Description
The original version of Pai Gow used
special dominos and dice. It's said to be a rather
complicated game, played slow enough to serve as a
social event and is rarely seen in gaming houses outside
of Asia.
The modern, Westernized version is
played with a deck of 53 cards, regular deck plus
a Joker and uses poker-like hands for ranking. It's
still a complex game but the changes make it more approachable,
as indicated by its success in casinos throughout the
world. And it's still a rather slow game with showdowns
often resulting in ties. This serves as a fine counterbalance
to the faster playing casino fare, and it allows a
player with a modest stake to last longer at the table
than would be possible with other games.
Pai Gow is often a multiplayer game
where the deal rotates around the table much like regular
Poker. One of the traditional rules is that the dealer
also acts as banker for that hand. In online play all
of this is simplified to the player vs house model.
Objective
Bets are placed and the player
receives seven cards. From these seven cards the player
forms
two hands: a twocard hand called the "low" or "front" hand;
a fivecard hand called the "high" or "back" hand.
The goal is to beat the dealer on both hands. The back
hand is ranked as in Poker with the exception that
A-2-3-4-5 is the second-highest straight beating K-Q-J-10-9.
The front hand is singles or a pair, with A-A being
the highest.
There are a few additional rules.
First, your front hand should not beat your back. If
it does, this is called a "foul" and both hands lose.
Second, the Joker can be used as a wild card to complete
a Straight, a Flush, a Straight Flush or a Royal Flush.
Otherwise it is treated as an Ace.
Betting
Betting in most online games is very
simple in that you make a single opening bet and that
is the end of it. In some Pai Gow games there are separate
bets for the front and back hands, but this is unusual
in online play.
If both hands lose to the dealer,
you lose your bet. If both hands win, you win even
money. If one hand wins and the other loses, it's a
push. If your hands are the same as the dealer's, called "copies",
the dealer wins. Obviously that’s an attraction of
playing dealer/banker in multi-player games. In such
games, you minimize your losses by betting low when
you are a player and being dealer/banker whenever possible.
If the player wins, the house takes
a 5% commission: you get $4.75 of a $5 winning bet.
There are a number of issues related
to the multiplayer games when it comes to the dealer/banker
question. Keep in mind that none of this applies to
typical singleplayer online play.
Dealer/Banker: In multiplayer Pai
Gow games the bank rotates from person to person, where
a player may pass the deal if they choose. If you want
to deal you must have enough money on the table to
broker all other bets made. If you are uncomfortable
with the full risk of banking, another player may co-bank
with you as dealer and the two of you will split the
wins and losses. The house will bank if no player is
willing to do it. If a player is banking, the dealer
can be a player, wagering as the banker asks. If a
player is the banker then the dealer will first compare
their own hands to that of the banker and make the
appropriate payments. Then the dealer will take the
banker's cards and compare them to the other players,
using the banker's money.
Payoff
All wins in Pai Gow are at even money,
less the house's 5% commission.
