Three Card Poker

Hi I'm new to the site, and not sure where I should have placed this topic. I came from viewing WizardOfOdds, and had a question about 3CP.

I had some info from wizardofodds.com Three Card Poker and was wondering IF it is at all possible to shift the odds to the players advantage if always playing the bet (never folding).

On that webpage, the 3rd comment down is answered "The house edge lies in the rule that if the player folds he loses, even if the dealer doesn’t qualify."
So what if the player never folds, even with Q,6,4 or less?

If a player bets blind, are the odds of the players cards vs dealer cards a 50/50 split? Then throw in the rule that a dealer must qualify, does this not take the player from a 50/50 to a higher advantage as the dealer may not qualify?

What are the odds of a dealer qualifying? And from there, what are the odds of the dealer winning the hand.

It has always been said that Three Card Poker has a house advantage based on if the Player bets. So why not reverse the rules on the house. Player is always in, House now must decide (qualify) on playing on.

On a $5 table, you would really be playing $5 Ante $5 Bet. So $10. but if dealer does not qualify, you only make $5. Regardless of te amount you make, the question remains, what are odds of winning if you always go in?

(No pair plus. Don't even care for this bet so lets keep it out of the equation)

Quote: QikGT

On a $5 table, you would really be playing $5 Ante $5 Bet. So $10. but if dealer does not qualify, you only make $5. Regardless of te amount you make, the question remains, what are odds of winning if you always go in?

(No pair plus. Don't even care for this bet so lets keep it out of the equation)

You answered your own question right there. You do have a 50/50 chance of having a better hand than the dealer. But you only win even money on that 50/50 chance when the dealer has a Q or better. All the times you have a better hand and the dealer DOESN'T have a Q, you only win 5 rather than 10. But if the dealer beats you, you lose 10. This disadvantage is bigger than the advantage you get of winning 5 by risking 10 when you have a WORSE hand but the dealer doesn't have a Q. From the Wizards page:
http://wizardofodds.com/games/three-card-poker/
Raising on everything, or playing blind, results in a house edge of7.65%.

If I win $1 or $100 in a hand, does not matter, what I would like to know is what is the players edge if playing blind, for Winning.
This doesn't matter about how much the bet is, or how much profit is made. So regardless of the bet amount, and regardless of the profit margin,
Take one hand, 3 cards for player, 3 cards for dealer, but dealer can't play if he doesn't qualify. What is the house/player edge? It must be in the favor of the player at this point as to who will win.

Quote: QikGT

What is the house/player edge? It must be in the favor of the player at this point as to who will win.

No, it isn't. Really, if that were the case, why would people have taken the time to determine that it only makes sense to stay in with Q-6-4 or higher?

When the player folds he only loses the ante, not the bet. "If you want to know why queen/6/4 is the borderline hand it is because if you raise on queen/6/3 you can expect to lose 1.00255 units, more than the 1 unit by folding. However if you raise on queen/6/4 the expected loss is .993378, less than the 1 unit by folding." (WoV 3 Card Strategy page.) So if you play blind, you play every hand at the house edge of 3.37%; but if you fold bad hands, and only play the ones with a positive expectation, you have an element of risk of only 2.01% (on the 5-4-1 pay table).

Regarding the Pair Plus, pay attention to the pay table. if it is 6-4-3-1, it isn't a bad bet, with an edge/eor of 2.38%.

Always playing blind results in a 7.65% HOUSE EDGE. There is no player edge playing this way.

His question was specifically stating whether he would win the bet or not, not whether he would win money, or was it positive EV. Since you win less when the dealer doesn't qualify, you WILL win more than 50% of the time when you go in blind, but as others have stated, you will lose money at a pretty high house edge of 7.65%. I could not find the exact amount of time the dealer doesnt qualify, but once that is known, the answer is easy. My guess is youd win about 56% of your hands, but one of the math guys can give you the exact numbers.

The dealer qualifies around 70% of the time. I'm sure The Wizard or someone here has an exact figure.

Thank you to Soopoo who seems to not be great at math, BUT can read. lol.

My question is, regardless of payouts or bet amounts, if a player was given 3 cards, and the dealer was given 3 cards, what are the chances of the player winning?
Then you can throw into the equation the fact that the dealer can ONLY winif they qualify with a Q or higher.

So in a single deck game, where 52 cards are used, and 3 are given to the player, 3 to the dealer, dealer has to qualify, WHAT ARE THE PLAYERS ODDS?

If the cards are shuffled after every hand it shoiuld be 50-50.

edit: the house advantage aslo stems from the Customer plays first... an important concept. Especially playing blind or in your example of deal 3 cards per opponent. Since you don;t know the contents of the opponent's hand, it becomes difficult to wager the outcome... your Straight-Flush might be beaten by Triples... your 10-6-5 might beat your opponent's 8-3-2. Going first, or wagering first is a disadvantage, because of the lack of information.