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Online Poker Playing Online poker is lots of fun. The download is easy. Just follow the directions and you will be playing poker in just a few minutes. Be careful if you decide to play in the real money games. You are protected by the tracking software that all the sites use to make sure that two or three guys can't gang up on you. It is much better protection than you will find in a brick and mortar casino. They simply can't tack the hands that are played. For one thing once cards are mucked, they are gone forever. Not so online. The sofware knows what every card that every player has ever held in his hand. Be sure and set up rules for yourself to follow. Never ever put any money at risk that you can't afford to loose. You play against real people in real time. It is extremely helpful to have braodband acces but dial ups work also. If you are on a dial up be sure and write down the number of the poker game that you are playing. Then if you get booted off you can sign back on again and continue in the game. The tracking sofware also knows when you get the boot and will allow you time to get back online. Reading The Poker Board When you look at the flop always take your time and use the same abount of time every time. Don' look at any of the other players when you raise your head. look instead at a neutral place or the dealer. You should not have picked up your cards until you have had a chance to study the other players at the table pick up theirs. Holdem can be fast paced but you can slow it down some without being obnoxious about it. One of the nice things about Texas holdem is that you can always tell what the best posible hand is by reading the board. Pre flop you know that the best two cards to hold is pocket aces. nothing can beat it. After the flop and right up to the river, you know what the best possible hand is by reading the board. It can tell no lies. If a pair shows up in the flop then you know the best hand is four of a kind. If three hearts flop then you had better hope that you have the Ace of hearts in the pocket. always look carefully, especially at cards that can bridge to a straight. A six and a nine somehow do not scream straight at you but if another player has a seven and eight in the pocket he has a good open end straight draw. The Bluff There are times to bluff and times not to bluff. Some people cannot tell the difference. You most certainly want to get caught bluffing a time or two a night just to make sure that you do not get pegged as a tight player. You must pick your time to bluff very carefully. Burn Cards You are going to see the dealer burn cards before the flop, turn, and river. No one gets to see the burn cards before they are mucked so they are of no help to you in making a decision. They should be taken into consideration when you are calculating your outs. The burn cards are a security feature of Texas Holdem. There is always the possibility that the card has been marked during play. The burn and muck of the cards makes it impossible for anyone to know what the next card coming up is before betting. The Check Raise When you are playing Texas Holdem you are going to want to check raise from time to time. The check raise seems to some people to be sneaky and underhanded. Coming as it does from a hand that first checks, pretending to have a weak hand, to a hand that will raise. It can really ruffle some feathers, especially those guys who are trying to limp into the hand. They want to get all the way to the river without spending any money. You want them to spend money. The other day I was playing and was dealt the seven of spades and eight of spades. I know that there are long odds of catching a flush on the flop and the eight has lots of over cards that will beat it, but I was feeling lucky. The flop comes seven of diamonds, seven of hearts and a king of clubs. Cool, I flopped a set. Fortunately for me another player flopped kings over sevens. His two pair looked pretty good to him. I could tell because he was eager to bet. I thought about it for a long time, making him wait. Then checked. He bet his KK/77 and I raised him. It changed the whole complexion of the game. He had thought he was top dog until I raised. He called me. On the turn the fourth seven came up. It gave him the full house and me the nut four of a kind. I checked again. He could barely hide his glee as he bet. Bad Luck Run You are going to find times when the cards run hot and the cards run cold. It all evens out over the long term. That is why strategy is so important when playing Texas Holdem. The best Holdem strategy is going to take the money. Nothing is feared more than the unknown. If you can develop a strategy that is able to shift gears during a game and become so unpredictable that you opponents don't know what you are going to do. Then you will have an edge. Vary the hands that you are willing to play. Once in awhile see the flop with Jack/3 off suit. Or some other equally bad hand. Do it as cheaply as you can. Remember that playing for the long run means that the cards will equal out over time. Time and hours of play will knock off the high spots and level out the bad runs. If you think that you on the verge of tilting. Get out of the game fast. Do something else for a couple of hours.