Texas Hold Em Community Cards

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11:46
23 Jan

Texas hold’em is by far the most popular variant of poker in the world today. It has been that way for decades but never more so than during this millennium following the poker boom.

Originating in the U.S. In the 1920s, the most popular community poker game in the world today is Texas Hold 'em. A Texas Hold 'em round unfolds in a series of phases: In the first phases, the dealer deals two private hole cards to each player, and then there is a betting round.
Community Card Poker Games. Community card poker is a type or variant of poker that uses cards that are dealt face up to the center of the table and shared by all players. In these games, each player is dealt privately an incomplete hand ('hole cards'), which is then combined with the community cards to make a complete hand.
Next in the poker hands list is a straight, consisting of a run of five cards of consecutive values, such as 4-5-6-7-8. Aces count as high or low, so you can make a 10-J-Q-K-A straight, the highest, or an A-2-3-4.

Community Card Poker Games. Community card poker is a type or variant of poker that uses cards that are dealt face up to the center of the table and shared by all players. In these games, each player is dealt privately an incomplete hand ('hole cards'), which is then combined with the community cards to make a complete hand.

The origins of the variant are shrouded in mystery, with very little known except the birth of the game being around the early 1900’s in Robstown, Texas. For decades the game spread like wildfire around the Lone Star state, but no further than its borders.

It wasn’t until 1967 when legends Doyle Brunson, Amarillo Slim, and Crandell Addington upped sticks and moved to Las Vegas that people began to wonder what his new, exciting game was all about.

Beginning of an Era

At the beginning, Texas hold’em was only found at the Golden Nugget Casino, which hindered the game’s growth as the card room there wasn’t the nicest around. In fact, most professionals who were resident in the city wouldn’t consider going there.

It wasn’t until the road gamblers played a game in the entrance of the Dunes Casino that word started to spread. This was right in the middle of The Strip giving the game maximum exposure.

Around the same time a man called Tom Moore was trying to get the best poker players in the world to play at an event named the Gambling Fraternity Convention. For whatever reasons he couldn’t pull it off, so in stepped Benny and Jack Binion who bought the rights from Moore and changed the name to the World Series of Poker.

In 1970 the WSOP circus headed to Binion's Horseshoe Casino where a series of cash games would be the format. Several games were spread with one of the variants being no limit Texas hold’em.

The Binions Take a Risk

This didn’t go unnoticed by observers who persuaded the Binions to change the format to what we still have today—a NL hold’em tournament.

It definitely took a while for the game to grow. In 1972 there were only eight entries, but this grew to around 10,000 at the peak of the poker boom.

During the 70’s Texas hold’em continued to grow in popularity, but not by as much as the top players hoped. Those guys could really see what a great game it is and wanted others to understand. It wasn’t nicknamed the Cadillac of Poker without reason.

Doyle Brunson then took matters into his own hands by writing the original classic Super System. This was the real beginning of poker growing into what it is today.

The growth, although welcome, wasn’t exactly booming. It took a few events for it to really get going.

The year 1998 was significant for a couple of reasons. It was the release date for the classic poker movie Rounders, and also when online poker was introduced to the world. Poker started to make some serious headway at this point but nothing prepared us for what was to come five years later.

In 2003 an accountant from Tennessee called Chris Moneymaker won the NL Texas hold’em WSOP Main Event after winning his seat in an $86 online qualifier.

All of a sudden, Texas hold’em was synonymous with poker. Everybody now knew the game where you got dealt two cards and had to make a five-card hand in combination with the five community cards.

And it looks so simple. Almost everybody who played the game thought they were great at it. The poker boom that took place over the next few years was unlike anything seen before because of this.

The game of NL Texas hold’em is why poker is what it is today. It is still the most popular poker variant in the world despite serious competition from pot limit omaha, and we expect that to remain the case for many years to come.

New fans of poker could do far worse than learning how to play Texas hold’em.

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The most popular poker game in the world these days is Texas hold’em, although Omaha is popular in Europe and growing more popular daily. So community card poker games are familiar to most people. Even lesser-known community card games like pineapple hold’em are easy to pick up on.

This post lists several different poker games with community cards. Surprisingly, most of them bear little resemblance to Texas hold’em. One thing these games do share in common with each other is that they often rely on different shapes in the layout when you’re playing.

My father-in-law loves these games with a love that surpasses reason. You’ll probably like some of them, too. Next time there’s a Thursday night poker game at your place, consider adding some of these games to the mix.

Common Elements of Community Card Poker Games

Community card poker games all share certain elements. Obviously, the sharing of some of the cards among all the players is one of those aspects. Those are the “community cards.” (They’re also often called “the board.”)

But you also can’t have a community card poker game without “hole cards.” These are face-down cards that you play individually. You use a combination of hole cards and community cards to create your final hand. Typically, when dealing a community card game, the hole cards get dealt first, then the community cards.

If you’re lazy, and it’s your turn to deal, consider spreading a community card game. You won’t have to deal as many cards that way. Just remember that even if you fold early in the hand, you’re still responsible for turning over additional cards in the later rounds. The players will get mad if you stop paying attention and hold up the game just because you’re no longer in the hand.

Betting order varies based on the game and the customs of the house. In stud poker games, the betting order is determined by the strength of the hands that are showing. In a community card game, though, no one can see your hole cards. And you all share the same face-up cards.

Betting usually rotates around the table clockwise, starting with the first player next to the dealer. In some home games, the betting alternates—during the first round, betting goes clockwise from the dealer, but during the second round, it goes counterclockwise from the dealer, and during the third round clockwise again, and so on.

In some community card games, there’s a lot of checking, but many home games handle that by forcing the player to bet or fold. You can’t check in this situation.

You can have all kinds of geometric shapes in a community card poker game, but they all fall into one of two categories.

The first is a game where the cards are dealt in rows that intersect in various places. If a card intersects with both a row and a column, it’s always the card that gets turned over last. Also, in some games, that card is always treated as a wild card.

Community card games at home are often played hi-lo style, where the lowest card of a certain suit gets half the pot. In these games, it’s customary to make the suit of the card at the intersection the suit that determines the low card. If you want to play a game with a lot of action, play this way, because it stimulates a lot of players to get into the pot.

The other geometric shape that’s often used in games like this is more like a circle. In these games, the cards don’t have intersections at all.

Strategy-wise, if you’re allowed to, you should check when you’re the first bettor. This gives you an opportunity to see where the other players are in the hand. A player who starts betting and raising with just one exposed card probably has strong hole cards.

Also, keep in mind that in a game with more cards, the hand that wins will usually be higher than in a game with fewer cards. You should play tighter in a game like that. That will increase your probability of profiting from such a game.

And now, the games:

Bundles
Cincinnati
Criss Cross
Death Wheel
H-Bomb
Iron Cross
Pyramid
Red and Black

Bundles

Each player gets five hole cards. The dealer also deals two rows of seven cards face-down in the middle of the table. When you start exposing cards, you expose them as corresponding pairs—if you expose the first card in row one, you also expose the first card in row two, and so on.

You can use just your five hole cards, or you can use three hole cards plus two cards from the board. The two cards from the board that you use have to be one of the pairs of corresponding cards. If you use the first card in row one, you also must use the first card in row two. You can’t use card one from row one and card two or three from row two.

This is a game of big pots, as there are seven betting rounds. (A pair of cards is exposed every betting round.)

Unless you have great hole cards, it’s probably a good idea to check early to see what the other players are going to do. Flushes and full houses are common when you’re dealing with this many cards.

You can play Bundles hi-lo, too.

Here’s what the board will look like:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Cincinnati

Cincinnati is probably the simplest community card game outside of Texas hold’em. It might even be simpler than Texas hold’em. Each player gets four hole cards, and four community cards are dealt face down in the middle of the table.

There are five betting rounds. Every betting round, someone can bet and expose another of the community cards.

In most home games, the dealer points out one of the face-down cards and declares it wild.

As far as community card games go, Cincinnati is kinda plain vanilla, but it’s a nice change of pace from Texas hold’em and other community card games.

The board in Cincinnati looks like this:

1 2 3 4

Criss Cross

Each player gets four hole cards. Then five cards are dealt in a “cross” pattern for the community cards. One of the cards, obviously, is in the middle of this pattern. It’s the intersection card. The four outside cards always get turned over first. The middle card is always turned over last.

There’s a betting round after each card gets turned over. You must make your final hand using your four hole cards and one of the two rows of three cards. If you’re playing hi lo, you still must choose just one row. You can’t use one row of cards for one hand and the other for the other hand.

You could vary the shape of the cards by putting them in a V or L shape, as long as there’s still one card that’s an intersection. This might avoid offending any religious zealots who are offended by the use of a cross during a card game.

You could also use nine cards instead of five cards. You would have five cards in each row with an intersection card. My father-in-law loves games like this where there are lots of cards, but I think this is a drag.

It’s common to make the card at the intersection a wild card in Criss Cross.

Here’s what the cards look like, usually:

2 3 4

Death Wheel

Death Wheel is always played hi lo. You get four hole cards, and then six more cards are dealt in a circle. You must combine three adjacent cards from the circle with the four cards in your hand to create your final hand.

When you’re revealing the cards, it’s mandatory to reveal them one at a time, but you reveal the card opposite of the one revealed previously. As usual, there’s a betting round after each card is exposed.

It’s a fun game where there are many potential combinations—the three-card combinations number six when arranged this way, so you have lots of options for what you combine your hole cards with in Death Wheel.

H-Bomb

As the name implies, the community cards in this game are dealt face down in the shape of an “H.” You’ll have two columns of three cards each with a single card in the middle. Each player also gets four hole cards.

The card in the middle is the intersecting card, so it always gets turned over last. You use three cards plus the four cards in your hand to create your final hand, but there are lots of three card in a row combinations. You’re able to use the cards in rows diagonally, too.

H-Bomb is always played hi lo. There are lots of betting rounds, obviously, and you can expect a big hand to win the final showdown—at least a full house.

The cards look like this:

1 2

3 4 5

6 7

Iron Cross

Iron Cross is one of the trickier community card games. You each get three hole cards, and then six community cards are arranged in a pattern that ensures two intersecting cards. There’s one card to the right-most position in the first row, four cards in the second row, and one more card in the left-most position of the third row. The left-most and right-most cards in the second row (the one with four cards) are both wild.

The wild cards must be turned over last. With this many wild cards, the winning hand is almost always at least four of a kind.

Here’s what the cards look like:

5 1 4 6

Cards five and six are the two wild cards. Cards two and three are the intersection cards.

Pyramid

You get four hole cards, then the board is made up of three rows of cards in the shape of a pyramid, as follows:

1 2

4 3 6

You combine your hole cards with one of the rows of three cards available in the game. These three-card rows include 5-1-4, 5-2-6, and 4-3-6. The middle cards (1, 2, and 3) must be exposed first. As always, there’s a round of betting after each card is revealed.

You can count on the winning hand being a straight or higher usually, because there are so many possible hands available.

Pyramid’s my favorite of these kinds of games, by the way.

Red and Black

Each player gets four hole cards, then four cards are dealt in two columns, as follows:

4 4

3 3

2 2

1 1

One of the rows is designated black, while the other is designated red. When a card gets revealed that doesn’t match the color of its row’s designation, it’s discarded immediately.

Red and Black is played hi-lo. The cards are revealed in the order that they’re numbered in the diagram above. They’re also revealed two at a time, which is a nice change of pace from some of the other games on this list.

Conclusion

If you thought the only community card poker games available to you were Texas hold’em, Omaha, and Pineapple… man, were you wrong. I’ve listed eight more community card games that are perfect for your next home game.