Rules and Basic Strategy for Caribbean Stud Poker

Caribbean stud poker is the No.3 casino game, more popular than roulette or baccarat. It is an easy-to-play game that derived from five card stud poker and is owned by Mikohn Gaming. Caribbean stud poker was the first game to involve a progressive jackpot of slot machines size. There is no organized record of jackpot payout, but it is believed that the biggest winning took place in 1990 at Harras Casino in Joliet, Illinois, when Al-Hakam Habassi from Chicago hit 712,070 dollars progressive jackpot playing Caribbean Stud Poker.

The game is divided into two parts: playing against the dealer and betting on the progressive jackpot.

Playing against the dealer proceeds as follows: all players place ante of the size determined by the table betting limits. Each player is dealt 5 cards face down, while the dealer gets 4 cards face down and 1 face up. At this stage, players may either fold or place a bet of double their ante and play the hand. When all players make their decisions, the dealer turns over his down cards.

If the dealer has a hand lower than Ace-King, he does not qualify. In this case, all players who did not fold, are paid even money on their ante only, while their bet is taken back without winning anything on it. The bets enter the game only if the dealer qualifies. To qualify, the dealer must have an Ace-King hand or higher. When it happens, all players hands are compared to the dealer's one. If the player's hand is lower than the dealer's one, the player loses and forfeits both his ante and his bet. If it is higher, the player wins. His ante always pays even money, while his bet pays according to the payout table. Standard payouts are: 1-1 on one pair or lower; 2-1 on two pairs; 3-1 on three of a kind; 4-1 on a straight, 5-1 on a flush, 7-1 on a full house, 20-1 on four of a kind; 50-1 on a straight flush and 100-1 on a royal flush.

Betting on the progressive jackpot is optional. If player wants to bet on it, he puts 1 dollar into a coin receptor at the table and is paid according to the progressive jackpot payout table regardless of the outcome of the game against the dealer. Progressive jackpot bets are only paid if the player has a flush or higher and normally have the following payout table: 50 dollars on a flush; 75 dollars on a full house; 100 dollars on four of a kind; 10% of the progressive jackpot on a straight flush (some casinos pay a fixed sum of 5,000 dollars) and 100% of the progressive jackpot on a royal flush.

Basic Strategy for Caribbean Stud Poker

Caribbean stud poker basic strategy is quite simple and does not require memorizing many combinations, as in blackjack. Basic Caribbean stud poker strategy says to place the bet and play the hand if the player has one of the following hands:

• A pair or a higher ranking hand.
• A non-pair hand with an Ace and a King as two highest cards, if one of the other three cards matches the dealer's up-card.
• Ace-King-Queen or Ace-King-Jack hand, if one of the cards in the hand matches the dealer's up-card.
• Ace-King-Queen hand, if the forth highest card outranks the dealer's upcard.

The house edge of Caribbean stud poker played using the basic strategy against dealer has 5.22% house edge, while the house edge of betting on the progressive jackpot depends on the size of the jackpot. With the standard payout table, the break-even point of Caribbean stud poker progressive jackpot is 263,000 dollars, which means that above this sum, the player has positive expectations, even though this advantage is only effective for straight and royal flushes, which are very rare hands.