BY TOM SOMACH

What do you get when you cross poker with duplicate bridge?

Duplicate poker, of course!

That’s the new form of poker being offered by a website called E-PokerUSA (www.e-pokerusa.com).

The website claims its form of poker is not gambling, and therefore is legal in the United States.

The loophole?

Players only compete against other players who have the exact same cards–as in duplicate bridge–so technically, the element of chance is removed.

Because there is no “luck of the draw,” the website claims, the game is purely skill, and therefore legal in places where online games of chance are banned.

So what are the rules of duplicate poker?

According to the website, the game is played like this:

“There are always two or more tables of players, with the same number of players seated at each table. An identically ordered deck of cards is used at each table for each deal, so that players in the same seat position at each table receive the same hole cards, and the board cards are the same at each table.

“Every player begins each deal with the same number of playing chips, regardless of how he or she may have done in any previous deal. The player’s score for each deal is based on the net number of chips he or she has at the end of that deal as compared with the number of chips the player had at the start of that deal.

“The player’s score for a session (set series of deals) is whatever the net plus or minus result is for that player on all of the deals played in that session. A player’s outcome for a session is determined by that player’s ranking compared to each of the other players in his or her same seat position.”

The website goes on to explain why it considers itself legal:

“E-PokerUSA is a skill-based games site. Games in which the outcomes are determined more by skill than by chance are not gambling games under the laws of most of the states in the U.S.

“The rules for conducting the various forms of duplicate poker offered by E-PokerUSA assure that the luck of the draw element normally associated with poker games is eliminated.

“This results in the outcome of the games being determined primarily by the skill with which the identical hands are played by the players competing against each other…not whether you got good cards or bad cards. Every hand can win if it is well played.”

Despite its disclaimer of legality, the website lists several states in the U.S. where it says it is not legal, and therefore, players from those states are banned.

Those states are: Arizona, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland, Montana, South Carolina, Tennessee and Vermont.

To play on E-PokerUSA, participants pay a fee to join, and then can compete for cash prizes.

Despite the letters “USA” in the name of the company, the website actually operates from Saskatchewan, a Canadian province.

(E-mail Tom Somach at tomsomach@yahoo.com.)