Home Game Tutorial #4: Badugi

Badugi is debatably not a poker game, because the hand rankings are different, but it still has the same betting mechanics as other limit poker games.

In Badugi, every player gets 4 cards. The goal is to make a hand with one card of every suit, no pairs, and the lowest cards possible. For example, if you had the 7 of diamonds, 5 of hearts, 3 of spades, and ace of clubs, you would have a 7-high badugi. which beats an 8-high, and loses to 6-high. 7432 would beat 765A because the second-highest card breaks the tie. If nobody has a badugi by the end of 3 drawing rounds, then the best 3 unique cards win, and if nobody has 3 unique cards, then the best 2 card badugi wins.

Like some other games, there is a dealer button and a small and big blind. However, a $4/$8 limit game is not $4 small blind and $8 big blind. Rather it means that one is only allowed to raise $4 or $8 depending on the betting street. These are called small and big bets. The big blind at the start is equal to the small bet, and the small blind is usually half of that. After the blinds, the next player can call, raise by the small bet amount, or fold. Then there are 3 drawing rounds, where players can discard some of their cards to make a better hand. after each draw, there is another betting round. After the first draw the small bet is used, $4 in our $4/$8 example, and after that, the big bet is used, which in the example would be $8. If 2 or more players remain in the hand, then the hand goes to showdown.