Preface
We hope that this is a useful reference for BARGE folks,and for anyone else. In particular, Tim started updating this rulebook because he can never remember the rules to Archie and wanted to make it easier to look them up.
This rulebook decends from Christopher J. Mecklin’s excellent rulebook, last updated in July, 2021. By 2024, it had fallen a bit out of date: BARGE being BARGE, and poker players being poker players, some newer games have been made up.
This version was created starting from extracting the text from the PDF of the 2021 edition. Many formatting errors were introduced in this process. Some have been fixed.
Web version and PDF Version
This rulebook is provided in both a web version and a PDF version.
https://www.barge.org/rulebook/ is the web home for this rulebook, and it is continually updated there. It looks great on a phone or a computer, and we can provide hyperlinks to rules from the Internet at large. It doesn’t print very well.
https://www.barge.org/rulebook.pdf is a PDF version. This prints to a proper book and should be printed double-sided. It has a table of contents and page numbers. It includes hyperlinks if viewed electronically, but it is not as easy to navigate as the web version. It is hard to use on a phone or tablet. (This version may also be slightly out of date compared to the web version, as updating it requires an extra trivial step, easily forgotten.)
Improving this Rulebook
The easiest thing to do is to contact Tim Showalter.
If you are technically inclined, the source code for the rulebook is available on GitHub1. A pull request is the clearest way to suggest a change, but you can also make suggestions over email, or over beers. Specific text is appreciated.
Having a little more historical context on each game would be welcome.
Acknowledgments
Thanks to Rich Bremer, Doug Grismore, Patrick Milligan, and Cliff Matthews for encouragement, and technical. and editorial input.
Preface from the 2021 Edition
(This section has been slightly abridged from the 2021 edition.)
This document contains the rules of many forms of poker, some of which will be played in BARGE 2021 tournaments, others in tournaments in past years, and yet others only in BARGE cash games or home games.
I obtained these rules from a copy of the official rule book for the XXV 25-Game Mix poker tournament played at BARGE XXV in 2015. That rule book was originally written by Patrick Milligan and Rich Bremer and is reproduced here with their permission. Also, rules for some of the stranger games came from an archived version of the BARGE website, called the BARGE Poker Game Rule Archive. I have also referred to Bob Ciaffone’s Robert’s Rules of Poker. [This link has been updated, as RRP has moved with Bob Ciaffone’s passing.]
Note that the rule book, unless otherwise noted, is written under the assumption that the games are being played in a limit format, with a small betting limit and a large betting limit. Please make appropriate adjustments when playing that game in the pot-limit or no-limit format.
This document also includes Appendices explaining the “Sevens Rule” (originally written by Michael Weisenberg) and various Lowball Scales (written by me [Chris Mecklin]).