Before you can start winning at poker, you need to know and understand how to play poker! There are a wide variety of poker games with different rules and poker strategies. There are even different betting structures (such as limit, no limit) and various poker game formats like normal cash games and Fun Play (play money) games.
Contrary to the impressions that you may have gotten via your television, there are many types of poker game with different variations, styles and poker strategy.
Texas Hold'em (usually just Hold’em) is the most popular poker game. You can play limit (with a betting limit), pot limit (the contents of the pot is the limit for bets) and no limit (no restriction will be played), with slightly different poker play strategies for each betting structure. Texas Hold’em is a community card game where each player receives two cards, while sharing five community cards. The player who stays until the end of the round and has the best cards (his or her cards combined with the community cards) to create the best hand of five cards, wins.
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Omaha Hold'em – a community card game similar to Texas Hold'em. Omaha casino poker players receive four separate cards and share five community cards. Usually it is played as Eight-or-Better, High-Low Split (split profits of the highest and lowest hand), but also as a high-only (only the highest hand) win. Furthermore, it can be played as Limit, Pot Limit and No Limit (No Limit is rarely played.)
Stud Poker has many variations. The Seven Card Stud is the most popular version, which is played in casinos, while seven-card high-low is more common in tournaments. Although Stud is very popular in many forms (Baseball, Anaconda, Chicago) with private card games, in casinos, it has lost much of its popularity when compared to community card games.
The most basic of all poker games, Five Card Draw, is a game that tens of millions of people are familiar with. Due to the extremely high level of basic skills (bad players do not have the slightest chance whatsoever) Draw is almost extinct in casinos. Jacks or Better, where the player must have a pair of Jacks or better cards before he can open up the game is a common variation.
Razz is the Seven Card Stud Lowball Version (Lowball = the worst hand wins). Razz, a routine game of poker, that is played with a full table, is not very popular, unless it is played in tournaments or shorthand situations (6 or less players), where limited chips and high ante animate players to take action. (see HORSE below).
Badugi is a four-card lowball / triple draw version (triple draw: there are 3 rounds of betting and exchange), in which the goal is to have four cards of different colors and different ranks at the end. So A234 of different colors would be the best hand. When, during the showdown, there is no player that has a four-card Badugi, the lowest three-card Badugi wins the round.
HORSE (Hold'em-Omaha-Razz-Eight or Better), HOE (Hold'em-Omaha-Eight or Better) and OE (Omaha High Low, Stud High Low) are used in casinos with higher limits. Mixed games are widely used to "keep out specialists" of individual games.
Poker games at home can be played by any rules, but poker rules at casinos and poker rankings are consistent. Cards are divided into ranks; with the highest card being the ace, followed by King,
Queen, Jack, Ten, Nine, and so on up to two. The poker hand ranking is as follows:
Straight Flush (Monochrome Street). Five consecutive cards of the same color. (Colors are spades, hearts, clubs and diamonds). The highest possible straight flush is a Royal Flush. A Royal Flush includes Ace, King, Queen, Jack and Ten of the same color.
Four of a Kind. Four cards of the same rank, for example four Kings.
Full House. Three cards of the same rank, with a pair of another rank. For example KKK33. (King, King, King, Three, Three)
Five cards of the same color. For example, Ace, Queen, Nine, Seven and Three of clubs.
Five consecutive cards of different colors. For example, 98765
Three cards of same rank, such as 888
Two cards of one rank and two cards of another rank. For example Queen, Queen, Ten, Ten
Two cards of same rank.
No Pair, High Card (High Card, less than one pair)
