Open Chinese Poker
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The final element to Open Face Chinese Poker strategy you need to be aware of is the penalties you can receive. If at any point you set your hands incorrectly (i.e. Your hands don't decrease in strength from the back to the top) then you have a pay a foul of six points to your opponent. Open-face Chinese poker, OFCP, commonly known as Open Face Chinese or OFC, is a variant of Chinese poker where players receive five cards to start and then one card at a time until each player has a 13 card hand legal or not. The game originated in Finland during the mid- 2000s and spread to Russia a few years later.
- 2 The Scoring System
Although usually played as a side game for points (which are then converted in a cash amount), OFC’s recent surge in popularity has led to it being introduced in a tournament format both live and online in America.
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The Basics of Open Face Chinese
So how exactly do you play Open Face Chinese?
At the start of each game the players involved are all dealt 13 cards each. After this initial deal no more cards are taken from the deck and it’s the player’s job to then make three hands: a back hand (five cards), a middle hand (five cards) and a top hand (three cards). To add an element of skill and forethought to the game, the strength of these hands must be descending, i.e. your strongest hand must be in the back and your weakest hand at the top.
The main difference with OFC compared to Chinese Poker is that instead of receiving all 13 cards face down at once, a round starts with players getting five cards face up.
At this point the player to the left of the dealer is then asked to arrange their opening fives cards. The cards can be placed in any position the player chooses: for example, two up top, two in the middle and one in the back hand. Once the first player has set their hand, the rest of the table are then free to set their hands in a clockwise order.
After setting their first five cards, each player is then dealt one card face up until everyone has received a total of 13 cards. As these cards are being dealt each player is free to put them in either their middle hand or their top hand and once the deal is complete all hands must be set.
After the deal is complete and each player’s hand is set, scoring for each of the three rounds takes place and the winner is the person with the highest score overall.
Five things You Need to Know about Open Face Chinese
- OFC is played with a full deck and each player is dealt 13 cards.
- The aim of the game is to set three hands: back (five cards), middle (five cards) and top (three cards). The strongest must always be at the back and the weakest at the top.
- The winner of a round earns one point. On top of this, six points are given to a player if they scoop all three boards.
- Bonus negative points can impact on a player’s score.
- The winner is determined by the player with the most points at the end of the game.
Open Face Chinese Poker Solver
The Scoring System
Before starting any OFC cash game, each player must agree on how much money a single point is worth. Once a figure has been agreed, players then assess who has the strongest hand on each street. The strength of a hand is based on traditional poker hand rankings as they evolved in the US and elsewhere.
The player who holds the strongest overall board (that is if they win two of the three hands) is awarded one game point plus any bonuses.
Generally you’ll find that a player might win one or two hands but not all three; however, if they do manage to beat every player in all three sets then it’s known as a “scoop” and they get 6 points. In addition to scoops, a player can also increase their winning score by hitting a Royalty Bonus. These extra points are awarded for the strength of a hand and add an extra element of skill to the game.
Because the size of each OFC board is different, royalty points are handed out for the following hands:
Open Face Chinese Poker – Top, Middle, and Back Hands
Hand Strength: Royalty Points
The final element to OFC’s scoring system is penalties. If at any point you set your hands incorrectly (i.e. your hands don’t decrease in strength from the back to the top) then you have a pay a foul of six points to your opponent.
Open Face Chinese Poker offers US poker players some very different challenges than they face with other types of card games.
Living in a Fantasy Land
One of the most interesting aspects of OFC that’s developed in recent years is the concept known as Fantasy Land. This part of the game is unlocked if a players holds QQ+ in their top hand. If a player achieves this state then their next 13 cards will be dealt to them facedown. This gives a Fantasy Land player a distinct advantage because they know all of their cards ahead of time and can, thus, set them accordingly. A stay in Fantasy Land can last indefinitely, providing the player makes quads or better in the back, a full house or better in the middle or trips up top.
Final Comments
Open Face Chinese might be a few years away from really establishing itself in the poker world in the United States, but with so many pros already enjoying its blend of skill and luck, there’s no doubt it’s a game on the up. While some will argue that it often favors the luckiest player, there’s still a lot of thinking to be done when setting hands. Moreover, the amount of money that can be made when playing for even moderate stakes is something that will certainly attract a lot of players.
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“Am I making the right move?” This is what I ask myself before I take each and every turn in Pineapple OFC. According to my score on the rating system (that I helped create), the answer is: not every time. I only get about 70 percent of tough situations correct, and have an average error of .5 points / tricky spot. This means I probably give my opponent a free point every couple of hands. With that kind of error rate, how could I even be expect to win? Well, luckily, my opponents are making even more errors than me.
Open Face Chinese Poker
The truth is we are all making a lot of mistakes in this fairly new game and unexplored game. That’s great for the fast learners, but could cost you a pretty penny if you are a late-bloomer or haven’t yet put in the effort to learn advanced OFC strategy. Let me show you four of the biggest mistakes I see players just like you make in this game time and time again:
Not Gambling for FantasyLand Enough
Sometimes the fear and embarrassment of fouling convinces you to play it safe in spots where it is clearly “game on.” You have to remember, it’s not whether you hit 50 percent of the time or more, it’s whether you make more points on average or not. Most Fantasyland gambles only need 25 percent to be worth it, so stop waiting for the golden opportunity and just go.
In this spot, gambling for Fantasyland is 2.6 points better on average than playing it safe. And it doesn’t particularly even matter that our opponent will foul a significant amount of the time because our hand is just plainly better on average if we make the gamble. If you aren’t making “risky” plays in Pineapple Open Face, you are making a mistake.
Completely Senseless Gambles
Just because you can improve doesn’t mean you should. I see this problem a lot when someone has set a rather ambitious flush draw or straight draw in the middle, but hasn’t developed their back at all. It’s especially true when you hit your trips card in the middle with just one, or even two pair, in the back. This is quite often a bad time to gamble.
In this situation, putting the ace up front forces you into a runner-runner situation, where you have to make a full house on the bottom and two pair or better in the middle. That is a dream my friend, and it’s a mistake of over seven points! Do not take a good hand and throw it away simply for a chance at “the big time.”
Bailing Too Early
If you are mid-game and thinking about breaking a three-flush for a single pair in the back, you better need a really good reason. A reason like, half your flush cards are dead, you can get to Fantasyland a lot easier if you pair the back, or you will scoop your opponent a lot even with such a weak hand. Most of the time, it’s just correct to wait it out for the flush, or bail on the next street. After all, there will be six more opportunities to hit something that helps you out, just be patient.
In this hand, it can be sometimes tempting to just play it safe and put the ten in the back, especially if there are more dead diamonds. But that is just way too safe, even with 3-4 additional dead diamonds! The correct play in this exact spot is actually to gamble for Fantasyland with the queen up front and ten in the middle (because of the three of diamonds…think about it). If you are playing it “super safe” you are making a mistake of over four points, yikes.
A bird in the hand…Don’t sacrifice a great card for the back to take a big risk in the front.
Now there are plenty of times to gamble in this game, but I have found that most of the time you are presented a made hand, you should take that before risking it all for Fantasyland or the like. This problem usually arises when you get three great cards for your hand and still have to throw one (or as I like to call it, “rich people problems.”) Generally speaking, you should build the bottom/middle in this situation and throw your “gamble” card. The main reason this holds true so often is because you are throwing away an out, thus reducing your chances, plus you will have another opportunity to hit that Fantasyland card on the next draw anyways. So think about those future opportunities before throwing a perfectly good hand away.
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In this situation, we have to decide whether to take Fantasyland now or take quads now… #richpeopleproblems. We don’t even have to set ourselves all-in and Fantasyland is worth approximately 14.5 points (7 for queens and around 7.5 for the added value of being in Fantasyland next hand), while quads is only worth ten points. Seems like a no brainer right? Well, actually, since we have five outs to hit Fantasyland on the next draw (45%), its 4.7 points better to play quads!!! Am I blowing your mind yet?
Open Faced Chinese Poker
If any of this helped you or if I was able to help you solve one leak in your game, please let me know by tweeting at @ofcstrategy. I truly hope I was able to give some quick pointers and valuable insight into errors that I see players making all the time. To see where you stand and how many errors you’re making on a regular basis, check out openfacesolutions.com and sign up for a free trial to use our tactics trainer, simulator, and the only Open Face Chinese ranking system on the web. ♠
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Derric “SixPeppers” Haynie is the author of Quantum Poker and creator of OpenFaceSolutions.com and OpenFaceStrategy.com. Check out those sites for more articles, solutions, tactics, news and information on Pineapple Open Face Chinese Poker.