Badugi - Hand Evaluation

Hand Evaluation

Badugi has a different ranking of hands than traditional poker. A badugi hand consists of one to four cards (from among the four cards in a player's hand) with distinct ranks and suits. Thus duplicates of suit or of rank are disregarded. Any four-card badugi hand beats a three-card badugi hand, a three-card badugi hand beats a two-card badugi hand, and a two-card badugi hand beats a one-card badugi hand. A four-card badugi hand consisting of all four suits is called a "badugi".

Two badugi hands containing the same number of cards are evaluated by comparing the highest card in each hand (where ace is low). As in lowball, the hand with the lower card is superior. If there is a tie for the highest card, the second highest card (if there is one) is compared. If the ranks of all the cards in the badugi hand are the same the two hands tie. Suits are irrelevant in comparison of two hands.

Thus the best possible hand is A234 of four different suits. The worst possible hand is K♣ K♦ K♥ K♠.

Here are a few examples:

• 2♠ 4♣ 5♦ 6♥ beats A♠ 2♣ 3♦ 7♥ (both are four-card hands) since the highest card is compared first and the 6♥ is smaller than 7♥.
• 4♠ 5♣ 6♦ K♥ beats 2♠ 3♠ 4♦ 7♥ since the former is a four-card hand and the latter is a three-card hand. (The 3♠ is disregarded as a duplicate spade, so the hand is a three-card 247.)
• A♠ 5♦ 9♦ 9♥ beats A♣ 2♠ 2♣ J♦. They reduce to the three-card hands A59 and A2J.
• 2♠ 3♠ 4♦ 7♥ beats 4♠ 5♠ 6♦ K♥; both are three-card hands, but the highest in the former is the 7♥ while the highest in the latter is the K♥.
• 5♦ 7♣ K♣ K♥ beats 2♠ 3♦ K♠ K♦ as the former is a three-card hand (after disregarding the K♣) while the latter is a two-card hand (both kings are disregarded since each is the same suit as another card in the hand).

If one can construct two (or more) different badugi hands with the same four cards (as in the final example), the better badugi hand is evaluated against the other hands. This occurs when there are at least two cards of the same suit one of which is paired. Here disregarding the paired, suited card generates a better hand than disregarding any other card.