Discovering the unknown card games in Thailand

Different cultures have taken to card games and ‘playing for money’ in various different ways, with poker being the primary card game to gamble at the world over. Thailand is no exception, but if you look beyond the more common games, there’s a rich history of ancient card games which originated here and it’s fascinating to see how they’ve stood the test of time.

Gao Ge

The rules of Gao Ge are a little confusing to those who’ve never played Asian card games before but not too difficult for those already familiar with poker, and soon turns out to be faster and less confusing after a few hands. As a vying game, players are trying to present the best set of cards. Gao Ge is played with a three-card hand but no community cards. From there it plays like poker, you can fold, bet and players take turns to raise, re-raise, or check until the cards are revealed.

The best hand is three matching cards of the same value, then are some lower value hands like a sequence of linear cards (Ace is always low) and the combination of King-Queen-Jack (not all of the same suit). If no player has any combo, it goes down to the point system. Here it’s always best to have nines, after all, Gao is Thai for nine. Nines are ranked as the best for this phase, as 10 to King are rendered worthless. At the point phase, all the players’ cards are revealed if anyone has a nine they win. If two players have a nine, then the value of their second-best card is considered, and so on. There are derivatives of this base game like Pok Deng which plays out slightly differently.

1-2-3-4

One of the most popular Thai card games is 1-2-3-4 and is simply enough for most audiences to pick up. Each player is dealt five cards and then a community card is revealed in the center of the game space to get it started. Whatever that card is, the first player must place a card on top of it which is between 1-4 numbers greater than it. For this game, Jack counts as 11, the Queen as 12 and the King as 13, and unsurprisingly the Ace is one. If the count exceeds 13, then you can go back around starting from one with an Ace card.

The rest is up to you. If you can’t play you could be out or you could try to play a ‘pass move’. There are lots of variations on what is and what isn’t a pass, usually depending on locality or family rules. Some accept a single ace or a pair of cards as a pass – but some don’t. Pass moves don’t affect the current count meaning that you can replenish your hand (not exceeding five cards). When players can’t fulfill the count or pass criteria, they ‘drop out’, until just one player is left. If the stock of cards diminishes before one player is left, the person with the highest single card (King is highest) will win.

Mixing of Tens

Another Thai card game is the Mixing of Tens. This might be one of the simplest card games ever. Players have pairs of cards and take it in turns to draw and discard until they have a pair which accumulates to 10. I.e. 2 and 8, 3 and 7, etc. Ace is always low, 10 you must have two of and the picture cards must match. Once a pair is collected it goes to the side and when a player has three banked pairs, they win.

Borrowed Concepts Turned into Thai Staples

While Thailand has plenty of original card games there are a few worth mentioning which have been introduced and re-imagined in Thailand. Ekae for one is a carbon copy of Old Maid, just with a Thai name.

Dummy is a game based on Rummy but has a few different values for the cards in play.

Slave is very similar to President, while there are a few borrowed from Chinese Culture like Gob dum Gob dang (Black Frog Red Frog) which is similar to Chinese Ten.

Trading Card Games: Summoner Master and Devacurse

Thailand has also given birth to two trading card games that enjoy a decent following both domestically and have some success overseas. Both Summoner Master and Devacurse follow mythical themes. In general terms, players have to collect a wide array of cards and then battle it out with their adversaries for fantastical world dominance. It is believed that the popularity of these games led to other trading card games like Magic the Gathering and Yu-Gi-Oh, to also have a decent following in the country.

How Do These Games Fit in With Modern Technology?

What most of these games have in common is the simplicity and accessibility to all, you simply need a deck of cards and off you go. Like everything, they do face a fight with modern technology to stay relevant because it’s so simple to just play poker online for real money here, so the convenience of the screen and the allure of winning money may sadly make these games even more obsolete as time goes on.