Pontoon for beginners: twist, stick and the trick

Pontoon is the card game many people in Britain learned at home before they ever saw a casino table. Twist & Stick follows that family version against a house hand.

Card values

Number cards count their face value. Jacks, queens and kings count ten. An ace counts eleven, or one if eleven would push the total past 21. A hand that can still count its ace as eleven is called soft; a soft 17 is ace and six.

The flow of a hand

You and the house get two cards each. Both house cards stay face down, so unlike some other card games there is nothing to read from the house. You twist to take a card, as many times as you like up to five cards, and stick when you are done. You may only stick on 15 or more. Then the house turns its cards and draws until it reaches 17.

Special hands

A pontoon is an ace plus a ten-value card in your first two cards. It beats everything except a house pontoon. A five-card trick is five cards totalling 21 or less, and it beats any total the house can make. Both return your stake plus one and a half times it in sparks.

Simple decisions

Below 15 you must twist. With a hard 17 or more, stick. With a soft total under 18, twisting is safe because the ace can drop to one. With four cards on a low total, a fifth card for the trick is often worth it. Going bust always loses, even when the house would also have gone bust, and that is where the house gets its edge.