Cribbage Flush In The Crib

Cribbage Rules

1. Cribbage Flush In The Crib Cover
2. Flush In The Crib Of Cribbage
3. Cribbage Flush In The Crib Covers
4. What Makes A Flush In Cribbage
5. Cribbage Flush In The Crib Queen
6. Cribbage Flush In The Crib Set

Aug 19, 2017 A flush of four or five cards. For a four-card flush, all four cards must be in the player's own hand, as opposed to being the shared Crib Card. A five-card flush must obviously use all five cards. The number of points is equal to the number of cards in the flush. It is a crib hand of one suit, 46J and another ten card, with a 5 of that suit cut up. The points are 15 for 6, a run for 9, nobs for 10, and a flush for 15. Any of the following cards in an unlike suit yields a '19 hand'; 2,3,7,8,and an unpaired ten card.

Objective

The objective in Cribbage is to be the first player to get 121 points. The gameplay is divided into three distinct parts, The Deal, The Play and The Show. Each part is explained in detail below.

This version of Cribbage is for two players, there are many other variations possible, but these rules are only for the variation we've chosen for this site. There are a lot of rules, I've tried to explain them as best I can here, but you can also look at the rules at www.pagat.com or at Cribbage Corner, both of those are good places to learn how Cribbage works.

The Deal

The game starts with both players drawing a card from the deck to find out who is the dealer. The person that gets the lower card is the dealer. If the players draw equal cards then they draw again until the dealer can be determined. This way of determining the dealer is only done in the first round, in subsequent rounds who is the dealer will alternate between the two players.

The dealer deals 6 cards to himself and 6 cards to the opponent. Each player then chooses two cards from their hand to put face down into the crib. The crib belongs to the dealer and is used at the end of the round to gain extra points. Which cards you choose to put in the crib is very important, as it affects how many points you can get in later parts of the game.

At this point each player has four cards in their hand, and the Crib has four cards. The deck of cards is then put to the side, and the non-dealer (also called a pone) cuts the deck and then reveals the top card. This card is referred to as the starter or the cut. If the starter is a Jack then the dealer immediately scores 2 points. This is known as Two for his heels. Once the starter card has been shown, the players are ready to proceed to the next part of the game.

The Play

The pone (the player who is not the dealer) starts by laying down a card on the table and announcing its value, e.g. lays down a 6 and announces 'Six'. The dealer then lays down a card and announces the cumulative value of the cards on the table, e.g. he lays down a 5 and announces 'Eleven'. This continues with the players laying down one card each until a player cannot lay down another card without the cumulative value going over 31. The player then says 'Go' and the other player can then continue to lay down his cards until he also can't lay down a card without going over 31. He then says 'Go' as well, and the player who laid down the last card will score 1 point if the total value is under 31 but 2 points if the value on the table is exactly 31. They then reset the count to 0 and continue with their remaining cards, starting with the player who did not lay down the last card. An ace is counted as 1, face cards are counted as 10 and other cards are their normal value.

During this phase there are several ways to score points, based on how you lay down your cards. Points are scored as you lay down your cards, e.g. if your opponent has just laid down a 4 and then you lay down another 4 on top of it then you will score a pair. The starter/cut card is not used at all in this part of the game.

Players always announce the cumulative value of the cards on the table when they lay down a new card. If they score points they will announce the points as well, e.g. 15 for 2, or 31 for 2. When a player has said 'Go' then the other player will say '1 for the Go' when he's claiming the point from laying down the last card. He might also say '1 for last', if the other player has not laid down any cards since the value was last reset. 1 for the Go or 1 for last are just different ways of announcing the same thing, that the player gets 1 point because he laid down the last card under 31.

Scoring during The Play

• Fifteen: For adding a card that makes the total 15, score 2 points.
• Pair: For adding a card of the same rank as the card just played, score 2 points.
• Pair Royal (Three of a kind): For adding a card of the same rank as the last two cards, score 6.
• Double Pair Royal (Four of a kind): For adding a card of the same rank as the last 3 cards, score 12.
• Run (sequence) of three or more cards: Score 1 point for each card in the sequence. The cards do not need to be in order, but they do need to be all together. E.g. H2 C8 D6 H7 S5 is a 4 card sequence because C8 D6 H7 S5 can be re-arranged into S5 D6 H7 C8, but H2 C5 C7 D7 S6 is not a sequence because the extra 7 in the middle breaks up the sequence of 5-6-7. Basically if you can take n cards that are in order and re-arrange them so all the n cards form a numerical sequence then it's a sequence.
• Last card, total value less than 31: Score 1 point.
• Last card, total value exactly 31: Score 2 points.

It's worth noting that even though all face cards count as 10, you cannot create a pair, pair royal or double pair royal with cards unless they have the same 'real' rank. E.g. two queens are a pair, a queen and a king aren't, even though they are both valued at 10. For sequences an ace is always low, you can't make a sequence with a king and an ace next to each other.

It's also worth noting that you can make points in many ways with the same cards. E.g. if the cards on the table are DA C7 and you lay down H7 you will get 2 points because 1+7+7=15 and 2 points because 7+7 is a pair of sevens. So, in that case you would announce 'Fifteen for 4'.

This part of the game continues until both players have played all their cards. The scores are updated as soon as a player gets points, and if a player reaches the target score, 121, the game is finished immediately.

The Show

Once The Play is finished, the players take back their cards from the table and it's time to calculate the score for their hands, and the crib. These are always scored in the same order: pone's hand, dealer's hand, dealer's crib. As before, the scores are added to the scoreboard as soon as they are calculated, and if a player reaches 121 the game is over immediately, the other player doesn't get to count his score. This means that there's no chance of a tie, or both players going over 121 in the same round. The dealer will normally get more points since he scores both his hand and the crib, but the pone scores his hand first, so if they're both close to 121 the pone might win, even though the dealer would have gotten more points if he were allowed to count them.

The Show Scoring

The scoring for The Show is similar to the scoring for The Play, but with some important differences. The starter card is used here with both hands and the crib, so a hand is the hand + the starter, and the crib is the crib + the starter. You can use the same card for many different combinations, e.g. it can be part of a pair and also part of a sequence.

• One for his nob: For having the jack of the same suit as the starter, score 1 point. E.g. starter is H4, you have HJ.
• Fifteen: Any combination of cards that sum to 15. You can re-use cards, so if you have HJ, SJ and C5 you get 2 points for HJ C5 and another 2 points for SJ C5.
• Pair: For any pair of cards, e.g. SQ DQ, score 2 points.
• Pair Royal (Three of a kind): For any three cards of the same rank, e.g. S8 C8 H8, score 6 points.
• Double Pair Royal (Four of a kind): For any four cards of the same rank, e.g. HA SA DA CA, score 12 points.
• Run (sequence) of three or more cards: Score 1 point for each card in the sequence. E.g. for SA H2 C3 D4, score 4 points.
• Flush, 4 cards: If all the cards in your hand are of the same suit, e.g. SA S5 S9 SJ, score 4 points. These four cards all have to be in your hand, you cannot have three cards in your hand + the starter count as a flush. A 4 card flush also can't be used for the crib, only for your hand.
• Flush, 5 cards: If all the cards in your hand, and the starter card, are of the same suit, e.g. SA S5 S9 SJ SQ, score 5 points. You can also get a 5 card flush for your crib, if all the cards in the crib and the starter are of the same suit.

Skunks and Double Skunks

A skunk is when a player wins by over 30 points, his opponent has less than 91 points when the game is over. A double skunk is when a player wins by over 60 points, the opponent has less than 61 points. Normally a skunk will count as two games and a double skunk as 3. However, on this site we're not playing multiple games, we only track each game individually. We will however show you an image of a skunk or two if you get a skunk, and we do keep track of skunk counts for the statistics page.

Variations

As with every game, there are slight variations in how people play Cribbage. I've tried to look at many sources and pick the most 'standard' rules I could. Some common variations is that the next-to-last hole on the scoreboard is the 'stinkhole' and not all points count there. I'm not using that variation on this site, you can score wherever you are. There are undoubtedly other variations that people like and would like to see here, if a lot of people request a specific variation I would consider adding it, but I don't want to start adding different options for the game, I like picking one way to play a game and sticking with it.

In cribbage, the probability and maximum and minimum score of each type of hand can be computed.

Distinct hands[edit]

• There are 12,994,800 possible hands in Cribbage: 52 choose 4 for the hand, and any one of the 48 left as the starter card.

${\displaystyle (\genfrac{}{}{0ex}{}{52}{4})\times 48=12,994,800}$

• Another, and perhaps more intuitive way of looking at it, is to say that there are 52 choose 5 different 5-card hands, and any one of those 5 could be the turn-up, or starter card.
  Therefore, the calculation becomes:

${\displaystyle (\genfrac{}{}{0ex}{}{52}{5})\times 5=12,994,800}$

• 1,009,008 (approximately 7.8%) of these score zero points,^[1] or 1,022,208 if the hand is the crib, as the starter must be the same suit as the crib's four cards for a flush.
• Not accounting for suit, there are 14,715 unique hands.^[2]

Maximum scores[edit]

• The highest score for one hand is 29: 555J in hand with the starter 5 of the same suit as the Jack (8 points for four J-5 combinations, 8 points for four 5-5-5 combinations, 12 points for pairs of 5s and one for his nob).
• The second highest score is 28 (hand and starter together comprise any ten-point card plus all four 5s, apart from the 29-point hand above).
• The third highest score is 24 (A7777, 33339, 36666, 44447, 44556, 44566, 45566, 67788 or 77889).
• The highest score as a dealer from the hand and crib is 53. The starter must be a 5, the hand must be J555, with the Jack suit matching the starter (score 29), and the crib must be 4466 (score 24), or vice versa.
• The highest number of points possible (excluding pegging points) in one round is 77. The dealer must score 53, the opponent must then have the other 4466 making another 24 point hand for a total of 77.
• The highest number of points from a hand that has a potential to be a '19 hand' is 15. It is a crib hand of one suit, 46J and another ten card, with a 5 of that suit cut up. The points are 15 for 6, a run for 9, nobs for 10, and a flush for 15. Any of the following cards in an unlike suit yields a '19 hand'; 2,3,7,8,and an unpaired ten card.
• The most points that can be pegged by playing one card is 15, by completing a double pair royal on the last card and making the count 15: 12 for double pair royal, 2 for the 15, and 1 for the last card. This can happen in two ways in a two-player game. The non-dealer must have two ten-value cards and two 2s, and the dealer must have one ten-value card and 722, in which case the play must go: 10-10-10-go; 7-2-2-2-2. For example:

• Alternatively, the players can each have two deuces, with one also holding A-4 and the other two aces. Then play might go 4-A-A-A-2-2-2-2.
• The maximum number of points that can be scored in a single deal by the dealer in a two player game is 78 (pegging + hand + crib):
  Non-dealer is dealt 3 3 4 4 5 J and Dealer is dealt 3 3 4 4 5 5. Non-dealer discards J 5 to the crib (as ill-advised as this may be). Dealer discards 5 5 to the crib. Note that the J is suited to the remaining 5. The remaining 5 is cut.
  Play is 3 3 3 3 4 4 4 4 go. The dealer scores 29 total peg points.
  The dealer's hand is 3 3 4 4 5 = 20
  The dealer's crib is J(nobs) 5 5 5 5 = 29
  The total score for the dealer is 29 + 20 + 29 = 78.
  Note that the correct play for both players is to keep 3 3 4 5 worth 10 points and discarding J 4 and 4 5 to the crib respectively, meaning in reality, this hand would never take place. A more realistic hand would be both players being dealt 3 3 4 4 J J with both discarding J J and a 5 cut. In this case, with pegging as described above, the total score would be 20 (hand) + 21 (crib) + 29 (pegging) = 70 points.
• The maximum number of points that can be scored in a single deal by the non-dealer in a two player game is 48 (pegging + hand), with the following example :
  Non-dealer is dealt 5 5 4 4 crib crib and Dealer is dealt 4 4 5 9 crib crib. Cut card is a 6.
  Play is 5 5 5 4 4 4 4, with the Non-dealer pegging 24. The Non-dealer scores 24 in the hand for a total of 48 points.
• The maximum number of points that can be scored with a four-card flush is 21, which is achieved with a hand of 5 5 10 J Q or 5 5 J Q K: a pair, six fifteens, a three-card sequence, and the flush. A five-card flush of 5 10 J Q K scores 18 if the Jack is not the starter.

Minimum scores[edit]

Cribbage Flush In The Crib Cover

• The dealer in two-player, 6-card cribbage will always peg at least one point during the play (the pegging round), unless the opponent wins the game before the pegging is finished. If non-dealer is able to play at each turn then dealer must score at least one for 'last'; if not, then dealer scores at least one for 'go'.
• While 19 is generally recognized as 'the impossible hand', meaning that there is no combination of 5 cards that will produce a score of 19 points, scores of 25, 26, 27, and greater than 29 are also impossible in-hand point totals.^[1] Sometimes if a player scores 0 points in their hand they will claim they have a '19-point hand.'^[3]

Minimum while holding a 5[edit]

If a player holds a 5 in their hand, that player is guaranteed at least two points, as shown below:

A 0-point hand must have five distinct cards without forming a run or a fifteen combination. If such a hand includes a 5, it cannot hold a 10 or a face card. It also cannot include both an A and a 9; both a 2 and an 8; both a 3 and a 7; or both a 4 and a 6. Since four more cards are needed, exactly one must be taken from each of those sets. Let us run through the possible choices:

• If the hand includes a 9, it cannot hold a 6, so it must hold a 4. Having both a 4 and a 9, it cannot hold a 2, so it must hold an 8. Holding both a 4 and an 8, it cannot hold a 3, so it must hold a 7. But now the hand includes a 7-8 fifteen, which is a contradiction.
• Therefore, the hand must include an A. If the hand includes a 7, it now cannot contain an 8, as that would form a 7-8 fifteen. However it cannot hold a 2, as that would form a 7-5-2-A fifteen. This is a contradiction.
• Therefore, the hand must include a 3. Either a 2 or a 4 would complete a run, so the hand must therefore include a 6 and an 8. But this now forms an 8-6-A fifteen, which is a contradiction.

Therefore, every set of five cards including a 5 has a pair, a run, or a fifteen, and thus at least two points.

Interestingly, a hand with two 5s also can score only two points; an example is 2 5 5 7 9, which would be most likely a crib hand, and would not score a flush because of the pair, although said hand can be a non-crib four-card flush if either 5 is the starter. A hand with three 5s scores at least eight points; a hand with all four 5s scores 20 points and is improved only with a 10, J, Q, or K (scoring 28 except for the 29 hand previously described.)

Flush In The Crib Of Cribbage

It is also true that holding both a 2 and a 3, or an A and a 4 (pairs of cards adding up to five) also guarantees a non-zero score:

• If a hand includes both a 2 and a 3 and is to score 0 points, it cannot have a face card, an A, a 4, or a 5. This requires three cards from the 6, 7, 8, and 9, and any such selection will include a fifteen.
• If a hand includes both an A and a 4 and is to score 0 points, it cannot have a face card or a 5. It also cannot have both a 2 and a 3; both a 6 and a 9; or both a 7 and an 8. If the hand includes a 2, it cannot have a 9 (9-4-2 fifteen). Thus it must have a 6. It then cannot have an 8 (8-4-2-A fifteen) or a 7 (7-6-2 fifteen). If, however, the hand includes a 3, it cannot include an 8 (8-4-3 fifteen) or a 7 (7-4-3-A fifteen). These are all contradictions, so every hand containing both an A and a 4 scores at least two points.

Odds[edit]

• The table below assumes the card(s) discarded to the crib are randomly chosen. Given this assumption, the odds of getting a 28 hand in a two-player game are about 1 in 170984, and a perfect 29 hand 1 in 3,248,700.^[3]

• However, if we assume that the player will always keep J555 if those cards are included in the hand, the odds of getting a perfect 29 hand starting with a six-card hand are 1 in 216,580, while the odds after discarding from a five-card hand are 1 in 649,740.^[4]

Scoring Breakdown, assuming random discard(s) to the crib^[1]

• Mean = 4.7692
• Standard deviation = 3.1254
• Skewness = 0.9039
• Excess kurtosis = 1.4599

Note that these statistics do not reflect frequency of occurrence in 5 or 6-card play. For 6-card play the mean for non-dealer is 7.8580 with standard deviation 3.7996, and for dealer is 7.7981 and 3.9082 respectively. The means are higher because the player can choose those four cards that maximize their point holdings. For 5-card play the mean is about 5.4.

Slightly different scoring rules apply in the crib - only 5-point flushes are counted, in other words you need to flush all cards including the turn-up and not just the cards in the crib. Because of this, a slightly different distribution is observed:

Scoring Breakdown (crib/box hands only)

• Mean = 4.7348

As above, these statistics do not reflect the true distributions in 5 or 6 card play, since both the dealer and non-dealer will discard tactically in order to maximise or minimise the possible score in the crib/box.

Card combinations[edit]

• A hand of four aces (AAAA) is the only combination of cards wherein no flip card will add points to its score.
• There are 71 distinct combinations of card values that add to 15:

Cribbage Flush In The Crib Covers

Hand and Crib statistics[edit]

If both the hand and the crib are considered as a sum (and both are drawn at random, rather than formed with strategy as is realistic in an actual game setting) there are 2,317,817,502,000 (2.3 trillion) 9-card combinations.${\displaystyle (\genfrac{}{}{0ex}{}{52}{4})\times (\genfrac{}{}{0ex}{}{48}{4})\times 44=2,317,817,502,000}$

• As stated above, the highest score a dealer can get with both hand and crib considered is 53.
• The only point total between 0 and 53 that is not possible is 51.

What Makes A Flush In Cribbage

Scoring Breakdown

• Mean: 9.50397
• Median: 9
• Mode: 8

See also[edit]

References[edit]

Cribbage Flush In The Crib Queen

1. ^ ^abcSteven S. Lumetta (2007-05-15). 'Amusing Cribbage Facts'. Archived from the original on 2018-01-16. Retrieved 2008-03-03.
2. ^Tim Wood (2008-08-05). 'All Possible Cribbage Hands'. Archived from the original on 2013-02-09. Retrieved 2008-08-05.
3. ^ ^abWeisstein, Eric W. 'Cribbage'. MathWorld. Retrieved 2008-03-02. All scores from 0 to 29 are possible, with the exception of 19, 25, 26, and 27. For this reason, hand scoring zero points is sometimes humorously referred to as a '19-point' hand.
4. ^Cribbage Corner (2008-05-05). 'Perfect cribbage hand odds'. Retrieved 2008-05-05.

Cribbage Flush In The Crib Set