much longer list of things you can safely learn at the table.
- What to put in your bag. Short, and one item on it is the one everybody forgets.
- What to say when you sit down. One sentence, said once in the first ninety seconds, that sets expectations and then ends the subject.
- Every house rule in one place. The page to take with you to a new table — because the thing that flusters beginners most is not a rule they got wrong, it is a rule that table does differently.
That last page is the one that matters most. American mah jongg has official rules, and it has what your table does, and almost nobody will tell you which is which — because to them it is simply how the game is played.
After the checklist you will hear from us twice more in your first week. After that we write when we have something worth your time — and always in April, when the new card comes out. Reply to any of it. We read every one.