Eight Poker Myths Dispelled

There is probably no other game that has as many myths and misconceptions as poker. Knowing the difference between the myth and the truth will, no doubt, help any poker player win in the long run. Poker is a game of cards and numbers. The best hand, statistically wins, and this is the fact. So don’t become a victim of some popular misconceptions that only will make you loose money.

Myth 1. “The winner in poker is the person who wins most pots”. Wrong. The object of the game is to win the most amount of Money. If you go for winning pots all the time you will loose money. To be a successful poker player you need to know when to abandon the pot and fold your hand. Winning a lot of pots and loosing big pots is a costly mistake.

Myth 2. “You should stop when you are ahead on your money”. There is absolutely no reason to do so. If you are playing well, enjoying yourself, drawing good hands and have nothing better to do why stop? It is better to continue playing, enjoying yourself and carry on winning. On the other hand when you don’t feel right about the game and things are not working out in your favour this is the time to stop and do something else for a while.

Myth 3. “When playing poker you must keep your poker face on at all times”. You can be as animated as you want as long as your actions do not show the strength or weakness of your cards.

Myth 4. “You have to bluff to win at poker”. Bluffing is fun and a part of poker strategy, when used correctly. However it can turn out to be dangerous and costly when used in the wrong circumstances and wrong opponents. Bluff against a “calling station” and you are in big trouble. Bluff against too many people ditto. Don’t even try to bluff against more than two players. And if you are caught bluffing too many times you can expect more calls from your opponents.

Myth 5. “Good poker players are born not made”. Although this might be partially correct when it comes to super-super stars, most good poker players develop through a lot of practice and diligent studying of the game and numbers behind it. This is why poker is considered to be a game of skill and those players who analyse and constantly improve their skills make money in poker while others pay for.

Myth 6. “Online poker sites are fixed”. Years ago that may had been the case in some instances however not these days. All online poker rooms are licensed and regulated; the license issuing body constantly checks the randomness of the dealt cards and fairness of the play. Online poker rooms’ employees cannot see your hole cards when they are dealt. This information becomes visible only when the hand is completed and available to you in your hands history. Being a director of a poker site, I have top level access to the system and I can assure you that there is no unfair advantage information available to anyone. In fact when you play poker online you are more protected than if you were playing in a casino when another player or an observer can catch a glimpse of your cards.

Myth 7. “Changing sites will change your luck”. If you going through a loosing streak it is very tempting to try your luck on a new poker site and hope for good. Unfortunately this rarely works for most players. The only thing that will make poker gods smile at you again is patience, analysis of your play and improving your skills. In fact staying loyal to your chosen online poker site pays off better as you get to become familiar with the software, types of players and have can enjoy online poker promotions offered by the site to its faithful players.

Myth 8.”You have to be super aggressive to be good in poker”. There are only very few successful players who constantly play super aggressively and win. Those players are mostly poker legends and mainly tournament players. Ordinary players who adopt this game style go broke very quickly. Players who make money constantly in poker are usually selective rather than over the top aggressive at all times. You don’t need to be wimp, but don’t go all in on every hand you get, a more balanced approach will give you much better results in the long run.

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Online Poker Rooms in Comparison

Poker players have many poker rooms to choose between when they want to play poker. The most familiar online poker rooms are Full Tilt Poker, PokerStars, PKR and PartyPoker, but you can find smaller poker rooms such as LuckyAcePoker, Doyle’s Room and William Hill Poker. The disadvantage with the smaller poker rooms is also the advantage: The smaller rooms have fewer players, and the chance to meet the same players more than once is bigger than if you play at e.g. PokerStars. That makes the note function in the small poker rooms very important, since you can take notes about a player and when you meet him again, you know exactly how he plays.

Of course, the note function is also a great tool in the bigger rooms, but the chance of meeting someone you have written a note about is small and if you don’t play online poker every day or maybe just one or two times a month, you should consider not using the note function. This is a basic rule about the poker rooms.

The User Interface

The bigger poker rooms are all different. Full Tilt Poker has a beautiful user interface and if I should choose to play at a poker room, based on the user interface only I would definitely choose to play at Full Tilt Poker. The user interface at PokerStars is very old looking and I actually don’t like it. It somehow reminds me of parchment paper from the time of Leonardo Da Vinci, which has nothing to do with poker. PKR is very unique when it comes to user interface, which of course is because it’s in 3D and you can interact with your avatar, but many find it frivolous and I think the average age of PKR’s players is low.

The Prize Money

Poker would be a whole other game, if it wasn’t for the money. The different online poker rooms arrange tournaments and actually a lot of tournaments daily. Not only is the main prize a percentage of the user’s buy-in to the tournament, it’s often prize money that the online poker room gives away. When it comes to prize money, PokerStars turns out to be the best. You can always find a tournament with a huge money prize. Full Tilt Poker is also good, but they have too many satellite tournaments. PKR’s tournaments are fun, but the amount of prize money is incredibly low.

The Amount of Players

The amount of players on an online poker room is actually very important. If there are few players (below 10,000) it tells something about the difficulty, and the basic rules are if the prize money is low the difficulty of the poker room is also low, because good players will never play low stakes poker. According to numbers, PokerStars has far more players than any other online poker room, and it is all time of the day. The reason to this could be the fact that PokerStars runs commercials on many different channels. Full Tilt Poker has almost as many players as PokerStars, but PokerStars still has the most. Real poker players will not choose PKR, because they play for the money, not for the experience.

Overall rating

Of course there are many factors why a poker room is better than another, but there three factors are relevant to all poker rooms. PokerStars tops two out of three with Full Tilt Poker as follow-up. That’s actually funny, because they offer the same bonus when you sign up.

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Five Ways For Poker Players To Get The Best Deal From Online Poker Promotions.

All online poker rooms around the world run a multitude of online poker promotions every day and a savvy poker player needs to find the best ways to make the most profitable return of the deposit investment while having an enjoyable game. With online poker rooms’ competition being as strong as it is now there has never better time to make the most of your deposit dollar and the hours you spend playing poker online combining business with pleasure.

- Online Poker Bonuses. After the Black Friday on April the 15th this year New Depositor’s bonuses for non US players went through the roof. Just two months ago a 100% deposit bonus was the standard rate you could find in online poker rooms, it all changed overnight. Now poker rooms eager to attract new players are willing to pay 150% or even 200% first deposit bonus to the players. So a little research can make you a lot of extra money if you decide to try out one of new online poker rooms and see the best capital return to your deposit investment

- Rakeback. Whether you play poker live or online the poker room takes a small part of each pot as a fee to provide you with the game. If you are an occasional player it does not really matter but if you spend a lot of time playing poker online you should contact the poker room support and ask about the “Rakeback “ programs that they might offer. This action alone can bring you hundreds of dollars back into your account. Some poker rooms giveaway 22% of the revenue collected, some give up to 40%.The average amount of rakeback you can get these days is about 33%. But remember you need to contact the poker room directly and ask for a rakeback program.

- Freeroll tournaments. This is the best way to build up your bankroll from nothing. All online poker rooms hold a multitude of Online Poker Freerolls where players can win real money without a single dollar risk. Many players have built up their bankroll this way when they started playing poker for fun and later turned into professionals. You can choose from a variety of free tournaments available in different poker rooms nowadays. There are different types of Freerolls to join Poker Tournaments available nowadays: starting from promotional freerolls designed to attract the new players, to higher level new depositor freerolls – for the players who joined the poker room with money, to massive loyalty freerolls – to reward the players for their custom and many more. Such freerolls start with a prize pool from as low as $10 and go up to serious money of tens or hundreds of thousands of free cash.

- Live Poker Events qualifiers. This year WSOP 2011 drew up over 700.000 players from across the world and has a prize pool of over $180,000,000 that is more than the Wimbledon, the Derby and the US Open put together. Online poker rooms offer a huge choice of online live poker events qualifiers to help ordinary poker players to qualify online and win huge sums of money while making history like Chris Moneymaker who won the WSOP 2003 Main Event. There are plenty of live poker events qualifiers available for different live events. Sometimes you can qualify to events like WPT, WSOP, EPT from as little as $0.30 for a chance to win hundreds of thousands of the events’ prize pool.

- Collect the hottest gadgets of your desire. You want to buy something that you really want? Well, you don’t need to cut down your bankroll as very often online poker rooms award their loyal players with the most desirable items on the market. Right now you can earn some of the best gifts online like IPods, IPhones, and IPads2 for doing nothing more than playing poker. So if you have your eyes set up for something it is always worth contacting your poker room to see if they are open to extend their promo further and reward you with a prize you are looking for. All poker rooms love interaction with their players and would be willing to offer you a very good deal for your custom, so don’t be shy and ask for the deal.

If you are a serious poker player online poker promotions suggested above are a great way to build up your bankroll and take advantage of your custom in online poker rooms.

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