Spots Stud

Seven card Stud Poker, dealt two down, four up, one down. The lowest card dealt face-down to each player is wild in that player’s hand.

A split-pot game, at showdown, with the pot split between the best hand at the table and the hand containing the ‘highest number of spots’. Spots refers to the number of ‘suit symbols’ in the center column of each card (a Three has three spots, an Ace has one spot, an Eight has two spots, etc.).

In case you do not follow how spots are counted, it goes as follows: Ace-1, Two-2, Three-3, Four-0 (no center column of spots), Five-1, Six-0, Seven-1, Eight-2, Nine-1, Ten-2, Face-0.

Variations

We suggest that after the sixth card is dealt (the fourth card dealt face up), there is declare round as in Guts Poker. Players declare whether or not they wish to continue playing the game. Only those players that call “in” proceed with this betting round, as well as the final card dealt and final betting round.

All those players that go “in” and do not win either high hand or high spots must match the pot before it is split between the two winners (in other words, it is not a progressive pot; the matching of the pot is extra winnings for the game’s two winners). A cap on this matching of the pot is optional, to protect against losing an unreasonable amount of money (once for playing the game, and a second time for not winning the game).