The Different Poker Games
The best-known games are Texas Holdem, Seven Card Stud, Five Card Draw, and Omaha, although Razz is also a well known game. Along with the standard versions of these games there are many variants of each. The most common variants are the high-low split games such as Omaha Hi-Lo and Seven Card Stud Hi-Lo where the highest (the best) and the lowest (the worst) hands split the pot.
Here we will deal with the four most popular games mentioned above and the hi-lo versions of those games.
The Objective
The objective in poker – in all forms of poker – is win as many chips (or as much money) from your opponents as possible.
The Method (how to win)
There are two ways to win in poker. The first is to have the best
five card hand at ‘showdown’. Showdown occurs when all bets are matched after the last round of betting – players then ‘show down’ their hands, and the best five-card hand wins.
The second way to win in poker is to be “the last player standing”. That happens when all other players fold their hands, normally because of the way you have bet. As the last player standing you do not have to show down your hand (although you may do so if you wish to). This means you can win pots without having even a good hand, let alone the best hand, just because of the way you bet. That is the art of bluffing.
The Key
The key point to remember when it comes to poker is that you can’t win every hand; getting away from hands you cant win is every bit as important to your overall success as taking down the pots you can win. So you must learn how to fold, as well as how to bet. As the old adage goes: “Money saved is just as valuable as money won.”
“You got to know when to hold ’em, know when to fold ’em”
- Kenny Rogers, from “The Gambler”, 1978.
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Five Card Hands
Regardless of what form of poker is being played, be it Seven-Card Stud or Texas Holdem, a final poker hand is always a combination of five cards, no more and no less.
This is crucial to remember – forget this and it will cost you!
In different forms of poker you get dealt different numbers of cards and the way in which a five card hand is constructed varies too. For example: in Omaha each player is dealt four cards, before another five cards a dealt face up on the table, that means each player has a total of 9 cards from which to form his best five card hand. But in Omaha the best five card combination MUST include exactly two cards from the hand and three cards from the table.
In Texas Holdem, on the other hand, each player is dealt just two cards with five being dealt face up on the table. But in Texas Hold’em players can make the best five card hand in three ways: they can either use both cards in their hand and any three from the five on the table, or they can use one from their hand and any four from the five on the table, or they can even use all five on the table (if for example there was a royal flush on the table).
But always, in whatever game, remember: five cards make a poker hand, no more, no less.