Today’s €350 Open Face Chinese (OFC) tournament is a fun addition to the schedule – something pokerish but without having to share community cards like flops, turns and rivers. This game is played with 13 cards per player, set face-up in turn:
- Open Face Chinese is played with a maximum of three players, each making their own hand of three rows using 13 cards (top: 3 cards, middle: 5 cards, bottom: 5 cards).
- Five cards are initially dealt to each player, and they must use all of them, placing them in whichever rows they choose. Once placed in a row, cards cannot be moved. For the rest of the hand, cards are dealt in threes, with each player in turn placing two and discarding one, until their full 13 cards are set.
- For a hand to qualify for scoring, the middle row must beat the top row, and the bottom row beat the middle row. If this is not the case, a hand is fouled and “scooped” – losing all points and royalties.
- Hand strength is determined using regular poker hand rankings. For the top three-card row, straights and flushes do not count; the strongest top row is AAA (three of a kind, Aces).
That’s pretty much it – rows are compared between players and points awarded for wins and royalties (if applicable). Extremely strong hands are awarded with a trip to Fantasyland (sounds great doesn’t it?) – for details on this, click the DESCRIPTION tab above.
