New Games I've Seen

Hello everyone!

Just wanted to write down some games I saw while exploring the internet.

First is Novo Poker - the exact same as Caribbean Poker, but if you have Three of a Kind or better, you can get "insurance" against the Dealer not qualifying. The insurance bet is paid 1:1 if the dealer does not qualify (below Ace/King) and pushes if the dealer beats your hand. I guess the house edge of this bet depends on how good your hand is, with a lower house edge for Three 2's than a Straight Flush. Either way the house edge is really bad.

Next is Dream Blackjack, in the Philippines whose 5.93% house edge makes it not a dream. There is a Push 22 but in return you can double on 3 cards.
They also seem to have the Over/Under 13 side bet...I thought this went extinct from counting :D

Thirdly, I found a New Zealand money wheel with slightly different pay table then I'm used to seeing - on closer inspection though it just seems to be a combination of existing pay tables so nothing for me to analyze there.

Additionally, I found another game from the Philippine Casino from earlier: Baccarat 27
It seems to be a new no-commission variety of Baccarat where a winning Banker 7 pays 1:2 but a winning Banker 2 pays 2:1. The house edge for Banker is 1.72%. I like what they were trying to do but sadly the higher house edge doesn't appeal to me. There are lots of side bets, all with high house edges.

Finally, I found two very similar Niu Niu varieties, but I do not understand the game well enough to say how "innovative" this is or isn't. The rules are slightly different from what the Wizard of Odds website has. I found one variant in Vietnam and another in the Philippines. Do we have any Niu Niu enjoyers/experts in this forum?

Miscellaneous questions:
Other than pai gow tiles, has there ever been a casino game played with dominoes in modern times?
Is there a "House Way" for Niu Niu?
And as always... has anyone seen any new games or side bets?:)

Like always thanks for reading I hope you have a good weekend :)

P.S. I will be adding some more rare games to my website like Vega$ 3 and Three Card Baccarat soon, I've been mostly focusing on adding more Baccarat and Blackjack side bets recently

Several years ago I put a large amount of effort into developing a Niu Niu spreadsheet for calculating EV probabilities - for development of a basic strategy and evaluation of 'collaboration' opportunities.

Sadly, my desktop PC suffered a catastrophic hard disk failure, and the spreadsheet was not backed up on the cloud. I interpreted this as a divine signal that analyzing Niu Niu was a No-No.

I can't remember whether Charliepatrick has analyzed Niu Niu or not.

I found a new game for extremely intelligent people last night.
It's an Indian game called 7 Up 7 Down. There are two dice and you bet on whether they will roll 7, Under 7, or Over 7.

You can play on my website here

Quote: harris

I found a new game for extremely intelligent people last night.
It's an Indian game called 7 Up 7 Down. There are two dice and you bet on whether they will roll 7, Under 7, or Over 7.

You can play on my website here
link to original post

It's not exactly "new"; "Over and Under 7" is mentioned in Scarne's Complete Guide to Gambling, which is from the 1970s, and this is also mentioned by the Nevada Gaming Control Board as an allowable side bet in craps.

There are some people for whom Casino War is way too complicated.

For them, I present, Dragon Tiger
I knew about its existence online but now I know it's played in India in real life so I added it.

If anyone has seen it with more side bets in real life I can add those. I suspect the side bets on the Wizard of Odds website are from online providers.

I will try to add all the other games that I found on this casino's website: Andar Bahar, Mini Flush, 5 Card Poker, Texas House Poker - the last two might just be re-named table games, I'll read about them on my bus to DC tonight.

Quote: harris

I will try to add all the other games that I found on this casino's website: Andar Bahar, Mini Flush, 5 Card Poker, Texas House Poker - the last two might just be re-named table games, I'll read about them on my bus to DC tonight.
link to original post

Update:

Mini Flush seems to be an Indian version of Three Card Poker - the rules are not completely clear to me based on what I see on the website/video.
5 Card Poker seems like Caribbean Stud but with the possibility to exchange cards? I don't think it's Lunar Poker (Russian Poker).
I am almost certain Texas House Poker is just Texas Hold'Em Bonus

Another game I found presents itself as a simplified version of Pai Gow Tiles

It's just a Baccaratified version with a 5% commission

Hoiana Pai Gow

I have thought about the idea of a simplified Pai Gow in the future - I guess it would probably involve eliminating Wongs and Gongs and making it so that any "5/7" will tie with any "5/7" for example.

Can anyone please identify if this 5 Card Poker is related to any known existing game? It seems like Oasis Poker but it says you can draw two cards...

1. I found out that there is a California-style no-bust version of Free Bet at the Crystal Casino in southern California.
2. Breakout Blackjack will premier at the Strat in Vegas soon
3. Hi-Lo Mojo will premier soon in Tulsa, OK
4. Light & Wonder recently posted about a game that looks like a mix between 3-card poker and UTH - I am sure it will be easy to analyze but I don't have time for that right now due to family obligations

From now on I will use this thread to inform forum readers about new games they might want to play
Anyone else can use this thread to report on new games too of course :)

I found this thing called Section Bets in New Zealand

When I saw it, I realized the house edge was lower than the normal bets...


Voisons has a 35/37 RTP (5.41% house edge)
Same with Tiers

Orphans has a 32/37 RTP (13.5135% house edge) :/

Quote: harris

I found this thing called Section Bets in New Zealand

When I saw it, I realized the house edge was lower than the normal bets...


Voisons has a 35/37 RTP (5.41% house edge)
Same with Tiers

Orphans has a 32/37 RTP (13.5135% house edge) :/
link to original post

When the Borgata first opened they offered a neighbors bet on roulette that was +EV by mistake I assume. When you won they did not take drop your bet so it was still alive for the next spin. That was probably 30 years ago but I remember doing the math in my room and thinking it was too good to be true.

^ Sadly the data on my current laptop only goes back a few years. I can see we discussed it back in 2018 - https://wizardofvegas.com/forum/questions-and-answers/math/31513-niu-niu/4/ and there are some figures (not mine) there.
If it's now an Ante/Raise game, similar to 3CP, then the quick way is to find the cutoff (assuming independence), and then run close calls using brute force. That's how one can get Q64 in 3CP. However with 5-card poker it's complicated by being able to see one Dealer card, so there may be close decisions depending on your cards. (Given suits don't matter it's easier to run through ranks of cards and multiply by how many are left over.)