A Quick Intro To Poker

Poker is becoming so popular, lately, that it’s almost a social requirement to know the basics of it.  I mean, it’s no fun to watch or participate in a game that you don’t understand.  Yet, people are constantly playing variations of the game everywhere, including at home with friends, in casinos and even on the Internet.  So, let’s talk about poker basics.

Three Poker Types:

Though there are hundreds of ways to play poker, when you factor in all the variations, most games fall into three families.  Games like Holdem, for instance, are community poker games.  That’s because they involve some community cards, which are used by all players.

Stud games involve players getting cards dealt only to them.  Also, some of their cards are displayed to their opponents and others are not.  7-Card Stud is one of the most popular Stud games.

Draw games, like 5-Card Draw, on the other hand, are games where all players have their own concealed cards, but may replace some or all of those cards with new cards before the final showdown.

Family Basics:

No matter what, the entire family of poker games has a few things in common.  These things are what make them poker games.  They’re also the things that make poker so interesting.

Betting/Winning Chips:

The first thing that all poker games have in common, obviously, is the betting.  What would poker be without betting?  Typically, betting is done with chips.  In cash games, players can buy in for an amount of money and leave the table at any time, turning their remaining chips back into cash.  In a tournament, each player pays an entry fee and gets the same amount of chips.  The final player or few players remaining get the prize money.

Forced Bets:

Another thing that nearly all poker games have in common is some sort of forced betting.  There are antes, which are chips paid by each player at the start of the hand.  There are also blinds, which are paid by just two players at the start of each hand.

The point of blinds and antes is to, basically, make sure that each hand has at least one winner.  That keeps the game progressing forward.  It would be a very boring game, after all, if nobody played most of the hands.

Winning:

There are two ways to win a poker hand, typically.  They first way is to simply be the last person left in the hand.  Each player has the option, on each betting round, to call, raise or fold.  If all but one player folds, that player wins and the hand ends early.

If two or more players see a hand through to the end, there’s a showdown.  That means that, of the remaining players, the player with the best hand wins.

Variations:

Now you know the poker basics.  Just keep in mind that they are just that, basics.  Each game is different and has slightly different rules.  For instance, in games like Razz, the worst hand wins, not the best.  So, always be sure to brush up on the rules of the specific game you’re playing, before you sit down at the poker tables.