After-kan win 嶺上開花 · rinshan kaihou

Short answer: Rinshan kaihou is a 1-han yaku, open or closed, for winning on the replacement tile you draw from the dead wall right after declaring a kan, scored as a self-draw.

Win on the replacement tile you draw after declaring a kan — “blossom on the ridge.”

Value	1 han, open or closed
How often	rare

Mahjong hand: 2 of characters, 3 of characters, 4 of characters — 4 of circles, 5 of circles, 6 of circles — 8 of bamboo, 8 of bamboo, 8 of bamboo, 8 of bamboo — 9 of bamboo, 9 of bamboo — 4 of circles, 5 of circles, winning tile: 6 of circles — Declaring a kan, then winning on the replacement tile drawn from the dead wall.

The moment to watch for: the fourth copy of a tile arrives while you already hold the other three, or while they sit on the table as an earlier pon. Declaring the kan カン earns a replacement draw from the dead wall, and if that tile completes your hand, the win is rinshan kaihou. Since the win counts as a self-draw, a closed hand collects menzen tsumo as well, and everything else already in the hand stacks on top.

The real question is whether the kan deserves to happen at all. Every kan turns over a new dora ドラ indicator for the whole table, and if the replacement tile doesn't win, you still have to discard something — with an opponent's riichi out, that forced discard can be expensive. The classic mistake is calling kan just to fish for this yaku when the kan breaks a sequence or pulls the hand out of tenpai テンパイ (see riichi and tenpai). Call it when your hand stays tenpai and the new dora is at least as likely to help you as anyone else; treat the rinshan chance as a bonus, not the reason.

Key points

Requires a kan first; the win comes from the dead-wall replacement draw
Counts as a self-draw (tsumo) for scoring purposes
Famous from anime and film, genuinely uncommon at the table

Worked example

Mahjong hand: 1 of characters, 2 of characters, 3 of characters — 7 of characters, 8 of characters, 9 of characters — 5 of circles, 5 of circles, 5 of circles, 5 of circles — 2 of bamboo, 2 of bamboo — 6 of bamboo, 7 of bamboo, winning tile: 8 of bamboo — Holding 555p and tenpai on 6s-7s, you draw the fourth 5p, declare a closed kan, and the replacement tile is the 8s.

Before the kan the hand is tenpai: 123m, 789m, a concealed 555p, the 22s pair, and 67s waiting on 5s or 8s. You draw the last 5p. Declaring a closed kan keeps the wait unchanged, so you set out the four 5p and take a replacement tile from the dead wall. It is the 8s — tsumo.

Rinshan kaihou is 1 han, and because the win counts as a self-draw on a closed hand, menzen tsumo adds another: 2 han before dora. The new kan also flips an extra dora indicator, which may add more, and the concealed quad carries a large block of fu.

Common mistakes

Treating the win as a ron. It is a self-draw: in most rules everyone pays their tsumo share, even when the kan used an opponent's discard.
Calling kan just to fish for this yaku. If the kan breaks a sequence or pulls you out of tenpai, the replacement draw has little chance of winning and the new dora helps everyone.
After riichi, declaring a closed kan that changes your wait. The only kan allowed after riichi is a closed kan on the tile you just drew that changes neither your wait nor how your sets are read; exact wording varies by ruleset.

Related yaku

Robbing a kan 搶槓 — Win by taking the tile an opponent adds to an existing pon to upgrade it into a kan.

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