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In regular texas hold’em, you start with two hole cards. In Pineapple, you start with three, creating many more possible good starting hands, and many more hands that can work with the flop.

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Just as in regular texas hold’em, there is a betting round after you receive your hole cards, and another betting round after you see the flop. However, in Pineapple a very important change happens here. AFTER betting on the flop is completed, you must discard one of your hole cards.

There are four possible betting rounds in Crazy Pineapple, shown in the rules above. Each bet and raise during the first two rounds is set at the lower limit of the stakes structure. For example in a $5/$10 game, all bets and raises are $5 for the first two rounds (after pocket cards are dealt and after the flop). Remember, all players must discard ONE pocket card after the second betting round.

Betting and raising during the last two rounds is set at the higher limit of the stakes structure. Same $5/$10 example; all bets and raises are $10 for the last two rounds (after the turn and after the river).

The maximum allowable number of bets per player during any particular betting round is four. This would consist of (1) a bet, (2) a raise, (3) a re-raise, and (4) a cap. The term cap is used to describe the 3rd raise in a round since betting is then capped and can not be raised anymore. Once the pot is capped, players will have only the option of calling or folding.

For example, if you start with a hand of (8h-8s-Jh) and then see a flop of 10h-9h-8d, you have a pretty big decision to make. If you want to keep your open-ended straight flush draw, you’re going to have to discard one of your trip eights (a pleasant dilemma, but a dilemma nonetheless). If you want to keep the trips, you need to throw away the the key card in the straight flush draw.

Pineapple really is an odd hybrid of texas hold’em and Omaha. The average winning hands are stronger in Pineapple than they are in texas hold’em, because you get to look at more combinations on the flop. Occasionally you will make a stronger hand in Pineapple than you would have in Omaha, even though you get four hole cards in Omaha, because Pineapple does not share the Omaha “you must use two and exactly two of your hole cards in your final hand” rule.

For example, if your Omaha hand was Ac-Qd-Jc-10d, and the final community board was Ah-As-5c-5h-8c, you do NOT have a full house, but rather only trip aces with a Q-8 kicker, because you must play at least two cards from your hand and can’t just add the ace in your hand to the two pair on board to make aces full of fives. In pineapple, had you kept an ace in your hand after the post-flop discard, the five on the turn would have given you a full house, just as if you’d started with A-J or A-Q in texas hold’em.

You’ll find Pineapple a fun game to play, because of the extra strong flops and extra key decision about what cards to keep after the flop.