The word "打牌" (dǎ pái) is a standard Chinese verb-object compound, formed by combining the versatile verb "打" (dǎ), which here carries the meaning "to play" or "to engage in", with the noun "牌" (pái), meaning "cards" or "tiles". The structure follows the common syntactic pattern where an action verb is directly paired with its object, creating a phrase that literally means "to strike/hit the cards" but is idiomatically understood as "to play card games" or "to play mahjong". This construction is analogous to other activity phrases like "打球" (to play ball) and demonstrates how "打" functions as a broad semantic placeholder for many recreational activities.