Ties are quite common.īecause Pai Gow in its original form is rather cryptic and symbolic, the winning combinations can be quite difficult to learn. T he object is to beat the banker’s front and back hands, respectively, and win even money on the wager, less a 5% house commission.

A fter wagers are set and the deal is made, the players arrange four tiles each to created two “hands,” a front hand and a back hand. Dice are used to determine which player receives tiles first. Pai Gow is a seemingly complex game for up to seven players, and it utilises 32 specially marked domino tiles. One ancient game that has survived virtually unchanged since the Song Dynasty (960~1279) is called Pai Gow (pronounced “pie gow”), which means “make nine.” Mahjong, Fan-Tan, and Dominoes are good examples. Prior to that, marked tiles, dice and coloured stones were used for games of chance, some of which are still played to this day. Pai Gow Poker is the Americanised version of Pai Gow played with playing cards rather than traditional Chinese dominoes.Ĭhina has made huge contributions to the world of gambling, not the least of which was the invention of paper used to make money and playing cards more than a thousand years ago.