Well hello there!

I am a long time lurker, but a first time poster. Hoping for some great input to improve the various home games I (co-)host and / or attend.

So, I have this group of friends who come to play poker at my place around once a month, all of them fond of the idea of mixed cash game (yeah, it's a rare but great bunch ) as well as the occasional dealer's choice tourney. We basically play anything from Hold'em to Triple Draw, though not really any odd games that aren't found on an online poker site - Also, no wild cards or anything like that.

Anyway, last year the weekend after easter sunday (yeah, it's coming up soon this year) someone had "created" his own game, and although it wasn't perfect it was good fun for the group and everyone enjoyed the variation. So, I thought I would try to make it a tradition and come up with my own game.

What I would love would be some input with regards to if it seems playable to you, how (big) you think it would play and whether it sounds like fun or not. Thanks in advance - here goes:

I give you Highey / Hidugi (That's right - it's based on badugi and the name is a play on Badeucy/Badacey/Archie )

1 . The structure is equal to standar 5-card draw: Everyone is dealt 5 cards face down as in any standard draw poker game, followed by a round of betting. Then there's a draw and another round of betting. Best hand wins.

2. This, however, is a split pot game, with the pot being split between the best standard high poker hand and (hold on .. ) the best "reverse-badugi-and-pairs-don't-count-against-you-hand" (haha, I laughed too while reading that out after writing it down )

so the best hand would be AAAAX since you would have four of a kind as well as a "hidugi A-low" to scoop the pot

Main problem for me is how to treat a flush in this game since equity for playing a flush (and much more so drawing for one) is of course seriously affected by awarding half the pot to a badugi. Any ideas on that issue? Could it be made a "automatic scoop hand"?

Any thoughts on the game in general? some improvements? Perhaps another drawing round or even triple draw? - shoot!

/TBJ

PS: This is a double post, since I have also posted in the home poker forum. I didn't know which would be the best to post in and I thought it might attract more responds. If that's NOT OK I kindly ask for a mod to delete this (or the other) thread. Thanks.

Just make a flush beat quads for the hi. Will be much better action that flushes scoop everything as flush draw ebcome way to valuable. You want people playing flush draws when they need to catch for 1/2 the pot only not people corr Carly drawing to flushes to scoo

I think you're going to struggle to make this easy to understand for people.

I was so baffled by it I started laughing out loud.

Sounds like a fun game. Check out the new game of KenEDugi for some inspiration (it was casually discussed in an unrelated thread in this forum recently -- search for it). That game is 3-way split between badugi, low, and high. Some hands in this game are very much one way hands -- it's ok for your game to have those too. Players play them at their own risk.

Thanks for rsponding to all of ya'

Really? Well, as stated I laughed myself when I wrote it out in words. On the other hand, while I do admit that the concept seems strange, I don't think it's out of this world or overcomplicated actually: The "Hidugi" is basically just about getting the four highest cards in four different suits (perhaps even simpler than regular badugi, since you don't have to think about pairs/trips/quads screwing your dugi).

Although, of course, when you are used to the regular badugi it's gonna seem strange for a second, admitted

Yeah, I agree that it would make a flush to strong of af hand, which is also what put me in doubt as to how to deal with it. Perhaps it would add more playability to a flush if there was a qualifier for the "hidugi", i.e. having a made hidugi? I am thinking that in that case there might not always be a hidugi to take half the pot, since one probably wouldn't draw to a very low one (like say an 7-8-9 dugi). That should add some chances for playing a flush (without always going only for half the pot, an aspect which i don't really like even though I could/would exploit it in a game of course). Thoughts?

Thanks for the reference, will definitely check it out. You might be right about the one-way-hands since people will be drawing to complete different kinds of hands, i.e. a standar high hand, a hidugi or both to scoop. That should actually give some room to manuever how to play a one-sided hand like a flush:

I think the general problem of standard 5-card draw is that it's too simple, there just aren't enough plays to desguise your hand. It's (too) easy to play position and put your opponent on the right hand, normally. In this game, though, you couldn't know exactly why someone is drawing say 2 or 3 cards to the same extent as in 5CD (oversimplified, I know, but still).

Anyway, would you play it with a single or a triple draw structure? What betting structure?

I've played 5 card triple draw half high half badugi (regular badugi rules) and I think it's a pretty good game. Seems simpler than yours but same idea