Home Poker Game Question - Wild card rule in a 3 Card Guts game

Our home poker game developed a controversy over a hand dealt in a pot match game.

The game is Three Card Guts Poker with low card in the hole wild

Player A was dealt 8-8-A
Player B was dealt 7-7-7
Both players stay in - pot is approx $125
(There is no "House Rule" on natural trips beating a wild card hand)

Player A showed hand and declared 3 Aces - Player B showed hand and declared 3 Aces for a split pot
Player A said Player B did not have a wild card since "there was no low card" and that Player A won and Player B must match the pot ($50 pot match cap)

Do both Players have 3 Aces?

If anyone knows of a poker rules web site stating a rule for this, please cite the URL with your answer.

I'm no expert on the rules of crazy poker games, but I'd say both players have 3 aces. Player A's argument that Player B has no wild card because all three are identical sounds ridiculous to me. Seven is definitely the lowest card in player B's hand. I strongly suspect that player A is an asshole, and if it were my home game I don't think I'd invite him to return.

Agree with PapaChubby

I third that -- both players had three aces.

I'm not a poker player, but I agree with the others. If Player B does not have a wild card because of not having a solo "low" card, then Player A does not either -- Player A has a "high" card but no solo "low" card. If that is the way Player A wants to interpret the rules regarding low pairs/trips, then a pair of 8s with an Ace kicker loses to trip 7s, in my opinion.

It's usually a good idea, before starting a home poker game, to declare that if there is any dispute over interpretation of rules, the hand will be declared dead, all players get their money back, and then a definitive decision will be made on the interpretation, which will then apply to all future instances. If it's a friendly game, with people who know each other, you shouldn't have much problem with having this issue.

As a side note, in a home game I ran many years ago, we finally came to a conclusion that a wild card was only applicable if it had something to match up with. A player with two 8s and an Ace, had two wild cards, and an Ace. Thus, he could declare he has three Aces, or a mini royal flush if such was applicable to the game. However, a player with three 7s, has three wild cards. With nothing to match them up with, he has no hand. I know it seems like a silly rule, but it did make for extra fun at our home game, and unique situations, like a person getting dealt three 7s, and having to discard one of them, hoping that his replacement draw isn't lower than a 7, or he would lose out on two wild cards.

Quote: konceptum

It's usually a good idea, before starting a home poker game, to declare that if there is any dispute over interpretation of rules, the hand will be declared dead, all players get their money back, and then a definitive decision will be made on the interpretation, which will then apply to all future instances. If it's a friendly game, with people who know each other, you shouldn't have much problem with having this issue.

That might cause a dishonest player to nit pick the rules for any technicality after losing a hand. I think if a resolution cannot be found at the table then an independent third party should be chosen to decide the outcome.

Quote: konceptum

As a side note, in a home game I ran many years ago, we finally came to a conclusion that a wild card was only applicable if it had something to match up with.

My California friends call some ridiculous games, like baseball, where getting five wilds is not unheard of. I don't like treating that as a "non hand." The way you do it is how slot machines treat wilds -- they have to combine with something.

Back when I played poker with friends, i set up two games that caused a lot of trouble.

One was a Hold 'em variant which required you use at least one of your hole cards for making a hand. So if the community cards were a royal, for example, you could win if you had a high card.

The other was five card draw, pairs are wild. Meaning if you had 2c,2s,4h,7h,5h you had a straight flush. one of my friends couldn't grasp the rule, so he argued over the result of every hand when we played that. In the end we dropped it.

I appreciate the feedback.

All of our players now agree that if the game calls for a low hole card to be wild, it applies to pairs as well as trips. The night of this disagreement, two players could not grasp that the seven was the low hole card, even after we had previously played a game of Roll Your Own, with a low hole card wild, where in the end, someone holding a pair as their two hole cards would have two wild cards (and more if they had that card up as well...).

What was a bigger issue last week was two players holding Royal Flushes in a game of 7 Card Stud with a wild card. One had RF in spades and the other in hearts. Three players declared that the Royal in spades would trump the Royal in hearts. A disagreement arose over whether to split the pot or whether suit was used as a tie breaker. (Issue was settled using Pagat's Rules of Poker and a second online poker rules sight - we split the $400 pot)

We finally decided to write down the House Rules as the variants come up.
Every once in a while a "real poker game" gets thrown in too...lol

Quote: Wizard

That might cause a dishonest player to nit pick the rules for any technicality after losing a hand. I think if a resolution cannot be found at the table then an independent third party should be chosen to decide the outcome.

Definitely possible, but again, with my group of friends, we never had this problem. However, I also should have mentioned that the unclear rule had to be something that the entire group felt was unclear, not one person. And even then, it really didn't come up all that often.

Then again, I've never played in a home game with people that I didn't know, so I'm sure that it's possible someone could get a little dishonest like this. So, YMMV on my suggestion, obviously. I just wouldn't play with people I couldn't trust to be fair with themselves and with the other players.