CoolhandThe games · Coolhand Poker
Seven Card Stud Hi-Lo
Seven Card Stud where the pool splits between the highest hand and the lowest qualifying hand. One hand can take both halves.
18+ · Nothing to win but the hand.
- Players
- 2 to 7
- Family
- Stud
- App
- Coolhand Poker · iOS and Android, soon
How it goes
This is Seven Card Stud, seven cards each and four of them face up, with one change at the end. The rounds of offers run as in the plain game: tokens in, match, or pass. The pool splits in two. The high half goes to the highest hand in the ordinary order. The low half goes to the lowest hand, but only one that qualifies: five different cards, all eight or lower. Your seven cards can make a high hand and a low hand at once, so one player can take both halves. If nobody has a qualifying low, the high hand takes everything.
A good hand
Hands that can win both halves at once. Three low cards that are close together, or all of one suit, can grow into a run or a flush for the high half while staying low enough for the low half. A start that points both ways is worth more than one that points a single way, however strong that way looks.
The usual mistake
Going after half the pool with a hand that can only ever win half. Somebody else may be set up to take both, and every token you put in with a one-way hand is paying to find that out. Splitting the pool is the best a one-way hand can do.
Played differently where you are?
Card games change from table to table, and we researched some of these games instead of playing them. If Seven Card Stud Hi-Lo goes differently where you play it, tell us. That's one of the things the closed beta is for.
The closed beta is by invitation. How to ask to join.