Category: Articles

At the start of the poker session the players cut the cards to decide who will deal first: the person with the lowest value card is the first to deal. The job of dealer in poker is very important, for not only does he shuffle the deck and deal the requisite number of cards to each player, but he is also in charge of the game during the period of the deal. The dealer will ensure that each player acts in his proper turn and puts the right amount of money into the pot. Play starts with the player on the dealer’s immediate left and progresses in a clockwise direction. This means that the dealer enjoys the advantage of being able to bet last. After the first hand has been dealt the role of dealer passes to the player who is sitting on the immediate left of the original dealer and then to each player around the table, again in a clockwise direction, so that all players can enjoy this benefit.

Before the cards are dealt, everyone contributes a small amount to the pot: this is called the ante. This makes sure that there is some money in the pot for the players to fight over at the start of the hand. Once money has entered the pot it can only be taken out again by the winner of that particular hand.

After everyone has anted the dealer shuffles the deck and offers it to the player on his right to cut. Then he deals one card from the top of the deck to each player, starting with the player on his left, dealing clockwise and finishing with himself. He does this five times in all, so that everyone has five cards. It is important that the cards should be cut, because it is one way to reduce the risk of cheating. Sometimes at the start of the session, the players might also cut to determine the seating arrangement, but in most home games people sit where they like at the table. The relative seating positions of players at the table is important for several reasons, some are prosaic but some are tactical.

 

The Betting

The first player to act in a draw poker game is the one to the immediate left of the dealer. His options are to check (meaning to make no bet at this stage) or open if he likes his cards. To indicate a check, players can say ‘check’ or simply tap the table. When betting it is usual to announce the amount you are betting, so everyone is clear about what you are doing. Then the option passes to the next player. Once somebody has opened the betting however, those behind can no longer check. They must fold (throw their cards away and take no further part in the hand), call (put in a sum to equal the bet to stay in the game) or raise (increase the bet). So when a player is calling a bet, he puts in the same amount of money as has already been bet. If he is raising he must say/raise’ and put in the amount of money required to call the bet plus an additional amount of money for the raise. Except when a player is all-in’ (see below for a definition) the amount of his raise must be at least as much as the amount of the bet. So if the bet is £10, the raise must be at least £10. Thus the player making the raise would have to put £20 into the pot, £10 to call the bet and another £10 to raise. All players must have put in the same amount of money in order to stay in the game. In the following example I have kept all of the bets in units of £10, apart from the antes (£1) for simplicity. This would be called a £10 limit game, because the bets are limited to a maximum of £10.
At the beginning of the betting round there is £6 in the pot (made up of a £1 ante from each player). The dealer was player F, meaning that player A is first to act. To begin with players A and B both check, player C opens for £10, so
now all subsequent players must call this £10, raise or fold. Player D folds and thus takes no further part in this hand. Player E calls by matching the £10 bet. Player F raises £10 and to do this he must first match the £10 bet and then put in a further £10 for the raise, making £20 in all. Note that all players must put an equal amount of money after each betting round to remain in contention for the pot. So as Player F has now put £21 in the pot, players A and B are each required to put in £20 (as they have only put in £1 each at this point) in order to stay in the game. However, player C only needs to put in £10 to call (because he has already put in £10). Player A decides to fold, but player B calls the £20. Player C decides to re-raise a further £10, but of course first he puts in the £10 to call, making £20 he puts in at this time. So now all subsequent players must put in the difference to equal the £31 total contribution that player C has made to the pot. Player E, who would have to put in a further £20, decides this is too expensive and folds, player F calls player C’s re-raise of £10, as does player B.

End of part 1, click for part2

There are many different types of online payment method available these days, some are fairly well known like PaySafe and others are less well known like Neteller. All the payment methods which I list in this article are solid and are ones you can trust 100%. In any case the majority of these online payment methods let you draw money directly to and from your bank account so you never really keep any money with them they are just a conduit.

You may have noticed that a lot of casinos offer special deposit bonuses if you use these alternative payment methods and the reason for this is that there are sometimes loopholes that mean that a player can complain to their credit card company after a big loss saying they were swindled and sometimes the credit card company can claw the money back from the online casino. As you can well imagine this is not a situation that the online casinos enjoy especially when the vast majority of them are completely above board and honest and for this reason they prefer to loose just a little bit of money through deposit bonuses as opposed to risking all the money by people depositing by credit card. Having said that you can of course still use credit cards to deposit money into your gaming account but hopefully by the end of this article you will see that using online payment methods is easier and makes more sense.

The main online payment methods found at online casinos and poker rooms are Neteller, Moneybookers, PaySafe, ClickandBuy and PayPal. There are of course quite a few more but these are the ones that you will find at most online gaming establishments. Personally I have three separate accounts with Neteller, Moneybookers and PayPal and I haven’t been to an online gaming site recently that doesn’t accept at least one of those payment methods. 

If I was to recommend just one of them then I would probably say Neteller purely because of the options it gives you. In effect it is a proper little bank account kept offshore, you can get a debit account and even a credit card for your account which works in most countries around the world and it has a really clean and easy interface. The support for Neteller used to be quite scrappy but it has improved a lot recently and in any case when has support and banks ever co-existed!

I could go into more details about the various online payment methods and maybe I will in another post but I just wanted to show you all the options out there. In summary I urge you all to open at least one online payment account and start getting those juicy extra bonuses from the online casinos and poker rooms.

The most famous game in the casino is poker and it gives skillful players the best chance to make money, but you don’t have to wear a stetson and drink whiskey to learn the ropes. Of all the casino games, poker is the most familiar. There is some dispute as to the roots of the game, but most agree that it is European. Most game historians say that it comes from an eighteenth-century French game, poque, but others say it derived from a German game called pochspiel. Still others look to the opposite side of the world and attribute the name to a Hindu word, pukka. Whatever the derivation, it’s clear that poker became popular in the US in the 1850s.
Poker is today a staple in any gambling hall, legal or illegal. More Americans have played poker than have played golf, tennis and backgammon combined. And whether they play for big stakes, nickels and dimes, or for matchsticks, the players’ enjoyment of poker is the reason it is undoubtedly the most popular card game.

Even when casino gambling was legal only in Nevada, poker could regularly be found in fire halls, social clubs, church basements, and fraternal organisations. It is now played legally in more than half the US, and semi-legally in all the other states and territories. As you might suspect, casino poker varies a bit from your kitchen table variety, but the basics are essentially the
same. What is most different in the casino is the skill levels of the players. You might be the card shark of your neighbourhood, but when you play poker in a casino, there are many other factors to consider, other than which player has the best hand.

You’ve seen that there are professional blackjack players who can make a living playing a game in which they can reduce or eliminate the house advantage. And you learned that good sports gamblers can handicap a sporting event through knowledge of specific details unknown to the average bettor.

But since poker is a game that has no house advantage, you must be prepared for a large collection of players who are trying to make a living from the game. There are more professional poker players than any other type of gambler.
 
Don’t be fooled into thinking that all the “professionals” are playing the high-limit games, and if you play games with £1
minimum and £2 maximum bets, you won’t have to worry about the pros. That’s not true. You’ll meet the professional poker players at every level, whether they are on the way up the ladder, or have been knocked down and are looking to get back up.

Should this deter you from playing the most popular game in a casino? The answer is a qualified “No”.

Because poker requires skill, it’s not something where you can hope to stumble across enough good luck to win. While there is some debate on how skill is acquired (are good poker players born or made?), you can read enough about the game to understand its nuances and sit down and enjoy a lively session. Just remember that you never stop learning about poker. After appreciating the basics, your education is just beginning. The various plays, the different combinations, but most of all, the variety of players is what often makes this game the most fascinating of all.

There are many different kinds of poker games. Five-card draw and five-card stud may be popular around the kitchen table, but are now a rarity in the casinos. Forget about the “wild card” games you’ve read about. You won’t see any Deuces wild, one-eyed Jacks, or Jokers added to a poker game in a casino. The two most popular poker games by far in a casino are seven-card stud and Texas hold’em. While there are many other poker permutations that you can find – Omaha hold’ em, Omaha Eight-or-better, razz, lowball draw and many more – for purposes of brevity and comprehension, you’ll be wise to concentrate on the two most popular games, which will be covered in this book.

When most people are asked to name a casino game the first one that they’ll think of is probably Blackjack or Roulette. The reason for this is the massive media exposure the game has in terms of appearing in movies, books etc. Another reason is that the game is so accessible and easy to play.

If you break Blackjack down to its core then you find that all you need to do is get nearer to a points total of 21 than the dealer. Depending on the rules of the casino the dealer has to stick on either 16/17 or higher or keep drawing cards until they go bust, with a points total greater than 21.

The points total is calculated as follows, cards 2-10 are worth the value printed on them. The face cards, Jack, Queen and King are also worth 10. The Ace is a little bit funny as it can be either 1 or 11 depending on what suits you the best.If you get dealt a 10, Jack, Queen or King together with an Ace then this is called a natural Blackjack and you get paid out at 2.5:1 as opposed to the usual 2:1 i.e if you bet $5 and win you would normally get paid out $10 but with a natural Blackjack it is $12.50!

To further complicate things a bit you are presented with a few options after you are dealt the first two cards. If the two cards have the same value, e.g two 10’s or 2 9’s or a 10 and a king then you are given the option of splitting your cards. What this means is that you repeat your initial bet but get a brand new hand to play each of which have an initial value of just one of the pair. Each of these hands is then dealt a new card. This can be a great strategy especially if the dealers visible card, the dealer is also dealt two cards one of which is visible to the players, is a 6 or lower. I have a table in the articles section which can be used as a strategy guide for these kind of decisions.

Another option after the initial deal is insurance. This is where the bank will offer you insurance against the bank getting a natural blackjack, which beats any hand you might have. Insurance will be offered if the dealers, banks, visible card is an Ace and if you take insurance, half your original bet, and the dealer makes the blackjack then you get paid at 2:1 which means you cover your original bet, if not then you loose your insurance money. It is completely up to you if you decide to take out insurance or not and at best it comes down to a gut feeling!

A third option offered at most Casino Blackjack games is the option of doubling your bet after the initial 2 card deal. This is similar to the decision of whether or not to split and depends heavily on how strong your hand is compared to the dealers but as a rule of thumb if you are sitting with a points total of 10 or 11 and the dealer is showing 6 or lower then you can double. Again the Blackjack strategy table, which I mentioned before, is very useful for this.

As mentioned previously the dealer has to stick at typically 17 although there are variations on this number from casino to casino. Because of this it is important that you get as high a points total yourself before the dealer reveals his second card and starts possibly drawing further cards. The Blackjack Strategy Table can be used to help you decide which number you should stick at but in general you should always try and get at least a 17 or higher to have any real chance of winning.

 

I will now provide a few examples to show how Blackjack should be played:

 

Example 1:

You get dealt a King and a 10 and the dealer has a 5 showing. This is a really strong starting position for you and a weak position for the dealer, you already have a points total of 20 which is the second best you can ever have, in this situation you should always stick as you would have to be extremely unlucky not to win, whilst the only card which could improve your hand is an Ace which is not very likely to come up!

 

Example2:

You get dealt a 5 and a 6 which totals up to 11. This is a very strong starting position and the only dealer card which would make you nervous would be an Ace. In this situation you should always double up your bet, unless the dealer has that Ace, because any card 6 or higher would give you a great chance of winning the hand.

 

Example 3:

Let’s say you get dealt 2 aces, this is not only a great hand in Texas Hold’em but also very strong in Blackjack although not together as you would have to take the lower value for at least one of them, i.e a value of 1 which gives a total of 12 which is not a very nice starting position. What you would do in this situation is split the cards so that each new hand now has a starting value of 11. If at least one of them gets an extra card with a value of 10 then you have Blackjack.

 

This then is the basics of Blackjack, obviously this is just a very brief overview but in reality it is not a very complicated game and can be enjoyed by anyone. I would recommend playing a few hands for play money until you get comfortable with it and then start playing to win some proper money. A great casino for Blackjack games  is 888 Casino.

Extreme Turbo Poker is a very popular variant of a Sit & Go tournament, also referred to as SNG tournaments. Poker Tournaments seem to be taking over more and more from regular "Ring" games at  Online Poker Rooms. It is easy to find these games but one of the places I recomend for good Sit & Go Tournaments, and in particular Extreme Turbo Poker, is Spin Palace Poker.

Sit & Go Poker tournaments are described in other articles on this site but in brief they are the most flexible form of Poker tournament there is. All you have to do is go to the Poker Room lobby, click on Sit & Go Tournaments and then click on the betting level you are happy with, for example $5. As long as there are still places free on a table you can join it. If all the tables are full then just wait a few minutes, a new one is sure to pop up. Most poker rooms mix all the variants of Sit & Go tournaments together and there are quite a few different types, like heads up and full table freezeouts and I will be discussing all these other types in future articles.

Extreme Turbo Poker is usually played as a No-Limit Texas Hold’em game but I have seen some Omaha games as well. The rules are much the same as in any other Poker tournament, you are given a stack of chips in return for your entry fee to the tournament. It is then a straight elimination match between you and your opponents and usually the top 2 or 3 players will share the total cash pot, which will be the entry fee multiplied by the number of players who entered. It should also be noted that Extreme Turbo Hold’em is usually played shorthand with 6 people but can also be played longhand with 10 players.

The main difference with Extreme Turbo Poker compared to standard Sit & Go poker tournaments is the speed with which the blinds increase. Each stage of the tournament is split into levels and each of these levels correspond with a betting level. In a standard poker tournament these levels rise every 5-10 minutes but with extreme turbo Poker is is every few hands so very soon the blinds can be up into the hundreds. This of course means that you have to play very aggressively right from the start to build up your stack otherwise the blinds will eventually destroy you. In many respects it is similar to the final few hands of a multi-table freeroll or standard multi-table poker tournament, where the betting levels are typically very high at the end and there is a lot of bullying and stealing of blinds. A lot of good players therefore use Extreme Turbo tournaments to practice for this stage of poker tournaments as well as also playing "Heads up" Poker, where there are just 2 players, to practice the final end game!

People either love or hate Extreme Turbo Poker tournaments and it depends a lot on whether you are a tight or aggressive player. I would however recommend that if you don’t like it you should probably force yourself to play it as it means you need to get out of your comfort zone, every one should feel comfortable in playing good solid aggressive poker sometimes, whereas at other times it is important to have the discipline of playing tight.

In summary Extreme Turbo Poker is an extreme roller-coaster ride through Poker World and I highly recommend you all check it out. 

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As you can see from the pages of our websites and  indeed just by having a look around the internet that there is a massive choice of online casinos, poker rooms and other online gambling sites like sportsbooks and online bingo places on the internet these days. It is however important that you choose an online gambling site which is right for you and this depends on a number of factors.

Firstly you need an online casino or poker room which is reliable. All of the casinos that we have listed on High-Roller Casinos are reputable and honest. If you should ever have any problems with any of them then please inform us and we will chase them for you, that is our service to you. 

The second thing to look out for is the type of games which are offered. In our reviews we try to give an indication of the games offered by each of the online casinos and poker rooms but the only proper way of seeing this is by visiting the site, downloading the software, registering for a play/fun account and trying out some of their games. If you decide that you like their games, you can deposit some real money and start playing for real.

The third thing are the bonuses. I could write several articles purely on the topic of bonuses and in fact I plan too over the coming weeks but for the purposes of this article I want to stress one thing, always read the terms and conditions of the bonuses before signing up for them so that you know what the gambling requirements are etc. Some bonuses seem mind blowing large but have big conditions attached to them whilst other smaller bonuses are actually far more realistic and you can achieve them just through regular play. It is also important to note that some games are excluded from bonuses, very often Blackjack is.

One final important factor when choosing an online casino is the customer service offered, you should always keep an eye out for Live support or Live chat, if a casino offers this then it is a sure sign that they take customer service very seriously. With Live chat the casino or poker room provide a customer service agent who you can talk to in real time and therefore resolve your problems much quicker. This isn’t to say that casinos and poker rooms without live chat aren’t good but it is a definite plus.

In summary, choosing the right casino for you is probably a combination of all these factors and many more, the most important thing and the best way to get started is to read our reviews, look at how we scored the casinos and poker rooms, click on the link and check them out for yourself, if you like what you see, sign up and enjoy.

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One of the most popular bets for inexperienced craps players is the field bet. Once again, it seems like a good bet. The betting area occupies a large chunk of the craps layout at each end of the table. For the table minimum, a player can wager that the two, three, four, nine, ten, eleven or twelve will appear on the next roll. Only a five, six, seven or eight will defeat that bet. The bet pays even money.

But take a closer look. Even though the field numbers winners seem to be more numerous than the losers, it’s simply not true. The amount of dice combinations that make up those seven numbers totals 16. But there are 20 ways to roll the five, six, seven and eight, so the player is giving the house a 5.56 per cent advantage. Looks can be deceiving in craps.

Another often well advertised bet at most dice games is the big six or eight. Because the six and eight are rolled so frequently, players mistakenly believe it is a good bet. By placing this bet, the player is betting that a six or eight will appear before a seven is rolled.

It is the same bet as a place bet on the six or eight, but the payout is considerably worse. By placing the six or eight, the player receives odds of 7-6, but a winning wager on the big six or eight only gets even money. A casino advantage of 9.1 per cent means the player will lose £1 for every £11
gambled. By placing the six or eight, players are dramatically reducing the casino’s advantage to only 1.5 per cent, meaning a player loses £1 for every £66 bet. But you won’t see that advertised anywhere. Only the most knowledgeable players realize they can get the best bets at the craps tables, while avoiding the “sucker” bets.

Video poker is not live poker, and except for how you evaluate the hands, it bears little resemblance to the table game.

Video poker is a fairly recent phenomenon, dating back to only the mid-Seventies. Although early slot machines used cards and poker hands as payout symbols, players had no choices to make; the reels stopped wherever the machine determined they would.

The increasing popularity of video poker can be traced to several factors and characteristics it has in common with many of the more popular casino games. For instance:
– It’s fast (like craps).
– It gives players the opportunity to make decisions and a reasonable control over the results (like blackjack).
– It’s similar to poker (like many of the newest casino games).
– It gives the possibility of a large payout and is not intimidating (like slot machines).
– You can play it for a low minimum, an investment as small as a few coins.

Maybe what makes it even more popular is that it returns your investment for a pair of Jacks to Aces. In effect, this makes the player feel that a tie (a push) is a win. This is an important psychological factor that makes it seem like you’re winning more than you actually are. Maybe it’s because when you drop a coin into the machine, you consider that a lost coin, so that when it reappears on an even-money payout, you feel like you’re a winner. It’s a subtle point, but a powerful one.

Perhaps the chief reason that video poker is becoming more popular is that even a casual player can determine the value of an individual machine. By simply glancing at the pay table included on every video poker game, you can determine how much that machine will pay back to players who use the optimum video poker strategy, or expert strategy.

Playing winning video poker requires three very important tenets. First, you should only play machines that give you the highest payout. Second, you must know how to use the best strategies to play those machines. And finally, you should be aware of how those machines reach those payout percentages. That is, you must be aware of whether that payout percentage is reached by awarding a single large jackpot or whether it encompasses many smaller payouts.  The level of frequency of the payoffos is called the volatility of the machine.

Many machines can be played to pay back more than 100 per cent of the money invested. How is this possible, you ask? Isn’t the casino going to lose money by putting these types of machines on the floor?

This question has two answers. Yes, the casino would lose money if every player on that particular machine understood and used expert strategy. But since only a small minority of video poker players truly know how to take advantage of
such a machine, no, the casino will not lose money by offering such a machine. And even if it was just expert players that were attracted to such a machine, they wouldn’t all be able to play at the same time. Therefore, the casino would undoubtedly surround that machine with others offering a significantly lower payout than that single 100 per cent-plus machine, guaranteeing the casino the chance to win more money from those other players.

The late Walter Matthau described poker as exemplifying’all of the worst aspects of capitalism that have made our country so great’, Along with Hollyvvood road movies, the images of the ‘rambling-gambling man’ and the poker-playing cowboy, willing to risk all on the turn of a card, are abiding metaphors for the free¬spirited American ideal, A recent Hollyvvood film, Rounders starring Matt Damon, realistically portrayed the game with all of its thrills and excitement. Set in New York’s underground poker world, Rounders tells the story of a card player who attempts to leave behind the poker-playing rounds for a legitimate career and a chance for a new life with his girlfriend. However, the new life is short on the buzz of high-stakes poker games and the Damon character is soon drawn back to the poker table.

Rounders gives one perspective on the game of poker, but often poker games are played by groups of friends purely for enjoyment, with winning or losing being secondary to the social experience, and with the stakes often nothing more than matchsticks, Inventor Sir Clive Sinclair is perhaps the best known of all the players who have appeared on Channe14’s Late Night Poker series, and he plays socially in a private game. For him, poker is an opportunity to meet friends and pass an enjoyable evening, Sir Clive has played poker for about ten years and for a recreational player he has acquitted himself very well against the ranks of professionals in the series. I am not alone in believing that if he played as much as some of the rest of us, he would become a very formidable player indeed.

However, I would contend that to experience the true thrill of poker it should be played for stakes that matter to the players. If you are playing for a sum of money that is meaningful to you, your sense of excitement will be heightened, your palms will start to sweat, the adrenaline will start to pump in your bloodstream and you will experience a sense of risk rarely encountered in everyday life.

It’s only one card, but what a difference it makes! with 53 cards in the deck, the different possibilities for winning hands in Joker Poker are very appealing to slot players who enjoy video poker. When that Joker appears on the screen, it adds an immediate bonus.

The explosion in the popularity of video-poker slot machines has understandably led to the development of games that use wild cards. The Joker Poker slot machine is the most popular of these games. It adds a 53rd card to the deck for each hand. Since this gives the player more opportunities to draw winning hands, and indeed makes the game easier, the payout is lower than ordinary video poker.

The Joker will come up about ten percent of the time and the player must be prepared to react to certain situations in a different manner to how he would in an ordinary video poker game. Strategy changes in this game and the different situations must be understood to take advantage of the higher payouts.

Though there are many different types of Joker Poker machines – most pay only on two pair, others pay for Jacks-, Kings- or Aces-or-better – and pay tables vary, the strategies are applicable to most situations. In Atlantic City and some riverboats, the highest jackpot is for five-of-a-kind. In Las Vegas, the royal flush cops the top award.

The Joker can be used as a substitute for any other card, or used as a fifth imaginary card of any value (to complete a five-of-a-kind hand, for instance). The machine automatically computes the best hand when using the Joker.

The only exception to this rule is that the Joker cannot be used to complete a royal flush (Ace, King, Queen, Jack, Ten of the same suit). A Joker completing this hand is paid off as a straight flush. In most versions of Joker Poker, the lowest payout is two pair, unlike many video-poker machines that pay out for Jacks or Better.

There are some basic rules that apply only to Joker Poker. These guidelines are formulated by the unique situations and odds that exist by the addition of the one wild card.

Never draw more than three cards, regardless of the first five cards received. If you get a Joker in the first five cards, always keep one additional card to start with a pair, before the draw. If you don’t have a Joker, keep at least two cards of the same suit, so you at least have the beginning of a flush. Drawing a royal flush simply is not possible when you get a Joker in the first five cards, so any flush will be paid off, at best, as a straight flush.

When you start with a Joker, you can’t finish with two pair. It’s simple.

With the Joker, partial straights are better than partial flushes. If you have a Joker-Seven-Eight-Nine any Five, Six, Ten or Jack will payoff. That is 16 possibilities. For a four-card flush with a Joker, you only have ten possibilities to complete that flush. Though the payout for a straight is slightly less than for a flush, you will draw a straight more times than a flush.

Winning at Joker Poker is no more difficult than an ordinary video-poker machine. Joker Poker is, however, much more complicated, and you must understand what the addition of the wild card does to the probabilities. This very challenge makes Joker Poker more exciting.

Give it a try.