If there is "no flower" and "nobody had ever chance to make any move", not even by drawing, we can conclude the calls are for concealed kongs.
Answer 1: Mrs. Hudson’s starting hand is 111 222 333 123 55 in the same suit and she declared three times a concealed kong, getting each time a 4 as her replacement tile.
Answer 2: She made three or four calls.
Exemple with four calls:
Starting hand: 111 222 333 123 44
Kong! draw a 4: -1111- 222 333 234 44
Kong! draw a 5: -1111- -2222- 333 345 44
Kong! draw a 4: -1111- -2222- -3333- 4444 5 (not a winning hand)
Kong! draw a 5: -1111- -2222- -3333- -4444- 55
Answer 3: Yes.
a) The non-declared "kongs" must be tiles hog with pungs + a chow, and we need to shift the chow after konging two times. It requires five consecutive tiles in the same suit.
b) The final hand is All Pung, so it have only five different tiles.
a+b) There is no room for other kinds of tiles -> Full Flush.
Answer 4: No. None of the 88-points fans have five consecutive tiles in the same suit.
Four Wins of Mrs. Hudson
- Details
- Created on Thursday, 26 April 2012 09:57
- Last Updated on Wednesday, 28 November 2012 18:00
- Written by Vitaly Novikov
A new Sherlock Holmes Mystery. When should you stop to try and make mahjong and when should you continue?
On Friday night Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Watson, Mrs. Hudson and Inspector Lestrade decided to play mahjong. While preparing the wall, they started to speak about the ability to handle game opportunities.
“One of the most difficult problems to solve by a player is to know when to stop by winning a deal, and when to go on with it,” – said Holmes. “Whenever the hand value does not bring the expected result -- continue to play! And, if you decide to continue playing, remember: somebody else may get mahjong.”
Everybody agreed by nodding their heads.
So, the wall is built, the tiles are dealt. Mrs. Hudson is East. And then something truly unexpected occurred.
Mrs. Hudson was pondering on something thoroughly and then she declared mahjong after making several calls so that nobody had ever chance to make any move.
“Gentlemen!” – she said. “THREE I had times the chance to finish the deal, but I was confused with the prospect to finish the game so early. So, for the fourth time my patience has gone and I declared mahjong.”
Question 1: Give an example of Mrs. Hudson’s starting hand and show how she decided to continue game three times.
Question 2: How many declarations (calls) did she make provided there are no flowers in her winning hand?
Question 3 (for experts): Is it necessary for Mrs. Hudson’s hand to be one-suiter?
Question 4 (for experts): Is it possible to find in four mahjong hands of Mrs. Hudson (three missed and one declared) 88-point fan?
Comments (3)
1Thursday, 03 May 2012 14:19
Sylvain MALBEC
2Thursday, 03 May 2012 22:52
Sylvain MALBEC
Answer 3: The final hand can be three kong and a chow (and a pair), so point b is false.
The hand don't need to be a Full Flush.
For example, it works as well with the starting hand 111 222 333 123 in one suit and 99 in an other, getting 4, 5 then 6 as replacement tiles.
Answer 4: Nine gates does have five consecutive tile, but you can't make three kongs in a row with it.
The hand don't need to be a Full Flush.
For example, it works as well with the starting hand 111 222 333 123 in one suit and 99 in an other, getting 4, 5 then 6 as replacement tiles.
Answer 4: Nine gates does have five consecutive tile, but you can't make three kongs in a row with it.
3Friday, 04 May 2012 04:43
Vitaly
Sylvain, thank you for your quick and full answer!!
Let wait for other readers' replies.
Let wait for other readers' replies.
It is difficult to judge the difficulty of problems, but some did take me some time to solve.
I especially enjoyed the '32nd of December' and its fourth question.
Thanks to Vitaly for the problems, to Martin for hosting the "venue" and congrats to Sylvain and Scott for their success.
A: two kongs of the same suit (i.e. 8 one-suit tiles) and a kong of wind
So... winds are now suit tiles?
And they are in every suit?
Wow!
Looks like I've misunderstood the question and it was actually an easy one!
Was it because I was the only one to answer the question within the allotted time?
Just curious.
Thanks.
At first, it looks like each player had three pure melded kongs, two of them separated by two numbers (e.g. 1 and 4), and that their left-side neighbour is waiting for these two said kongs with a ryanmen (e.g. _23_).
But it turns out there are not enough tiles for that.
So, here's the trick:
Watson had: melded: 1111m 4444m 5555m, concealed: 23s EE.
Lestrade had: melded: 1111s 4444s 5555s, concealed: 23p SS.
Holmes had: melded: 1111p 4444p 5555p, concealed: 78m WW.
Mrs. Hudson had: melded: 6666m 9999m, concealed: RRRR(concealed kong) 23m NN, and erronously melded as flowers: 2223m.
It certainly "cut off all conceivable scenarios".