Random wishes

[cosdogg]

I generally would like to hear from the group of players who deem it good strategy to wish for random cards when playing the Mahjong. It certainly seems like it is a risk/reward proposition that has way higher risk than reward.

[scottishben]

In terms of risk reward it is more likely to hurt your opponents than your partner, particularly the next person to play.

Wishes that appear random are rarely fully random for instance a wish of a 2 probably signifies that the person wishing is either without a 2 or has at most 1 2.

The problem with a wish that isnt what you passed is that if it causes a problem for partner they can get very annoyed with you and it hurts your partnership. But a random wish will usually perform better than wishing what you passed with a few clear exceptions....e.g. if you pass a 2 and your partner might have a strong hand wishing a 2 is very strong.

If you have 2334566 plus some high cards you might pass a 3 and a 6, and receive a 2 and a 7 - a wish of a 3,4 or 5 is very bad for you but a wish of 2 or 7 isnt that disruptive.

Playing the Greek system if you dont have more than 1 ace and partner passes something other than ace or better then a wish of an ace is often good, if you hold 2 aces you might wish a king