ULTIMATE FOUR OF A KIND TRIPLE DOUBLE BONUS STRATEGY

The ‘Ultimate Four of a Kind’ version of games combines a unique bonus feature with popular video poker rulesets. It’s one of the very popular ‘added bet bonus‘ games that require a player to add a additional bet amount to activate a bonus feature. These games can be played as regular games of their specific ruleset though they shouldn’t—the return percentage is typically better when the bonus feature is activated. In this game, the ‘Ultimate Four of a Kind‘ rules are combined with the popular ‘Bonus Poker‘ series of games.

The same advice goes for this ‘Ultimate Four of a Kind’ variation as goes for the rest of the genre. If you’re not going to invest the sixth coin to activate the bonus feature you’re much better off playing a ‘regular’ Triple Double Bonus Poker game. The return percentage on the most common ‘Ultimate Four of a Kind’ Triple Double Bonus Poker pay table is decent at 99.75%. If you’re going to play without the bonus, however, you’re not going to get that return. More importantly, you can find a better return percentage on a variety of other ‘Triple Double Bonus Poker’ variations playing five coins per hand.

‘Ultimate Four of a Kind‘ is typically found in the same multigame format as ‘Ultimate Aces‘. Like ‘Deuces Wild variations. We’ll cover each of the games individually since they each have a unique paytable and in some cases their own dedicated strategy decisions. In most cases, however, the ‘Ultimate Four of a Kind‘ games use identical strategy to their non-bonus counterparts.

ULTIMATE FOUR OF A KIND RULES

The ‘Ultimate Four of a Kind‘ series has slightly different rules from game to game. On the ‘Jacks or Better’ version, there’s only one hand that activates the bonus feature. On some of the ‘Bonus Poker‘ games, there are multiple hands. On this version, all of the Four of a Kind hands activate the bonus feature though just like the ‘regular‘ version of this game they offer different base payouts for hands of different values. For the most part, the game plays like a normal version of the specific ruleset. When a player makes the bonus hand on the draw (usually 4 of a Kind) he activates the bonus feature.

When the bonus feature is activated, the player picks cards face down from a 53 card deck (Joker added). Since the majority of the ‘Ultimate Four of a Kind‘ machines in use are three hand games the player is awarded picks for each qualifying hand. Some games (eg: the ‘Ultimate Four of a Kind Bonus Poker’ games) awards different amounts of ‘card selections’ for certain hands. On this machine, however, each qualifying hand awards one selection. The cards the player selects are revealed and based on their value a bonus of varying amounts is paid. This also varies slightly from one ruleset to another.

BONUS CARD PAYS:

• JOKER 4000
• ACE 400
• 2-4 290
• 5-K 200

ULTIMATE FOUR OF A KIND TRIPLE DOUBLE BONUS POKER STRATEGY

As you can likely surmise from looking at the pay table this game can be downright brutal. If you’re not hitting your quads you’ll feel like a truck hit you—or your bankroll at least. It’s surprising that Triple Double Bonus Poker is a game that many ‘sharp‘ video poker players seek out and enjoy. Maybe it’s the challenge. If the four of a kinds are falling your way you can rack up a nice profit very quickly.

The strategy for Triple Double Bonus Poker is essentially the same as ‘Bonus Poker‘. There are a few adjustments in the hand hierarchy to reflect the higher payout on 4 aces and the lower payout on two pair. It’s similar to basic ‘Jacks or Better‘ except it seeks to minimize the ‘lower paying‘ hands while giving a player a better opportunity to hit the 4K bonuses. The only real difference between ‘Super Double Bonus Poker‘, ‘Double Bonus Poker‘ and ‘Bonus Poker‘ is the payout on the 4K hands. The two pair payout is also reduced. One of the harder things for me to get used to playing the various bonus poker variations was holding the ‘Ace‘ when given a choice between high cards. In traditional JoB you’re discouraged from holding the Ace in that situation since it reduces the chance of drawing to a straight or straight flush.

• Royal Flush
• Straight Flush
• Any Four of a Kind with or without ‘winning’ kicker
• 4 to a Royal Flush
• Three Aces
• Three of a Kind w/ Kicker (2223, 2224, 3332, 3334, 333A, 4442, 4443, 444A, AAA2, AAA3, AAA4)
• Three of a Kind (222, 333, 444, AAA)
• Full House
• Flush
• Straight
• Three of a Kind (5-K)
• 4 to a Straight Flush
• Pair of Aces
• Two Pair
• 3 to a Royal Flush (KQJ)
• High Pair (JQK)
• 3 to a Royal Flush (AKQ, AKJ, AQJ, KQT, KJT, QJT)
• 4 to a Flush
• 3 to a Royal Flush (AKT, AQT, AJT)
• Pair of 2,3 or 4
• 4 to an outside straight
• 3 to a straight flush
• 1 pair of 5,6,7, 8, 9 or 10s
• 4 to an inside straight w/ three high cards
• 2 Suited High Cards
• Unsuited JQK
• Unsuited JQ
• Ace
• J10 Suited
• KQ, KJ Unsuited
• KT, QT Suited
• Jack, King or Queen
• 4 To an Inside Straight
• Discard Everything

FINAL NOTE ABOUT STRATEGY

It’s important in this—and every other ‘Ultimate Four of a Kind‘ Bonus Poker based variation—not to get so fixated on the ‘Four of a Kind‘ bonus card draw that you forget proper strategy for this game. The valuation difference among four of a kind hands of various values and with specific kickers is huge.

As you can see in this strategy chart holding the kicker with a relevant three of a kind is essential. So if you get:

2H 2D 2S 4C X

In many video poker games you would hold:

2H 2D 2S X X

That’s the INCORRECT play in Triple Double Bonus Poker. The difference between four deuces (400) and four deuces with an A, 2, 3, 4 kicker (2000) is too great. Instead, this would be the correct play:

2H 2D 2S 4C X

Keep in mind that the quads—and particularly the quads with kicker bonus hands—are everything in this game. If all you’re doing is mucking about with low hands you’ll be ‘ground out‘ in rapid fashion.