Open Chinese Poker
One card game that has seen its popularity increase substantially over the past few years is open-face Chinese poker. Its popularity has been aided by the unique Chinese poker scoring system that allows players to win part of a round and, therefore, lower the variance experienced.
In Open Face Chinese Poker you try to beat your opponent by forming better poker combinations and creating better hands. You score points that will help you to beat your opponent. Another way to almost ensure that you win a lot of points is by getting in Fantasyland. Gus Hansen talks about how to play open face Chinese poker (OFCP) - Learn how to play the game, the rules, scoring and strategy with this simple guide from t. Open Face Chinese Poker. Discover a new and exciting card game!
It is a game that made its way to the United States during 2012 and since then has seen major card rooms such as Bellagio and Wynn casinos in Las Vegas spread Chinese poker at its poker tables, and TonyBet Poker open the only real money open-face Chinese poker online site.
The relative simplicity and the fact a single round can be over in five-to-ten minutes have helped the game spread around the world faster than any other card game played today. All you need are a deck of cards and at least two players, and you’re ready to go.
Like its rules, open-face Chinese poker scoring is also easy to understand. While there are several variations of the Chinese poker scoring system, the most commonly used is known as the 1-6 method, and it is this that we will look at today.
Before you can work out how to calculate points in Chinese poker, you have to complete a round of it, meaning that you and your opponent will have a board that looks similar to the one shown in the image below, one that has all 13 cards of the players face-up.
In the popular 1-6 Chinese poker scoring, players receive a single point for winning each row: 1 point for winning the top (or front) row, 1 point for winning the middle row, and 1 point for winning the bottom (or back) row. Should a player win all three rows, that player wins three bonus Chinese poker points and is said to have “scooped.” However, if you only win two of the three rows, you win 1 point overall.
In the example above, Thomas won all three rows — helped by the fact that Tony fouled his hand — and was awarded a total of 6 points.
Chinese Poker Scoring: Bonuses
To encourage players to try and make big hands, there are a number of ways to earn bonus Chinese poker points. These bonus points are awarded regardless of the player winning or losing the hand.
We’ll use an actual example of a hand to show how to calculate Chinese poker points.
Thomas loses the top line because his jack-high is weaker than Tony’s queen-high, so he loses a point and Tony wins a point. Thomas then wins the middle because he has a pair of sevens to beat Tony’s ace-high.
The bottom line is where things become interesting because Thomas has a higher straight and wins. As he has made a straight at the back, he should receive 2 points, but because Tony also has a straight (albeit a weaker one), the bonuses cancel each other out.
Bonus points are awarded based on the strength of the hand and its location on the board.
Having a pair of sixes on the top line gives a +1 bonus and this increases by one as the hand increases in strength, up to a maximum of +22 should you manage to have at the top.
Meanwhile in the middle three-of-a-kind awards +2, a straight +4, a flush +8, a full house +12, quads +20, a straight flush +30, and a Royal Flush +50.
There are also bonus Chinese poker points awarded for strong hands on the bottom line in the 1-6 Chinese Poker scoring method. There a straight gives +2, a flush +4, a full house +6, quads +10, a straight flush +15, and a Royal Flush +25.
Chinese Poker Scoring: Fantasyland
Those of you who have been researching open-face Chinese poker will no doubt have heard of the term Fantasyland. While it may sound like a theme park opened by a pop star, it serves as a bonus round in Chinese poker.
To enter Fantasyland, you need a pair of queens or better on top. Making a pair of queens on the top line itself nets you a +7 bonus, but getting to Fantasyland can prove even more profitable.
Once in Fantasyland, the usual Chinese Poker scoring system still applies except here you receive all 13 cards at once instead of the starting five and then one at a time. You are able to set your cards all at once, then wait for your opponent to play his or her hand according to the standing rules.
Being in Fantasyland gives you a massive advantage over your opponent because you can quickly see if it is possible to make strong hands in each row and therefore potentially win large bonuses.
You can stay in Fantasyland for another round by making at least three-of-a-kind deuces on top, or a full house in the middle, or quads at the back. Do this and you’ll soon see the Chinese poker points rack up and earn you big wins at the table.
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cash game strategytournament strategyopen-face Chinese pokerChinese pokerrulesscoring
“Am I making the right move?” This is what I ask myself before I take each and every turn in Pineapple OFC. According to my score on the rating system (that I helped create), the answer is: not every time. I only get about 70 percent of tough situations correct, and have an average error of .5 points / tricky spot. This means I probably give my opponent a free point every couple of hands. With that kind of error rate, how could I even be expect to win? Well, luckily, my opponents are making even more errors than me.
The truth is we are all making a lot of mistakes in this fairly new game and unexplored game. That’s great for the fast learners, but could cost you a pretty penny if you are a late-bloomer or haven’t yet put in the effort to learn advanced OFC strategy. Let me show you four of the biggest mistakes I see players just like you make in this game time and time again:
Not Gambling for FantasyLand Enough
Sometimes the fear and embarrassment of fouling convinces you to play it safe in spots where it is clearly “game on.” You have to remember, it’s not whether you hit 50 percent of the time or more, it’s whether you make more points on average or not. Most Fantasyland gambles only need 25 percent to be worth it, so stop waiting for the golden opportunity and just go.
In this spot, gambling for Fantasyland is 2.6 points better on average than playing it safe. And it doesn’t particularly even matter that our opponent will foul a significant amount of the time because our hand is just plainly better on average if we make the gamble. If you aren’t making “risky” plays in Pineapple Open Face, you are making a mistake.
Completely Senseless Gambles
Just because you can improve doesn’t mean you should. I see this problem a lot when someone has set a rather ambitious flush draw or straight draw in the middle, but hasn’t developed their back at all. It’s especially true when you hit your trips card in the middle with just one, or even two pair, in the back. This is quite often a bad time to gamble.
In this situation, putting the ace up front forces you into a runner-runner situation, where you have to make a full house on the bottom and two pair or better in the middle. That is a dream my friend, and it’s a mistake of over seven points! Do not take a good hand and throw it away simply for a chance at “the big time.”
Open Face Chinese Poker App
Bailing Too Early
If you are mid-game and thinking about breaking a three-flush for a single pair in the back, you better need a really good reason. A reason like, half your flush cards are dead, you can get to Fantasyland a lot easier if you pair the back, or you will scoop your opponent a lot even with such a weak hand. Most of the time, it’s just correct to wait it out for the flush, or bail on the next street. After all, there will be six more opportunities to hit something that helps you out, just be patient.
In this hand, it can be sometimes tempting to just play it safe and put the ten in the back, especially if there are more dead diamonds. But that is just way too safe, even with 3-4 additional dead diamonds! The correct play in this exact spot is actually to gamble for Fantasyland with the queen up front and ten in the middle (because of the three of diamonds…think about it). If you are playing it “super safe” you are making a mistake of over four points, yikes.
A bird in the hand…Don’t sacrifice a great card for the back to take a big risk in the front.
Now there are plenty of times to gamble in this game, but I have found that most of the time you are presented a made hand, you should take that before risking it all for Fantasyland or the like. This problem usually arises when you get three great cards for your hand and still have to throw one (or as I like to call it, “rich people problems.”) Generally speaking, you should build the bottom/middle in this situation and throw your “gamble” card. The main reason this holds true so often is because you are throwing away an out, thus reducing your chances, plus you will have another opportunity to hit that Fantasyland card on the next draw anyways. So think about those future opportunities before throwing a perfectly good hand away.
In this situation, we have to decide whether to take Fantasyland now or take quads now… #richpeopleproblems. We don’t even have to set ourselves all-in and Fantasyland is worth approximately 14.5 points (7 for queens and around 7.5 for the added value of being in Fantasyland next hand), while quads is only worth ten points. Seems like a no brainer right? Well, actually, since we have five outs to hit Fantasyland on the next draw (45%), its 4.7 points better to play quads!!! Am I blowing your mind yet?
If any of this helped you or if I was able to help you solve one leak in your game, please let me know by tweeting at @ofcstrategy. I truly hope I was able to give some quick pointers and valuable insight into errors that I see players making all the time. To see where you stand and how many errors you’re making on a regular basis, check out openfacesolutions.com and sign up for a free trial to use our tactics trainer, simulator, and the only Open Face Chinese ranking system on the web. ♠
Open Face Chinese Poker Game
Derric “SixPeppers” Haynie is the author of Quantum Poker and creator of OpenFaceSolutions.com and OpenFaceStrategy.com. Check out those sites for more articles, solutions, tactics, news and information on Pineapple Open Face Chinese Poker.