I’m not a raging Tichuaholic ( “I’m addicted to Tichuahol!”), but this has been interesting. Not bad ideas, just outweighed by the other arguments (to my tastes). Allowing “long” straights helps make lots of low singletons worthwhile – again, they may keep the lead.īut I see the arguments for the five card limit as reasonable. The ability to put them into pairs or trips makes them better … the can’t win you the lead (except a small pair combined with a large trip during full house), but they may be able to keep it. You are never going to get rid of the issue. The great card games allow mechanisms to mitigate. “Bad” cards are the bane of any card game, in that you can’t do much with a bad hand. (The person making that statement didn’t see the full argument). About the only reason I don’t particularly subscribe to is the “It makes it easier to go out,” which was part of the complaint. (Note that Dennis, the person who made this suggestion, specifically agrees that the current rules make passing more interesting). I find these arguments fairly compelling, particularly Curt Carpenter’s and Marks. I lean strongly towards the current rules. There are interesting decisions (Whether to break a seven card straight to beat a six card straight, etc).You unbalance the game towards pairs/trips/fullhouses.It turns wretched hands (lots of low cards, only a single high card) into playable ones.It makes the decision to bomb more agonizing.It makes ‘relinquishing control’ more dangerous.It adds tension in that anyone could go out quickly once they got the lead.It makes the “when to break up a straight” decision more interesting.It would keep people from going out on a single lucky play (or two, or three).It would add some hard predictability to the hand.Reasons for limiting straights to 5 cards:

Here are the arguments I’ve seen (in various places): Right now there are threads going here, on the SABG site, and on BGG.

Tichu 6 player rules