Three Leaf Clover

Updated 30 October 2026 · Fan site. Not affiliated with Rockstar Games or Take-Two Interactive.

Three Leaf Clover is a story mission in Grand Theft Auto IV (2008) in which Niko Bellic and the McReary brothers rob the Bank of Liberty in Algonquin. Packie McReary gives the job. The robbery goes wrong, and the crew has to shoot its way out through the streets and subway tunnels. It pays $250,000 and is often called one of the best missions in the series.

What is Three Leaf Clover in GTA IV?

Three Leaf Clover is the bank robbery in Grand Theft Auto IV. Niko Bellic joins the Irish-American McReary family for a daylight raid on the Bank of Liberty in southern Algonquin. It is part of Packie McReary's strand of missions and comes after Waste Not Want Knots, according to the GTA Wiki (gta.wiki). Our GTA IV missions list shows where it sits in the story.

Who is in the crew?

Four men go into the bank: Niko, Packie, his older brother Derrick and their friend Michael Keane. Gta.wiki says their brother Gerry is at the family house when the job is planned but does not take part. Niko has to show up in a suit, and the mission can only be started during the day.

What happens in the mission?

The plan is simple on paper. Two of the crew watch the customers while Niko and Derrick go for the vault, which Derrick rigs with explosives on a timer. Then a customer with a gun opens fire and kills Michael. The vault blows, Niko grabs the money, and the crew walks out into a five-star police response.

The escape is the part players remember. The robbers fight through alleys towards a waiting police helicopter, then change plan and drop into a subway station. They follow the tracks through the tunnels with police behind them, come up through a service exit and steal a car. Niko then has to shake the police and drive the brothers back to the McReary house in Dukes. Gta.wiki notes that the five-star wanted level cannot be lost during the robbery itself and only drops later.

At the house Packie mourns Michael and pays Niko his share. Gta.wiki puts the total haul at about $1,000,000.

What do you get for completing Three Leaf Clover?

These rewards come from gta.wiki. After the job, Gerry and Packie phone Niko with new work, which leads into missions such as Actions Speak Louder than Words and Smackdown.

Why is Three Leaf Clover so famous?

Many writers rank it as the best mission in the series. In a 2022 feature, GamingBible's Ewan Moore called it the greatest GTA mission of all time, pointing to its writing, its twist and the sudden noise of the shootout in a game that is usually quieter. TheGamer's Andy Kelly wrote in 2021 that few missions match it and compared its look, with suited robbers carrying bags of cash through gunfire, to Michael Mann's film Heat.

Both writers also link it to the series' later heists. The planned robberies of GTA V, such as The Jewel Store Job and The Paleto Score, grew into a full mission type, and gta.wiki notes that Packie talks about this bank job if he is hired for The Paleto Score.

TheGamer also points out that the mission has no checkpoints. A failure sends you back to the start, so the tension holds all the way through. The failure conditions on gta.wiki include losing any of the crew on the way to the bank, killing too many hostages, leaving a teammate behind and destroying the money.

Is Three Leaf Clover in the GTA IV episodes?

Yes. Wikipedia notes that Luis Lopez is in the bank during the robbery, and the job is shown from his side in the episode's first mission, I Luv LC, at the start of The Ballad of Gay Tony. Gta.wiki says Luis is chatting with the armed customer in the queue when the crew arrives, which makes him one of the hostages. It adds that the shootout also appears in the end credits of The Lost and Damned.

Wikipedia's article on GTA IV also mentions the robbery in its plot summary, describing it as a major bank job Niko carries out with Packie and his brothers. For the McRearys' wider story, including what happens to Derrick and Kate later on, see our Packie McReary page.

Why is it called Three Leaf Clover?