I am probably far more aware of (some might say obsessed with) penalty cards than most players. I’ve written about straight penalties, flush penalties, low straight penalties, low straight kicker penalties, straight flush penalties, and high card penalties, as well as specific card penalties such as a ‘9 penalty.’ There are also some situations where two or three penalties must occur at the same time before the strategy is affected.
In 9/6 Double Double Bonus (DDB) Quick Quads there is a type of hand where a suited ten changes the play from holding an ace by itself to holding a 3-card straight flush combination. I’ve been aware of this penalty and include it on my personal strategy sheet. A friend of mine, Kenny, discovered it independently from me and calls it a “royal flush penalty card.” He has a point.
In this game, it’s a close play (usually) whether to hold an ace by itself or certain 3-card straight flushes with no high card and one inside (usually a gap). Specifically, the straight flushes we’re talking about are 234, 245, 346, 356, 457, 467, 568, 578, 679, 689, 78T, 79T. When you have an unsuited ace in the same hand as one of these combinations, which cards you should discard are usually determined by the fifth card in that hand.
There are three factors to consider in determining whether to hold the ace or the 3-card straight flush:
1. The rank of the fifth card;
2. The suit of the fifth card; and
3. The interaction of the ace with the 3-card straight flush. This interaction may just penalize the ace or sometimes penalize both the ace and the 3-card straight flush.
The simple penalties to the ace would be a 2, 3, 4 (and, to a lesser degree, 5) of a different suit than the ace. These would be called low straight penalties because each card hurts the chances for an A2345 straight. A card of the same suit as the ace is a flush penalty. 2, 3, 4, or 5 of the same suit as the ace is a straight flush penalty because it eliminates the chance for an A2345 straight flush.
The specific hands I want to talk about today are the suited 234 and 245 (but NOT 235 which has extra value because if you draw a pair of fives, you’ll get a “Quick Quad” and be paid 260 coins).
(If Quick Quads is new to you, I’ll be teaching 8/5 Bonus Poker Quick Quads on Tuesday September 24, 2013 at noon in the Showroom at the South Point in Las Vegas. The class is free and you’re welcome to attend if you are at least 21 years of age. This class will NOT, however, include a discussion of penalty cards.)
We’ll assume that either of these 3-card straight flushes is all hearts to make them easier to talk about. Assume the fourth card is the ace of spades. Notice that all three of the hearts are low straight penalties to the ace and that the ace is also a straight penalty to the straight flush combinations.
If you examine the 48 possible fifth cards remaining in the deck, you’ll find that 12 of them give you a pair, four of them give you a 5-card straight, eight of them give you a 4-card flush or straight flush, and three of them give you a 2-card royal flush including two high cards combination. You would hold any of these pairs, straights, 4-card flushes, 4-card straight flushes, or 2-card royal flushes before you would hold the lone ace or either of the 3-card straight flushes. Of the other 21 possible fifth cards, with 20 of them you hold the ace by itself and with only one of them you hold the 234 or 245. That one card is the ten of spades.
The “why” is fairly simple. Holding only the ace of spades and discarding the ten of spades and the three low hearts makes it more difficult to get a flush or straight and makes it impossible to end up with a royal flush. The ten of spades is the only royal flush penalty card that is not proper to hold with the ace. (You hold a suited AK, AQ, or AJ. You should NOT hold a suited AT.)
Holding the suited AT is incorrect in most games. In DDB it’s even a bigger mistake because keeping the ten eliminates any chances for getting aces and a kicker, in addition to 4444A, 3333A, and 2222A. In Quick Quads DDB, holding AT is even worse than in regular DDB.
If you held AT, you could draw TT9 and end up with a TTT9A Quick Quad, but an ace by itself can be part of TTT9A, 9998A, 8887A, 6665A, 5554A, 4443A, 3332A, and 222AA.
In addition, in DDB Quick Quads, four aces are paid 1,000 rather than 800, as are 2s, 3s, and 4s with a kicker. It’s approximately four times more difficult to get four aces starting from AT as it is from holding the ace by itself.
On my personal strategy sheet, I listed the ace by itself ahead of such straight flushes, but with the note (‘234’, ‘245’ > “AT”). Calling it a “royal flush penalty”, or ‘rfp’ could make the note read (‘234’, ‘245’ > A with rfp). I’m sticking with my previous notation, but Kenny’s notation is clever.
There are other hands in DDB Quick Quads where you have the same suited ten royal flush penalty. If you want to find all of them, a good tool to use is the video poker strategy calculator available for free from the Wizard of Odds website.