7 Card Stud Poker Strategy - Rules and Strategy for 7 Card Stud | Poker Strategy

In today's article we will talk about the rules of 7 Card Stud and, furthermore, discuss some basic beginner strategy. What do you need to know when starting to play 7 Card Stud and what do you need to watch out for?

Rules
In 7 Card Stud (just Stud from now on) every player starts off with being dealt three cards. Before getting dealt the cards, every player is required to pay an ante. In a $1/$2 Stud game, the ante is usually $0.10, although this can vary sometimes. In all of the examples throughout this article it will be assumed that we're playing a $1/$2 game. After every player placed an ante, the cards are dealt. Two cards are dealt face down, only

for you to see, and the last card is dealt open, for everyone at the table to see. This third, open card is also called the door card.

Door-card
The player with the lowest door card needs to pay the bring-in. If two or more players have the same low card, the rank is decided by the suits of the cards, with spades being the highest, followed by hearts, diamonds and finally clubs. The (2-Clubs)

is therefore the lowest possible card. The bring-in is a forced bet, and the player has the choice of betting the minimum bring-in of $0.50 or placing a complete-bet of $1.

As in other poker variations, the action continues clockwise around the table, so the player to the left of the player paying the bring-in is next to act, and so on. This next player has the option to fold, call the bring-in, to complete or to raise, if the first player chose to complete. After this, a re-raise will always have to be 100% of the previous raise. So, if a player completes to $1, then the next raise will have to be $2 and the one after that will be $3.

Fourth street
After the first betting round is completed, players receive another card. This is called "fourth street". This card is also dealt face-up for everyone to see. When playing Stud live games, a card is burned before a new street is dealt, just like in Hold'em. Now the player with the highest two up-cards has the action. In this case AA would be the highest possible combination of cards. If there are two or more players with the same best hand, then the player who is closest to the dealers left has the action.

The minimum bet is now $1. The first player now has the option to check, bet or double-bet. Only on fourth street does a player have the chance to make a double bet, and he can only do so if the player has a pair with his two up-cards. A double-bet would therefore be $2. On later streets players no longer have the option for a double-bet. Every player can choose to check (if no player before him has bet), to call if a bet has been placed, or to raise. The betting on every street is capped at four bets. So, if one player bets, he can be raised another three times. A double-bet counts as two bets here, so the maximum that can be bet on this street is $4.

Fifth street
After the betting is completed on fourth street, a fifth card is dealt. Fifth street is also dealt face-up. The minimum bet on fifth street and all remaining streets is $2. Again, the player with the highest up-cards has the action. This doesn't always have to be the same player who started the action on the previous street. Again the betting is capped at four bets, so the maximum that can be bet is $8.

Sixth street
After the third betting round, sixth street is dealt. Here the same rules apply as on fifth street. Again the card is dealt face-up and the minimum bet is $2.

River
Once sixth street is completed, the last card is dealt. This is called the river or seventh street. This card is dealt face-down and can't be seen by your opponents. If you are still in the hand on the river, you now have three face-down cards and four face-up cards in front of you. The player who had the strongest hand on sixth street and therefore started the betting will also have the action on seventh street. Again the minimum bet is $2 and the betting is capped at four bets. If the hand is checked around or a bet is called the remaining players in the hand see a showdown, and the player with the best 5-card combination wins the hand. The hand values are the same as in Hold'em.

Community card
Sometimes it can happen that there aren't enough cards left in the deck for every player to receive one. A Stud cash game is often played at tables with up to eight players. If all eight players stay in the hand until sixth street, this means that 48 cards have been dealt. Add to this the three burned cards, and only one card remains in the deck. If this is the case, then the river card is dealt face-up. This is the community card. This card completes the hands of all the remaining players.

Strategy
Strategy is very important in Stud. In Stud, you have a lot more information available than you do in Hold'em or Omaha, simply because you can see more cards. Your strategy therefore depends not only on your own cards, but also on the cards that are visible on the table, the number of players at the table and the number of opponents left in the hand.

Hole cards and door card
The first thing that happens (after paying the ante) is that you get dealt your two hole cards and your door card. But what are the combinations that you can stay in the hand with? This depends very much on the other cards that have been dealt, but in general you can be happy with the combinations listed below. These are split up in draws and hands that already have showdown value.

Draws:
1. Combination draw: This means that you are holding three flush cards that are consecutive or have a gap in between. You now have the possibility of hitting a straight or a flush with your four remaining cards. This is a very strong drawing hand.
2. Flush draw: Three cards of the same suit, whereby an Ace is obviously much stronger than, for example, an 8-high flush draw.
3. Straight draw: The strongest draw you can have here is an open ended straight draw like 9-10-J for example. If there is a gap in between, your hand loses value. The higher your cards the stronger the hand.
4. Three Broadway cards: This is a draw that needs a lot of improvement. With this you can hit a pair or a strong straight draw. If you hit your pair, your hand immediately has showdown value, albeit not very high.

Hands with showdown value:
5. Sets: This is the strongest possible starting hand you can be dealt and can be compared to AA in Hold'em. This hand is also very well disguised.
6. High pairs with a dangler: For example AAx. If the third card is also suited or connected, this increases the value of your hand even more.
7. Small pairs: The showdown value of small pairs is not very high. Basically what you want to do with a hand like this is try to draw to a set cheaply.

A lot of information
When playing Stud, you need to be very concentrated and focus on the door cards from all of your opponents. You want to pick up as much information as you can. If you don't do this, you will often pay the price on later streets. You don't only need to know what the chances are of your own hand improving, but also how likely it is that your opponent's hand improves.

Before payers fold their hands, you will want to know the following things:
- What door cards have been dealt
- How many cards of every suit have been folded
- Which player has to pay the bring-in and what your position is relative to this player.

You don't necessarily need to know exactly what cards your opponents folded, just having a general idea about which cards are out of the game will do. You need to know all this in order to determine whether or not your hand can still be improved. If, for example, you have three clubs in your hand and you saw three other clubs being folded, then this drastically reduces the value of your hand. Or if you have a pair of tens and two other players fold a ten, then the hand is a lot less interesting for you to continue with.

On later streets, after a couple of players have folded and some continue in the hand, and it is becoming pretty obvious that some of your opponents are on a draw, you want to know whether or not your opponents are likely to hit these draws.

A general rule for straight draws is that you should fold them whenever two or more of your outs can be found in the hands of your opponents. If you are holding 4-5-6 and you see players at the table with a three or a seven, then your hand is dead. You are not getting the right odds to continue, especially because any pair you might hit will often not be enough to win the hand either.

The same counts for flush draws. If you are holding three cards of the same suit, then you need to fold if two or more players show cards from the same suit. This counts especially when sitting at a full ring table. If you are playing shorthanded and you have the chance to see a cheap fourth street, then you still get reasonable odds, but in full ring games your hand is almost always dead.

For pairs and similar hands this is a lot more obvious because you have less outs. With Queens and higher you often want to continue, even if one of the remaining Queens is already out of the game. With Jacks and lower it would be nice to have an additional draw to go with it.

Position is less important
During the first betting round, focus on the position of the raiser. If a player in early position raises the bring in, then this is usually the sign of a strong hand. If this happens in late position, the player might be going for a steal.

Position is less important in Stud than it is in Hold'em or Omaha. This is because the position of the player who is first to act in the initial betting round is almost never the same as the player who has the action on fourth street. This position can keep changing up until sixth street, although this won't happen very often. Playing hands in position, which is especially important in Hold'em, is a lot less important in Stud. So, position is less important in Stud because you will only have the guaranteed advantage for one street, and you don't know whether or not you will still have that advantage on later streets.

Later streets
Come fourth street, you will have a relatively good idea about which players are on a draw and who already has a made hand. If a player has two Aces among his up-cards, that is obviously very strong. That also means that players who stay in the pot must also have a very strong hand.

Sometimes you also have the chance to represent a strong hand that you don't even have. If, for example, you have four open cards all of the same suit, it's not hard to represent a flush with a hand like this and to try and bluff your opponent out of the pot.

Conclusion
Stud is much more of a drawing game, similar to Limit Hold'em. Something you need to be cautious of is chasing draws without getting the right odds for it. This will cost you a lot of money in the long run. Especially at the lower stakes players will often want to chase every possible draw and call every Ace down to sixth street or even the river. If this is the case, you need to play your strong hands very aggressively and minimise the chasing of draws yourself.

Remembering folded cards is very important in Stud. The longer and more often you play, the easier this will become. The first thing you look for is the cards that improve your own hand. If your hand is dead, then the rest is irrelevant. If you want to carry on in the hand, you need to have a general idea about which cards are still in play and which ones have been folded. This is a lot of information to take in, especially when playing multiple tables online.

The number of online Stud players is pretty limited. If you start playing Stud as well, you will quickly get a feel for who the regulars are and how they play. Especially at the lower limits hands are played pretty openly. There is not much bluffing going on and players chase their draws all the way down to sixth or seventh street.

There is also a Hi/Lo variation of 7 Card Stud, which is comparable to Omaha Hi/Lo. Just like in Omaha, the Hi/Lo part makes many combinations and outs a lot more considerable and also makes the game a lot more complex.

Enjoy the game…