Everyone has a different gaming budget and interests among buddies. Some will prefer playing blackjack, others will spend their time playing craps again. And who wants to play poker against each other? This is certainly not fun - you can also play it at home. With a limited gaming budget, different interests - no one wants to use their hard-earned money in a high-risk game - not even out of friendship. What surely happened then on the wonderfully planned trip to the gamers' paradise - you split up, watched the other buddy and munched sandwiches. As I personally saw last week, however, this does not have to be as I just described.
There is something like the Holy Grail among buddies' games - it's called Pai Gow Poker. Pai Gow Poker satisfies all of the key elements of a great group game - a low volatility and slow game flow to satisfy those with different game budgets, and great fun at the same time. Pai Gow Poker is a type of game where you sit at the table with € 50 and still have your fifty mice four hours later (including free cocktails). I played three games of Pai Gow Poker myself last week; resulting in a € 50 win on the first game, € 7 on the second, and a loss of € 3 on the third game. Not bad, right?
At no point in the individual games did I have € 15 less than my original gaming budget. Pai Gow Poker is an amazingly simple, clever, and social game. The players and the dealer get seven cards each. The players then have the opportunity to put together the best five cards and two card poker hands from all seven cards. The only rule here is that the value of the fifth card hand must not be higher than that of the second card hand. To make things even more interesting, even the joker cards remained in the deck. This joker can only be used as or in a straight or flush.
As soon as a player has put his hands together he plays against the dealer. If the player's 5-card and 2-card hand beats that of the dealer, the player wins. If the player wins only one card hand - regardless of whether it is a 5-hand or 2-hand, this is considered a "push". If the player loses both card hands, he loses his bet (Tip: Make sure that your two-card hand is as strong as possible. This is the decisive hand - whether you win or lose).
