In September 2017, I finally managed to reach the rank of 6th dan in the online mahjong game Tenhou.
Upon checking, it appears that I reached the 5th dan rank in August 2016, so it took exactly about a year.
Since I get home from work fairly late on weekdays, I can only play two or three games at most, and there are days when I'm too tired to play at all.
On my days off, I sometimes play 4 to 8 games, but I also have various plans that prevent me from playing, so I think I play about 50 games a month.
I'm honestly surprised that I've made it to 6th dan, considering I used to struggle at the advanced tables.
I want to believe that my efforts to improve little by little, by acknowledging my own shortcomings and honestly reading books, have finally paid off.
This time, I'd like to reflect a little on my current academic performance.
A collection of articles on improving your mahjong skills, techniques, mental game, Tenhou (online mahjong platform), etc.
Average rank/rank distribution
The average rank is 2.41, which means you're slightly above the middle.
However, as your rank increases, it becomes increasingly difficult, so if you don't improve, I think things will only get worse.
Regarding the ranking distribution, there were quite a lot of 2nd place finishes, followed by 1st place, 3rd place, and finally 4th place.
Second place had the most votes, and fourth place had slightly fewer,I feel like there are probably other areas where we could push further.
However, in Tenhou, where avoiding the last game is crucial, I don't think it's entirely wrong.
The progression to higher ranks takes quite a bit of time.
Number of matches
I don't know when I started because I don't have the early logs, but there were two logs in July 2015.
I suspect there was a somewhat long gap before 2015.
The official website states that the average number of matches for a 6th dan player is 2203, so 1233 matches might actually be a pretty good pace.I thought about it for a moment.
Win rate/fire rate
The average winning rate for 6th dan players is 22.6%, which is somewhat disappointing.
However, the average rate of dealing into a winning hand is 13.1%, which is about 1% better than average.
I get the impression that I'm somewhat of a defensive type.
In my opinion, if your "winning rate - discard rate" is around 10, then your playing style is viable.
(I've been calling it "Waho-sa" for the time being.)
If you look at the scores of top performers, they often have scores around 12.
A score of 7 or 8 sounds quite challenging.
This metric becomes quite useful when adjusting the balance between offense and defense, or when evaluating the performance of others.
For example, let's say someone with a winning rate of 20% and a losing rate of 10% changes their style to be a bit more aggressive, and their winning rate becomes 21% and their losing rate becomes 10.5%.
This means that while the winning rate has increased by 1%, the rate of dealing into a winning hand has increased by 0.5%, but the difference between winning and dealing into a winning hand is positive, so it can be said that the balance between pushing and folding has been successfully adjusted.
Even if this metric is low, it's still possible to succeed if there are special factors such as "very high RBIs" or "very low RBIs from losing."
In fact, there are some top-class players like that.
secondary dew rate
The average for 6th dan is 35.1%, so I think my score is still a little low.
When I extracted the meld rate from only the top-tier tables, it was only about 28%, which I think is completely unacceptable.
When I first started playing at the top-tier tables, my score was much lower, but after significantly re-evaluating the situations in which I should call,
It's been slowly rising.
At the same time, my grades have also been gradually improving,I've come to realize that the ability to vocalize is an extremely important factor in being a top-class animal.
Personally, I think calling tiles in the late game to aim for a formal tenpai (ready hand) is a weak move.
recovery rate
Considering that the average for the 6th level is 17.0%, this is slightly on the higher side.
It's honestly unclear whether this reflects a slightly lower rate of calling tiles or indicates a high level of skill in achieving a ready hand.
I hope it's the latter, but it's probably the former.
I think that if the exposure rate increases, it will naturally decrease, so I'm not too worried about it.
Afterword
First, I tried to analyze my current academic performance.
In the next article, I'll share some of the things that helped me progress from 4th dan to 6th dan.
Things that helped me go from 4th dan to 6th dan in online mahjong (Tenhou)
This is a page summarizing other articles related to mahjong.
A collection of articles on improving your mahjong skills, techniques, mental game, Tenhou (online mahjong platform), etc.
