The UK Poker Guide and Online Poker Sign Up Codes

Managing your emotions when playing poker is extremely important and can make the difference between winning and losing. We all know how difficult it can be to always control our emotions and even though some have a harder time than others, the bottom line is that emotions can cost you the game. Most pokers players learn to stay calm cool and collected at the table for long periods of time by keeping their emotions in check. Letting your emotions interfere with your game is called “Playing on tilt�, or “Going on tilt�, and is a common expression among players everywhere. Playing on tilt refers to players who start to play badly and begin making dumb mistakes that end up costing them the game, more importantly, large amounts of cash. There are various things players can do to help them to keep the emotional factor at bay.

Here are a few good tips to help you avoid “playing on the tilt�:

Take a break and walk it off. One of the most important things a player can do, especially after a bad loss, is to take a break. Even a short walk or a few relaxing deep breaths can really help to re-focus the player and put a stop to the downward cycle. Most tournaments offer regular short breaks that players should always take advantage of. These breaks are often popular among smokers who find that a quick cigarette break can calm them right down.

Listen to music. Many players will wear a music device and listen to their favorite tunes while playing. Music is a great stress reducer and can sooth many bad nerves. While listening to music may help players to maintain control and many professional players even recommend it, it can be annoying to some players.

Talk it out. Talking to a friend can also be very beneficial. Sharing your anger and re-counting a bad hand with a trusted friend can really reduce your own anger. In addition, a good friend will always empathize, support and, hopefully, offer some useful advice. Often friends know us best and usually know the right things to say. Besides, what are friends for right?

Eat Something. Eating can really have a calming effect for many players. It could be a whole meal or just a snack, perhaps even just chewing a stick of gum will do the trick. If it works, go for it! Whatever it is.

Gambling can be very addictive and emotions only feed the fire. While the above tips are very good suggestions, players often come up with their own calming solutions. Whether it be playing a game on your cell phone or getting a massage, knowing what keeps your head cool when playing poker is the key to controlling your emotions and staying on top of your game. Remember, once a player starts to let their emotions take over, other players quickly pick up on it and move in to easily take advantage of that player.

Lastly, even the best players realize that there is no room for emotions in the world of poker. So whenever you feel yourself losing control of your emotions, calm down. Again, use whatever method works for you.

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What is the hand that every poker player wants? This is the one hand that will beat all other hands at the table pre flop. The hand every poker player dreams of starting with. Pocket Aces. Granted, there are many other good hands, but none of them can beat pocket aces. If you want to significantly increase your odds of winning the pot, then this is the hand that you should be looking for. Very rarely do you hear about someone folding pocket aces. That is because some players mistakenly think that they cannot be beat. This is true up to a point in the hand. You do not ever want to fold pocket aces before the flop; after the flop, it’s a different story.

Pocket aces are most valuable before the flop. This is the time that you want to feed the pot with as much money as you can manage, and do it as quickly as possible. After the flop your chances of winning can decrease dramatically. You want to play this great hand while you have the hand won and not waste it. If you can do this, in most cases, your strategy will work to your advantage.

If, for some reason, you do not accomplish this and other players call your raise, you could find yourself in a very tough situation. After the flop you would be forced to try to determine what cards are in the hands the other players and then decide if they are good enough to beat yours. There is a good chance that your hand probably will not get any better because it is hard to improve on a pair of aces. The hands of the other players will have a much better chance of improvement.

If you find yourself in this situation, the game could go one of several different ways. You might get lucky and the other players will hit absolutely nothing on the flop. This scenario will leave you ahead in the game. However, if they do hit say two fives come up on the flop and they come out with a big bet, you have a problem because chances are you could be behind in the hand.

At this point, you really need to consider the idea that you are going to lose the hand. This is because there are many hands that will be able to beat your aces now. If you feel that any of the other players at the table have a better hand than you, then it is time for you to get out of the hand. This is when it is really important for you to know how to read the other players and decide when to fold. Pocket aces may be the best hand early in the game, but after the flop they lose their power. Don’t make the mistake of thinking pocket aces cannot be beat. As a poker player, I can say they can be and they will be. Aces can be a dangerous hand. When you know your beat, fold them!

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What are Ring Games and Tournaments?

When poker lovers worldwide claim they know the game well, most of them still don’t understand the basic differences between a ring poker game and a tournament poker game. Sure, some may have heard of the two types of games, but even then they don’t know enough about the differences between them. These differences are vital because they impact on a player’s strategy when playing. If you are a poker player but you aren’t clear about the differences between the two types of games, you’ll be sure to make important mistakes when playing. And mistakes in poker, mean losing money. You probably know more about tournament poker because that’s what you’ve seen on television. Ring games are rarely televised, because the big name players tend to compete in tournament games and not ring games.

Ring Games

A poker game called a ring game is about real cash on the table. That’s why it’s also called a cash game. The ring game begins after a poker player places real money on the table. Chips are still used in ring games, but it’s the real money that makes all the difference. Each chip has a real money equivalent. For the duration of this sort of game you can buy as many poke chips as you want. Also, no one can knock you off your seat. Not in a ring game. The blinds stay the same, but each ring game has different limits. In fact, one of the most important and significant differences in these ring games is that there is real cash, real money on the table of poker, and not simply poker chips. The other big difference is that you can stop at anytime. You can always stop, in the middle of a ring game, pick up your chips and cash out.

Tournaments

Tournament games are only played with poker chips and usually the poker chips are exchanged for what is called a buy-in. For example, if you are wanting to engage in a game of tournament, say for a buy-in of $100.00, then you would deposit your $100.00 and receive a pile of chips and a seat at the tournament table. Everyone playing will begin with the same number of chips. You get knocked out only when you lose your chips. Every so often, in tournament games, the blinds go up. At times, re-buys are allowed but only for a specified period of time and that usually only happens if you are knocked out. Right at the end of a tournament poker game, some of the places will receive payment for placing. At the end of the tournament the winner will always end up with the largest potion of the money.

Differences in Strategy

Both ring and tournament games may essentially be the same games, but the way they are played, the strategies players must use to play well, differ significantly. When it comes to ring games, a player can take it slow. There is no need to rush to make a move. In fact, you can sit there for as long as you like without playing many hands at all. In a tournament game, however, you need to very selective and think quickly regarding which hand you will play. In a tournament game, every chip that is won or lost has a major impact on your chip stack. And with the raising of the blinds, you won’t be able to sit idly for very long. You will be forced to make a move.

Differences such as these make the games interesting because players are forced to adopt a number of different strategies to play successfully. Some say that luck plays a larger role in tournament games than in ring games. Keeping this mind, if you strike out playing a tournament game, you might have better luck playing a ring game. If you strike out playing a ring game, at least you can restock your stack of chips, which means you’ll probably get your money back in the end. With a tournament game, however, losing our stack means you’ve totally lost out. You can’t re-buy. You might be one of the best players around, but in a tournament game the cards have to like you. You might play a great hand each time, but even the best poker hand has been known to lose a player’s money.

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The idea that poker is a game of luck is a badly flawed one.  If you play bad cards hoping that luck will save your hand in the draw, then you are going to be out of a lot of money with no one but yourself to blame.  Likewise if you let an amateur opponent betting on luck chase you down on every hand, you still have yourself to blame.  Skill wins poker, not luck, and letting yourself or anyone else believe otherwise is going to undermine how you play.

Some players never learn.  Time and again you hear them complain about losing when they started with a pocket pair of faces.  It isn’t bad luck.  It’s bad playing.  The only way to protect your hand is by playing it.  Sitting on a good hand when you could be betting on it is a flat out waste.  You open yourself to chasers when you should be betting them out of the game early.

If you don’t move aggressively on an early advantage, then don’t be surprised if ultimately another player draws out on top.  There is no rule that says you must play to the last card; the sooner you can take the pot the better, especially if your hand is at risk.  No reasonable player will beat you with what started as a weak hand unless you let them stay in the game.

Don’t slow play your own hand if the draw has been good to you.  For example, if there is potential for a straight in the draw, and you already have one in hand, then don’t let chasers ride it out hoping the draw will make a combination for them too.  This applies to online play as well. Often, in online poker, you will get fed a nice string of hands that tend to crush the table. You gotta hope that players at the table have weaker, but still decent hands that will induce betting into you. However, some players will wait for the draw anyway, but if you bet hard you will eliminate most chasers and stand a good chance of profiting from those that remain.

Betting is your hand’s best security.  If your hand is good but vulnerable, then bet to use your current advantage.  Don’t bet low hoping to string along a player waiting for their one out, because sometimes they get it.  Winning a small pot early in the hand is far better than taking a small loss at the end of it.

That said, it all comes down to risk.  You have to know what a good hand is, and you have to know when a good hand is really good enough to go the distance, or when it’s best to make your move early.  If your good hand stands to get better with a draw, then there is no sense in betting everyone out early.  The idea, after all, is to take the biggest pot possible.  If you can safely see all five cards drawn, then by all means let the other players pump your pot.  But if you’ve got a nice pocket pair and the other players are betting weak, don’t wait and see with the rest of them.  The point of all games is winning, but in poker it’s about winning big.

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Ten Basics for Building and Protecting Your Bankroll

Any player entering the competitive world of poker needs to decide a few things before starting regular play. One of the most important parts of your over all poker strategy is bankroll management. Learning to pace and protect your money early on will benefit you greatly later. The way you play your money is a personal choice, but good money management can be achieved simply and without cramping your style.

First. You must determine your end goal. Why and what are you playing for? Is it more about ranking or is it purely for money? Do you want to become a professional, or are you just playing for entertainment?

Second. You must devise a strategy for meeting your goal. At this stage you are determining the size of your initial bankroll, which will depend largely on how big you want to get into the game. Obviously high stakes play is going to require a greater initial investment than low stakes play.

Third. Open a new bank account to be used only for playing poker. This helps you to track what you spend and what you make. It also helps to view your earnings and your losses as a separate income.

Fourth. Your bank account is your bankroll. Don’t borrow from it for anything else, and always play with your bankroll in mind. Your bankroll should increase to meet your goals.

Fifth. Determine how your earnings will be divided in advance. What percentage goes into the bankroll, and what percentage are you taking as a profit to place in your personal account? Again, keep your goals in mind; if you want to play higher stakes then a larger percentage of your initial profits should go toward building your bankroll.

Sixth. Stay organized. Record all of your wins and losses, deposits and withdraws as if you were balancing your checkbook. This will show you how successful you have been thus far at moving toward your goals.

Seventh. Give yourself a budget and stick to it. It sounds rudimentary and many players find it limiting, but it’s easy to get excited and lose more than you planned. You will never do that if you determine what to bring to the table in advance and leave when it’s gone. It also makes figuring winnings easier if you know exactly what you started with.

Eighth. This is really just the second part of the last step. As you improve and get closer to your goal, you may want to increase your limits. You may also choose to divide your money differently at this point; once your bankroll is built up, you can take more of the profits for non-poker use.

Ninth. Update and upgrade your goals as you reach them, and likewise devise new strategies to keep you on track.

Tenth. Now that you have developed your strategy, it is time to put it to the test. It is important that you use self-restraint when playing. Many players get loose when they are both up and down, but you should play each hand with the same level of focus and consideration, regardless of your position at the table. Never stray from your bankroll strategy, and you’ll never lose your bankroll.

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The rules of texas holdem can be understood via 3 simple questions – who, what, and when; once you know the answer to all of these questions, you know how to play texas holdem.

WHO: THE DEALER, BLINDS, AND ALL THE REST

Texas holdem starts with the dealer; a position that at home rotates after each hand in a clockwise direction by passing the deck of cards. In a casino setting the act of dealing will be fulfilled by a single professional casino dealer. In the case of the casino play, the dealer acts as a proxy for the person whose turn it is to deal. The requirement to maintain the dealer position and its movement is crucial as this determines bet order, play, and blinds (which will be explained later). The dealer position is indicated in a casino by a ‘button’; a small disc with ‘dealer’ stamped on it, which the professional dealer will move a position to the left after each hand, in much the same way that the deck itself would be moved in a home game.

There are two positions in texas holdem play known as ‘blinds’; there’s the ‘big blind’ and the ‘little blind’ and they are the players filling the two positions to the left of the dealer with the little blind being directly to his left and the big blind being directly to the little blind’s left. Blinds are the compulsory amounts entered into the pot before the cards are dealt. Texas holdem requires no ante as other poker games do, instead it uses the blind system to kick start the betting even before the cards are dealt as the blinds are essentially compulsory bets on the unseen cards. The little blind is usually half the size of the big blind and these amounts will always be determined before play begins. Most often, the big blind is equal to the amount of a full small bet, so in a $2-$4 game the big blind would be $2. As the dealer position circulates so do the blind positions, so all players at some point pay both blinds.

If you are not the dealer, and not a big blind or little blind, you are ‘all the rest’, and you have no special role or requirements.

WHAT AND WHEN: CARDS AND BETS

First Round: After the blinds have been paid, 2 cards are dealt to each player face down – these are you ‘hole cards’ and shouldn’t be shown to anyone. The first betting round begins with the player to the left of the big blind. The bet at this point is to value of big blind which was the essentially a preemptive bet. This player therefore has 3 choices; call, raise, or fold. Betting continues around the table accordingly. The small blind, if he chooses to see the bet must make his original bet up to the amount on the table. If for example in a $2-$4 game where there had been one raise, the small blind must add $3 to see the bet. If the big blind wishes to raise the bet after being seen, he may do so once in the first round.

Second Round: following completion of the first round of betting, 3 community cards known as the ‘flop’ are placed face up on in the center of the table. These cards are for everyone’s use and should be used to make up each persons best 5 card poker hand. There will be two more cards dealt in this fashion – rounds 3 and 4. At this stage the blinds are no longer relevant so betting begins with the first player to the dealer’s left that is still in the game. As no bet has yet been laid, unlike in the first round when the blinds were the first bets, the player now has an extra option – he may check. A ‘check’ allows you to not bet so long as no-one before you has bet anything. So, this first player has the options of bet, check, or fold. If he checks, the next player has the same options; if he bets however, no-one else in that round can check but rather have the options of fold, raise, or see. Betting continues until all bets are seen. Some tables will limit the number of raises per betting round.

Third and Fourth Rounds: Following the second betting round, a fourth community card is dealt known as the ‘turn’, and a third betting round occurs following the same format as the second. Following this round, the fifth and final community card is dealt – the ‘river’. All 7 cards with which you can make up your best 5 card poker hand have now been dealt – the 5 community cards and your 2 hole cards. The fourth and final betting round is competed and once all bets have been called, each player still in reveals his hole cards. If a hand is revealed that beats yours, you are under no obligation to show what you have; you simply concede. The winning hand takes the pot.

Read our reviews of Great Places to Play Texas Holdem

Full Tilt Poker

Party Poker

Ultimate Bet

PokerStars

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