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Hello everyone. I fell in love with the Harrow Deck when I first heard about it. It fascinates me both as a story device and in it's mechanics. I've also loved learning about different games that can be played with the cards. Whether it's Towers (the game that comes with the base rules), Pillars (a fanmade game that is very similar to Go Fish), Illusionist or Last Azlant (two games introduced in The Harrow Handbook that are resemblant of Liar's Dice and UNO respectively).
However, I have never seen a version of one of the most popular card games, Poker, that used the Harrow Deck. I hope to fix that.
Obviously the most basic way to start making Poker, is figuring out what hands of five cards exist and how are they ranked.
Here's what I've got so far:
True Cross- Having five cards, all of the same suit, that make up both one row and column.
Truest Match-Five cards, all of the same alignment.
True Match-Four cards, all of the same aligment, with one card that doesn't fit.
True Opposing Match-Three cards of one alignment, two cards of a second alignment.
Suit-Five cards all of the same suit.
Cross-Having five cards that do not all share the same suit, and make up one row and column.
Good Match-Three cards of the same alignment.
Opposing Matches-Two Pairs of alignment.
Match-Two cards of the same alignment
What do you guys think?
Very clever. I'm always looking for new things to do with the Harrow deck
What is the composition of a harrow deck? I'm guessing it's not 4x13 if you need variant rules for poker.
6 suits, 12 cards per suit.
All cards are story cards (similar to Major Arcana in Tarot decks)
But they are also all ordinal cards (similar to Minor Arcana), using the 12 good/neutral/evil and lawful/neutral/chaotic combinations to create a number line.
6 suits,
12cards per suit.All cards are story cards (similar to Major Arcana in Tarot decks)
But they are also all ordinal cards (similar to Minor Arcana), using the12good/neutral/evil and lawful/neutral/chaotic combinations to create a number line.
9 cards per suit, 6 suits.
What is the part about "Cross-Having five cards that do not all share the same suit, and make up one row and column." all about?
Rows and columns? Are these extra symbols on the cards?
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What is the part about "Cross-Having five cards that do not all share the same suit, and make up one row and column." all about?
Rows and columns? Are these extra symbols on the cards?
Each of the nine cards in a suit has an alignment: LG, NG, CG, LN, N, CN, LE, NE, CE. The alignment is indicated on the card
The standard Harrow spread is a 3x3 layout: rows are the Good/Evil axis, and columns are the Lawful/Chaotic axis
So if you have five cards, and lay them in their corresponding position in the 3x3 matrix, you have a "cross" if the cards line up along a single row and a single column.
A sample hand might be
LG, NG, CG, True Neutral, NE. That would be the top row, and the center column of the spread.
Good:......LG..NG..CG
Neutral:....x..NN..x
Evil:...........x..NE..x
Or CG, CN, LE, NE, CE. That would be the bottom row of the spread, and the right column.
Good:.....x....x...CG
Neutral:..x....x...CN
Evil:......LE....LN..CE
Obviously, a Cross with the cards all in the same suit is less likely than a Cross with the cards not all in the same suit.
This is probably too complex for poker after a few drinks. Casino games are generally mechanically simple.
This is probably too complex for poker after a few drinks. Casino games are generally mechanically simple.
It's not any more complex than trying to remember what a 'full house' is. Basically it's 3 of one axis and 2 of the other.
You can't lay them out without revealing the alignments.
It's not beyond the ability to a human to learn to visualise it, but it's a high bar for casino games.
My favorite trick is to misread 6s as 8s.
No, poker is easy. Pretend to be a girl (if you need to pretend). Raise a lot. Win all the money from the chauvinists who can't fold to a woman. Repeat. The drunker they are the better. It's foolproof if you pick the tables right.
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The frequency of hands is going to be a little different for a 6x9 harrow deck than a 4x13 IRL deck.
My calculations:
--Rarest--
True Cross: combin(9,1)*combin(6,1) = 54
Truest Match: combin(9,1)*combin(6,5) = 54
Suit: combin(9,5)*combin(6,1) = 756
True Match: combin(9,1)*combin(6,4)*combin(48,1) = 6480
Cross (includes True Cross): combin(6,1)^5 = 7776
True Opposing Match: combin(9,1)*combin(6,3)*combin(8,1)*combin(6,2) = 21,600
Good Match (includes True Opposing Match): combin(9,1)*combin(6,3)*combin(48,2) = 203,040
Opposing Matches: combin(9,2)*combin(6,2)^2*combin(42,1) = 340,200
Match (includes Opposing Matches, includes True Opposing Match): combin(9,1)*combin(6,2)*combin(48,3) = 2,334,960
--Most Common--
Total: combin(54,5) = 3,162,510
None of the above: 631,044
The "flush" is rarer than a "4-of-a-kind", and the "5-of-a-kind" is as rare as the "royal flush". The "full house" is rarer than the "straight", and like 7-card stud, having a "pair" is more common than having "high card."
It seems like a okay system, but according to my math, 62% of hands are a single pair, which is going to necessitate ranking the alignments (e.g., LG beats NG which beats CG which beats LN, etc.). In game, it could be fun to have different alignment rankings across the world, depending on the predominant deity / political system / personal alignment in the region. So someone from a LG country plays in a game in a LE country and all the alignments are re-ordered, and they get angry, hahaha.
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On a more poker-y level, you can deal out the cards 3-1-1 and have three rounds of betting (plus an ante up front, of course), with the turn and river double the ante size.
Step 1. Ante.
Step 2. Dealt 3 cards. Roll for initiative (Perception?).
Step 3. Winner of initiative can fold, defer, bluff (Deception vs. Perception DC or Intimidate vs. Will DC) to force the other player to fold, bet (Diplomacy vs. Will DC) to force the other player to continue.
Step 4. Dealt 1 card. Roll for initiative.
Step 5. Same as Step 3, but maybe with a different bet size?
Step 6. Dealt 1 card. Keep same initiative?
Step 7. Same as Step 5.
Now that I write it out, it seems like a lot of rolling for every hand. It accurately portrays poker but maybe non-poker players won't have the patience for that. I might go with ante-deal 5-initiative-skll check if people aren't as degenerate a gambler as I am (LHE, obviously, given the betting scheme, hehe).
You could do a suit order but I'm not sure it's necessary. Poker uses the highest unpaired card as a tie breaker between single pairs.
I haven't checked the maths but it looks sane. However, it doesn't look any overlap was considered where a hand is in multple categories (e.g. all 3 ace hands are also ace pairs).
Poker uses the highest unpaired card as a tie breaker between single pairs.
Only when the pairs match, that is, AAK > AAQ, but AA > KK. So the kickers only play when the pairs match, and most of the time for stud games, the pairs don't match, so the kickers don't matter. (Community card games like Hold'Em, this comes up a lot more frequently).
Basically, the alignments need to be matched to a rank order system either way. Otherwise, you'll end up with a lot of ties when {LG1, LG2, LN1, CG3, NE5} goes up against {CG4, CG6, NG3, NN4, CN6} (both are "one pair" and someone needs to decide if LG > CG or CG > LG.
it doesn't look any overlap was considered where a hand is in multple categories (e.g. all 3 ace hands are also ace pairs).
It shouldn't. The 2-of-a-kind hands only choose from the unpaired "ranks." So 9 alignments, combin(6,2) chosen from one alignment, and the 3 kickers are chosen from the 48 other cards (combin(48,3)). That does mean that the 2-of-a-kind hands do include the 2-pair hands and full house hands, but since we calculated them above, it's easier to just subtract them than rearrange the math.
Okay, I don't understand the card alignments. How does this game actually work? You can assume that I understand poker.
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Okay, I don't understand the card alignments. How does this game actually work? You can assume that I understand poker.
There are six suits. Every suit has nine cards.
The nine cards in a suit are LG, NG, CG, LN, True N, CN, LE, NE, CE.
In addition to the story picture on the card, there are symbols that indicate which suit it is in and what alignment it is.
If you lay out the cards with the rows being G, N, E and the columns being L, N, C, you will have a 3x3 array.
LG...NG...CG
LN...NN...CN
LE...NE...CE
Reading this array right-to-left, top row to bottom row, as one would read English, you can create a hierarchy of alignments with LG first, and CE last, as listed in the earlier paragraph. Using this hierarchy, you can say that an LG card is "higher" than an LE card. (or lower, depending on how you want to 'count' the list).
One might, for example count
1=LG, 2=NG, 3=CG, 4=LN, 5=NN, 6=CN, 7=LE, 8=LN, 9=CE.
or you might reverse the counting and make
1=CE, 2=NE, 3=LE, 4=CN, 5=NN, 6=LN, 7=CG, 8=NG, 9=LG
So, if you're using a 5-card hand, you might have
LG Crowns
LG Books
LG Keys
NN Crowns
CE Books
which would correspond to 9 Crowns, 9 Books, 9 Keys, 5 Crowns, 1 Books (if you're using a convention in which 'good' is better than 'evil')
In addition to establishing the convention for what order the alignments follow, a convention for the hierarchy of the suits would also need to be established. The playing card convention is Spades, Hearts, Clubs, Diamonds so, the 6 suits would also need to have a convention about which is 'higher'.
Oh right, they've jsut replaced the numbers on the cards (1-9) with alignments instead? And because they are alignments you can lay them out in a 3x3.
In that case I don't understand what watery soup is saying about not being able to do tie breakers. For that, it must just be the same as numbered cards.
Right, but which alignment has the highest value?
All Watery Soup is saying is that there need to be agreed upon conventions about how to rank the suits and how to rank the alignments.
why do the suits need ranking?
why do the suits need ranking?
Because you need a way to evaluate two identical hands that differ only by suit.
Is 1,2,3,4,5 Crowns a 'better' hand than 1,2,3,4,5 Keys?
Similar to
Is 1,2,3,4,5 Clubs a 'better' hand than 1,2,3,4,5 Spades?
Is 1,2,3,4,5 Clubs a 'better' hand than 1,2,3,4,5 Spades?
Those are actually both equal in all forms of poker I'm familiar with.
There is a ranking of suits in games like 7-card stud, where the lowest card showing is the "bring in" (forced bet), it's ascending alphabetical (clubs-diamonds-hearts-spades). But when evaluating hands, the suits are ranked equally, and Ac2c3c4c5c would split the pot with As2s3s4s5s.
It's more important to rank things along the alignment axis.
why do the suits need ranking?Because you need a way to evaluate two identical hands that differ only by suit.
Is 1,2,3,4,5 Crowns a 'better' hand than 1,2,3,4,5 Keys?
Similar to
Is 1,2,3,4,5 Clubs a 'better' hand than 1,2,3,4,5 Spades?
That's a split pot.
I understand this now.
EDIT: It's probably only split because it's super rare. If this variant produces more of them, it might get a special rule.
It's not about how gamers do the alignments but how they are done in the game world.
Although I think the same dichotomy extends to the real world. The purest alignment is N because it's basically the one that keeps the rest balanced. So I'm not be really sure what your definition of pure is.
When I was in Britain I got the impression most of them thought LG was too authoritarian or limiting, and CG was the most ethical, and they didnt really understand the introspectiveness of NG. Though that is a broad generalisation.
Justice Vs Order. LG and CG are on very different sides of that.
Lawful Stupid
And there the cards are laid out from top to bottom before left to right.
I always lay them out left-to-right, but read by column (top-to-bottom). The system for laying them out is not specified in any of the rules.
"The Tapestry" is the most common spread, but 'The Bridge', 'The Cross', 'The Path', and 'The Sword' are also traditional Varisian spreads. Those alternate spreads include both the order of laying out the cards, along with the order of reading them.
And, the following random layouts are also suggested:
a) a single card
b) Throw the entire deck into the air, and 'read' the face-up cards
c) natural forces: Let the wind scatter the cards, or have a chicken or goat select a card
d) numerology: Eyes of the Pharaoh sect have assigned a numerical value to each card.
You can use (b) to calculate pi, which will keep (d) happy.
I just thought to mention that to me, any "harrow poker" would likely have evolved out of the core usage, the harrow reading.
No, that's backwards. Historically, the core usage for any deck of cards is gaming and gambling. Fortune-telling comes later. Very few people can (or want to) do fortune-telling, and everyone can gamble, and that won't change much just because the fortune-telling actually works more often than chance; a deck wouldn't standardize if it was only used for fortune-telling, there's just not enough reason for people to use the same deck repeatedly. E.G. You'd see the canon deck, a 48-card deck with TN removed, a 30-card deck with each suit having Law, Chaos, Good, Evil, and Neutral as 5 distinct separate cards, a 10-suit deck with Law/Chaos/Good/Evil alongside Hammers/Keys/Shields/Books/Stars/Crowns, and that's just assuming that the fundamental traits being symbolized have to stay intact to preserve the special divinatory value of the Harrow deck.
It's only with frequent games being played that the deck stabilizes and has a form that's recognizable regionally; travelers wanting to play familiar games with familiar decks across all of the Italies/France/the Germanies/the British Isles/etc. (And historically it basically stops there until you can mass-produce decks of cards, so you absolutely wouldn't have the same deck in Varisia as in Absalom. But you wouldn't have a single unified trade tongue (Common/Taldane) in Varisia and Absalom until you have industrialized long-distance transit, and for the same reason we ignore that and have everyone understand Common, we can and should ignore the regional variants and have everyone use the same Harrow.) We would expect the divinatory usage of Harrow to show up many centuries earlier in Golarion, where it works, than on Earth, where it doesn't, but you still wouldn't get a standardized deck without gaming or some established organization, whether it was a church of Harrowing or a fortune-teller's guild.
It's moderately plausible that common spreads derive from notable poker hands, especially when the geometric interpretation is easily present on the 'poor man's deck' by having the symbol and its location specify the card. But generally I would expect there not to be much correlation. It will be based on what hands are rare and recognizable as special.
