Atlassino Academy · Other tables · Lesson 2 of 10
Pair Plus and the 6 Card Bonus
The Pair Plus circle pays on your own three cards, and its price depends on which of three pay tables is printed on the felt. Here are all three, the 6 Card Bonus beside them, and what a fold does to a side bet.
The Pair Plus circle sits right beside the Ante. What does a bet there cost, and is the price the same at every table?
The short answer
The price depends on the pay table printed on the felt, and three different tables are in use. Counted over every possible three-card deal, the table for Quebec casinos keeps about 2.32% of each Pair Plus bet, the table for B.C. casinos and at Casino Regina about 5.57%, and the table printed in Ontario about 7.28%. The 6 Card Bonus beside it keeps about 15.28%. At an example bet of $5 on every hand of an hour, the B.C. table comes to about $14; the $5 is only an example, not a table minimum and not a suggested bet.
The longer the bar, the more of each bet the table keeps on average. The bars are worked out over every deal, not over one evening.
Mayaformer floor supervisor · manners, money and breaks
Pair Plus is the circle people fill without thinking, because it sits right next to the Ante. Every hand it is a separate decision, every hand it is optional, and every hand it carries its own price.
A bet on your own three cards
Three Card Poker is played against the dealer or against a pay table, never against the other players at the table. The Ante and Play are the game against the dealer, and lesson 9.1 is about them. Pair Plus is the bet against a pay table.
Our own plan of one seat, not a copy of any room’s layout. The Ante and Play circles are the game against the dealer; the two dashed circles are side bets, each optional, each settled by its own pay table.
A Pair Plus bet is paid by the pay table on a pair or better in your own three cards, whatever the dealer holds. The dealer’s cards play no part in it, and neither does whether the dealer’s hand qualifies.
Six hands of three cards, from the highest Pair Plus line down to no pair. In three-card hands a straight ranks above a flush, because three cards in a row are rarer than three of one suit. What each line pays depends on the table, and the next section puts the three tables side by side.
Three Pair Plus tables, three prices
The documents we could read print three different Pair Plus tables, and each belongs to a province or to a room.
| Your three cards | B.C. and Casino Regina | Quebec | Ontario | Deals that make it |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Straight flush | 40 to 1 | 40 to 1 | 40 to 1 | 48 |
| Three of a kind | 30 to 1 | 30 to 1 | 30 to 1 | 52 |
| Straight | 5 to 1 | 6 to 1 | 6 to 1 | 720 |
| Flush | 4 to 1 | 4 to 1 | 3 to 1 | 1,096 |
| Pair | 1 to 1 | 1 to 1 | 1 to 1 | 3,744 |
| No pair | lost | lost | lost | 16,440 |
| Price of the bet | 5.57% | 2.32% | 7.28% |
The highlighted lines are where the tables part ways: the B.C. table pays a straight one bet less than the Quebec table, and the Ontario table pays a flush one bet less. Every other line is the same on all three.
The first table is in the rules for B.C. casinos, and Casino Regina prints the same table on its own page. The second is in the rules for Quebec casinos. The third is printed by two rooms in Ontario and by a provincial guide for Ontario.
One line moves the price more than it looks. A straight comes up in 720 of the 22,100 possible three-card deals, and paying it one bet less is what makes the B.C. table 3.26 percentage points dearer than the Quebec table.
Leoformer dealer · rules and maths
When I dealt this game, almost nobody read the Pair Plus table before the first chip. Two felts can look alike from across the room and still pay a straight or a flush differently, so read the table on the felt in front of you, line by line.
Under the rules for B.C. casinos the pay tables are posted at each table, and one room in another province says its pay tables are on the table signage. The table on the felt in front of you is the one that pays, whatever any page says.
What a fold does to Pair Plus
A fold is the moment the rules part ways. Under the rules for B.C. and Quebec casinos, a Pair Plus bet still plays after a fold: a pair or better in your three cards is paid, Ante gone or not.
Two rooms in Ontario print the opposite rule: a player with bets on the Ante and Pair Plus has to make the Play bet to go on, and without the Play bet both the Ante and the Pair Plus are lost.
Both rules are printed, each for its own tables. Played by the Q-6-4 rule of lesson 9.1, or by optimal play, every hand you fold has no pair at all, so a fold never takes away a Pair Plus payout under either rule. The two rules give different results only when a hand with a pair is folded, and folding a pair is a mistake in itself.
The 6 Card Bonus
The 6 Card Bonus is the second side circle. It is settled on the highest five-card hand from six cards, your three and the dealer’s three, and it pays from three of a kind up.
Your three cards
The dealer’s three cards
The highest five-card hand from all six: Three aces, paid 5 to 1 on the table for B.C. casinos
Two aces in the dealer’s hand and one in yours make three aces. Unlike Pair Plus, the 6 Card Bonus counts the dealer’s cards too.
| The highest five of six cards | B.C., and two rooms in Ontario | A provincial guide for Ontario |
|---|---|---|
| Royal flush | 1,000 to 1 | 1,000 to 1 |
| Straight flush | 200 to 1 | 200 to 1 |
| Four of a kind | 50 to 1 | 25 to 1 |
| Full house | 25 to 1 | 20 to 1 |
| Flush | 15 to 1 | 10 to 1 |
| Straight | 10 to 1 | not printed |
| Three of a kind | 5 to 1 | 5 to 1 |
| Below three of a kind | lost | lost |
| Price of the bet | 15.28% | not worked out |
The rules for B.C. casinos print a 6 Card Bonus table. Two rooms in Ontario print the same table, and a provincial guide for Ontario prints a different one, with no line for a straight. On the shared table the bet costs about 15.28% of each bet, more than twice the dearest Pair Plus table. The guide’s table is not complete without a line for a straight, so its price is not worked out here. No rules for Quebec casinos we could read print a 6 Card Bonus at all.
Under the rules for B.C. casinos the Ante Bonus, Pair Plus and 6 Card Bonus together pay out at most $50,000 in one round, to all the players at the table combined. That is a limit on what one round pays out across the table, not a limit on your bet, and the Ante and Play are outside the ceiling.
An hour with Pair Plus and without
No Canadian document we could read prints how many hands an hour a Three Card Poker table deals. The figure used here is the one in the Las Vegas Strip rating table: 50 hands an hour. The table has no figure for this game; the figure for Caribbean Stud, another poker game played against the dealer, is used.
- One hand$0.28the average price of an example $5 Pair Plus on the table for B.C. casinos
- Hands in an hour50the figure in the Las Vegas Strip rating table
- One hour$14on average, worked out from the unrounded price of one hand
The price of one hand is shown rounded to the cent, and the hour is worked out from the unrounded price. Amounts are in Canadian dollars.
A Pair Plus bet on the table for B.C. casinos is paid on about 25.6% of all three-card deals, the pair-or-better ones, and lost on the rest.
The Pair Plus is the whole difference between the two bars: the Ante and Play cost the same with it and without it.
Each figure is a long-run average and not a forecast: one hour of 50 hands can come out well above it or well below it. How far an evening strays from the average is lesson 10.1. House edge sets these side bets beside the prices of other bets; each of its side-bet figures says which pay tables it is worked out from, so read the line that matches the felt.
Mayaformer floor supervisor · manners, money and breaks
Side circles are optional, every single hand, and every circle you fill adds its own price to that hand. Decide at home how much money the evening gets and how long it lasts, and stop when either one runs out.
If you notice chips going into the Pair Plus circle to get back what the Ante lost, that is the moment to stop, not the moment to bet more.
Pair Plus is not a way to get back money already lost, and a provincial guide for Ontario says so about this bet in particular. Chasing losses is the subject of lesson 10.3.
If it stops being fun
If gambling stops being entertainment, help is available. 19+ in most of Canada; 18+ in Alberta, Manitoba and Quebec. More on responsible gaming.
The lesson on one card
That is the lesson. Here it is on one card: print it, or keep it on your phone.
| Your three cards | B.C. and Casino Regina | Quebec | Ontario |
|---|---|---|---|
| Straight flush | 40 to 1 | 40 to 1 | 40 to 1 |
| Three of a kind | 30 to 1 | 30 to 1 | 30 to 1 |
| Straight | 5 to 1 | 6 to 1 | 6 to 1 |
| Flush | 4 to 1 | 4 to 1 | 3 to 1 |
| Pair | 1 to 1 | 1 to 1 | 1 to 1 |
| No pair | lost | lost | lost |
| Price of the bet | 5.57% | 2.32% | 7.28% |
19+ (18+ in AB, MB, QC) · Set a limit before you sit down · Play responsibly · the line for your province is at Helplines by province
Practice: Pair Plus?
One hour at a Three Card Poker table, 50 hands, taken ten hands at a time in five stretches. An example $10 Ante goes out on every hand, with the Play made or folded by the Q-6-4 rule of lesson 9.1. Before each stretch you decide whether an example $5 Pair Plus goes out beside the Ante. After each choice you see what each choice costs on average over those ten hands and, in grey, what those hands actually did. The last screen is the whole hour, with a Pair Plus on every hand and with none.
Nothing is scored here, and nothing is bet. A fold is settled by the rule for B.C. casinos, under which the Pair Plus still plays; under the Q-6-4 rule no folded hand holds a pair, so in this hour that rule changes nothing about what a Pair Plus bet pays.
Lesson done
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The practice table needs JavaScript. Here is one stretch of the hour from it, with the answer.
The first ten hands of the hour
The hour so far, in rows of ten hands
P pair, F flush, S straight, T three of a kind, SF straight flush: a Pair Plus bet is paid on these hands. A dot: no pair, and a Pair Plus bet is lost.
An example $10 Ante on every hand, with an example $5 Pair Plus as an option beside the Ante
Hands 1 to 10 of the hour are next, with an example $10 Ante on each. Does an example $5 Pair Plus go out beside the Ante on these ten hands?
- An example $5 Pair Plus beside the Ante on all ten hands Pair Plus adds $2.79 on average over these ten hands to the $3.37 the Ante and Play cost. What the Pair Plus actually did here: paid on 3 of the ten hands, −$20.00 in all.
- The Ante alone on all ten hands With the Ante alone these ten hands cost only the Ante and Play: $3.37 on average. What the Ante and Play actually did here: +$20.00.
Hands 1 to 10: 6♥ Q♥ K♦ · 6♦ A♠ 5♠ · K♠ A♠ A♦ (Pair of aces) · 10♠ 7♣ 4♥ · A♣ J♠ 2♠ · K♣ 9♦ 9♠ (Pair of nines) · K♥ 8♠ 2♦ · 4♣ Q♦ 8♣ · 3♠ 10♥ 10♣ (Pair of tens) · 9♦ 5♥ 6♠. Two hands were folded under the Q-6-4 rule. Ten hands are far too few for the average price to show: one stretch lands above or below the average by luck.
The end of the hour
The whole hour
P pair, F flush, S straight, T three of a kind, SF straight flush: a Pair Plus bet is paid on these hands. A dot: no pair, and a Pair Plus bet is lost.
- A Pair Plus on every handpaid on 13 of 50 hands
- The Pair Plus bets alonecame out −$80.00
- The Ante alone, all hourcame out −$80.00
- The Ante with a Pair Plus on every handcame out −$160.00
An example $10 Ante and an example $5 Pair Plus
The hour is over. Had an example $5 Pair Plus gone beside the Ante on all 50 hands, it would have been paid on 13 of them. What would it have added to the price of the hour, on average?
- −$80.00, what the Pair Plus bets alone came to in this hour That is what this one hour happened to do. The price is what the Pair Plus costs on average, and one hour of 50 hands lands well above or below that average by luck.
- $250, every Pair Plus bet of the hour That counts every Pair Plus bet as lost. A Pair Plus bet is paid on every pair or better, and in this hour that happened on 13 of the 50 hands.
- About $14, on average $17 an hour for the Ante and Play alone, $31 with the Pair Plus on every hand: the difference is the price of the Pair Plus, charged in this hour as in any other.
- $0.28, the price of one hand That is the average price of one Pair Plus bet. An hour holds 50 hands, and each hand is priced the same.
Over many hours like this one, an example $5 Pair Plus on the table for B.C. casinos adds about $14 an hour to the $17 the Ante and Play cost. One hour of 50 hands is far too short for that average to show: this hour came out at −$160.00 with the Pair Plus and −$80.00 without the Pair Plus.
Every stretch of the hour is worked out the same way: the hands are dealt in advance with a fixed seed, every hand is settled with and without a Pair Plus bet, and the average beside each result is the price of one hand times the hands played.
How the practice run works
Where the hands come from. All 50 hands are dealt in advance by our engine for this track, with a fixed seed and a fresh deck for every hand, so every visitor plays the same hour. Every hand is settled twice, once with a Pair Plus bet on the table for B.C. casinos and once without, by that table and by the rules for B.C. casinos for the Ante, the Play and a fold.
What each figure is. The average under each choice is the price of one hand times the hands in the stretch. The grey figure is what those hands actually did. Add up the averages of the stretches you put the Pair Plus on: that sum, give or take a few cents of rounding, is what the Pair Plus added to your hour on average.
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Check yourself
Mayaformer floor supervisor · manners, money and breaks
Four quick ones. Pick an answer, then check it. No timer, no points: just whether it stuck.
Back to the question we opened with. A Pair Plus bet is not priced the same everywhere: the pay table on the felt decides the price, and of the three tables we could read, the one for Quebec casinos costs least and the one printed in Ontario costs most.
Where to go next, and further reading
19+ (18+ in AB, MB, QC) · Play responsibly · the helplines are further up this page
Further reading
- Rules of Play for Table Games — Poker · BCLCThe B.C. rules for Three Card Poker: the Ante and Play bets, the Queen the dealer needs, and the Pair Plus and 6 Card Bonus pay tables.
- Game rules: Three Card Poker · Loto-QuébecQuébec’s rules, in force since 2018, with their own Ante bonus and Pair Plus tables.
- Three Card Poker · OLG PlaySmartThe game against the dealer and against a pay table, and the one rule of thumb for when to play a hand.
How it’s worked out
Tables, rules, numbers, pace, sources and hosts
Where this happens. Every table on this page is a live Three Card Poker table in a room you can walk into. Where in the country such a table stands is the business of our casino pages, not of this lesson.
Rules. The table for B.C. casinos, its fold rule and its payout ceiling are the rules published for B.C. casinos: a set of rules for a province’s casinos, not a report of what any one room deals. The Quebec table and fold rule come from the rules for Quebec casinos; the Ontario table comes from two rooms in Ontario and a provincial guide, and the Ontario fold rule from those two rooms; the Casino Regina table from that room’s own page. Where the documents differ — three Pair Plus tables, two rules for a fold, two 6 Card Bonus tables in Ontario — each is named with its province or room, and none is picked silently. That a hand folded by the Q-6-4 rule or by optimal play never holds a pair is our own count, not a sentence of any document.
Numbers. Every price on this page is worked out when the page is built by our engine for this track: Pair Plus exactly, over all 22,100 three-card deals; the 6 Card Bonus exactly, over every way six cards can fall; the hour as one hand’s price times the hands in an hour. No Canadian document we read prints the house edge of any of these bets, so every percentage here is our own count. The practice hour is one set of hands dealt with a fixed seed and settled hand by hand. Our checks recompute every figure from the engine rather than reading it back from this page.
Pace. No Canadian document we could read prints how many hands an hour a Three Card Poker table deals. The figure here is 50 hands an hour, from the Las Vegas Strip rating table, which has no line for Three Card Poker and lends the line for Caribbean Stud. It carries no source button on this page.
What is deliberately absent. The Ante, the Play, what the dealer needs to qualify, the hand ranks and the Q-6-4 rule are lesson 9.1, together with the Ante Bonus and the price of the Ante and Play. The Trips bet of Ultimate Texas Hold’em is lesson 9.3, its decisions lesson 9.4; Let It Ride is lesson 9.5; Pai Gow Poker is lessons 9.6 and 9.7; Sic Bo is lesson 9.8; the money wheel is lesson 9.9; choosing among these tables by the price of an hour is lesson 9.10. How far one evening strays from the average is lesson 10.1, and chasing losses is lesson 10.3. There is no price here for the 6 Card Bonus table of the provincial guide for Ontario, and no maximum bet: no document we could read prints one.
Sources. Every rule and every table on this page carries a button with the sentence it rests on, the publisher who wrote that sentence and the date we read it.
Hosts. Maya and Leo are illustrated characters. Their backstories, a former floor supervisor and a former dealer, are written for the course: neither is a real person, and neither speaks for any casino. The rules and numbers on this page come from the sources it cites, not from their experience.
No promise. Three Card Poker and its side bets are played against the house. Knowing which pay table is on the felt and what each circle costs lets you choose what to put down; nothing on this page makes a side bet cheaper, and nothing here says how an evening at the table would end.
Against the dealer or a pay table
Rather than compete with the other players at the table, Novelty poker games pit you against the dealer or a pay table. Some of the rules and pay tables may vary slightly by casino, but each game has its own unique spin on the poker classics.
Three Card Poker is based on one easy-to-follow concept: whoever has the higher three-card hand—dealer or player—wins.
Pair Plus and your own hand
If the Player's hand contains a pair or better, the Player wins a payout according to the Pair Plus Payout Schedule.
Players receive Pair Plus payouts regardless of the Dealer's hand.
Section 6.0 Three Card Poker with Six Card Bonus Side Bet, 2.1.2 to 2.3.2
A Pair Plus bet wins if the player’s hand is made up of a pair or a higher-ranked combination, regardless of how the dealer’s hand ranks, and even if the player has folded.
The Pair Plus table, rules for B.C. casinos
PAIR PLUS PAY TABLE HAND VALUE BONUS PAYOUT Straight Flush 40 to 1 Three of a Kind 30 to 1 Straight 5 to 1 Flush 4 to 1 Pair 1 to 1
Section 6.0 Three Card Poker with Six Card Bonus Side Bet, 5.1 to 5.12
The Pair Plus table at Casino Regina
Pair Plus Pay Table Bonus Payout Straight Flush 40 to 1 Three of a Kind 30 to 1 Straight 5 to 1 Flush 4 to 1 Pair 1 to 1
Casino Regina · GameSense — Know the game: Three Card Poker · read
The Pair Plus table, rules for Quebec casinos
PAIR PLUS SIDE BET PAYOUT TABLE
STRAIGHT FLUSH 40 to 1
THREE OF A KIND 30 to 1
STRAIGHT 6 to 1
FLUSH 4 to 1
PAIR 1 to 1
The Pair Plus table printed in Ontario
Pair Plus Payouts
Pair 1 to 1
Flush 3 to 1
Straight 6 to 1
Three of a Kind 30 to 1
Straight Flush 40 to 1
Fallsview Casino Resort and Casino Niagara · Playing Poker — Three Card Poker · read
HAND PAYOUT Straight flush 40 to 1 Three of a kind 30 to 1 Straight 6 to 1 Flush 3 to 1 Pair 1 to 1
The pay table is posted at the table
The payout schedules shall be posted at each table.
Section 6.0 Three Card Poker with Six Card Bonus Side Bet, 5.1 to 5.12
Minimums and maximums, and maximum payouts are posted at the table.
Fallsview Casino Resort and Casino Niagara · Playing Poker — Three Card Poker · read
Game rules and pay tables are available on the table signage.
Club Regent Casino · Gaming · read
A fold and Pair Plus, rules for B.C. and Quebec casinos
The Pair Plus bet and the 6 Card Bonus bet, if wagered, are still eligible to win if the Player folds;
Section 6.0 Three Card Poker with Six Card Bonus Side Bet, 6.6.1.a and 6.8.2
A Pair Plus bet wins if the player’s hand is made up of a pair or a higher-ranked combination, regardless of how the dealer’s hand ranks, and even if the player has folded.
A fold and Pair Plus, two rooms in Ontario
To play both, the Player bets the ANTE and PAIR PLUS spots. The Player must then make a Play wager to continue the game. If a Play wager is not made, the Player forfeits the Ante and Pair Plus wagers.
Fallsview Casino Resort and Casino Niagara · Playing Poker — Three Card Poker · read
How the 6 Card Bonus pays
The Player wins a payout according to the 6 Card Bonus pay table if the combination of the cards in the Player's hand and the Dealer's hand creates a 5 card hand of Three of a Kind or better.
Section 6.0 Three Card Poker with Six Card Bonus Side Bet, 2.1.2 to 2.3.2
the “6 Card Bonus” is an optional bonus side bet based on the highest five-card poker hand that can be composed out of the player’s and dealer’s three cards.
The bonus pays on a Three of a Kind or better.
Fallsview Casino Resort and Casino Niagara · Playing Poker — Three Card Poker · read
If the player wagered on the Six Card Bonus, the bet pays based on the best five-card poker hand that can be made combining their hand and the dealer’s three-card hands.
The 6 Card Bonus table, rules for B.C. casinos
SIX (6) CARD BONUS PAY TABLE HAND VALUE BONUS PAYOUT Royal Flush 1,000 to 1 Straight Flush 200 to 1 Four of a Kind 50 to 1 Full House 25 to 1 Flush 15 to 1 Straight 10 to 1 Three of a Kind 5 to 1
Section 6.0 Three Card Poker with Six Card Bonus Side Bet, 5.1 to 5.12
The 6 Card Bonus tables printed in Ontario
Royal Flush 1000 to 1
Straight Flush 200 to 1
Four of a Kind 50 to 1
Full House 25 to 1
Flush 15 to 1
Straight 10 to 1
Three of a Kind 5 to 1
Fallsview Casino Resort and Casino Niagara · Playing Poker — Three Card Poker · read
HAND PAYOUT Royal flush 1,000 to 1 Straight flush 200 to 1 Four of a kind 25 to 1 Full house 20 to 1 Flush 10 to 1 Three of a kind 5 to 1
The payout ceiling, rules for B.C. casinos
Combined maximum total Ante Bonus, Pair Plus and 6 Card Bonus payouts to all Players during any one round of play shall be an aggregate amount of $50,000.00.
The basic game (Ante and Play Wager) is not affected by the aggregate rule.
Section 6.0 Three Card Poker with Six Card Bonus Side Bet, 5.1 to 5.12
Pair Plus and losses
If you want to feel the excitement of the Pair Plus bet, go for it, but don’t use it as a strategy for chasing back your losses.
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