NoMercy OFC Crash Course: Opening With Three Of A Kind (Part 7)

Welcome to my personal blog on OFC Pineapple (Open Face Chinese Poker). Week after week, we’ll go over the history of the game, basic rules and recommendations, anecdotes from the players, more advanced strategies, hand analysis, and etc. Stay tune and enjoy the Fantasy-ride!

After a short break in these openings to talk about Hold’em and discuss, among other things, the importance of aggressiveness and staying up to date with new trends and optimal strategies , we are now back to Open Face Chinese Poker tactics.

OFC is my absolute passion and as a matter of fact, we are finalising a book at the moment along with other pros, about the best openings. It is still a work in progress, but this complete bible of openings will be available soon and great news, it will feature illustrations and images from your favorite poker site, CoinPoker!

As explained earlier, we are now covering a crucial subject in OFC: your openings. The way you will chose to place your initial 5 cards will be the foundation of your hand and it represents a key decision. Remember that one of the ultimate goals in Chinese Poker is to reach Fantasyland, so starting with the most effective placement will greatly help you get there!

We are studying optimum openings in order of the highest starting hands by ranking, and we already covered the top poker hands:

• Royal Flushes
• Straight Flushes
• Quads
• Full Houses
• Flushes
• Straights

We are now turning to the next two category in line: Opening with Three of a Kind

Opening with Three of a Kind

This chapter will be really plain and simple, as there is not one single exception that can apply here:

You ALWAYS position your trips in the back.

As for the two remaining cards:

• If both cards are from Jack to Deuce, they both go in the middle.
• If one card is an Ace, a King, or a Queen, you place that card on top and the other one in the middle.
• If both remaining cards are A,K,Q, you place the highest one in the middle and the smallest one on top.

That’s it! Shouldn’t be too easy to memorise this chapter!

Still, it is important here to remind to all readers that the entirety of these optimal openings are based on the following premise:

You are first to act in a heads-up format.

This is crucial to keep in mind, because let’s take a look at the following example:

You receive A-A-A-J-5 in opening. According to the above rule, you would place AAA in the back along with J-5 in the middle. However, if you were in a 3 handed game and you could see 3 Jacks already in your opponents’ hands, it would make no sense to place your Jack in the middle here (unless it was suited with the 5).

Indeed, a non-suited Jack should be placed on top, because it is completely dead and will not help you accessing Fantasyland in any way.

Be aware of the reasons why you make every single decision in OFC. That’s how you will become a winning player!

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!

Isabelle “No Mercy” Mercier

OFC “Progressive” World Champion