Tens or Better

Try Tens or Better in demo mode, free and without registering or depositing, and practice the holds a paying ten changes.

Pays per credit at the five-credit maximum. On the 5/4 table a flush and a straight pay the same 4.

6/5 is the standard Tens or Better schedule; 5/4 is the table on Habanero's game, set out in the next section.

Habanero's Tens or Better runs 5/4 in every hand-count version: one credit below 6/5 on both the full house and the flush.

The key number: Habanero's 5/4 table is short pay, cut below the standard 6/5 schedule: 96.95% under perfect play against 99.14%.

Below five credits the return is 96.20%, a smaller drop than usual, because this game's royal still pays 500 per credit at smaller bets.

A paying hand ends 49.45% of deals here, against 45.46% on 9/6 Jacks or Better, and nearly all of the difference is the pair of tens. The full house arrives as often as ever, but at 6 instead of 9 its share of the return falls from 10.41% to 6.96%.

The rule: A ten is a high card in this game: it can pair into a paying hand, so it earns a place in holds that Jacks or Better would throw away.

Values below are per credit bet, averaged over every possible draw.

• A lone ten is worth keeping. Dealt 10♦ 9♣ 5♠ 4♥ 2♦ on 6/5, keep the ten by itself: worth 0.50, against 0.41 for the nine and ten together and 0.37 for drawing five new cards.
• Four to a straight flush beats a pair of tens. Dealt 10♠ 10♥ 9♠ 8♠ 7♠, break the paying pair and keep 7♠ 8♠ 9♠ 10♠: worth 3.43, against 1.51 for the tens. On the 5/4 table the gap is almost unchanged, 3.28 against 1.50.

Borrowing the Jacks or Better holds is expensive here: perfect 9/6 Jacks or Better strategy on a 6/5 machine gives up 0.839 points of return, a price the strategy guide puts beside other borrowed strategies.

Keep the first line that fits the deal. In this list a high card means a ten, jack, queen, king or ace, which is why there is no separate line for a ten with a suited high card.

1. Royal flush, straight flush or four of a kind.
2. Four to a royal flush, even when that breaks a made flush, straight or paying pair.
3. A full house, flush or straight.
4. Four to a straight flush.
5. Three of a kind.
6. Two pair.
7. A pair of tens or higher.
8. Three to a royal flush.
9. Four to a flush.
10. A low pair (twos through nines).
11. Four to an outside straight.
12. Three to a straight flush with two high cards.
13. Four to an inside straight with four high cards.
14. Two suited high cards.
15. Three to a straight flush with one high card.
16. Four to an inside straight with three high cards.
17. Two unsuited high cards.
18. One high card.
19. Three to a straight flush with no high card.
20. Nothing: draw five new cards.

Following this list costs 0.058 points on 6/5: it returns 99.08% where perfect play returns 99.14%. On the 5/4 table four to an inside straight with four high cards moves above three to a straight flush with two high cards, and three to a straight flush with one high card leaves the list; that version plays at 96.88% against 96.95%.