5 Rules For Playing Casino Poker

Poker in a casino doesn’t have to be an intimidating, awkward, or uncomfortable experience. Quite the opposite. With the right perspective and a few pointers about what to do and how to do it, playing in a casino can be more enjoyable, relaxing, and pleasant than playing in your own home. Hey, you don’t have to clean up when the game is over!

1. It’s OK to look like you don’t know what you’re doing.
This is, by far, the most important rule. Don’t worry how others view you. It doesn’t matter. In fact, if your goal is to win money and have fun then it would be great if you could fake the image of a new player even if you're an experienced pro. Experienced players tend to play more softly, less aggressively, and less competitively against a new player. It’s human nature for most of us to be nice to the new guy. And, if they think you’re awful, they’re not going to be paying much attention to what you’re doing -- figuring that they have the edge.

Sure, there are some jerks who love to point out everything that everyone else does wrong. But don’t worry about them. They’re jerks -- and they’re generally not respected or liked in the poker room. They’re also not really very good players. If they were, then why weren’t they in some high stakes game rather than behaving badly in the low limit game you entered? If they were really sharp, why would they be pointing out the mistakes other players are making? This can only make others better players or drive them away, no? So don’t give them a moment’s pause. Chances are that the majority of the players at the table are siding with you over them anyway. Their attacks make you more likeable -- so enjoy them or just ignore them.

2. Act in turn.
This is easy to do. Pay attention to where the action is and make sure to bet when it is your turn to do so. Other players can’t stand someone who takes forever because they’re distracted -- or someone who bets too soon. Take a couple of seconds before you act just to make sure that you are, in fact, acting in turn. Also, a pause before you act will get you in the habit of thinking about what you’re going to and why you’re doing it -- both good things in the long run.

3. Find out as much as you can about the poker room before you sit down.
There is no rule that says that you have to sit down in a live game as soon as you arrive in a poker room. Yet that’s exactly what new players routinely do. Sure, you’ll be eager to play after a long drive. But don’t follow your instincts on this one. Take a while to look around when you arrive. I can honestly tell you that I did not play one hand on my first visit to a poker room. I walked around, read the rule book, watched the dealers, learned where to buy chips, saw where the bathrooms were and watched other players lose their money before I ever bought one chip. I suggest the same to you.

Find out what games they spread, what limits are offered, where players buy chips, what the rake is, how you get your name on a list for a new game, how you change games, how seats are assigned, what tournaments they offer, what special promotions or players comps they offer to players -- and how they get dispensed. Don’t be embarrassed with having a lot of questions. The job of a poker room floor person or manager is to make new players feel welcome. You are their reason for being. So don’t be shy.

Make sure you’re taking advantage of all of the few perks that are available to poker players. Some places let you earn points while you play that can be redeemed for food, rooms, or other items for sale in the poker room. If you don’t have a player’s club card, however, you may miss out. If there is a rule book, get it and read it. If you have any unanswered questions, again, don’t be shy. In a poker room, information is about the only thing that’s free. Take advantage of it.

4. Pick a game with limits you know you can afford.
Yes, you might be able to beat the biggest game in the poker room. You may have the bankroll of Midas and his golden touch to match. But when you’re first visiting a room, you don’t have to prove anything. You’re much better off just getting acclimated in a game that won’t hurt you if you get a bad run of cards or have difficulty concentrating.

Think of it like driving a car for the first time. You want a nice big empty parking lot or a wide country road without a lot of traffic. You don’t want to learn to drive on a 70-mph superhighway or in downtown Manhattan.

5. Plan on a short session with many breaks.
Playing in a casino game is likely to be very different from a home game. The tempo of the play tends to be much faster. Players make their decisions more quickly and there’s a lot less conversation, eating, or general time-wasting than in most home games. This stems in part from the more serious style of play that most players have adopted in a casino poker game. And it’s surely a product of having a professional dealer who keeps things moving in order to maximize the house rake for the hour as well as his hourly rate of tips. This speed of play can be tiring at first until you get used to it. Even so, many new players stay way too long, hurting their ability to concentrate and destroying their discipline.

Table Position in Poker

Position is simply where you are sitting in relation to the dealer's button. In holdem and many other poker games, your position at the table is a big factor. The strength of your position comes from the fact that the betting goes in a clockwise fashion. In a favorable position you get to see how many other players react to their hands and whether they fold, bet, or call before you do. The poker phrase, "Position is power" comes from this simple idea.

There are many names associated with position to identify where players are sitting in relation to the dealer's button. Each particular position has its own strengths or weaknesses.

• The small blind has the worst position after the flop and must invest half a bet.



• The big blind invests an entire bet and similarly has a poor position.



• The player under the gun has the worst position preflop and a junk position afterwards.



• The button has the best position during any betting round.

The importance of your position depends on many factors. For example, in no limit holdem, position is much more important than in limit holdem. It is always better to be in an late position though, so it is important to identify what hands are generally playable in all positions.

For example, lets say you're under the gun. You have Queen-Ten, unsuited and decide to limp into the pot. The player to bet after you raises, and everyone but you folds.. Now you're in a jam. Chances are good that this player has a better hand than you. If they have any ace, king, or pocket pair, they are statistically better than you. You'd suspect that someone who raised has at least a hand like that. Now you can either call again and go into the flop as an underdog or you can fold and just give up a bet. What's worse is that if you call, you will be acting before this player for the rest of the hand.

On the other hand, let's say you're on the button. You have Queen-Ten, unsuited and everybody folds to you. One option would be to fold and let the blinds fight it out. Another would be the just call and see what happens on the flop. Many players here would raise because you could steal the blinds and even if you didn't, you'd act after them for the remainder of the hand. Raising is only a viable option because of your favorable position.

Another notable factor is that position goes hand in hand with knowing the players directly around you. For example, an aggressive, blind-stealing player to the immediate right of a tight player usually results in the tight player's blinds getting stolen.

Being in late position with a good hand has major strengths over being early with a good hand. Early position raisers are assumed to have a good hand and it tends to scare players away. Early preflop raises can force the other players to call two bets at once (or more in the case of pot limit or no limit holdem) when there is nearly nothing in the pot worth fighting for. In late position, there may be players who have already called one bet. Those players only have to call one bet (in limit) with a little something already in the pot. So players in late position with a good hand have the ability to manipulate the pot size, which will make future bets easier to call in the upcoming betting rounds.

Learning to Fold in Holdem

If all things were equal at the poker table, you'd win, roughly, your share of hands: that is, around one-tenth of hands played if it's a regular 10-seat table. Assuming, for the moment, that nobody folds before showdown.

But nothing is ever equal at the poker table. You and the other players have different strengths; you sit in positions which drastically change your advantages; and you can choose to fold anytime it's your turn, changing the number of competitors. Your greatest point of control is whether to take part or not in that particular hand.

All players cut themselves out of the running by folding some of the time, because it's perfectly obvious that just showing up to play isn't a winning strategy. Too many of us, however, don't fold often enough -- as if relying on others to fold and get out of our way. I don't think it's simply an urge to do something rather than nothing; some excellent poker players believe there's an ingrained impulse to act once we've been dealt a hand. But I think it's a superstition. A feeling, a belief that we would win if others just cooperate a little. We regard folding as giving in, as failure. Deep down, we don't really, really believe that we should ever fold.

It's a superstition you have to reject. Even if we were sitting at the imaginary equal-chance table above, never folding is still not good strategy, is it? You are still losing far more often than you win.

You need to fold more often than other people, generally. Those selected hands you play you choose because you have a strong starting hand. This is in direct opposition to what you may feel at the poker table, though.

You may find your justification for staying in with those cards was thin, or just plain false. Setting rules for yourself is often useful in combating the impulse to call to stay in, and hence the popularity of starting hand charts. You'll adjust that group of hands you decide to stay in with according to your position, the level you're playing, and your impressions of the other players.

You can see, from the percentage of the times they win, which are always fairly good Holdem hands before the flop although they are not pairs: AK, AQ, AJ; KQ, KJ.

But just because your starting hand is a lot better than the other ones you've been getting all session -- like getting dealt QT after stuff like 89 offsuit and 72 off for hours -- that doesn't make this hand a strong hand. This is especially true if it hasn't been a particularly loose table. Evaluating your hand does NOT mean comparing it to your previous hands.

What to Buy for Home Poker

How much you want to spend on your game is up to you. You can buy a deck of cards and plastic chips for under $10 at your local Target or Wal-Mart. But if you are going to host a regular game, it’s worth investing in some nice chips, cards, and even a table.

A number of local retailers sell nice chips that are thick, and feel like the chips you use at the casino. The best way to buy chips in my opinion is online. I've checked prices at a number of local retailers, and even the one who claimed to have the lowest prices in town could not beat the deals that are available online. The best can be found on Ebay. Just type in “poker chips” and you can easily find a set to your liking. You should be able to get a great set for around $100 or even less, depending on chip style and quantity.

In terms of cards, the best in my opinion are KEM. I paid $20 for a set of two decks three years ago at a local mall. I still have the set, and while it has been used countless times, the cards seem like new. $20 may sound a bit steep for cards, but the quality is what you pay for. A nice set of cards are more enjoyable to play with as well -- they are the same kind that are used at many casino card rooms, and have a nicer feel than the $.99 deck than you could buy at the gas station. Another very durable set are A-Plus playing cards, which are similarly priced.

If you want to go all out, you can invest in a poker table. These are available online too. Ebay has a wide array to choose from, or simply do a search for “poker tables,” and you’ll find many retailers who carry them. You might also find poker tables at specialty stores in your area. Prices range from about $150 on up to several thousand.

Another option: Buy a felt that you can use to cover the table. This is a great way to create a poor man’s poker table, and substantially cheaper. Either a felt or poker table makes a great investment. You’ll see there is a huge difference between playing on a regular table than playing on a felted table. A felted surface makes it much easier to shuffle cards and chips, and makes for a more enjoyable game.

Additional Etiquette. Finally, a few words on etiquette if you are invited to a game, to increase the likelihood that you will be invited back.

Always offer to bring something. Not doing so is, simply, rude. If someone is hosting a game, offer to bring some beverages or snacks. You don’t have to spend a bundle, it’s just a matter of being courteous to the host.

Don’t take it upon yourself to light up a heater unless you know it’s okay to do so. In theory, poker, beer, and stogies all go together. If it’s your home, that’s one thing, but if you’re going to another’s house (especially if they have a family) it’s not very polite to assume you can light up.

Also, know when to leave. This may sound obvious, but many people just don’t get the hint. The “last hand” becomes “one more go-around” and then “one more hour.” Don’t imagine you can hang around for another hour after the game drinking the last two beers in the cooler, especially if the host has a family or has work in the morning.

Finally, offer to host, if you can. If the host of the game wants to host every week, fine. But it is nice to offer to host a game if you’ve been going to the same game for several weeks.

Avoiding a Bad Beat

Avoiding bad beats is one of the most important skills to learn in poker. Poker players at any level just hate it when they get a bad beat, they are are the most annoying and frustrating hands in the game! So what are they, and more importantly, how can you go about avoiding bad beats?

Well a bad beat is when you are overwhelming favorite to win a hand - but still lose. It really is a sickener as often you can lose all your chips and go out of the game on a bad beat, just because you were convinced you had the hand won.

There are two types of bad beat in the game of Texas Holdem poker - the type that you can't really do anything about and the type that can be avoided.

Here's a scenario for the first type:
You've got a pair of aces, the best possible starting hand while your only opponent left in the betting is holding a pair of fours. The flop comes A Q 4 and your opponent goes all-in. You call, you've got the best possible hand at that point. The turn is a 4 and you don't catch your ace on the river, you've just lost to four of a kind.

In this case you could not have done anything about it. There is no way you could fold your triple aces, you had the best possible hand. If you fold that you might as well take up knitting!

Here's how the second (avoidable) type of bad beat plays out:
You've got A Q and again only you and MrX are involved in the betting. This time he's low on chips and is going all in with J 9 out of desperation. You decide to call as you've got a good chance of boosting your chips and you feel he doesn't have a hand. Flop is 10 7 2 and he hits his 8 on the turn for a straight.

So how can you go about avoiding bad beats like these? Firstly you need to realize that in online poker tournaments the instances of bad beats are much higher than in real life poker in a casino or home poker game.

There are several reasons for this, but the botom line is that it comes down to the online poker player being a different breed. The average online player is far more likely to play a hand and is far more likely to be distracted by other games he's playing at the same time, or the TV, or the kids or whatever.

You need to counter this by playing a very tight poker game. Only play VERY big hands and don't get involved in any hand with more than three callers. Even pocket aces have only a slightly better than 50% chance of winning against three opponents.

So stay tight, and when you do hit a hand, bet big. You want to limit your opponents as much as possible so make a big raise and get them to fold. Avoiding bad beats is a skill that it definitely pays to learn.

Some Hold Em Strategy From the Best

I was around at a friends place last night, passing the time before heading out with a quick game of Hold Em. Keen to test out the new lessons I had learnt from my browsing through the poker archives, we got stuck into it. The game was fairly even, with neither of the four of us getting a clear advantage over the others. As we were leaving, I noticed one of my friends had poker book lying around on the counter. Then I saw the cover image - Daniel Negreanu - and had to take a closer look.

What I discovered was an great source of poker tips and advice from various sources, and an opportunity to apply these skills to my next game. Eager to see if there was anything of this type available on Amazon, I came across this - Power Hold Em Strategy by Daniel Negreanu.

The books only available for pre-order at the moment, but I've already gone ahead and secured mine, and given the articles by Daniel that I have read before, this should be a gem!