Starting Tiles are shuffled on the table and arranged into eight face-down stacks of four tiles each in an assembly known as the
woodpile. Individual stacks or tiles may then be moved in specific ways to rearrange the woodpile, after which the players place their bets. Next, each player (including the dealer) is given one stack of tiles and must use them to form two hands of two tiles each. The hand with the lower value is called the
front hand, and the hand with the higher value is called the
rear hand. If a player's front hand beats the dealer's front hand, and the player's rear hand beats the dealer's rear hand, then that player wins the bet and is paid off at 1:1 odds (even money). If a player's front and rear hands both lose to the dealer's respective hands, the player loses the bet. If one hand wins and the other loses, the player is said to
push, and gets back only the money they bet. Generally seven players will play, and each player's hands are compared only against the dealer's hands; comparisons are always front-front and rear-rear, never one of each. There are 35,960 possible ways to select 4 of the 32 tiles when the 32 tiles are considered distinguishable. However, there are 3,620 distinct sets of 4 tiles when the tiles of a pair are considered indistinguishable. There are 496 ways to select 2 of the 32 tiles when the 32 tiles are considered distinguishable. There are 136 distinct hands (pairs of tiles) when the tiles of a pair are considered indistinguishable.
Scoring Each player groups their four tiles into two hands of two tiles each. The two hands are referred to as the "high" and "low" hands, based on their score. Otherwise, the next highest-ranked hand results from creating a
Gong or
Wong, which are specific combinations with the
Day and
Teen tiles. If the four tiles drawn for the two hands do not permit the formation of a named pair, Gong, or Wong, then the total number of pips on both tiles in a hand are added using
modular arithmetic (
modulo 10), equivalent to how a hand in
baccarat is scored. The name "pai gow" is loosely translated as "make nine" or "card nine". However, if a Day or Teen is grouped in a single hand with any other tile, the standard scoring rules apply. The combination of a Day or Teen with a seven (
Tit, 1-6; or
Chit, 2-5 or 3-4) is sometimes referred to as a
high nine, as the score is the maximum (nine) when added together, and the group contains a high-rank tile for potential tiebreaking purposes.
Modular arithmetic When a hand is formed from two tiles that are not a named pair, Wong, or Gong, the total pips on both tiles are counted and any tens digit is dropped; the resulting ones digit (the sum of all pips
modulo 10) gives the final score. There is one exception. The 1-2 and the 2-4 tiles which form the
Gee Joon pair together, can act as limited wild cards singly. When used as part of a hand of mixed tiles, these tiles may be scored as either 3 or 6, whichever results in a higher hand value. For example, a hand of 1-2 (scored as +6 instead of the face value of +3) and 5-6 (+11) scores as seven rather than four. If the player has both the 1-2 and 2-4 tiles, those collectively form the highest-ranked named pair and should be used together to form an unbeatable rear hand.
Ties When the player and dealer display hands with the same score, the one with the highest-valued tile (based on the named pair rankings described above) is the winner. For example, a player's hand of 3-4 and 2-2 (
Chit and
Bon) and a dealer's hand of 5-6 and 5-5 (
Foo and
Mooy) would each score one point. However, since the dealer's 5-5 (
Mooy) outranks the other three tiles, they would win the hand. If both have a bonus combination (Wong or Gong) or the scores are tied, and if the player and dealer each have an identical highest-ranking tile, then the dealer wins. For example, if the player held 2-2 and 1–6 (
Bon and
Tit), and the dealer held 2-2 and 3–4 (
Bon and
Chit), the dealer would win since the scores (1 each) and the highest-ranked tiles (2-2
Bon) are the same. The lower-ranked tile in each hand is never used to break a tie. There are two exceptions to the method described above. First, although the Gee Joon tiles form the highest-ranking pair when used together, when used as single tiles in a mixed hand, for tiebreaking purposes, they fall into the mixed-number ranks according to the number of pips. That is, the 2-4 ranks sequentially below the
Chop Chit tiles (3-4 and 2-5), and the 1-2 ranks sequentially last overall, below the
Chop Ng tiles (3-2 and 1-4). Second, any zero-zero tie is won by the dealer, regardless of the tiles in the two hands. == Strategy ==