5 Card Dash Help

How to play 5 Card Dash

Drop...

Use the mouse or left arrow, right arrow and down arrow keys to arrange the falling cards into rows of poker hands. The game ends when no more cards fit!

Score!

Beat the 'Minimum hand' to score and remove that row from the board.
Fill the whole 'Rule Book' to go to the next level.

More...

Read all the topics below for more information.

Modes

5 Card Dash comes in 3 flavors: Regular, Pro, and Freestyle.

Regular Mode:

You control the falling speed of the cards by using the down arrow key. No time pressure, just try to create the best poker hands you can with the cards you are dealt.

Pro Mode:

Position the falling cards into poker hands by rows. As you get to the higher levels, the cards will fall faster.

Freestyle Mode:

Choose one level to play and rack up the points for a high level score. Great for practicing a level or for a quick 5 Card Dash fix!

Tutorial:

A 2 minute animation of how to play 5 Card Dash.

The Mouse

To use the mouse, move the cursor over the card grid.

Mouse left/right	Moves the active card left/right.
Left click	In Regular mode, drops the active card one step. In Pro and Freestyle, makes the active card fall faster.
Right click	Drops the active card to the bottom. After it hits, you can't move it anymore.

You can also use the keyboard to play. (See "The Keyboard" for keyboard information.)

The Keyboard

To use the keyboard to direct the cards, move the cursor out of the card grid.

Left Arrow	Moves the active card left.
Right Arrow	Moves the active card right.
Down Arrow	In Regular mode, drops the active card one step. In Pro and Freestyle, makes the active card fall faster.
Ctrl or End	Drops the active card to the bottom.
Up Arrow	Chomp -- discards the active card.
Spacebar, Pause or p	Pauses the game.
Esc	Quit.

Scoring

Poker hand scores include points for card values as well as poker hand combinations.

Any hand that meets the 'Minimum hand' will score at least the card points and the poker hand points.

Card Points:

Jokers	0 points
Wilds	0 points
2-9	5 points
10-K	10 points
A	15 points

Read the "Poker Hands" section to see the points for poker hands.

Poker Hands:

Name	Points	Description	Example
1 pair	50 pts	2 cards with same value
2 pair	75 pts	1 pair and another pair
3 of a kind	100 pts	3 cards with same value
straight	150 pts	5 cards in sequence (any suit)
flush	150 pts	5 cards with same suit
full house	200 pts	3 of a kind plus a pair
4 of a kind	250 pts	4 cards with same value
straight flush	300 pts	5 cards in sequence with same suit
royal flush	500 pts	A,K,Q,J,10 in same suit
5 of a kind	500 pts	5 cards with same value

Aces can be either high or low in a straight. The cards can be in any order.

Bonuses

Rule Book Bonus:

Complete the hands listed in the 'Rule Book' to get the rule book bonus. As the levels increase the rule book bonuses also increase.

Bonus Cards:

Use cards from the 'Bonus Cards' section in a scoring hand to earn bonus card points:

1 bonus card	50 points
2 bonus cards	200 points
3 bonus cards	450 points
4 bonus cards	800 points

Sequential Rule Books:

Some levels will start out with only the top rule open, which means you will score only after that rule is filled. Once it is filled, the next rule will open up. With a sequential rule book there are two strategies for play:

1) Score poker hands in the order that they open up, or

2) Collect poker hands to score multiple rows at one time for extra points

Two rows that score at one time will result in a 2x bonus, three rows at once will score 3x, and so forth.

Specials:

	Burn	Discards the single card it lands on
	Fold	Folds (removes from the board) the entire row it lands on
	Wild Changer	Changes the wild card to the value of the one it lands on
	Face Up	Flips over all face-down cards in the column
	New Suit	Changes the suit of the card where it lands
	New Card	Redeals the card it lands on

Miscellaneous

Chomps:

Use the up arrow key to "chomp" or discard a falling card before it lands. Earn a Chomp card every time you complete a level (up to 4).

Wild Cards:

Wild cards and Jokers can take on any value to complete a poker hand.

Decks:

Each level uses 1, 2 or 3 decks of cards. The number of different card backs in the dealing area tells you how many decks are in the level.

When the deck(s) are used up, they are reshuffled. In Pro and Freestyle modes, cards fall faster with each new shuffle!