The game is simply about guessing whether the last card in the row of 3 cards will qualify.
There may be casinos where the rules differ somewhat from what is described here, but here are the roll-up Red Dog rules.
How to play Red Dog
The cards are ranked just like in poker – so ‘Ace’ is highest and ‘2’ is lowest.
From high to low: A K Q J 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2.
Color does not matter.
It is played with 2 to 8 sets of cards.
The game starts with the player placing his bet on “Bet” and clicking on “Deal”
The dealer now draws 2 face up cards. And there are now 3 possible outcomes:
- if the cards are in sequence (e.g. ‘3’ and ‘4’ or ‘Queen’ and ‘King’) it is a ‘tie’ and player gets his bet back 1:1 (Push)
- if the cards are the same (eg ‘7’,’7′) the dealer draws a 3rd card. If this card matches the first 2, the winner plays his bet 11:1 otherwise it is a tie and the player gets his bet back 1:1.
- if the cards are neither the same nor in order, it is a spread. The player can now choose between Double (doubling his bet) or Raise (increase his bet – max. up to double) or Stand (Continue with original bet) The dealer now draws a 3rd card.
Rescue Dog Strategy
The more decks of cards used, the smaller the casino’s advantage. With 1 set of playing cards, the casino’s advantage is 3.155% and drops to 2.751% with 8 sets of playing cards, this is in contrast to most other casino card games, where the casino’s advantage increases the more sets of cards are used.
Even with 8 sets of cards, there are not great advantages to playing Red Dog, but there is one rule to remember if you want to optimize your odds: Raise must only be made when a spread is in the player’s favor, which is with 7 cards or more, regardless of how many decks of playing cards are used.