Vying game · Game 358 of 388 ♠
Ambigu
Four cards, two draws and a price on every combination – Louis XIV's "mixed" game, the old French cousin of draw poker.
- Players
- 2–6
- Duration
- 45 min
- Age
- 16+
- Difficulty
- medium
- Cards
- 40 cards (A–10, no face cards), plus chips
- Skill – Luck
- SkillLuck
- Everyone for themselves – Lots of interaction
- Everyone for themselvesLots of interaction
- Simple – Complex
- SimpleComplex
- Quick – Long
- QuickLong
Mood lively
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Full rules
Overview
Ambigu is an old French betting game from the time of Louis XIV. Its name means "mixture": it combines the hands of several older games – points and primes, sequences, three of a kind and flushes – into one ranking. Everyone builds a four-card hand, with two chances to exchange cards, and bets chips on having the best one. The winner takes the pot (all the chips bet) and, in addition, every other player pays them a price for the combination they hold. Ambigu is one of the old games in which players could already draw new cards, as in Five-Card Draw.
These rules follow R. F. Foster's Complete Hoyle (first published 1897), the fullest English description.
- Players: 2–6. Everyone plays for themselves.
- You need: a standard 52-card deck with the Kings, Queens and Jacks taken out (40 cards), and chips – the same number for everyone, e.g. 100 each. Play for chips, never for money.
Setup
The cards rank from 10 (high) down to Ace (low). Each card is worth its number in pips; the Ace counts 1.
Agree on a betting limit – the most anyone may bet or raise at one time, e.g. 10 chips. Everyone draws a card; the highest deals first. Dealing and play go anticlockwise (to the right), and the deal passes to the right after each hand.
A deal, step by step
- Ante: everyone puts 1 chip into the pot.
- Deal: the dealer deals two cards to each player, one at a time, face down.
- First draw: starting on the dealer's right, each player either says "enough" and keeps both cards, or discards one or two cards and gets as many new ones from the top of the pack. Either way, each player then puts 2 more chips into the pot.
- Two more cards: the dealer shuffles the rest of the pack (without the discards), has it cut and deals two more cards to each player. Everyone now has four.
- First betting: in turn, each player says "I pass" or "I play". To play, you bet any number of chips up to the limit. Once someone has bet, every other player in turn – including those who passed – must call (match the highest bet), raise (bet more) or give up (throw in their cards and lose what they have bet). - Everyone passes: the dealer chooses. Either everyone adds 1 chip, the pot stays and the cards are dealt again – or the dealer puts in 2 chips, and everyone must keep their cards and go on to the second draw. - Nobody calls the first bet: the bettor takes the bet back, the pot stays for the next deal, and the last player who refused pays the bettor 2 chips. - Nobody calls a raise: the raiser wins the pot, shows their hand and is paid the price of their combination by every other player. - Two or more players have bet the same: go on to the second draw.
- Second draw: each player still in may discard any number of cards (0–4) and get as many new ones. If the pack runs out, shuffle the discards and deal from them.
- Final betting: in turn, each player still in passes or plays. If everyone passes, the cards are thrown in, the pot stays, and everyone adds 1 chip for the next deal. Otherwise, bet as in poker: call, raise or fold, until everyone left has bet the same.
- Showdown: the players still in show their cards. The best combination wins the pot, and every other player at the table pays its holder the combination's price. Only the winner of the pot is paid.
If a player bets or raises and nobody calls, that player takes the pot, shows their hand and collects the price in the same way.
You must pay a winner's price even if you have lost all your chips in the pot – keep about 10 chips aside for this.
The combinations
From lowest to highest:
| Combination | What it is | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Point | two or more cards of one suit – count their pips | 1 |
| Prime | four cards of four different suits | 2 |
| Grand prime | a prime of more than 30 pips | 3 |
| Sequence | three cards of one suit in sequence (e.g. 4♠ 5♠ 6♠) | 3 |
| Tricon | three cards of the same rank | 4 |
| Flush | four cards of one suit | 5 |
| Tricon with prime | a tricon whose fourth card is of the missing suit | 6 |
| Flush with sequence | a flush containing a sequence | 8 |
| Fredon | four cards of the same rank | 10 (11 with four 9s or 10s) |
- A double combination (tricon with prime, flush with sequence) beats any single one. A fredon beats everything.
- A pair is worth nothing.
- Ties: between equal combinations, more pips win. For the point, three cards always beat two; if the pips are equal, two cards in sequence beat two that are not (8 and 7 beat 10 and 5). Between sequences, the higher sequence wins. If everything is equal, the player nearest the dealer's right wins.
Example: Dan deals. After the second draw, Anna, Ben and Carla are still in; Dan folded. Anna has 2♠ 3♠ 4♠ 9♠ – a flush with a sequence. Ben has 5♥ 5♦ 5♣ 8♠, a tricon with prime. Carla has 10♥ 9♦ 7♣ 6♠, a grand prime (32 pips). Anna wins the pot, and Ben, Carla and Dan each pay her 8 chips.
Winning the game
Play for an agreed time; whoever then has the most chips wins.
Tips for beginners
- The price matters as much as the pot: a strong combination earns chips from every player at the table, even those who folded early.
- In the first draw, keep two cards of one suit or two of the same rank; they can grow into a flush or a tricon.
- A 10 and a 9 of different suits are a good start for a grand prime.
- If everyone passes after four cards, the dealer can force a second draw – think about whether that helps you before you pass.
Variants
- The 1730 rules: in the Académie universelle des jeux of 1730, as explained by the Académie des jeux oubliés, the two-card round could go round several times with exchanges, until a player said "battez" ("shuffle!") and paid a small separate stake. In the next round, players could only match the opening bet, not raise it; raising came only after the final exchange. The price was paid by everyone who took part in the deal, and a fredon was worth 8.
- Prices: in the Académie des jeux oubliés' version, a tricon with a grand prime is paid 7.
Background & history
- Family: Vying game (four-card hands with a draw, prices for combinations)
- Origin: France, 17th century (first described in 1659)
- Also known as: Meslé, Mêlé
- Related games: Primero, Bouillotte (Brelan), Poque, Poker
According to Wikipedia, the rules of Ambigu first appear in 1659 in La Maison académique, a French book of games, where it is also called Meslé ("mixed"). It was in fashion at the court of Louis XIV. The Académie des jeux oubliés quotes the preface of the 1702 edition, whose author signs only as "P.P.B." and claims to have received the rules from a lord of Slavonia, where the game was called Prispistrihoc; he preferred to call it "l'Ambigu ou le Meslé". The Slavonian origin is probably invented. The name refers to the game's mixture: it brings together combinations known from older games – the point and prime of Primero, the three of a kind of Brelan, sequences and flushes – in a single ranking.
The Académie universelle des jeux of 1730 contains the game, and French games books kept printing its rules through the 19th century and, according to Wikipedia, occasionally up to the present century. In English it was described by R. F. Foster, whose Complete Hoyle derives it, like Bouillotte and Brag, from Brelan. Foster also notes that "the draw" from the rest of the pack, familiar from Five-Card Draw, already existed in "the old French game of Ambigu". The Encyclopaedia Britannica of 1911 described it as combining elements of whist, bouillotte and piquet.
Because its ranked combinations, exchanges and rounds of betting look so much like poker, the Académie des jeux oubliés calls Ambigu the old game closest to poker. David Parlett disagrees: he groups it with the other four-card games such as Primero and Mus and writes that none of them "has much bearing, if any, on Poker", whose ancestors he sees in three- and five-card games like Brag, Bouillotte and Poque.