Odds and Ends Rules

Odds and Ends was contributed to pagat.com by Chris Gaskill. It uses a standard 52-card deck and standard poker rules.

The object is to win the pot with the best five-card high hand from a player's four hole cards and the three community cards, or by making a bet no one calls.

Wild cards. The highest odd card in each player's own hand is wild for that player. The odd ranks are 3, 5, 7 and 9; face cards are never odd.

1.3(a) If a community card of the same rank as a player's wild card is turned up, that card is ended: it stops being wild and reverts to its natural rank.

1.3(b) An ended card is not replaced. The player's next-highest odd card does not become wild.

Hands are ranked by the standard hand rankings. The source does not say whether an ace counts as odd, whether two cards of the wild rank in one hand are both wild, or where five of a kind ranks. The dealer shall announce these before the deal; by the usual convention, five of a kind ranks above a straight flush.

Antes or blinds follow the table's usual practice. Each player is dealt four cards face down.

Three community cards are dealt face down in the centre of the table.

There is a betting round before any community card is turned.

The community cards are then turned face up one at a time, with a betting round after each.

Each time a community card is turned, any player holding a wild card of that rank loses the wild card, as set out in rule 1.3(a).

When all three community cards are face up and the last betting round is complete, the remaining players make their best five-card hands from their four hole cards and the three community cards. The best hand wins.

A wild card is safest when its rank has fewest copies left unseen. A player holding two cards of the wild rank knows there are only two more that could end it.

Holding no odd card at all means having no wild card, which is a real disadvantage in this game.