Wild card
A wild card is basically a card which can be used as any card the player chooses. This is naturally the card which will result in the best hand for the player. Almost all games consist of one or more cards which are designated as wild cards, usually the joker, though it can be a suited card or a normal card as well. Since most games require a player to play his/her best five card combination, players do not even require declaring their wild card, as it becomes obvious in the combination displayed. Though wild cards are mostly popular in home games, or other informal games, they are sometimes used in standard poker games as well, just for a change.
There are two basic rules that govern wild cards, fully wild cards and bugs. While a fully wild card places no restriction on the type of card the player wants to designate his/her wild card as, a bug, is usually designated as an ace, unless it can be designated as a card which completes a flush, straight or straight flush. This is the common practice in casinos, with regard to wild cards.
Many professional poker players consider wild card games as amateurish, and even though too many wild cards can reduce skill usage, they do ensure more action in the game. Also, casinos avoid wild card games as this can increase confusion, increasing distraction and altering game play too much. Due to the amounts involved casinos rarely like to keep their rules this flexible.
The concept of bug, or semi-wild cards, is generally in casino poker games such as Draw Poker or Lowball. It basically involves shuffling one or two jokers are shuffled into a fifty-two card deck, the standard deck, to make a fifty three or fifty four card deck. Unlike the usual rule which requires that the bug will be an ace unless it can complete a flush or straight or straight flush, in Lowball, the bug can only be the best possible low card in the hand. For example, suppose Player A has cards 6-5-Joker-2-A, then in Lowball, the Joker will be designated as 3, which then makes 6-5-3-2-A.
The fully wild cards are mostly prevalent in home games, but even there they can be a little difficult to handle. Players mind end up with five of a kind combinations, which might have been impossible without wild cards, and cleaning out other players. Obviously five of a kind is the highest ranked hand possible, and will even beat down a straight flush. So even though they are immensely helpful in getting some action started in a tight game, they can prove too much to handle for normal light games.
Wild cards actually increase the strength of the average hand, which is directly proportional to the number of wild cards introduced. For example, in a game with no wild cards, a two pair hand is considered to be of medium strength, but in a game with multiple wild cards, the chances of this hand winning are much lower.
All wild card selections are done before the start of the game, and in some games, an entire rank of cards is chosen as wild cards. If less than four are chosen, they need to be picked in such a way that these cards can be recognized easily and have distinct values, such as Suicide King – K ♥. Jokers are extremely popular as wild cards in home games, and are often shuffled into the standard deck. But on the whole it is important to remember that wild cards should only be used to introduce some action into tight games, otherwise they may dilute the natural skill level of a game.
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