Trick-Taker: Poker

Each player is given 20 vp tokens

Normal trick taking rules. Deal out deck.

Lowest card takes the trick. Trumps still act as trumps.

Once hand is finished, each player independently shuffles up their won tricks and draws (up to) 2 cards. Player who took the ace of spades is first to play is big blind, player to the right is small blind. 3 rounds of betting. Each round players draw one more card from their personal trick deck. Last person in, or player with best hand (normal values) wins the pot for the round.

During play, your goal is to build a strong poker hand for later and sluff all other cards. But everyone is doing this. Try to give terrible cards to players with good ones to pollute their deck, and vice versa giving good cards only to players with weak ones. Consider patterns over card strength.

Everyone wants SOME cards to be in contention, unless they plan on folding.

Screwy variants:

Minimum ante instead of blinds? Discourage people from trying to win no tricks
Joker is lowest card in trick taking, looses to everything. In poker it's wild.
After the trick taking round is finished, pass your won trick pile to the left. This is your deck for the poker round.
Teams, tichu style. Try to pass a strong hand to your friend and eat the extra.
For more players, add more suits to the game

What does this do to hand strengths?

Poker variants:

Holdem: before a round begins, deal out (number of players) cards into a faceup river. Then deal the rest out normally and start the round. During poker round players only draw 2 from their trick decks.

For a poker luck spin, only reveal one card in river, then reveal one more every betting round. Unknown burnt cards during trick taking, but keen players will realize what's missing.

Same for iron cross, indian, etc.

Notes to self:

Ante creates a bigger pot, and is generally more fair. Discourages people from dodging all cards and "passing" on the poker round. Gives everyone something to play for.
Blinds tied to cards won (ace of trumps is big blind) creates an interesting dynamic to play around/for, gives players the option of dodging a round if that's what they want to go for. Starts off the round of betting and rotates. Gives players control over who starts a round, etc. etc.
Pro play uses both.
60 cards divides cleanly for 3,4,5,6 players. lowest common multiple

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_poker_variants

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betting_in_poker

Hocus inspiration:

Players draw 7 cards from their decks (if they can) and take turns performing one of the following actions:

Play a card to the pool

There are 2 (3 w/5p) pools for players to play into, each can hold up to 4 (5?) cards.
On their turn a player can play a card from their hand into the pool, influencing what hands are possible to build with it.
Each is essentially a Hold 'Em river. The round ends (immediately?) When all (one?) are full (or players are out of cards). Players match their pockets with the river to craft the best hand possible.

Play a card to the pot

The pot is the reward for winning that pool.
On their turn a player can play a card from their hand face down into a pool's pot, making it a bit jucier to win.

Cards have different point values on them, with higher/stronger (poker) cards being worth more points if won in the pot instead of used to win.
Joker is worth 3 pts. faces 2. numbers 1. 2s 3s 0.

Odd idea: Maybe there is a single trump suit for Trick taking. Trumps are worth 0. points. When trumps are won in a pot, they are placed in front of the winner and are not shuffled back into the deck for the next round. Instead, they begin the next trick taking round with those cards in hand and are dealt that many fewer cards from the deck. (Everyone gets the same hand size even if they kept trumps.)

Play a card to a pocket

The pocket is the Hold'em 2 cards to match against a pool.

When the round ends, players will assign each of their pockets to one of the pools. Once all pockets are assigned, they're all revealed and the best hand wins that pool's pot, and scores all points within it.

On their turn a player can play a card from their hand face down into one of their pockets. They may look at these cards any time, but never move a card out of or between pockets once placed.
Players can build up to 2 pockets, if the round doesn't end first or they don't run out of cards.

Vanilla playtest 1 - straight trick taking (low high) + 7 card draw

-Worked ok, but unexciting. One player ended up with a big deck

-poker section went very fast

Alan: look at German whist. Its not trick taking to do poker, its trick taking to do trick taking, with bidding.

Playtest 2 - same as above, except two cards burned for 3 players (53 cards with joker) which became the face up river for poker round.

2 card river shown at start of trick taking round, play out trick taking, shuffle up, draw 3 bet draw bet draw bet reveal. 5 cards against 2 river.
Worked well! 53 card deck too big for 3 players, trick pile decks become very random.

Is this a bad thing? Drawing from a semi random personalized deck is fine. Maybe a bit tighter, but not keep enough bloat for players to be fuzzy on their decks.
Poker side was quick, which is good as a payoff to the trick taking, but perhaps a bit too quick? Feels like not enough payoff for the deck management setup. Just 7 cards off of 20 or 30 is rough for a one time draw. And then the deck is no longer used.