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    Texas Hold-em Poker

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    Texas Hold-Em is probably the most popular form of poker played today and it is the main form of poker popularised by the many current poker TV shows, and the hugely successfull multi million dollar tournament, the world series of poker known as WSOP.

    There are many on-line poker rooms and Texas hold-em can be played 24hours a day in virtually any country in the world from the comfort of your own home.

    Texas hold-em in South Africa is currently in its infancy, with weekend games held at a few of our local casinos.
    I expect this to grow eventually, but casinos in South Africa tend to be a bit slow in recognising the immense growing populartiy of the game.

    The rules of Texas hold-em are fairly simple to learn, though the various strategies can take a bit longer to master.

    An Introduction To The Game

    The final objective of the game, is at the end of the betting rounds, to be the player with the best 5 card ranked poker hand. The game is played with one standard deck of four suited playing cards, no jokers, total 52 cards.

    The play is as follows:

  • The first event is to determine the sequence of play. Each player is dealt one card - The person with the highest card is the dealer, the immediate person to the left is the small blind and the person to the left of them is the big blind.

    The blinds are a means of force betting and insures that there is at least one round of betting in each hand of texas hold-em. The big blind is double the amount of the small blind.
    In tournament play the value of the blinds generally increase as the game progresses - this could be determined by time, say every 15 minutes, or by a pre-determined amount of hands, such as every 10th hand.

    Back to the game:

  • Each player is dealt 2 cards, dealing the first card to the player who is "small Blind", face down, these are called the hole cards, or your pocket cards.
    Then the first round of betting starts.

    There are three different types of betting formats in Texas hold-em. The format is decided before the start of the game. The three types are:

  • Limit Texas Holdem (A betting limit is in each round and on each hand)
  • Pot Limit Texas Holdem (A player can bet a maximum of the total pot size, based on the amount of chips currently on the table)
  • No Limit Texas Holdem (A player can bet all of their chips at any time)

    Now back to the game, after being dealt the hole cards, the first player to the left of the big blind makes his first betting move. The options are:

  • Fold - the player does not want to bet and discards his cards
  • Call - the player matches the amount of the value of the big blind bet
  • Raise - the player raises the value of the bet - the ammount a palyer can raise is determined by the betting format of the game

    After the bets have been made, the first of the community cards are dealt, these are 3 cards and are dealt face up shown to all the players, and all the players can make use these cards to make the best possible poker combination with their hole cards. This show of the 3 cards is called "The flop".

    After the Flop the next round of betting starts - with the first player that is still in the game to the left of the dealer making the first call.
    Once the betting has concluded the next communtiy card is dealt, this show of card is called the "the turn".

    Another round of betting commences, again starting with the first player to the left of the dealer that is still in the game.

    After the betting round is over, the last community card is dealt, called "the river".

    A round of betting proceeds and the winner of the hand is determined by the best 5 card poker hand using your two hole cards (the first two cards you were dealt face down) and a combination of the 5 community cards.

    That is the basic play which is fairly easy to learn - the hard part is learning to calculate the odds of winning the round based on the first two cards dealt - your hole cards.

    | Poker Slang | | Starting Hands | | Basic Mistakes | | Bad Beat VS Idiots | | Home | | Play for money |