Do's & Dont's: Insight in your Pokergame

[KukriKhan]

aces and tens were my lucky combo tonight, it got me 2 full houses which won me 200 bucks.

Aces and tens is always a keeper. Congrats, man. Aces and Eights, tho' statistically a fine hand, has some superstition attached.

[Dutch_guy]

By the way, now that we're on the subject of poker. Does anyone here play online ?

[The Stranger]

im thinking about it... but it takes too much time and downloading and all that stuff..

[The Stranger]

Aces and tens is always a keeper. Congrats, man. Aces and Eights, tho' statistically a fine hand, has some superstition attached.

thanx :)

[Ramses II CP]

I'm always wary of playing with strangers online. It's very hard to find a nice, even game online. If the game has no stakes then it's pointless and people play crazy, which will teach you bad habits even if you try very hard to play with discipline. If the stakes are low then you'll have trouble weeding out the crazy players, to whom the money means nothing, from the tactically aggressive players, and some people will be so super cautious that you just can't get a read on them at all (Which, for me, usually forces me to muck mid-range hands more than I like).

If the game has high stakes you can never be sure that the betting patterns are honest. No matter how good the validation system anyone with enough time can game it and put themselves in more than one position at the table. I'm sure I don't need to point out the advantages of that. Give me two, or even better three, positions at a table and I'll pull far more of the marginal pots for myself just by keeping an extra man in past the flop. Give me two positions at a table where the players don't change for 30 minutes or more and... they can just give me their money and go.

In short, IMHO, you need to be really careful who you play with online and what you're willing to risk. If you really want to play online I strongly recommend a tournament style game, with set stakes and distributed payouts at the top rather than a free/sit-in style of game where someone can catch lucky once and just walk away.



P.S. I'm really not a very good poker player, but I've played with some good poker players and I like to think I've learned enough from them not to lose my shirt immediately.