Three-card poker is a popular addition to the casino world that combines two games in one yet is still simple to play. The game was invented during the early nineties and has rapidly gained popularity ever since in both Internet and earthly casinos. The two parts to Three-Card Poker are called "Pairlus" and "Ante and Play". Players can place bets on either or both of these games in each round on the same dealt hand. Play is against the dealer in Ante and against a list of winning hands in Pairlus.
Three-Card poker is played with a standard 52-card deck and the order of play for Three-Card poker is as follows: First players make their Ante and/or Pairplus bets. A player can make a bet on either or both parts to the game. The dealer then gives each player and himself three cards all dealt face down. Players can then examine their cards and play continues differently for the two parts of the game.
Players in the Ante game must decide to either fold or raise with a 'play' bet depending on the strength or weakness of their hands. A raise is equal to the original Ante wager. The dealer then displays his hand and compares it to the players. The dealer must qualify his hand by showing at least a queen or higher. If the dealer doesn't qualify the player wins even money and the raised bet is pushed.
If the dealer does qualify then the higher hand wins based on an order of poker hands that is comparable to other types of poker. So for instance, a straight flush would be the highest hand and so on down through three of a kind, a straight, a flush, a pair, and a high card.
If the player's hand beats the dealer then both the Ante and the play bets pay even money. If the dealer has the higher hand then both bets lose. A tied hand is pushed.
The Pairplus bet is paid out according to a displayed table of possible hands similar to the way video poker is paid out. The better the player's hand ranks on the list the higher the payout and top end hands can have payouts of up to 40 to 1. There are slight variations in the payout tables at different casinos. The player's hand is all that matters and the dealer's cards are irrelevant.
Strategy in Three-Card poker can be quite easy. If you have a queen or better and with at least a six and a four you should raise your bet. The reason is that this hand is a borderline hand. If you are holding cards lower than the six and four your chances of losing go up by enough to not make it worth the raise.
On roughly two out of three hands the dealer will qualify so your singleton cards are important. If both the dealer and player are holding a queen it will be down to the remaining singletons to decide the hand and the six and four put you just above halfway up the rank of hands.
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