Forged many years ago in the Caribbean and spread throughout the world via cruise ships, Caribbean Stud Poker is now a staple in any good casino. Games have come and gone in places, such as Vegas, but Caribbean Stud Poker locked on and never let go. It’s fun to play—even if the house advantage is a bit high. You can have fun playing this game online or in a regular casino.
Played with a single 52-card deck, each game of Caribbean Stud Poker accommodates up to seven players at a time. This is a game that is just fine when flying solo, but I like playing with many people. Online play is very fun and many online casinos offer solo play.
Let’s talk about the table for Caribbean Stud Poker. You’ll notice that there are four spots on the table. You’ll need to know these four spots to play. First, there’s the card area, which is where your cards will be placed each hand. Next is the Ante area, which is where your ante bet goes at the start of each hand. If you’re going to stay in a hand, you’ll be putting money in the Raise area. Sometimes this is called “Bet” on certain layouts, but it’s all the same. Finally, there’s the famous progressive slot. This is where your $1 goes if you want to be entered into the progressive jackpot.
So now that you know about the betting areas, let’s take a look at the action. As I kind of alluded to earlier, your first “action” will be to put some money in the Ante area. Each table has it’s own minimum wager—$5 and $10 minimums are most common. Once you put your ante bet down, you now need to decide if you want to be entered into the progressive jackpot. We’ll talk about this later in more detail. You can’t enter the progressive after the hand starts, so now is the time to do it.
Once you’ve anted up and played or passed on the progressive, it’s time to start the hand of Caribbean Stud Poker. The dealer will give you five cards—hopefully really good ones. The dealer will also get five cards and you’ll be shown one of those. We call this card the “upcard.”
Okay, you’ve got your hand. It’s now time to evaluate it and see how good or bad it is. If you’ve looked at your hand and found it to be poor, you can just fold and quit. You’ll lose your ante bet of course.
In the next part of our Caribbean Stud Poker overview, we’ll pick it up from here. We’ll start with your decision to stay in the hand.
