Pai Gow Moments

In the past few posts we have been looking at strategical points as presented by Fortune Palace.  Here is the last installment, which talks about the House Way and the Bonus Bet as offered in their casinos.  Enjoy!

The House Way

The House Way is the set of instructions each casino gives its dealers on how to set their seven card hands. Most online casinos offer a House Way button so that you can automatically take advantage of this set of rules.

What’s important here is understanding that the House Way isn’t set to win all the time, but to keep losses down so that the casino wins in the long term. In other words, the House Way is a safety option, probably best suited to new players and low-risk punters.

Another important point is that some House Way buttons (ie at Golden Palace) automatically play the hand once it’s set. Others (Spin Palace, Ruby Fortune) set the hand but give you the option of whether to play it that way or not. This may not seem much but it affects your overall strategy.

The Bonus bet

If you bet on the bonus, then you’ll win up to 8000 times your stake if your seven cards contain a bonus hand (Straight or above). The payouts are big, but don’t come anywhere near the odds against, so the house edge is substantial.

This won’t suit low and medium risk punters. However, if you’re a high-roller, and prepared to take the risk, the Bonus bet adds enormously to the fun and excitement of Pai Gow Poker.

It’s the way we play!

Here is the second installment of Fortune Palace’s Optimal Pai Gow strategy.  With this post, hopefully you will be able to complete and apply this optimal strategy for winning at pai gow poker.

2 pair:
Always split, unless:
1. Two pairs of 6s or below - don’t split.
2. The hand contains an ace - play the ace behind.

3 pair:
Always play the highest pair in front.

3 of a kind:
1. If three Aces, play a pair of Aces behind and Ace high in front.
2. Otherwise, play the three of a kind behind and the remaining high cards in front.

Straight, flush, straight flush:
Set the back as whichever hand gives the better front.

Full house:
Set the three of a kind behind and the pair in front.

2 sets of 3-of-a-kind:
Split the higher set into a pair and a single  - play the pair in front and play the smaller 3-of-a-kind behind. For example, with K,K,K,10,10,10,5 you should play K,K and 10,10,10,K,5.

Four of a kind:
1. If 2 to 6, play it behind.
2. If 7 to 10, split into pairs, unless a pair or an ace and a face card can be played in front.
3. If J to K, split into pairs, unless the hand also contains a pair of 10s or higher.
4. If Aces, split into pairs, unless a pair of 4s or higher can be played in front.

Royal flush:
1. Play behind.
2. If Royal flush with two pair, split as per two pair rule.
3. Split, if an A, K or a pair can be played in front and a straight or flush behind.

Five Aces:
1. Split, unless a pair of Ks can be played in front.

For every game there is more than one way to win.  The same thing goes for pai gow poker.  Many players have come up with their own strategy – both experts and budding players alike.  In order to be good at pai gow poker, you either have to adopt one existing strategy or if you’re that good, come up with your own winning one.  Here is one strategy presented by Fortune Palace for its players.  They call it the optimal pai gow strategy.

Basic Strategy

The temptation for players of Pai Gow poker is to see hands in straight poker terms. The secret to winning Pai Gow poker is in remembering that you have to win both hands in order to win the bet. The player’s basic strategy in Pai Gow poker is therefore to set the two-card hand (front) as high as possible, whilst still leaving a higher five-card hand (back).

If this isn’t possible, and would leave you with two weak hands, set a ’stopper’ or ‘blocker’ by setting the back hand as high as possible and leave a weak front hand. This won’t win, but will hopefully stop the bank winning, giving you a chance to bet again.

If your hand is just single cards (ie nothing - no pairs, straights, flushes) all you can do is set your 2nd and 3rd highest cards as the front.

If you have a single pair, put the highest two single cards as your two-card hand eg if your hand is K,10,10,9,5,3,2, split them into K,9 and 10,10,5,3,2.

These rules cover the majority of hands you’ll be dealt.

(to be continued)

In the last post we had a quick look at pai gow poker, its background and some basics. If you are someone who likes playing poker and are into variations and new things, then you would most definitely get into pai gow poker.

To make it easier to understand, pai gow poker is simply a variation of 7 card stud. To add a twist, it also has elements of pai gow tiles. Perhaps one of the main differences of pai gow poker from conventional poker is that it makes use of 53 cards instead of the usual 52. The additional card is the joker. Having the joker makes it possible to get 5 of a kind. What are the implications of this hand? In conventional poker, the highest hand would be a royal flush (5 sequential cards in the same suit, ten to Ace). In pai gow poker, though, since we have the 5 of a kind, this beats the royal flush. Ask any poker player who has tried pai gow poker and he will tell you that the 5 of a kind hand ups the excitement another level.

With some poker variations, you know that not all the cards in the hand are used to determine who the winner will be. In pai gow poker, all 7 cards are utilized. The dealer deals 7 cards to all the players face down. Once this is done, the cards are split into two hand – the high hand (5 cards) and the low hand (2 cards). Once a player has split his cards he is not allowed to touch them.

Over the years, as pai gow tiles continued to become popular in the East, some of the concepts leaked to the rest of world.  The result was two-fold.  One was that pai gow tiles were taken up by a number of enthusiasts.  That is what we have been talking about in the past months.  The other result is that the tile game evolved into something similar yet different as well.  This is what we know now as pai gow poker.

So how did pai gow poker come into existence?  Historians have traced the first games of pai gow poker back to the 1800s when the Chinese immigrants brought the tile game over.  However, perhaps due to the lack in equipment, cards were used instead of tiles.  Though pai gow poker has been around since that time, it wasn’t till the 1980s that it was offered in the casinos.

The objective of pai gow poker is to complete two winning hands that would beat the banker’s two hands.  In pai gow poker, each player is dealt 7 cards.  He has to make a hand out of 5 cards – this is called the high hand.  The remaining two cards also form a hand called the low hand.  The rankings of the hands are then played just like you would in customary poker.

How does one win?  If both the low and high hands are better than the banker’s hands, the player wins.  If the banker’s hands are better than both the player’s high and low hands then the banker wins.

In the next few posts let’s look at this game in some more detail.