Talk:Twenty-one (banking game)

Scoring and variants
I don't know where this information comes from, but it describes a very simplified version of the game played in UK. Some examples:
 * 1) the '5-card trick' i.e. a player's five cards total 21 or fewer points, which beats everything except a pontoon, and often pays a bonus, though less than a pontoon does
 * 2) the 'royal pontoon' of three sevens, which outranks every other hand
 * 3) the 'junior pontoon' of 10 (pip card) + Ace (shown in the illustration), which ranks below a 'true' pontoon of court card + Ace
 * 4) a player's ability to split the first two cards received if equal ranking (sometimes restricted to Aces) which are then played open.  Clearly it would be bad tactics to split two 7s even if this were allowed, in case of a third
 * 5) the ability to buy more than one card (for a sum equal to the opening stake), as long as a free card has not been 'twisted', allowing the holder of a putative 5-card trick to score a betting coup

These are the rules I played to as a schoolboy, and they aren't complicated. They call into question your assertion that US blackjack is a more complex or sophisticated game. If anything it seems simpler.Chrismorey (talk) 16:02, 5 August 2019 (UTC)


 * That's interesting. The information in the article is fully sourced and you can see the references. I wonder if the game you were playing is Pontoon for which an article needs to be written; this one is really about the historical "Vingt-Un". The current Pontoon (card game) article is about an Australasian / Asian version from Malaya and should be retitled Malaysian Pontoon to make way for Pontoon. Feel free to start the article and to draw on other sources that compare Blackjack and (British) Pontoon. Bermicourt (talk) 07:26, 6 August 2019 (UTC)