Introduction to Seven Card Stud
Seven card stud is one of the oldest poker games, and still enjoys a significant amount of play, but nothing like its holdem counterparts, and even Omaha is close in popularity (and growing). It is important to know seven card stud and its variants to be able to play mixed games. A mixed game is a poker table at which several different poker games are dealt in a rotation. A common rotation is HORSE - Holdem, Omaha, Razz, Stud, and stud Eight-or-better.
Basics of Seven Card Stud
7CS is played by as many as eight players at a table. There are no blinds as in holdem. Instead, each player contributes a predetermined ante to the pot before the deal. Two cards are dealt face down, one at a time, to each player, followed by a third card, face up to each player. The player with the lowest upcard is required to start the betting with a bring-in bet. The bring in player must make this bet, but may elect to complete the bet to the full amount of the small bet for the table (10 units at a 10/20 table). Play then proceeds to the left of the bring in. Any player must complete the bring in (if it hasn’t been done yet), call the bring in, fold, or raise (if the bring in has already been completed). Even player around the table then acts in turn until all players have called the same bet (or everyone folds to someone’s bet).
A player’s upcards are for their use only, but they must remain exposed as long as the player is still in the hand.
When the third street betting (so called because three cards had been dealt) is complete, the dealer puts a fourth card face up in front of each player. Another round of betting ensues, followed by another face up card for each player left in the hand. Eventually the remaining players will have two hole cards are four cards face up (after sixth street). When the sixth street betting is complete, the dealer sends each player one last card face down (seventh street). Most casinos allow the player to ask for this card face up, but it is rarely done for deceptive purposes. In the rare case that so many players continued in the hand that the dealer does not have enough cards to deal the last round, one single card is dealt face up in the middle of the table, and this is a community card.
After the seventh street betting round, all players still in the hand have a showdown. The best combination of the player’s seven cards (or six cards plus the community card) is used to make a five card poker hand. The best hand wins the pot. It is rare, but possible, for two players to have the same hand value in stud games and split the pot.
Stud Variants
There are two common variants of seven card stud. The first is Stud High/Low, often called Stud Eight or Better. The “E” in Eight or Better is what gives the “E” in HORSE. Stud High Low is a split pot game, where the best five card poker hand takes the “high” half of the pot. The best low hand takes the low half of the pot. A low hand consists of five separate ranks of cards, with the qualifier that all five must be eight or lower (”Eight or Better”). Straights or flushes do not invalidate low hands.
In high-low split games, aces can be used as both high and low. For example, a player with AAA3467 has three of a kind, aces, for high, and 7643A for low.
Low hands are read from the highest card down. If the highest card is the same, the second highest is compared. The best low hand is 5432A, called the wheel. 86543 is a lower hand than 8732A, even though most of the cards in the 8732A hand are lower.
The other common variant of stud is Razz. Razz is seven card stud played for low only. The entire pot is awarded to the best low hand (ties are possible). The only major difference in the play, other than how the pot is awarded, is that the bring in bet is made by the highest, rather than the lowest, upcard.