10,99 €
Mehr erfahren.
- Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
- Kategorie: Lebensstil
- Sprache: Englisch
Take poker online the fun and easy way! Five years ago, 50 million people were playing poker recreationally or professionally. Now that number is more than 100 million, including a huge influx of young people. Online betting is up nearly four-fold over the past year, with total wagers running over $30 billion. Winning at Internet Poker For Dummies provides the lowdown on the hottest game around, highlighting the best sites and virtual games and showing how to make secure online bets. The book covers setting up an account, securing funds, navigating a basic online poker game, using Internet abbreviations and lingo, observing online poker etiquette, playing popular online poker games such as Texas Hold 'Em and Omaha, devising a winning strategy, and participating in tournaments.
Sie lesen das E-Book in den Legimi-Apps auf:
Seitenzahl: 404
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2011
Ähnliche
Winning at Internet Poker For Dummies
by Mark "The Red" Harlan and Chris Derossi
Winning at Internet Poker For Dummies®
Published byWiley Publishing, Inc. 111 River St. Hoboken, NJ 07030-5774 www.wiley.com
Copyright © 2005 by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Indianapolis, Indiana
Published by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Indianapolis, Indiana
Published simultaneously in Canada
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Sections 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, 978-750-8400, fax 978-646-8600. Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Legal Department, Wiley Publishing, Inc., 10475 Crosspoint Blvd., Indianapolis, IN 46256, 317-572-3447, fax 317-572-4355, e-mail: [email protected].
Trademarks: Wiley, the Wiley Publishing logo, For Dummies, the Dummies Man logo, A Reference for the Rest of Us!, The Dummies Way, Dummies Daily, The Fun and Easy Way, Dummies.com and related trade dress are trademarks or registered trademarks of John Wiley & Sons, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the United States and other countries, and may not be used without written permission. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Wiley Publishing, Inc., is not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book.
LIMIT OF LIABILITY/DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTY: The publisher and the author make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this work and specifically disclaim all warranties, including without limitation warranties of fitness for a particular purpose. No warranty may be created or extended by sales or promotional materials. The advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for every situation. This work is sold with the understanding that the publisher is not engaged in rendering legal, accounting, or other professional services. If professional assistance is required, the services of a competent professional person should be sought. Neither the publisher nor the author shall be liable for damages arising herefrom. The fact that an organization or Website is referred to in this work as a citation and/or a potential source of further information does not mean that the author or the publisher endorses the information the organization or Website may provide or recommendations it may make. Further, readers should be aware that Internet Websites listed in this work may have changed or disappeared between when this work was written and when it is read.
For general information on our other products and services, please contact our Customer Care Department within the U.S. at 800-762-2974, outside the U.S. at 317-572-3993, or fax 317-572-4002.
For technical support, please visit www.wiley.com/techsupport.
Wiley also publishes its books in a variety of electronic formats. Some content that appears in print may not be available in electronic books.
Library of Congress Control Number: 2004116935
ISBN: 0-7645-7833-2
Manufactured in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
1O/RY/QR/QV/IN
About the Authors
Mark “The Red” Harlan: Mark “The Red” Harlan was born in Rawlins, Wyoming and has lived exactly the life you would expect as a result. Armed with a degree in Applied Mathematics (from a school he never utters the name of), he began a 20-year stint in the computer industry. Red has worked with several cutting-edge Silicon Valley companies ranging from Apple Computer (where, among other positions, he was Human Interface Evangelist — making applications easier to use and openly berating those who didn’t) to Danger (makers of the T-Mobile Sidekick). Alarmingly, Red has probably already touched your life, since he designed the bidding schema that is in use by eBay today. Red has a heavy writing background (some of it actually readable) having authored Notes from the Fringe, InfoWorld’s most popular computer column in the heyday of the Internet; and the DevEdge News for Netscape’s developer community. Red now sports the hefty title of Chief Marketing Officer at CyberArts Licensing, a company providing software for the next generation of poker rooms on the Internet (such as www.gamesgrid.com). CyberArts is the place where Red mixes his love of poker with his deep understanding of graphical user interfaces to make online poker easier to use, better looking, and considerably more fun. Today Red lives a glamorous lifestyle, roughly akin to a well-to-do college student, in Santa Clara, California. Red welcomes non-spam email at [email protected].
Chris Derossi: Chris Derossi is a 20-year computer veteran and serial entrepreneur. Having started his first company at the age of 14 he has worked at a myriad of corporations since (creating several along the way). Among other positions, Chris has been: the Chief Architect of the Macintosh Operating System at Apple Computer, the founder of ePeople, and the CEO of Trading Technologies. Chris was a founder of MacTech magazine and has written extensively for the computer industry, in publications such as Byte and Dr. Dobb’s Journal. Today, Chris is the CEO of CyberArts Licensing, a software company working feverishly to take Internet skill games (including poker, naturally) to the next level. Aside from running day-to-day business matters, Chris is responsible for the entire architecture of CyberArt’s poker offering (seen at www.gamesgrid.com), ensuring that the technology is stable, robust, and hugely scalable. For the last 15 years Chris has been an avid poker player and is often found clutching the first place trophy in the tournaments he enters. Chris was born in Laramie, Wyoming and today lives in Henderson, Nevada (a stone’s throw from Las Vegas) with his wife and two children. Chris can be reached at [email protected]. Red and Chris both man a Winning at Internet Poker for Dummies discussion board at http://pokerbook.gamesgrid.com.
Dedication
From Mark “The Red” Harlan: I dedicate this book to Jacqueline because I always said I would, to members of the Math Alliance just because, and to my Uncle Poison because legends should live on.
From Chris Derossi: I dedicate this book to my wife, Jennifer, and my children, Grayson and Miranda, who are always there with love and support.
Authors’ Acknowledgments
From Red: My Mom, Marijane “Quarter Slots” Harlan, worked backbreaking hospital nights for 20 years, simply to assure I was educated and would turn out “okay.” There are debts I owe to the world and then there is this. All moms wish they were as good as you.
Super-thanks to those Lakewood High School teachers from all those years ago: Luanne “Thesis” Rohovec (Pendorf), for teaching me how to write; Derald “Liver Green” Dunagan and Gary “Jag” Hurst for teaching me how to think; and Nic “Shorts” Ament for the bad ass poker nickname. You’d be amazed at the difference you’ve made in my life. Books can’t be done without basic sustenance, which is to say music, food, and caffeine. So thanks to Isaac “Shaft” Hayes, Curtis “Superfly” Mayfield, Sly “Stand!” Stone, James “Mr. Dynamite” Brown, Donna at the Hick’ry Pit, Hanan at the Original Pancake House, Rahim at 7-11, and Clarus at the Bitmap Café. Dig it.
My Project Editor, Sherri “The Spine” Pfouts at Wiley was not only forced to endure my incessant sassiness, taunting, and flexing of deadlines; but she then went well above the call of duty by doing a bunch of stuff (I still don’t even know what) to make my life easier when my eye exploded in the midst of writing this book.
Then there is Chris “No Nickname” Derossi. A true force of a human being, he’s the smartest and most ethical person I’ve ever done business with. Chris has been and is always the calm in the eye of the storm that is my life. His continual unquestioning support, deep understanding of my psyche, and sharp attention to detail has made this book not only happen crisply, but also be twice as good as it would otherwise have been. And although I’m a considerably better person just by knowing him, I still have no idea what he did to deserve me. Thank you, sir.
And my sincere thanks to you, the reader. Nothing here is possible without you. It sounds trite, but that doesn’t make it less true; you have helped fulfill a lifelong dream of mine. I sincerely hope something in these pages makes you think, learn, or at least laugh. In the Western world, time is the most precious of all commodities; I truly appreciate you spending it with us.
From Chris: My name would not be on this book at all if it weren’t for the monumental talent, effort, and graciousness of my coauthor, partner, and friend, Mark Harlan. Writing a book takes an enormous amount of work and creates a mountain of pressure. Mark not only handled both with ease, he did it while keeping his sense of humor and unique, thought-provoking outlook on life. Mark deserves most of the credit for what’s on these pages, and he has my thanks and respect for all of the sleep he gave up to get it done.
I must acknowledge Konstantin Othmer for introducing me to serious poker. Instead of keeping his friends in the dark to bolster his poker profits, he helped us learn. I owe thanks to Kon for many years of recreation and extra income.
Thanks also to Margot Maley Hutchison, who asked me if I wanted to write a book when I first met her a decade ago. She waited patiently until I said yes, and was very helpful throughout the entire process.
Finally, thanks to the many, many people who have helped and encouraged me while I’ve spent countless hours in entrepreneurial pursuits, of which this book is just a small part. I consider myself to be fortunate enough to follow my dreams thanks to my family, friends, and associates.
Publisher’s Acknowledgments
We’re proud of this book; please send us your comments through our Dummies online registration form located at www.dummies.com/register/.
Some of the people who helped bring this book to market include the following:
Acquisitions, Editorial, and Media Development
Project Editor: Sherri Cullison-Pfouts
Acquisitions Editor: Mikal Belicove
Copy Editor: Josh Dials
Technical Editor: Jay Greenspan
Editorial Managers: Michelle Hacker, Christine Meloy Beck
Editorial Assistant: Melissa S. Bennett
Cover Photos: © Getty Images/ Photodisc Green
Cartoons: Rich Tennant (www.the5thwave.com)
Composition Services
Project Coordinator: Adrienne L. Martinez
Layout and Graphics: Lauren Goddard, Stephanie D. Jumper, Barry Offringa, Julie Trippetti
Proofreaders: Laura Albert, Leeann Harney, Jessica Kramer, TECHBOOKS Production Services
Indexer: TECHBOOKS Production Services
Publishing and Editorial for Consumer Dummies
Diane Graves Steele, Vice President and Publisher, Consumer Dummies
Joyce Pepple, Acquisitions Director, Consumer Dummies
Kristin A. Cocks, Product Development Director, Consumer Dummies
Michael Spring, Vice President and Publisher, Travel
Brice Gosnell, Associate Publisher, Travel
Kelly Regan, Editorial Director, Travel
Publishing for Technology Dummies
Andy Cummings, Vice President and Publisher, Dummies Technology/General User
Composition Services
Gerry Fahey, Vice President of Production Services
Debbie Stailey, Director of Composition Services
Contents
Title
Introduction
About This Book
Conventions Used in This Book
What You’re Not to Read
Foolish Assumptions
How This Book Is Organized
Icons Used in This Book
Where to Go from Here
Part I : Internet Poker Basics
Chapter 1: Creating a Winning Combination: Poker, the Internet, and You
Me, Winning on the Internet? You Bet!
Stepping Out of the Casino Mentality
Gathering the Basics
Choosing Your Poker Path
Chapter 2: Getting Online and Choosing a Site
Creating Your Virtual Poker Environment
Choosing a Site
Getting Your Game Going
Chapter 3: Putting Internet Poker’s Nuances to Work in Your Play
Comparing the Real World Game to the Online Version
Getting a Feel for the Virtual Game
Playing Your First Hand
Speaking the Poker Dialect of Internetese
Chapter 4: Taking Your Cash to Cyberspace — Safely
Getting Familiar with Online Betting, Payouts, and Losses
Identifying Honest “Banks”
Transferring Money
Part II : Taking Your Poker to a New Level — The Cyber Level
Chapter 5: Adapting to a New World: Internet Poker
Grappling with the Psychological Basics
Examining the Limit Differences Online
Dodging (and Dealing with) Online Pitfalls
Practicing Poker Patience Online
Chapter 6: Figuring Out Your Opponents (Without Them Figuring Out You)
Evaluating Your Online Opponents
Keeping Your Opponents from Figuring You Out
Chapter 7: Exploring Your Online Game Options
Melding in Ring Games
Taking On Tournaments
Chapter 8: Building Your Online Poker Skills (Without Going Broke)
Playing for Free
Deciding You’re Ready for the Real Deal
Chapter 9: Strategies for Short-Handed Ring Games
Adapting to Short-Handed Ring Games
Playing Mano-a-Mano in a Head’s-Up Ring Game
Translating Ring-Game Play into Tournament Play
Part III : Taking Over Tournaments
Chapter 10: Perusing Your Online Tournament Options
Examining Online Tournament Types
Measuring Online Tournament Sizes
Choosing an Online Tournament
Chapter 11: Clueing in to Tournament Chip Standings
Making Sense of Your Chip Standing
Using Your Chip Standing to Your Advantage
Re-Buying and Adding-On Chips
Tip-Toeing on the Bubble: Finishing in the Money
Chapter 12: Winning Single-Table Tournaments
Entering the Land of Single-Table Tournaments
Developing Table-Size-Specific Strategies
Playing Short-Handed Stud, Hold ’Em, and Omaha
Hitting the Home Stretch: Head’s-Up Play
Chapter 13: When Your Chips Are Flying: Single-Table Strategies
Analyzing Where You Stand — Chips-Wise
Using Your Chips to Your Advantage
Firing Up for the Final Stages
Reflecting on the Tournament
Part IV : The Part of Tens
Chapter 14: Ten Common Internet Poker Mistakes
Playing Too High of a Limit
Playing Too Low of a Limit
Playing Poorly Because You’re Anonymous
Playing Too Quickly
Playing When You’re Distracted
Playing Without the Necessary Know-How
Playing at the Wrong Table
Falling into Common No-limit Pits
Playing Without the Perks
Playing Without Taking Notes
Chapter 15: Ten Things to Keep in Mind in the Heat of Battle
Don’t Bluff Lesser Opponents
Don’t Make a 50/50 Bet Against an Inferior Player
Don’t Insist on Winning Every Hand in Head’s-Up Play
Drop Marginal Hands
Take Your Time
Don’t Give Up Prematurely
Play When You’re at Your Best
Pay Extra Attention to Unusual Behavior
Shake Up Your Play
Reflect
Chapter 16: Ten Great Internet Poker Resources
Card Player Magazine Online
The World’s Largest Poker Newsgroup
Pokercharts
Book Stores
The World Series of Poker Online
Poker Odds Calculator
Poker Analyzer
Information Blood Hound
Poker Potpourri
Online Discussion
Chapter 17: Ten Mistakes to Avoid during Live Action
Playing Out of Turn
Betting an Incorrect Amount
Causing a “Chip Tell”
Exposing Your Hole Cards
Showing Your Cards During the Hand
Mucking a Winning Hand
Making a String Raise
Leaving Your Hand Unprotected
Giving Advice to Another Player on a Hand
Forgetting About Your Dealer
Appendix: Glossary
Introduction
F or something like 150 years, people have been playing poker on shady riverboats, in smokey backrooms of otherwise legitimate businesses, in booze-laden college dorms, on cramped tent floors, and at family kitchen tables. Although the games are often social events, the underlying purpose is always the same: play, play, play, and try to take as much of whatever you possibly can from the steely-eyed person sitting across from you. Be it pretzels, lingerie, or cold hard cash, what your opponents have is what you want. Victors get the spoils; losers get large servings of crow (usually served cold with no garnish).
A few years ago, the Internet came along, and along with it, the first “Big Change.” Now you can play against people anywhere in the world, at any time of the day, and for varying sums of money. And the card house where it all goes down is exactly as far away as your computer.
Early concerns of cheating and the inability to see the faces of your competitors, crossed with the uncertainty of passing electronic cash to an unknown foreign entity, gave many would-be online players reason to pause, but the efforts and technology aimed at making the game safe have prevailed. Internet poker has truly exploded in the past couple of years, no doubt due in large part to the numerous televised poker events and Internet sponsorship of some of the top players in the world.
The Internet traffic statistics are staggering, with the busiest poker sites dwarfing the clientele at brick-and-mortar casinos: At any given moment, tens of thousands of players duke it out on a multitude of tables. Internet poker was nothing 10 years ago, and today it’s a billion-dollar industry with no signs of subsiding.
In some ways, the online world is identical to the real one. You can play Texas Hold ’Em, Omaha, and Seven-Card Stud. You can play less popular competitive games, such as Pineapple, Five-Card Stud or Draw, or wild card games, depending on the site. You can compete for play chips or hard currency. You can play in ring games or tournaments.
But in some ways, the online world is very different. You have to be able to judge a site for quality. You have to download and master the software. You have to make electronic transactions over-the-wire to move your cash. And don’t forget that you have to choose between table sizes and game types.
At first it can all be a little much. But don’t despair. You have a clear path through this wilderness. Come along, and we’ll take you there.
About This Book
This book specifically covers the nuances of Internet poker as compared to everything in the brick-and-mortar world. You should think of Winning at Internet Poker For Dummies as an augmentation to any and all poker knowledge you already have; you definitely shouldn’t think of this book as the stand-alone, end-all, be-all poker reference. We’ve written this text to dovetail cleanly with Poker For Dummies (Wiley), but it can just as easily walk hand-in-hand with any other beginning or intermediate poker text.
Thinking Internet poker is identical to brick-and-mortar poker can be a costly mistake. The two are similar, but they have key differences. Our main goal is to point out the differences and help you avoid the myriad of pitfalls lying in wait for the unsuspecting.
We help you discover the nuances of an Internet poker table, pick a site to your liking, and transfer your electronic funds. From there, we take a peek at online poker psychology and delve into some of the unusual table sizes and games that, for the most part, only exist online. After we get you playing, we give you handy tips and tricks on how to stay ahead of the game — and hopefully even win.
Conventions Used in This Book
Some of the special terminology we use in this book includes:
Brick and mortar: We use this phrase to describe real, physical cardrooms where you sit across a table from live human beings. It doesn’t necessarily have to mean casinos; in most cases, you can just as easily think about any home game you play in.
Godzilla: Large radioactive monster that mostly hangs out in Tokyo bay. Aggressive player with a good poker face — bad temper when losing. Known as Gojira in Japan (“go” from the English gorilla and “jira,” the Japanese world for whale). We talk about Godzilla a little in Chapter 13.
Hard currency: When we use this phrase, we mean the money that you have on deposit with a poker site — the actual money that you gamble with. When you place a $1 bet online, you put hard currency on the line. We use this phrase to minimize confusion with money as a general concept. Chapter 4 is where we talk about transferring your money online.
Ring game: A single poker table, with anything from two to ten players, where everyone competes for hard currency. You can come and go as you please in these games. Some brick-and-mortar players call this game form money play.
Tournament: A special form of poker where you pay a set entry fee, plus a smaller registration fee, to receive a set amount of tournament chips. Players compete, busting out one by one, until only one person remains. Chapter 10 is where we start to get down with tourneys.
For a slightly longer glossary, head to the Appendix in the back of this book.
What You’re Not to Read
Well, maybe you shouldn’t take it to the “I boycott this” extreme, but we should let you in on a couple of things to know about this book:
Sidebars contain information that you don’t have to read to understand Internet poker. They serve as asides, anecdotes, or extended forms of examples. Only reading the sidebars in this book is the mental equivalent of sitting on the back porch and hearing your favorite poker stories from your uncle.
Order doesn’t matter. That being said, you can read anything you want without hurting our feelings. Read any chapter at any point. Feel free to skip around. We use copious cross- references to help you understand anything you may have skipped over during your reading journey.
Foolish Assumptions
In order to begin, we’ve made several assumptions about you, our dear reader. We assume that
You’re already familiar with the basic forms of poker, and that you have a cursory understanding of poker strategy. If you don’t, turn around right now and buy yourself a copy of Poker For Dummies (Wiley) or some other introductory-to-intermediate text on the game.
You can use a computer and have the ability to connect to the Internet. We also assume that you have downloaded and installed software onto your computer before. If these concepts are foreign to you, pick up a copy of Internet For Dummies (Wiley) and/or PCs For Dummies (Wiley).
You’ve used the Internet to the extent that you’re familiar with using search engines and making elementary transactions (for instance, you’ve bought something online).
You think winning is better than losing. If you don’t, we honestly can’t tell you where to go for help, but we’d love to sit with you the next time you play.
You’re a noble human being. You must be if you’re willing to spend this much time with us, and hey, we truly appreciate it.
How This Book Is Organized
We’ve intentionally written this book in such a way that you can jump into it at any point and just go. We haven’t created complete word chaos, however; here’s the method to our madness:
Part I: Internet Poker Basics
This section talks about the hardware and software you need to play, includes a tour of an Internet poker table, tells you how to pick a quality poker site, and coaches you through the transfer of your precious money. By the time you reach the end of this section, you should be able to play a simple game of poker online.
Part II: Taking Your Poker to a New Level — The Cyber Level
Here we explore the variety of games available to you on the Internet, and we let you in on a few secrets about what’s different in the online poker world, including a bit on the nuances of Internet poker psychology.
Part III: Taking Over Tournaments
Here you find the down and dirty on the strategic differences between the Internet and the brick-and-mortar world for tournaments. We also drill into unusual table sizes and those crazy single-table tournaments.
Part IV: The Part of Tens
Lists, lists, lists. This part is the dessert after your tasty meal. Here we give you ways to not screw up your Internet poker game, how to keep your head on straight in the heat of the battle, where to go to find more great Internet poker info, and tips on how to behave in the brick-and-mortar world after you leave cyberspace (should you ever venture out of your cave, that is).
Icons Used in This Book
Throughout this book, we guide you toward important points by using the following icons:
Next to this icon, you find information that you should keep in the back, front, and sides of your poker noggin as you play. We think this stuff is important to remember.
The information next to this icon tells you to do something that can potentially save you time, money, and poker frustration. It helps you in the end, so read it.
Make sure to read the text next to this icon. It can save you a lot of blood, sweat, tears, gut-wrenching pain . . . and money.
“Exactly!” is what you’ll think when you read this icon’s info — it should perfectly illustrate what we’re trying to explain.
Where to Go from Here
Pretty much anywhere you want. Find something you think is interesting and go for it.
Can’t make up your mind? Just pick a page . . . any page.
Part I
Internet Poker Basics
In this part . . .
H ere we cover all the basics: the hardware and software you need, criteria for choosing a site of quality, and the nitty-gritty of moving your money online. We even give a tour of an online poker table.
Chapter 1
Creating a Winning Combination: Poker, the Internet, and You
In This Chapter
Winning cold, hard cash (or maybe soft, electronic cash)
Understanding the differences between the real and cyber worlds
Assembling the necessary hardware, software, and poker knowledge
T he online poker boom has been astounding. At the end of 2004, at any given moment, more than 10,000 players were competing on over 150 poker sites. On any given day, combined bets totaled more than $130 million. And the numbers keep going up.
And not surprisingly, not all the new attendees play poker well. Sure, you have to watch out for some sharks, hustlers, and poker savants; but the misfits, slackers, and the terminally distracted greatly outnumber the dangerous players. In online play in general, and especially at the lower-limit tables, you have the potential to make alot of money.
In this chapter, we talk about the basics of Internet poker, as well as the raw materials you need to play a truly fascinating form of America’s favorite card game (and recently, America’s favorite game, period).
And the rest of the book? Well, we talk about everything else there.
Me, Winning on the Internet? You Bet!
In case you’re confused by the title of the book, we should get one thing clear from the start: Yes, you can win money playing poker on the Internet. Recognizing that, however, doesn’t make it easy. Even if you’ve “mastered” brick-and-mortar play, you can’t simply walk in and take the candy from all the Net brats. You come screen to screen with some pretty tough players. Heck, Net dwellers have won the past two World Series of Poker Main Events in Las Vegas. But coming out on top of your favorite game is certainly possible, and to do that you need to know your poker theory and have money to put on the virtual table.
The most important thing to understand about Internet poker is that you’re still playing poker.
Knowing your poker theory
With very few exceptions, nearly all the poker theory you already know and have gleaned over your life applies in the Internet world. You must deal with nuances and fine points, yes (and you can bet that we cover those in detail, such as in Chapter 3), but poker is poker, no matter the form or forum.
If you’re looking for general poker theory, you can’t find much of it here (with the exception of single-table tournaments on demand, which we cover in Chapters 12 and 13), but you can find the info in books like Poker For Dummies (Wiley). If you aren’t familiar with the nuances of poker itself, you should read and study up on general theory first before you play with anyhard currency online.
In any betting situation, the basis to making money is being more informed than your opponent. If you ignore reading up on poker theory, the players who aren’t so cavalier will beat you in the long run.
If you’re not completely up on poker theory, don’t let it stop you from getting started. You can always play for free chips, which we talk about in Chapter 8. In fact, you can also play in free-roll tournaments, where you pay nothing and still have a chance to win hard currency (check out Chapter 10).
Just like real money, but faster
Yes, the money you play for online is the real deal. That’s the good news, of course. The bad news is you can lose real money as well.
Because of the speed of computer play, a full Internet table goes through more than twice as many hands per hour than the brick-and-mortar equivalent. That means you can expect your money swings to be twice as big on the Net: If you play a winning strategy, you win twice as fast; if you play a losing strategy, you watch your money walk away at double the speed.
Chapter 8 goes into detail about easing into money play online with micro-limit (small-limit) games. We talk more about the ramifications of speed in Chapters 3 and 5.
Dealing with the dough
In order to win money, you have to throw in a few bucks yourself. Such is the law of the land when it comes to poker (except for those extra-special free-roll tournaments). So before you can play for hard currency online, you have to get money to your poker site — which can scare some people silly. We first want to tell you: You have safe outlets to get your money online . . . and safe ways get it out again. The most common mechanism for money transfer is through electronic payment services that you connect directly to your bank account. You can write an electronic check as well. For more information about all things green, see Chapter 4.
If you don’t want to lose a lot of cash while you learn, we recommend free-chip games and free-roll tournaments as tools to get you up to speed. (See Chapters 8 and 10.) But only play these forms of “poker” to get used to the Internet and to get familiar with a particular game. When you’re comfortable playing at these levels, make sure you move on.
If you play too long with no potential for loss, you’re bound to develop some bad poker habits, which we also cover in Chapter 10.
Stepping Out of the Casino Mentality
Although they both offer run-of-the-mill poker, the online poker environmentis far different from the brick-and-mortar world surroundings. You need to give up what you know and love about playing in the casino and hunker down by yourself, in the corner, with your computer. Besides your physical surroundings, you experience other differences too . . . like when you want to actually play, you have to first download a poker site’s software. Next you have to realize that looking for tells is a bit different, because your opponent may be sitting somewhere across the planet rather than across the table in front of you. And if you’re still desiring a bigger challenge, don’t worry: You also have to deal with bigger bets online.
Playing poker on the download
To get up and running in the online world, you need a poker client (a program that runs on your computer) that you download from the poker Web site of your choice. When you play, your client talks to a poker server on your site. The server acts partially as a communication mechanism between you and the other players. When you make any action (call, raise, bet, fold, sit down at the table, and so on), your client passes that information to the server, which relays the action to all your opponents. When your opponents make an action, your site’s server relays the information back to you.
We talk about how to pick a quality site in Chapter 2. Downloading software is super easy, and we also cover installation and use in Chapters 2 and 3.
Looking for tells online
The most obvious difference between the physical and the online world is that you don’t have another player glaring at you from across the table. The lack of player presence directs your focus to the game, whereas before you may have split your time between looking at your opponent and the cards in play.
But being alone doesn’t mean that you play in a world devoid of tells and clues about another player’s bluff (or worse, when he tries to sucker you in with a killer hand). It just means that the clues you want to keep track of and watch for are different. We cover the psychological aspect of “reading” online players in more detail in Chapter 6.
Experiencing poker in the pure
Experience shows that, in many ways, Internet poker is a purer form of the game. The decisions you make tend to be more positional than in the brick-and-mortar world. Where you sit in relation to betting around the table and the number of chips you have relative to the other players (especially in tournament play) hold bigger roles.
In the online world, you see bigger betting (pushing all-in in no-limit games for example), largely because you come across more novice players and the stakes can be lower (so players don’t have as much to lose). You also see a little less folding (especially in low buy-in, no-limit games) than in the brick-and-mortar world. We delve into these nuances, and more, in Chapter 3.
Your pal, the rake
We do know of one way that the online world is identical to brick-and-mortar ca-sinos: the way they make money, namely through the rake. The rake is a small percentage of every pot that the poker sites take (usually 5 percent, but sometimes as high as 10 percent). They typically cap the rake at $3.
The rake is a good moneymaking mechanism for the house, because losers don’t care where their money goes, and a winner doesn’t mind scooping a $97 pot rather than one worth $100. But the erosion is real and unavoidable.
For tournaments, sites charge a registration fee, usually 10 percent of the tourney buy-in, that goes directly to the site. A $10 single-table tournament costs you $11 ($10 plus a $1 entry fee).
A few sites have a no-flop, no-drop policy. If the site’s Hold ’Em or Omaha players never see a flop, it doesn’t take a rake. Other sites don’t rake any pot less than one dollar, which is nice for micro-limit games (for more on micro-limits, see Chapter 8). To find out about a site’s rake rules, look at the help or about section of its Web site.
You don’t have a way to reduce the rakes directly, but by taking advantage of sign-up bonuses and “bonus bonuses” (see Chapter 2 for all bonus info), you can certainly help reduce their sting.
Turbo tournaments sometimes cut the registration fee slightly. A $25 tourney may only have a $2 fee, rather than $2.50, and over the long run you can use every penny of your savings. For more on turbo tourneys, see Chapter 7.
Gathering the Basics
Before you can play poker on your computer, you need three things: money, the right hardware and software combo, and a hungry poker brain.
Meeting the minimum requirements
If you want to play for money online, you have to have money. For the most part you need electronically-transferable cash (a few sites accept bank checks through the mail — the slowest and clunkiest way to transfer money — but many no longer accept checks directly). Credit cards usually don’t work, but debit cards often do, along with electronic checks (ACH in bankspeak) and some forms of phone cards. We dedicate Chapter 4 to all money matters.
Sites also have an age restriction. You always have to be at least 18, and some require you to be 21. See the site’s rules and regulations for the requirements.
Getting the computer goods
You need three things computer-wise to get going: the proper hardware, a good connection, and a site’s poker software.
Hardware
For hardware, you need nothing more than a reliable PC that can run a fairly modern version of Windows (the later the better — nothing earlier than the 1998 version). As tempting as it may sound, youdon’t want to play on some flake-box machine that, say, automatically shuts off on odd-numbered days or tends to eat a hard drive about once a week.
Unlike when you’re playing video games, the speed of your computer, as well as the speed of its connection, doesn’t matter. But you do have to worry about the reliability of your connection. Poker isn’t a game of millisecond reaction speed. Sites give their players plenty of time to act, so what matters most is that your connectionis reliable. By reliable, we mean you don’t get dropped after you connect to the Internet.
Although a newer version of Windows works best, if you have an old Windows ’98 system parked in the garage, you may want to resurrect it for use as a dedicated online poker machine after you catch the online fever. It saves you some familial embarrassment caused by pacing back and forth behind 8-year-old Timmy while you anxiously wait for him to finish his homework on your home’s main PC. We’re not suggesting you buy a machine just to play poker, but if you have an old one lying around, you can put it to good use.
An Internet connection
A dial-up modem that never drops you is much better than a DSL connection that goes belly up every 20 minutes. If you have the luxury of choosing different connection means, pick the one that won’t drop you mid-hand. See Chapter 2 for a little more on connection basics and Chapter 5 for information on detecting, and coping with, disconnection.
Poker software
Poker software itself is always free of charge from the site of your choosing. (Don’t even think about playing a site that tries to charge you just to download its stuff.) Expect downloading to take just a couple minutes if you have a high-speed connection and possibly more than 20 if you have dial-up. We talk more about downloading and the fine art of choosing a good site in Chapter 2.
Bulking up your poker know-how
This book concentrates on the specific nuances of Internetpoker. If you’re not generally familiar with poker as a game, have never played for hard currency, or don’t have a good handle on crazy poker lingo, you need to get a good primer and brush-up. Poker For Dummies (Wiley)is an excellent choice (we designed our book to dovetail with that one), as are any number of other poker texts. Chapter 16 gives some good resources you can check out for recommendations on general poker theory, as well as places where you can buy, buy, buy to your little chip-pushing heart’s content.
Choosing Your Poker Path
You have many more paths you can take in the online world compared to brick-and-mortar casinos. You can play in tournaments or ring games. You can play fixed-limit or no-limit. You can play Hold ’Em, Omaha, or Stud (and even wild card games). You can play at tables with as many as nine other players or head’s up against a sole contender. What separates the Internet world is that you play all these types of games at any time, not just when management gives you the go-ahead in a brick-and-mortar casino.
And you can skip around this book, depending on what you want to do:
If you’ve never played poker before and you want to try it out for free right now, choose a site we list in Chapter 2. Download the software, go to Chapter 3 and figure out the button controls, and then start gambling with play money. All poker sites also have game basics in their help sections — you can definitely learn enough there to play.
If you’re an experienced hard currency player in the real world, take a quick skim of Chapter 3 to find out about your online controls. Make a hard study of Chapter 2 to choose a great site, and then follow the directions in Chapter 4 to make a financial deposit.
If you’re already a denizen of the online poker world, but you’ve just now decided to shift over to play seriously for hard currency, head to Chapter 5. Get our take on the psychology of online poker.
Chapter 2
Getting Online and Choosing a Site
In This Chapter
Setting up your real world to play in the virtual one
Picking your playground
Getting the software you need
Creating your identity
A cquiring and installing Internet poker software ranks right up there with some of the most painless “new” computer experiences you can ever have. The hardware and Net connectivity required are minimal, and the whole software operation essentially boils down to clicking a download button on a poker site to get a poker client that runs your game. A single click of the icon after you download and you’re off and running.
Your biggest concern should be picking a good site. With our checklist throughout this chapter, you can confidently put any potential host under the microscope of quality. But before you get too far along and jump straight into the downloading and playing process, you should tweak the real-world room where your computer sits just a tad.
In this chapter, we give you some tips on getting yourself comfortable — both physically and with your new poker site — getting your software situated, and crafting your identity for play.
Creating Your Virtual Poker Environment
The fight between online gaming sites for your business is fierce, and because of this competition, poker providers make sure that the hardware, software, and connection environment you need is fairly minimal and user-friendly. Such service allows you to focus on setting up your poker environment to maximize your gaming experience.
Figuring out hardware and software requirements
As it stands right now, online pokerisn’tcomputationally (nor display) intensive. Essentially, your computer acts as a glorified accountant and rule keeper; it really doesn’t have any heavy work to do. If you’re still trying to get by with that wind-up 286 box from the ’80s, this could quite possibly be the best news you’ve heard all day.
Hardware
If you have a machine capable of running a fairly modern version of Windows — Windows 98 or later, for example — you have all the hardware firepower you need. The audio and video involved with an online poker game are extremely simple sounds and animations (cards flipped over on a table, a beep reminding you to bet or fold, chips pushed from one area to another, and so on). No site currently offers more sophisticated options, such as streaming audio and video from other players, although such perks seem fairly inevitable. (Start setting your computer camera up —strip poker can’t be far behind!)
It doesn’t matter if you want to play on a laptop or a desktop. If you have a choice of machines, pick the one you feel most comfortable using for long periods of time.
If your screen is kind of fuzzy, and you don’t normally stare at it for excessive periods of time, you may want to consider upgrading to a new monitor. Gawking at fuzzy images for hours at a time is draining, and when you play online poker, you have enough happening in the fatigue department without adding any grief.
The problem with Macintosh
As of press time, no hard currency poker sites that cater to the Macintosh are of high enough quality to discuss in this book. This doesn’t mean that you Apple users are without options. You can:
Wait. With the online casinos competing so heavily, the various sites can’t afford to keep ignoring a base of potential customers. Keep an eye on the sites we list in the section “Sifting through the sites” later in this chapter. You can also occasionally look at a version site, such as www.versiontracker.com, or a software review site, like www.mygamblingdirectory.com, to check out various listings.
Play for free. Find a site where it doesn’t matter what computer you use. Many sites offer free poker online. For example, the games section of Yahoo! (games.yahoo.com) has Hold ’Em. The problem is that free play isn’t a good reflection of money play. It doesn’t make your level of play any better, and it may well make it worse. But hey, you do get to play poker against other humans.
Find a money site with a Java client. We should emphasize that we don’t recommend playing with Java clients because the user experience is so abysmal (very slow and uneven). But it does give you an option in a world where your choices are few.
Get a cheap Windows machine. Heresy, you say? Maybe, but you should consider this: We both worked for Apple, but we play online on Windows boxes. (And when we do, Chris wears his super-nerdy-yet-sexy Apple belt buckle, and Red wears his ultra-cool Mac project T-shirts. It is true, however, that those items burn our bodies as we play.)
System software
As far as Operating System (OS) versions go — as with everything else in the computer world — the more recent the version, the better. You shouldn’t start up anything older than Windows 98 if you can avoid it, although you can always tryanything (especially if your threshold for frustration is fairly high).
If you have multiple Windows possibilities to choose from, we recommend Windows XP. Not only is XP a recent, currently supported version, but it also was most likely the version of choice by the programmers who created your poker site software. If you run into problems with your site’s software, the support people are more likely to be able to help you on XP than with other versions of the Windows OS.
If you try an OS older than Windows 98, be certain to extensively test the site you’re interested in with free chips first. You don’t want any nasty surprises when the hard currency hits the table.
Poker in the palm of your hand
You can’t, as of now, find any hard currency-based handheld environments (such as Windows CE, Palm OS, or custom cell phone environments), but we keep hearing a ton of rumors about them. It seems that their existence in the not-too-distant future is a near certainty.
The big problem the handheld world has is unreliable connectivity; so when poker finally does fall into your palm, expect the interaction to be a bit different. It may be something like head’s-up play only, where you’re allowed five minutes per betting decision. This is pure guesswork on our part, just to give you a feeling of where the future may lead.
Connecting your Internet necessities
One of the most attractive features of online poker is your ability to play with the barest of Internet connections. The only disadvantage of using a slower dial-up modem is the amount of time it takes to download the client (the poker program running on your computer) from the poker Web site; it takes about 20 minutes over a modem versus just a couple shakes of a mouse pad with a broadband connection (such as DSL). After you download the poker program from the site of your choice (see the section “Sifting through the sites” later in this chapter for the most popular), you’re set to go. If you have to play from a world where your Internet connection is slow, don’t fret: Your opponents have no strategic advantage, of any kind, in having faster network connections.
In short, if you can reliably connect to the Internet, easily see Web pages on your computer, and you use an Operating System version no older than Windows 98, you can play poker online.
Although a slow network connection is perfectly fine for online poker, a flaky connection that goes down often isn’t (regardless of connection speed). If you lose your network connection in the middle of a hand, you may be able to reconnect in time before the site folds your hand, but not always. And when you play for hard currency, losing your hand to a bad connection can be costly if you’ve already invested money in the pot. See Chapter 5 for more on disconnection.
