Pok Deng is undeniably a famous (or, ironically, infamous) game rooted in Thai culture. I think most Thai people have played at least a game of Pok Deng. I have been told and have taken for granted that the host ("เจ้ามือ") statistically wins in a game of Pok Deng. At first, it is not clear why is that the case. So, I tried to investigate that.
Turned out, with the way I played, being the host was suboptimal (zero edge, large variance). Moreover, the only way that the host could statistically win is through a more complex strategy.
While Pok Deng is a famous game, there is not a single piece of formal game theoretical exploration article that I can find. So this is probably the first one. I tried to get this published somewhere since I thought it is a somewhat interesting investigation. But I am not willing to rewrite this article in Microsoft Word (i know, eww), nor pay any fee to get this peer-review. So, I didn't have much choices.
So take it with a big grain of salt, and if there is any issue / mistake, kindly let me know!
Enough with the informal introduction, go read the article!
- Can also look at mixed strategy.