• Do Casinos Use More Than One Deck In Poker Room
• Do Casinos Use More Than One Deck In Poker Real Money

1. An example of rake in poker. Around 2-10% goes to the casino or dealer for running the game. Further in this article, I’ll explore this subject in more detail, explaining finer nuances of rake.
2. Poker traditionally has to be played with one deck. When you have more than one deck, the entire face of the game changes - more hands become possible, the probability of some hands changes drastically, and so on. To demonstrate this, I decided to analyze poker with two decks of cards. As I calculate it, this is the correct ranking of hands.
3. A stripped deck may be used. Poker was first played with only 20 cards. In the spirit of poker history, players will sometimes only play with a stripped deck. A popular poker game in Spain is played with cards 8-A. It is played similar to hold'em, except that one card is dealt at a time and a player must use both hole cards.
4. Well, if that's what you mean, then no. There is no casino or legitimate home game that plays hold'em with more than one deck of cards. In theory you could actually feed 22 players off of one.

The more cards that are played before a reshuffle the better. This is also why shuffling machines are bad, because their deck penetration is about 2%. Many people don't play unless the penetration for 2 decks is over 55, and 6 deck is 75% or higher. They can also shuffle when they feel like it.

I was very bored today.
Poker traditionally has to be played with one deck. When you have more than one deck, the entire face of the game changes - more hands become possible, the probability of some hands changes drastically, and so on.
To demonstrate this, I decided to analyze poker with two decks of cards. As I calculate it, this is the correct ranking of hands:
Royal flush
Five of a kind
Straight flush
Flush with two pair
Four of a kind
Flush with one pair
Flush with no pairs (1)
Full house
Unflushed straight
Three of a kind
Two pair
One pair
High card
Note 1: You could, if you liked, join a flush with one pair and a flush with no pairs. Then, a full house would beat them. Flush with two pair is rare enough that it should stay separate, though.
All ties are handled in the same way they would be in normal poker.
Some notes:

• I tried to stick to the framework of basic poker hands as best I could. Because of this, five of a kind and flushes with pairs seemed like necessary additions. You could add all kinds of other spiffy hands if you wanted to (i.e. does having a suited pair make it better?), but that's beyond the point of my analysis.
• The Royal flush being top dog seemed like something players would expect, so I included it. If you preferred, you could consider the Royal to be a straight flush, with five of a kind being better. As long as the Royal flush is considered separately, however, it wins: there are 128 Royals and only 728 fives-of-a-kind.
• With five decks, the Royal flush gets dethroned as the best hand, because a flushed five of a kind (with only 52 possibilities) would be king. I'm not sure how adding more decks would affect this, however.

For the curious (and peer review), here are my actual calculations for each hand. 'C' means combinations, e.g. 8C3 is the number of combinations for drawing 3 items out of a list of 8, derived from the formula nCr = n! / ( (n-r)! * r! )
Edit: I forgot to account for flushed vs. unflushed pairs. Embarrassing! The new numbers are correct.
Royal flush:
4 different suits to flush in
2 different ways of getting each card in the royal flush
2
2
2
2
128 different Royal flushes
Five of a kind:
13 different ranks
8C5=56 different ways of getting five cards of that rank
728 different fives-of-a-kind
Straight flush:
4 different suits to flush in
9 different high cards (since Ace high gives royal flush)
2 different ways of getting each card in that particular straight flush
2
2
2
2
1172 different straight flushes
Flush with two pair:
4 different suits to flush in
13C2=78 combinations of ranks for pairs
11 different ranks for fifth card
1 combination for first pair in suit
1 combination for second pair in suit
2 cards possible for fifth card in given rank
6884 different flushes with two pair
Four of a kind:
13 different ranks for four-of-a-kind
12 different ranks for fifth card
8C4=70 combinations for four-of-a-kind
8 different cards of rank for fifth card
87360 different fours-of-a-kind
Flush with one pair:
4 different suits to flush in
13 different ranks for pair
12C3=220 combinations of ranks for extra cards
1 combination for pair
2 ways of getting each extra card in chosen rank and suit
2
2
91520 different flushes with one pair
Flush with no pairs:
4 different suits to flush in
13C5=1287 combinations of ranks for five cards
2 ways of getting each card in chosen rank and suit
2
2
2
2
164738 different flushes with no pairs, including straight flushes
Subtract 1172 straight flushes
163566 different flushes with no pairs or straight
Full house:
13 different ranks for three-of-a-kind
12 remaining ranks for pair
8C3=56 combinations for three-of-a-kind
8C2=28 combinations for pair
244608 different full houses
Unflushed straight:
10 different high cards for a straight
8 ways of getting each card in the straight
8
8
8
8
327680 different straights, including straight flushes
Subtract 1172 straight flushes
326508 different unflushed straights
Three of a kind:
13 different ranks for three-of-a-kind
12C2=66 combinations for ranks of extra cards
8C3=56 combinations for three-of-a-kind
8 different cards for fourth card
8 different cards for fifth card
3075072 different threes-of-a-kind
Unflushed two pair:
13C2=78 combinations of ranks for pairs
11 different ranks for fifth card
8C2=28 combinations for first pair
8C2=28 combinations for second pair
8 different cards of rank for remaining card
5381376 different hands with two pair
Subtract 6884 different flushes with two pair
5374492 different unflushed hands with two pair
Unflushed pair:
13 different ranks for pair
12C3=220 combinations of ranks for extra cards
8C2=28 combinations for pair
8 different cards for each remaining extra card
8
8
41000960 different hands with one pair
Subtract 91520 different flushes with one pair
40909440 different unflushed hands with one pair
High card:
13C5=1287 combinations of ranks with no matches
8 ways of getting each card
8
8
8
8
42172416 different hands that do not contain a pair, three-of-a-kind, four-of-a-kind, or five-of-a-kind
Subtract 327680 different straights (including straight flushes)
Subtract 163566 different flushes with no pairs (not including straight flushes)
41681170 hands that contain no other hand

I was very bored today.

I'll say! This reminds me of some of the stuff that floats around the internet. It's entertaining, but always leaves me thinking 'Somebody has a lot of free time.'

i.e. does having a suited pair make it better?

Yes.
It's no different than the suited five of a kind in five deck poker that you mentioned.
Similarly, many Black Jack side bets pay X for specific cards, but pay more if they are suited.

i.e. does having a suited pair make it better?

Yes.
It's no different than the suited five of a kind in five deck poker that you mentioned.
Similarly, many Black Jack side bets pay X for specific cards, but pay more if they are suited.
Well, the flushed five of a kind is a special case: it's a flush, and it's five of a kind. Same with a straight flush (or for that matter, a Royal) in normal poker. You certainly could say that suited pairs are better, but keep in mind that there's a difference between, say, a suited pair of aces, and a flush with a pair of aces.

I didn't check all of your figures, but I disagree with your Two Pair / Three of a Kind result:

Three of a Kind
trips ..... combin(13,1)*combin(8,3) = 728
kickers ... combin(12,2)*combin(8,1)*combin(8,1) = 4224
total ..... 728 * 4224 = 3,075,072 (this agrees with your total)
Two Pair
pairs .... combin(13,2)*combin(8,2)*combin(8,2) = 61152
kicker ... combin(11,1)*combin(8,1) = 88
total .... 61152 * 88 = 5,381,376 (this is much higher than your total)

The above Two Pair figure does not subtract the counts for suited Two Pair hands if they are deemed to be higher in rank than other Two Pair hands. Nevertheless, the figures show that Three of a Kind is still a better-ranking hand than Two Pair.

Yeah, that looks right. I'm not sure where my mistake was, but it seems to be in punching numbers into my calculator. How I made the exact same mistake more than once is a bit weird, but whatever. I'll change it.

Yeah, that looks right. I'm not sure where my mistake was, but it seems to be in punching numbers into my calculator. How I made the exact same mistake more than once is a bit weird, but whatever. I'll change it.

I think you missed the last factor of 8, which corresponds to the suit of the kicker. You listed it, but forgot to include it in the calculation.Wizard
Administrator
I have a table for poker combinations with 1 to 8 decks here. Scroll down to 'Multi-Deck Probabilities.'The Casino I work at is getting a 6 deck Texas Hold'Em table game next month. 5 of a kind suited is the best hand. It's called Texas Shootout. It's reviewed on the Wizard of Odds site and looks pretty cool.

The Casino I work at is getting a 6 deck Texas Hold'Em table game next month. 5 of a kind suited is the best hand. It's called Texas Shootout. It's reviewed on the Wizard of Odds site and looks pretty cool.

Here's the Wiz's page on it: http://wizardofodds.com/texasshootout
Looks kinda interesting.
Where do you work?
On a side note: Would that be advertising? Nah. I'd bet that the Wiz wouldn't want you to mention your casino in every post, but since this is tied to the thread's topic, I doubt he'd mind a quick plug.

Do Casinos Use More Than One Deck In Poker Room

I spent the entire article last time discussing the flexibility of the plastic cards used in modern casino poker rooms, and how to use this feature to your advantage. But there is much more to know about cards, and what poker rooms do with them.

“New setup”

Once in a while, you’ll hear a player ask the dealer for a “new setup.” What he’s asking is for the current cards in play to be replaced with new ones. Poker rooms almost all keep two decks of cards in rotation at each table. A “setup” is a pair of decks with contrasting back colors, so that they do not get intermingled.

The chief reason that players make this request is superstition. They perceive that they have been getting an unlucky series of hands or bad beats, and they irrationally believe that a different deck of cards will change their luck for the better.

Please don’t ever be one of the players who does this. It stops the game for five minutes or more while the dealer goes through the security procedures of inspecting the replacement decks and getting them shuffled properly. If there were some tangible benefit to it, fine — but there isn’t. The poker room is simply indulging the fancies of one player to the detriment of the rest. I really wish they would refuse such requests.

(As an alternative, I long ago proposed that poker rooms should require the player who requested the new setup to leave the room for ten minutes. During that time, play would continue as usual, with the same cards. When the requesting player returned, everybody would just lie and tell him that the cards had been replaced, on the theory that what he doesn’t know won’t hurt him. However, I don’t hold out any serious hope that any poker rooms will actually implement this brilliant plan.)

When I’m in an impish mood, I’ll pass the down time by quizzing the requesting player on why he’s asking for the change. I ask him to explain how a different deck of cards will make any difference in what hands he gets. Of course, the player can never produce any coherent explanation of this, because there isn’t one. My hope — which is probably misplaced and futile — is that the needling effect of forcing the player to admit that there is no rational basis for his belief will make him think twice before making this request again in the future.

Some players assume that when requesting a new setup, the cards brought to the table will be brand new ones. These players somehow convince themselves that new cards will be luckier than ones that have been used before. (I don’t pretend to understand how they come to such hare-brained ideas.) As I discussed in my last article, poker room cards are expensive, and made to last. They are carefully put away when a table closes, to be used again. The replacement cards that are brought to the table are just as “used” as the ones they’re replacing.

“These cards are marked!”

Those of us of a certain age might remember a funny TV commercial from the 1970s for M&M candy that featured cards covered with chocolatey fingerprints because the dealer was improvidently snacking on regular chocolate bars. The players are angry and about to lynch the dealer, until M&Ms come to the rescue, giving him a mess-free way to get his chocolate fix.

There is one legitimate reason to request a new deck — or at least one new card — and that is if one or more cards become visibly marked.

Clever commercials notwithstanding, chocolate is not very likely to be the culprit (though occasionally a messy player eating at the table does cause the cards to get greasy). Sometimes it’s a small nick or tear in a card’s edge. Most often, in my experience, the printed ink on the card’s back develops a distinctive worn spot as the card ages.

You should always point out such defects to the dealer so that the card can be replaced. And, yes, most card rooms replace just the faulty card, not the entire deck. If they do replace the whole deck, it’s usually just to give them an opportunity to inspect the rest, not because they’re going to dispose of the other 51, if they prove to be perfectly good.

Card Shufflers

Do Casinos Use More Than One Deck In Poker Real Money

Many poker rooms now have automatic shuffling machines built into the tables. These are a great time-saver for everybody; more hands per hour means making money faster, if you’re a winning player.

The machines also produce a more thorough shuffle than do dealers using the standard casino procedure. In fact, the machines genuinely randomize the deck. Each one has a random number generator, assigns each card a random position in the shuffled deck, then moves it to that position in the stack.

Occasionally you’ll run into a player who requests that the dealer shuffle the deck before placing it into the machine. I’ve even played in a casino that required this of its dealers. This is silly beyond words. It makes no difference what order the cards are in when they get placed into the shuffler — you can’t get the deck any more randomized than the thing does on its own.

These machines do have a couple of downsides. First, they’re fairly noisy. Most of the time, this isn’t perceptible because of the prominence of the ambient noise of the typical poker room. But if you happen to be playing in a quiet room, the thing sounds like a dishwasher at work. Second, they are the number one cause of damaged cards, creating tears, creases, and worn spots.

Another advantage of shuffling machines is that intrinsic to their operation is making sure that there are exactly 52 cards present; a missing or extra card will cause an error message to be displayed to the dealer. The newest model (there is only one manufacturer of this equipment) is so sophisticated that it identifies each individual card, and thus can recognize if a duplicate card is present, even if the total number of cards is correct. (These new machines are not yet common in poker rooms, but they probably will be someday.)

We’re about halfway through all you need to know about cards in a poker room. My next articles will continue the subject.

Robert Woolley lives in Asheville, NC. He spent several years in Las Vegas and chronicled his life in poker on the “Poker Grump” blog.

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