This will probably bore most of you, but I would guess most people are familiar with Hi and Low Chicago. Generally the game is dealt same as 7 stud, with the highest or lowest whichever was called spade chopping the pot with the high hand.

The variation of that that I prefer is to play for all the suited hole cards in your hand to count as an aggregate total. Basically, you just add up all you hole card spades using blackjack counts, i.e. all face cards = 10, ace = 11 everything else is face value. The beauty of his variety is that nobody is guaranteed 1/2 the pot by virtue of catching one lucky card right off the bat. It also makes for some interesting river cards where people playing for the high hand miracle their way into the high count. In the event of a tie count, whoever has the highest card of the suit in the hole wins. For example, I get As6sKd down vs someone with 9s8s7h down, my ace would bet the 9 hi, 17 count my opponent has.

Easy enough to play with different suits.
Clubs = Dog Pound
Hearts = Valentines Cards
Spades = Garden Tools
Diamonds = Caret Patch

And yes, I am already aware that the names are ridiculous, they just keep track of which suit is being played at that moment.

I suppose, you could also play that game low, but seems like there would be a bunch of split half-pots. Maybe if two or more players (both thinking they would get half the pot) managed to avoid catching any spades in the hole, then only the high hand would win for a scoop. Never tried that before, but I kinda like the sound of it.

My problem with the Chicago games has always been, and I don't mean to cause a scandal by saying this, the disappearance of the ace of spades from the deck. It always seemed to grow tiny little legs and then run and hide under a pizza plate or in someone's lap. If any of my kitchen-table friends are reading this, yes, I mean you.

Str8Raiser's variation seems to be the perfect remedy for this.

Is there any way we could play some invented variants online? Obviously, it'd have to be for play money, but is there any "generic" software out there which allows for flexibility? From the top of my head I can think of the software used to play Magic: the Gathering online, Apprentice and Magic Workstation, which do not enforce rules. Some of you computer whizzes out there could probably program something new, I suspect. We could do some poll to find the most popular invented variants here and try them out.


Anyway, variant:

Blackjack-inspired poker. Could be done in many ways, but the idea is that the best poker hand is a certain number, with any higher than that a "bust" hand, being consecutively worse. For instance, in a variant where each player was dealt 2 cards, you would have a betting round, then a drawing round where players take turns hitting or standing (perhaps there could be betting after every hit, with betting rounds ending after both stand), then another betting round. At a showdown, 21 is the nuts, with all hands below 21 ranking beneath it, and all hands 22 and above ranking lower than <22 hands.

I think a standard form probably wouldn't be the best way to do it, though, given the relative ease of getting the nuts and the second nuts. There's no reason you couldn't, for instance, have the number of aimed for be considerably higher than 21, have the deck stripped of some higher cards, have draw poker style drawing and many other possibilities, like Stud-style face up cards. Perhaps being able to not use one of your cards may have some interesting strategy implications - deciding whether to hit or not you have multiple hands to draw to, while pairs give disadvantages.

An attempt at a version:

27 is the nuts. Betting structure is a bit problematic (perhaps something like spread limit, or "half pot limit" could work, because there may be a lot of betting rounds). The deck is stripped of TT-KK, leaving Aces as ones. Each player is dealt two facedown cards and one up card (upcards just make it interesting, the number that are dealt up can easily be varied) and posts antes. There is a betting round. Players remaining can then choose to hit and be dealt a faceup card or stand. If all players stand on one round, there is a final betting round and showdown. If not, there is another betting round and another drawing round, continue with betting rounds until each player stands.

Although I'm not sure whether this game as it stands is feasible, I like the strategy possibilities in this sort of game. Your decision to hit or stand and betting strategy will influence your opponent's decisions to hit or stand, potentially inducing them to bust or not to hit when they're behind.

How about this. Five card draw. Make the best blackjack hand (closest to 21) out of your 5 cards. Ties are broken by going to the best blackjack hand out of the cards not used for the first blackjack hand, and then if still tied, and if any players have cards left unused, to the best blackjack hand out of the still unused cards.

The nuts would be A-A-A with any two 10-value cards, which would be scored as 21-21-11. This would obviously be very rare.

Any hand with two natural blackjacks is obviously a very strong hand and will win over any hand with two 21s which doesn't include two naturals -- for instance, A-A-K-J-2 (scored as 21-21-2) beats A-Q-8-7-6 (scored as 21-21).

In this variation, 21s would be very common, you'd basically be playing to make a 21 in as few cards as possible so that you'd have a decent chance for making a good hand out of the remaining cards. 5-card 21s would probably be fairly weak, and usually would be worth breaking for the draw; someone drawing four to an Ace would be a huge favorite to beat you.

Played this the other day in my home game based on this suggestion. Its way better than straight chicago. More room for bluffing and more scoops. Only played a couple rounds so my sample size is tiny.

The early versions of iPoker had the capability to play almost any game on a LAN. We had some TD and anaconda tournaments at work, and I believe we may have even had a freezeout over the internet (we dialed up for the server, grabbed an IP address and sent it out via email). Subsequent versions dropped these features. If you can find older versions (1.x?) there is even one with cross-platform Mac/Win95 server capabilities.

If anyone is interested in setting up a server like this, I'd be willing to provide whatever meager help I'm capable of. There are some really bright computer people on these boards, but I'm not one of them.

Also, there is a thread about declare games on the stud forum. Might be fun to see if there's some freeware that coud be adapted to deal a declare stud game.

High-low-low Omaha/9. Nine qualifier for low. If there is a low hand possible, the pot is split between the best qualifying low hand and the worst qualifying low hand. If there is no qualifying low hand, the pot is won by the best high hand.

Sounds as if roughly 90% of your starting hands are worth playing preflop. Pure Action game, I guess.

If you ever wanted a Hi-Lo variant of Razz, this is for you. I think this game should be called Middle of the Road.

Basic format is a 7-card stud game. Pot is split between Hi and Lo hands, both with qualifiers (8 Lo, 7 Hi). Here's the weird part, you are looking for the WORST Lo and the WORST Hi. The worst low in this game is 8-7-6-5-4 (straights and flushes don't bust for low or for high). Similarly, using only the top 8 cards to make a high, the worst high is 7-8-9-T-J. Obviously, the best two cards to be dealt here are 7-8. Being a two way game with a qualifier, it is impossible to have nut-nut, since if you have five lows, you can't have five highs, and vice versa. But there is lots of freerolling, as anyone with the nuts one way can push hard, hoping anyone chasing the other end is counterfeited. if nobody has a qualifying Hi the Lo scoops, reverse is also true. As you can imagine, with 40% of the nut cards working both ways, this game is draw-heavy and for major action junkies and true gutty gamblers. Me likey.

Do aces swing both ways?

Let's say I have A289 and the board is 567xx. Can I play A2567 and 56789 for nut nut, or do cards speak and I only get credit for the A2?

It's a split pot game. You don't have to play the same hand for best low and worst low. Of course, I just made the game up, so I have no idea how it actually plays.

Cool. I thought it might be a best-worst, or worst-best game like Lomaha. I think it has some real potential as a gamb00ling game...

We play 2/22 and 7/27 all the time at my home game. You play them high low. Closest to 2 wins low closest to 22 wins high. In 2/22 you have to be at or over. We also play this one roll your own. That way you have a lot of people rolling up faces cards so they can angle for the low. sometimes 8 1/2 or 9 1/2 will take down low. The beauty is once you are the only one going for a low you can keep pumping the pot. We play with tens as ten and face cards are 1/2 point. Betting structure is $1 per upcard that has been dealt. Basicly $1 per round.

7/27 is close to the same. We usually play it with 3 cards, two would work also. You can play this one roll your own as well. You don't have to be at or above to win. Innies beats outies. Meaning 7 1/2 beats 6 1/2 because 7 1/2 is inside. Also 26 1/2 beats 27 1/2. 27 1/2 does beat 26 since it is only 1/2 away not a full point.

Kansas city stud Trips or better.
Played as 2-7 stud with a qualifying high hand trips or better.
fun game helps out when you make a straight with a draw like 7543. Lots of scoop potential and sometimes gets guppies drawing to two pair.