Three Card Poker Rules and Strategy

Three Card Poker is a casino table game that is fast paced and involves simple decision making. The game consists of two parts, Ante-and-Play and Pairplus, on which the player can bet either together or separately. Once learnt the rules of the game are relatively simple and when played with optimal strategy the house advantage ranges from approximately 2.5 to 3.5 percent.

Three Card Poker Rules

Before the cards are dealt the player can make a wager on the Ante-and-Play bet and/or the Pairplus bet. Following this the player is dealt three cards to their hand and the dealer deals three cards to its own hand. Depending on what bets are made the game proceeds as follows.

Ante-and-Play

Once the player is dealt their hand he must decide whether to fold or raise. If the player decides to fold he loses his initial ante bet and the game ends. If the player decides to raise, another bet equal to the ante bet must be wagered and the dealer reveals his hand. If the dealer's hand consist of a Queen high or better it is said to qualify otherwise the hand is said to not qualify. Below describes the possible outcomes and how the payouts are handled:

• Player folds - Lose Ante bet.
• Player raises/Dealer does not qualify - Ante bet paid 1 to 1 and Raise bet is returned.
• Player raises/Dealer does qualify - Compare hands and winning player hands are paid 1 to 1 on both Ante and Raise bet. Losing player hands results in losing both bets. Tied hands result in a push on both bets.

In addition to the payouts described above if the player's hand is of sufficient strength the player will be paid a bonus on the Ante bet as follows.

• Straight Flush - 5 to 1
• 3 of a Kind - 4 to 1
• Straight - 1 to 1

This pay table is typical of most casinos although others wanting a higher house advantage have reduced pay outs of the Ante bonus.

PairPlus

The player makes no further decision once the cards are dealt and is paid depending on the rank of their hand the PairPlus bet is paid as follows:

• Straight Flush - 40 to 1
• 3 of a Kind - 30 to 1
• Straight - 6 to 1
• Flush - 3 to 1
• Pair - 1 to 1
• Any Other - Lose

The result of the hand does not depend on the dealers hand in any manner.

Three Card Poker Strategy

The following is the optimal way to play for each of the games involved with Three Card Poker. These strategies minimize the house advantage, minimizing the players loses once the initial bet is made. The strategies are simple compared to games like blackjack and do not involve too much memory on the player’s part.

Ante-and-Play

Once the initial ante bet is made the player must decide to fold or raise. The optimal strategy is to raise with any hand of Queen/Six/Four or better and fold worse hands. With this strategy the house advantage is 3.37%, that is the player will lose $3.37 for every $100 wagered on the ante bet. Overall the player will raise 77.6% of the time and fold 22.4%.

PairPlus

The only decision to make is how much to bet. Given the pay table listed in the rules section the house advantage is 2.32%, that is the player will lose $2.32 for every $100 bet. Sometimes casinos have different pay tables, generally with higher house advantage.

For more information and details on the math behind this game visit Three Card Poker.

Three Card Poker
Three Card Poker