A Beginner’s Guide to Let’em Ride Poker

How to Play Let’em Ride Poker

The aim of Let’em Ride Poker is very simple, you simply need to use your cards with the community cards to make a pair of 10s or better. You start a round by placing an Ante bet, this is the only compulsory bet in the game.

After you have made the bet five cards are dealt, three of them are dealt to you and they are dealt face up (when playing online, offline the cards are dealt face down and must be kept hidden from the other players). Next, two more cards are dealt face down, these are community cards.

You then have two options. You can choose to raise if you think that you have a strong hand. The raise bet will be the same as the Ante bet. Alternatively, you can choose Continue, which means that you are not willing to bet more on the hand.

After you have decided, one of the two face down cards is revealed. You then have two options once again. You can Raise, to place another bet equal to your Ante, or you can continue, to keep playing with no bet.

The final card is revealed and you are paid out according to the strength of your hand. You only win if you have a pair of 10s or better.

A typical game may offer 1:1 for 10s or Better, 2:1 for Two Pair, 3:1 for a Three of a Kind, 5:1 for a Straight, 8:1 for a Flush, 11:1 for a Full House, 50:1 for a Four of a Kind, 200:1 for a Straight Flush, and 1000:1 for a Royal Flush. 

The payout is for each bet that you make. For example, if you have bet €10 on all three bets and have a pair of 10s, then you will win three payouts at 1:1.

Let’em Ride Poker Hands

It should be clear by now that Let’em Ride Ride is really not a complicated game and it will take you very little time to learn the rules. However, if you want to give yourself the best chance of winning, then you need to be aware of the different types of poker hands. In fact, you need to be able to spot them very quickly as when deciding whether to bet or not, you need to see what your hand could potentially become.

However, Let’em Ride Ride uses standard poker hands and you are most likely already familiar with them. Even if you are not, they take very little time to learn. There are just ten of them (although the weakest one is not strictly relevant to this game), and they are:

• Royal Flush– This is the strongest hand possible and it contains the cards 10, J, Q, K and A all from the same suit.
• Straight Flush –This is five cards in numerical order from the same suit; for example, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 of Hearts.
• Four of a Kind –This is a hand that contains four cards of same value, such as 8 Diamonds, 8 Clubs, 8 Spades, 8 Hearts.
• Full House –This is a hand that consists of three of a kind together with a pair, for example, three 6s and two 9s, the suit is irrelevant.
• Flush –This is a hand of five cards from the same suit, for example, Q, 4, 3, 7 and 9 of Diamonds.
• Straight – This is five cards in numerical order, the suit is not important. For example, 6 Clubs, 7 Diamonds, 8 Spades, 9 Hearts, and 10 Diamonds.
• Three of a Kind – This is three cards of the same value and two unrelated cards. For example, 5 Hearts, 5 Clubs, 5 Diamonds, 9 Spades and K Hearts.
• Two Pair – This is a hand that contains two individual pairs of cards and one unrelated card. For example, 7 Spades, 7 Hearts, A Diamonds, A Spades, 3 Hearts.
• One Pair – This is a hand that contains two matching cards and three unrelated cards. For example, 4 Spades, 4 Clubs, 2 Diamonds, 7 Clubs, 3 Hearts.
• High Card – If a hand does not contain any of the above, then it is judged according to the highest value card in it.

Let’em RidePoker Side Bets

Most versions of Let’em Ride offer an optional €1 progressive jackpot side bet. This bet contributes to the progressive jackpot pool and gives you the chance of winning a huge payout. Furthermore, it also gives you the chance of winning some fixed bonus payouts. Often, the bet will pay the full jackpot for a Royal Flush, 10% of the jackpot for a Straight Flush, pay 500:1 for a Four of a Kind, 100:1 for a Full House, and 75:1 for a Flush. This may vary slightly from casino to casino, but the principle remains the same.

Let’em RidePoker Strategy

A great thing about playing Let’em Ride is that there is an optimal strategy. This is a mathematical strategy designed to reduce the house edge. Even better, you do not need to understand the strategy in order to follow it, and it is very easy to learn.

There are only two decisions to be made in the game, whether to Raise or not before the fourth and fifth cards are revealed. The first decision comes after the first three cards are dealt. At this point, you should Raise in the following situations:

• When you have a winning hand (Tens or Better)
• When you have three of the cards needed to form a Royal Flush
• When you have three of the cards needed to form a Straight Flush with no gaps, 5-4-3 or higher
• When you have three of the cards needed to form a Straight Flush with one gap and at least one card that is Ten or higher
• When you have three of the cards needed to form a Straight Flush with two gaps and at least two cards that are Ten or higher

The gaps are extremely important to be aware of. If you have one gap, it means cards such as 7, 9 and 10. The gap here is between the 7 and 9, a gap of one card. If you have two gaps, it would be a hand such as 8, J and Q. Here you are missing the 9 and 10, two cards, so it is two gaps.

After the fourth card is revealed you need to make your next decision. You should raise in any of the following situations (regardless of what you did before the card was revealed):

• If you have any winning hand
• If you have four of the cards needed to form a Flush
• If you have four consecutive cards needed to form an Outside Straight with at least one card that is Ten or higher

An Outside Straight is a hand that can be made into a straight with the addition of a card that it is either one lower or higher than the four already in the hand. For example, 7, 8, 9, 10 can be made into a Straight with either a Jack or a 6. It is in contrast to an Inside Straight, which is a hand such as 6, 7, 9, 10 where only one card from the middle of the sequence can complete the straight. In Let’em Ride it is worth raising if you have an Outside Straight as long as one card is worth at least 10 as there is the chance of forming both a Straight and a Tens of Better hand.

If you correctly follow the strategy, then you can reduce the house edge of Let’em Ride to just 3.51%, which is far lower than many other casino games. This doesn’t take into account the progressive jackpot side bet, which does have a much higher house edge, but can be a lot of fun when used wisely.

There is no doubt that Let’em Ride is an extremely enjoyable form of casino poker and it has advantages over other games, such as the fact that there is no dealer qualifying hand to worry about. It will take you no time at all to get to grips with the basics of the game, and after reading this guide, you should be set to start having hours of fun playing it.