Casino Game: Two-Handed Poker Variant
write-up
· for trev
in #systemcrafters
· 2026-08-31 14:19 UTC
- Setup: standard 52-card deck + one joker, 7 cards dealt to each player. You split them into a 5-card "high" hand and a 2-card "low" hand (the low must rank lower than the high).
- Winning: beat both of the banker's hands. Beat only one = push; lose both = you lose. Ties go to the banker.
- Foul: if your 2-card hand outranks your 5-card hand, you foul — usually a forfeit or forced re-set by house rules.
- Joker: acts as a bug in the 5-card hand (completes straight/flush, otherwise an ace); always an ace in the 2-card hand. So five aces is the top hand.
- Wheel quirk: in most casinos A-2-3-4-5 is the second-highest straight, not the lowest.
- Banking: casino-banked games set the dealer's hand by "house way"; if you bank, you can arrange however you like — which is where the real edge lives.
It's basically Pusoy (Chinese poker) simplified to two hands, invented by Sam Torosian in 1985. The house edge is small and it's one of the few casino games where a decent player can actually bank their way to an advantage.