Pai Gow poker is the American version of the Chinese game Pai Gow. Fred Wolf and Sam Torosian invented the game of Pai Gow Poker. Pai Gow is also called double-hand poker. Pai Gow poker is played with regular playing cards instead of the Chinese dominoes.
The game uses a standard fifty-two card deck and one joker. Usually played on a table for six and each player attempts to beat the banker. The games objective is to make two poker hands out of the seven cards dealt to the player. One is a two-card hand also known as on top or in front and a five-card hand also known as bottom or behind.
The most frequent hand encountered that needs some Pai Gow poker strategy is the two pair. The house usually splits this way. If both pairs are low or one pair is low and one pair is medium, then the Pai Gow poker strategy is to split unless holding a king or better. If both pair is medium or one pair is low and one pair is high, then the Pai Gow poker strategy is to split unless holding an ace. If both pair is high or one medium pair and one high pair, the Pai Gow poker strategy always split. This Pai Gow poker strategy of splitting pairs can be seen at Trump Plaza and most other casinos. Card with ranks of 2 to six is considered low cards. Cards with ranks of seven to 10 are considered medium cards. Jack and above are considered high cards.
Test simulations were run using millions of pair of hands and the accompanying highest single card. Here is the better Pai Gow poker strategy to take against the house strategy. Split the two pairs unless the following conditions are met: first, the sum of the ranks is nine or less with a king or an ace or second, the sum of the ranks is fifteen or less with an ace. By sum of the ranks, take the value of one pair and add it to the other. For example, holding a pair seven and a pair five would give a sum of the ranks of twelve, 5 + 7 = 12. Face cards have the same value they have in poker, Jack is eleven, Queen is twelve, King is thirteen and Ace has the highest value at 14. Using this method you would reduce the house edge by 0.04%.
Here are some strategies on other kinds of hands. The correct Pai Gow poker strategy when a player does not have any pair or any higher ranking set of cards, is to put the second and third highest card in front and the rest at the bottom. When the player has nothing but a straight the Pai Gow poker strategy should be to put the pair on the bottom and the highest two single card on top. If the player has three pairs, he should always place the highest pair on top. If the player has three of a kind and nothing more, he should play the trips on the bottom and the two highest single on top. Unless the trips or three of a kind is aces, then he should always break up the aces by playing one ace on top and a pair at the bottom.
There are a lot more Pai Gow poker strategy but they would occur less frequently. The Pai Gow poker strategy here is a good start.
This article was written by Alexis.