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| Casino Games - Three Card Poker - How to Play Poker Three |
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Three Card Poker is Two Games in One: A seat at the 3 Card Poker table offers two separate games to play. You are usually allowed to play either one or both games at the same time, but some casinos will require you to play both while others will make only one optionable. The two games are "Three Card Ante/Play", where you compete against the dealer, and "Pair Plus" that has different bonus payouts for 3 card poker hands of one pair or better... When both games are played at the same time, players may wager different amounts on each game. |
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| The games are played with a standard 52 card deck. The cards are distributed to the dealer in groups of three by an automatic shuffling machine. The player's table layout is shown at the right. Three Card Poker rules and payouts are printed on the table at each player spot. |
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| Play Poker Three Online at the Best Online Casinos |
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| Three Card Poker - Pairplus |
Pairplus is a simple bet on the cards with a payout for all hands of a pair or better. Below are six examples of actual payout tables used by some casinos.
Payoff Tables for Pairplus |
Hand |
Table 1 |
Table 2 |
Table 3 |
Table 4 |
Table 5 |
Table 6 |
| Straight flush |
40 to 1 |
40 to 1 |
35 to 1 |
50 to 1 |
40 to 1 |
40 to 1 |
| Three of a kind |
30 to 1 |
25 to 1 |
25 to 1 |
30 to 1 |
30 to 1 |
30 to 1 |
| Straight |
6 to 1 |
6 to 1 |
6 to 1 |
6 to 1 |
5 to 1 |
6 to 1 |
| Flush |
4 to 1 |
4 to 1 |
4 to 1 |
3 to 1 |
4 to 1 |
3 to 1 |
| Pair |
1 to 1 |
1 to 1 |
1 to 1 |
1 to 1 |
1 to 1 |
1 to 1 |
The house advantage on Pairplus with the payout tables above ranges from 2.3% to 7.3%. |
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| Three Card Poker - Ante and Play |
Normal Ante and Play gameplay
For Ante and Play , the player places an "ante" bet before receiving his cards. With this information, the player can fold his cards and lose the ante bet, or raise by placing out a bet of equal money to the ante bet. If he chooses to play, there are three possibilities. The first is that the dealer does not 'qualify'. To qualify, the dealer must have a hand of a Queen High or better. If the dealer does not qualify, the ante bet is paid out even money, but the play bet is simply returned. If the dealer does qualify, the player wins if his hand is of higher value than the dealer's, and gets paid out even money on both his ante and play bets. If the dealer's hand is of higher value, the dealer takes the Ante and Play bets. Rules vary on what happens when the hands are of exactly equal value: some say that the player simply gets his money back, but others say that the player is paid even money on his bet.
The Ante Bonus
In addition to normal Ante and Play gameplay, there is a bonus payout on the ante bet for especially good hands.
Ante Bonus Payouts |
Hand |
Table 1 |
Table 2 |
Table 3 |
Table 4 |
| Straight flush |
5 to 1 |
4 to 1 |
3 to 1 |
5 to 1 |
| Three of a kind |
4 to 1 |
3 to 1 |
2 to 1 |
3 to 1 |
| Straight |
1 to 1 |
1 to 1 |
1 to 1 |
1 to 1 |
These bonus payouts are paid only on the ante bet for any player who chooses to play, regardless of whether the dealer qualifies or whether the player wins or loses. |
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| Poker Three Strategy |
Optimal strategy in ante and play is to raise if you have a queen/6/4 (that is a queen, 6, and 4 all in the same hand) or greater, regardless of the bonus pay table. Overall the player stands to lose 8.66% of the original wager but win 5.29% on the bonus.
In any poker based game hands are scored first according to the highest card, then the second, and then the third, and so on if there are more. A queen/7/3 would beat queen/6/4. The queens tie so the second highest cards are used to break the tie, and a 7 beats a 6. The third card does not matter in this case because the hand was resolved by the second card.
Queen/6/4 is the borderline hand it is because if you raise on queen/6/3 you can expect to lose 1.00255 units, more than the 1 unit by folding. However if you raise on queen/6/4 the expected loss is .993378, less than the 1 unit by folding.
The strategy of raising on any queen or better, in other words mimicing the dealer is not a bad strategy but you may lose more with it than the optimal strategy above. The house edge playing the mimic the dealer strategy is 3.45%. Raising on everything, or playing blind, results in a house edge of 7.65%. |
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| Three Card Poker Player Wins Ties |
The probability of tieing the dealer in Three Card Poker is possible. The effect of this rule lowers the house edge in the "full pay" bonus table 1 above from 3.37% to 3.24%.
There is a small strategy change to make if the ties go to the player. Under this rule the player should still raise on Q/6/4 or better, plus raise on Q/6/3, only when all three suits are different (this lowers the probability of a dealer flush).
If the player follows the proper raising strategy under the ties win rules then the probability of a tie is 268272/407170400 = 1 in 1517.75 hands. For academic purposes only, if the player always raises then the probability of a tie is 450528/407170400 = 1 in 903.76. |
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| Three Card Poker Player May Call |
At many casinos if the player makes a tip for the dealer then the player has the option to call on the tip portion of the bet. For example if the player bets $5 for himself and $1 for the dealer the player may raise his own wager but not the tip. The correct strategy based on the tip alone is to call any hand of king high or less. So on hands of Q/6/4 to K/Q/10 the player should raise his own bet but not the tip. However with less than Q/6/4 there is a conflict of interest. To maximize the total expected value of the player's bet and the tip the player should raise on hands just under Q/6/4. The greater the ratio of tip to bet the more hands under Q/6/4 the player should raise on.
A fantastic advantage play, in collusion with the dealers, would be to bet the table minimum on the bet and the table maximum on the tip. Then raise on ace high or better, otherwise call. This would result in a player advantage on the tip of 26.09%. |
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