NoMercy OFC Crash Course: Opening with Quads

Hello everyone! Welcome to my personal blog on OFC Pineapple (Open Face Chinese Poker). Week after week, I’ll go over the history of the game, some basic rules and recommendations, anecdotes from the players, and finally, some more advanced strategies.  Stay tune and enjoy the Fantasy Ride!

As explained earlier, we are now covering a crucial subject in OFC: your openings. Indeed, the way you will chose to place your initial 5 cards will be the foundation of your hand and it therefore represent one of the most important decision you will have to make in Open Face Chinese Poker. We are studying all the best openings in order of the highest starting hands by ranking, until we reach the very worst opening hand with 5 rags such as 10-7-5-4-3 in 4 different suits. 

Remember that one of the ultimate goals in Chinese Poker is to reach Fantasyland (FL), so starting with the most effective placement will greatly help you get there!

We already covered the very best poker hand in the last two blog posts as we went over all possible scenarios and draws that concern a Royal or a Straight Flush as a made hand, or as a draw with 4 cards:

Royal and Straight Flush Openings (Part 1)

Royal and Straight Flush Openings (Part 2)

Let’s move on with the second-best starting hand.

Quads

Your quads will obviously go directly in the back for a 10 points bonus. The question is; where to position the remaining card?

The optimal play will be to position an Ace or any card in between Deuce and Jack in the middle. As for a remaining King or a Queen, this card should go on top since it is a major Fantasyland asset. As such, you want to maximise its potential for value.

Question – What if your Quads consist in 4 Aces? Wouldn’t be best to place 2 Aces in the back and 2 Aces in the middle, in order to be ready to access Fantasyland by catching a pair of Kings or a pair of Queens?

Remember that your average FL will totalise 8 points and that Quads in the back are worth 10 points already. Plus, your board is all open for big bonuses if you manage to score a Flush or a Full House in the middle, for example.

Question – What if your Quads consist in 4 Queens? Wouldn’t be best to place 2 Queens in the middle and 2 Queens on top, so you simply have to cover this pair in the back in order to access Fantasyland? Catching a pair of Kings or a pair of Aces would be enough to validate your board here.

Even if it would be relatively easy to validate that board, the focus on FL would be exaggerated. It would not justify splitting Quads and abandoning 10 points royalty in the back, on top of surrendering eventual big bonuses in the middle. These extra potential points matter too much. Remember that you can still make it to FL with a pair of Kings or Aces on top!

Bottom line; play all your Quads in the back.

Rendezvous next week for the continuation of these series of tips on Open Face Chinese Poker!

Meet me at the OFC tables on CoinPoker to practice your skills and enjoy the action. Open yourself a CoinPoker account today. Welcome to Fantasyland!

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Isabelle “No Mercy” Mercier

OFC “Progressive” World Champion