Mahjiku › Questions › What is the difference between winning by self-draw and winning off a discard?
For the table game: four players, real tiles, Hong Kong style — not the solitaire puzzle.
Self-draw (自摸) means you drew your own winning tile; a discard win means someone threw it to you. In Hong Kong the difference is usually not in the hand’s value but in who pays — on a self-draw all three opponents pay in full, while on a discard the thrower normally pays alone.
Both are wins, and in Hong Kong scoring both are usually worth the same count. What changes is the bill.
Read those together and the real reward becomes obvious: a self-drawn hand collects three times what the same hand collects off a discard, without adding a single point to the count. That is exactly why the legacy additive reference sheet prices the self-draw bonus itself at 0 — the all-pay is the reward, and charging for it twice would double-count.
This is the axis tables disagree on most. Common variations, all supported in House Rules: 出銃加倍 — the thrower pays double; 半銃 "half shot" — the thrower pays double and the other two pay a single share each; all-pay on a discard — every opponent pays, thrower or not; and 自摸加倍 — a multiplier on top of a self-draw (×2 at some tables, ×1.5 at others). Ask before the first hand, not after an expensive one.
Unless another sheet is named, examples use the legacy additive reference sheet. Fresh installs select Half Spicy, whose hand values and payments differ. Check the sheet selected for your table.
South holds this hand — runs of 2-3-4 in all three suits, a run of 5-6-7 characters and a pair of 9-dots — with sets claimed from the table:
| Line the engine found | 中文 | Faan |
|---|---|---|
| Ping Hu | 平和 | 2 |
| Mixed Triple Chow | 三色同順 | 6 |
| Base | 底 | 1 |
| Total | 9 |
Same count, 27 against 9. Kept fully concealed, the self-drawn hand would also add the concealed-hand line. The payout guide runs it under every discard convention the app supports.
Last updated: 2026-10-24 · editorially reviewed 2026-10-10. Every Hong Kong number on this page is computed from Mahjiku's rule sheets when the page is built.
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