Once you know how many copies of the dealer upcard are held by the players, you play your one-pair hand according to the table. The table below summarizes the collusion strategy when playing on a full (6 player) table.
Using a simple strategy based on this upcard copies count, the house edge is cut in half down to 1.7% (on a full table).
It’s very easy to know how many copies of the dealer upcard are left for the dealer to pair with. As I’ve pointed out in my posts on practical collusion for Caribbean Stud, it’s very easy to communicate how many copies of the dealer upcard the confederates hold (signal with chips, coughs, etc.). I worked out a very simple collusion strategy, which only requires communication of dealer upcard copies amongst the confederates. This strategy yields a house advantage of 3.4%. The player simply calls 1x with a pair of 2’s thru 9s, and raises 3x with a pair of Ten’s or higher. The simplest and most common strategy does not take into account the dealer upcard. Also, one of the dealer cards is exposed. The dealer has the advantage of starting with 6 cards, but gives back some edge by allowing the player to raise 1-3x after seeing the hand. In Four Card Poker, each player is dealt five cards, from which they play their best 4 card poker hand. I continue to look at the effects of collusion on the carnival games, and today I worked on Four Card Poker.
