How scoring works in okey
Two different numbers in okey are both called points: the opening threshold your groups have to be worth before anything goes on the table, and the match score that carries one hand's result into the next. Classic okey uses neither, 51 uses the first, and 101 uses both.
Two different numbers in okey are both called points, and telling them apart answers most of the question. One is the opening threshold: what the groups in your hand have to be worth before you may put any of them on the table. The other is the match score, the tally that carries the result of one hand into the hand after it. In 101 Okey Masası the three modes sit in the same app — classic okey, Kaptırık (51) and 101 — and they answer the scoring question in three different ways: no threshold at all, a threshold that climbs while you wait, and a fixed threshold with a score that runs across the whole match.
Two numbers, both called points
The question comes up because one word is doing two jobs. The first job is permission: before your runs and sets can leave your hand, the rule set may demand that they are worth a certain amount between them, and until they are, they stay where nobody can see them. That number is counted once, at the moment you open, and it has nothing to do with winning — it is the price of getting started. The second job is the result: a tally that survives the end of a hand turns a series of hands into a single match, and that is the number that decides who finishes ahead.
- Opening threshold — what your groups must be worth before anything goes on the table. Classic okey: none. Kaptırık (51): at least 51 points. 101: 101 points.
- Match score — a tally carried from hand to hand. 101 keeps one, and the lowest total at the end of the match wins.
- Neither number changes how a hand finishes: every tile in a run or a set, then the last tile discarded.
What the opening threshold measures
The threshold is measured against what you are laying down, not against what stays behind in your hand. Until the groups you intend to open with are worth enough between them, nothing goes on the table, however finished they look sitting in front of you. That turns the first stretch of a hand into a waiting game with a target: you are not trying to end the hand yet, you are trying to be worth enough to start. A hand can look tidy and still be short of the bar, and while it is short it stays hidden, so the other three players learn nothing about it.
| Rule set | What you need to open | Does the number move? |
|---|---|---|
| Classic okey | Nothing — there is no threshold | There is no number to move. |
| Kaptırık (51) | At least 51 points, or an opening built from four pairs | Yes — it rises with every player who opens after you. |
| 101 | 101 points | No — it is 101 in the first hand and in the last. |
A threshold other people can raise
In 51 the number is only where the hand starts. The bar rises with every player who opens after you, so what you have to be worth is decided partly by the three people around you rather than by the rule sheet. Clearing it early means clearing it while it is at its lowest, and holding a strong hand back to make it stronger is a choice the mode charges you for. In 101 that decision is made before the first tile is drawn: the threshold is fixed at 101 and stays there for the whole match, so a player who opens ahead of you costs you tempo, not price.
The one opening with nothing to count
51 has a single exception to its own arithmetic, and it is pairs. An opening built from four pairs has no threshold to clear at all — not a discounted 51, a waived one. That changes what a duplicate tile is worth to you: in a rule set where every group is measured against a number, drawing the same tile twice is normally a hand going nowhere, but here it is a second road to the table, and one where nothing has to be added up. Reading which of the two roads your tiles are on is most of the early game.
The score that survives the hand
In a single hand of okey the result is the whole game: somebody finishes, and the table starts again from nothing. 101 does not work that way. It is a longer match played across several hands with a running score, so a hand is a line in a tally rather than a game in its own right. One brilliant hand followed by four careless ones is not a shape 101 rewards, because the tally does not care which hand a number came from — and a hand that goes badly is one entry among several rather than the end of anything.
Why the lowest total wins
101 counts downwards. When the match ends the winner is whoever holds the lowest total, which inverts the instinct most games train into you: you are not chasing a big number, you are keeping yours small. That is also why the two numbers pull in opposite directions. The threshold asks you to build something big before you are allowed to show it; the tally asks you to keep your own figure small across several hands. Both are counted in points, and they are not the same skill.
How many hands is a match?
You choose. A 101 match runs 1, 3, 5, 7, 9 or 11 hands, and that single setting decides how much the running score matters. At one hand the tally has nothing to accumulate and the game sits close to a single hand of okey with a 101-point entrance fee. At eleven it is an evening, and a bad hand early is something you can still play your way out of. The longer the setting, the more what you are managing is the score rather than any one opening.
Scoring at a glance
| Numbers called points | Two — the opening threshold and the match score |
|---|---|
| Classic okey threshold | None |
| Kaptırık (51) threshold | At least 51 points, rising with every player who opens after you |
| 101 threshold | Fixed at 101 points, for the whole match |
| Opening with no threshold | Four pairs, in 51 |
| Which mode keeps a match score | 101 — a running tally carried across hands |
| Who wins a 101 match | The lowest total at the end |
| Match length in 101 | 1, 3, 5, 7, 9 or 11 hands, your choice |
| The deal in 101 | 22 and 21 tiles |
| How a hand ends | Every tile in a run or a set, then the last tile discarded |
Counting without three people waiting on you
Adding your groups up under time pressure is the part that puts people off, and the honest place to practise it is the offline mode against bots, which needs no internet connection and nobody's patience. Once the counting is automatic, quick match seats you at a four-player online table; if you would rather choose the company, you can open a private room for friends, and a table that does not fill is completed by bots. All three rule sets are in the same app, so the fastest way to feel the difference between no threshold, a rising one and a fixed one is to play the same kind of hand in each — the screenshots of every mode are on the game page at /games/kaptirik/.
Where to get it
101 Okey Masası is free on Google Play and on the App Store, and the interface is in Turkish. Which version is live on each store, and the links to both listings, are on /games/kaptirik/.