Poker 2004

dailystar.com poker - With the use of a bonus code, it is possible to receive a 150% bonus payment on top of your first deposit.

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This is a very good offer, and one which is above the average for most poker rooms. Live support is available on this site, which is always preferable to me as it is a fast and efficient way of dealing with queries. The games on offer at this site are of a reasonable variety with Omaha, Holdem and Stud available in 5 card and 7 card formats. This is generally accepted as the basic three games which every site should offer if it wishes to be successful, but I personally like to see another game such as 5 Card Draw included too. This certainly wouldn’t bother me too much however, as it is important to remember that sites must be able to think they can fill the tables of a certain type of game, in order to offer it.

Guaranteed tournaments can be found at dailystar.co.uk poker with some tournaments having guaranteed prize pools of up to $250k. Satellites to major land based tournaments can also be found here which is always going to be a draw for players with big aspirations within the game. ‘Sit n Go’s’ are also on offer here, and if you can win 6 in a row, you will be eligible for a large payout, which increases by thousands each week that it goes unclaimed. The smallest of these, with a buy in of only $2.40, requires 4 consecutive wins to trigger a $2,000 windfall.

All in all, I think dailystar.com poker has a chance to do well as a poker room. Much of what is offered would certainly appeal to me as a player, and I hope to see them improving each month.

Pacific Poker currently have some interesting promotions going on and these are as follows. Six days a week there is a $20k gauranteed tournament to keep those of us who like a large prize pool logging in each day. Also running is the very interesting ‘double or nothing’ series of SnG’s.

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These involve half of the table winning double their entrance fee, and the first half to be eliminated, winning nothing. With all the players simply trying to last as far as the money half of the table, I feel this would set the game up for a bolder player use this fact to their advantage.

Referring a friend to pacificpoker.com results in the referring player receiving $50, and the referred new player receiving an extra $25. This is a generous offer I feel.

The first time deposit promotional cash match of 100% is good, although it’s release is triggered partly by the amount of points you earn wagering real money. New players will also be pleased to see that they have access to a $1,000 welcome freeroll to help them get their funds off the ground. If as a player, you like the biggest prize pools and tournaments, the $100k deep stack tournament that runs every sunday, should be for you.

Although the direct buy in might be a little large for some players at $200, there are satellites available so those of more modest means still have a chance of a big payday.

Overall, a nice little package of promotions to keep the players happy at www.pacificpoker.com

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The first point to be made about www.pokerheaven.com is that the first time deposit bonus is of an excellent level at 200% on top of your deposit amount. This bonus is capped at 1,000 Euros, but it is a great offer and is well above the industry average. If this isn’t enough to get you interest, then there are many other promotional offers available too.

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The 160,000 Euro Freeroll Series has just got underway, with players looking to win their way to both an excellent cash prize, as well as a seat in th 100k Euro freeroll at the end of the series. Considering the size of the prizes that are possible, this is a great offer for players to get excited about.

There is also a refer a friend offer available here which entails a 50 Euro payment to the referring player for each new player referred to the site. Poker Heaven are also running a one off, free qualifier to their 1 million Euro tournament in December, which is very generous of them indeed.

There is also a great loyalty points system in place at Poker Heaven, this means that players who are regularly wagering, will soon earn enough points to spend on either tournament buy ins, or merchandise from their online store.

Another great promotion is running here, which gives players who final table 3 gauranteed tournaments in a row, a final table SnG with prizes paid out to all partcipants. First prize for this being 3,500 Euros.
Overall I feel there are a lot of great promotions on offer at Poker Heaven.

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Although poker is a game which does not involve long term preparation before a big game, other than having some experience in the game of course, short term preparation can be important.

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As a player I like to go to a game in a calm and positive frame of mind, and I find certain things help me to do this. Half an hour spent online playing some poker can help get you into a poker mindset, and give you that little bit of extra sharpness going into the first hand I feel. Sometimes going into a tournament having not played for a couple of days, can mean your ‘radar’ is slightly off with reads and suchlike. This might of course not be a problem, but if you get involved in a hand which requires a big decision early on, then you want to be focused enough to get it right.

Sometimes I also find that a glass of wine and some music help me relax too, and put me in the right frame of mind for a big game.

I also know someone who is a little superstitious and likes to bring a lucky charm with them. They also sometimes play out hands of holdem with a deck of cards on their own, and only stop once they have been dealt the losing hand a few times in a row. Their reasoning is that if they do this, they will go into the tournament being due a winning hand, crazy as that sounds.

As much as I think that is ridiculous in some ways, I firmly believe that anything which sends you into a game with more confidence can be helpful in it’s own way.

Whatever your own routine for preparing for tournaments, as long as you go into the game relaxed, positive, and with faith in your ability, you are bound to do as well as is possible.

For me, when a tournament is nearing it’s conclusion and you reach heads up play, you need to be the person that takes charge, if the size of your chipstack allows you to. Often your opponent will start applying pressure immediately, and I personally feel that firing back with reraises and aggression is the only way forward. If you are timid and allow yourself to be pressured into folding every hand preflop, your opponent will be taking your blinds one after another and you cannot afford for this to happen.

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It is true that giving an aggressive opponent some of their own medicine may mean you get knocked out of the tournament, but at least you have gone out with a fight rather than being raised into submission.

The advanatge of putting your opponent into a defensive style of play cannot be understated when you are heads up with big blinds. It doesn’t really matter which poker variation you are playing, although Texas Holdem is especially good for this type of strategy because of the amount of time you do not get dealt a playable hand. If your opponent expects every hand to cost them all their chips to play, they will be putting down hands with the slightest of pressure, and giving you their blinds which soon add up. Within only a few hands, you have often made enough extra chips to be able to take your opponent on with a weaker hand, providing you have them comfortable out chipped that is.

Certainly the most important thing about heads up play I feel, is to be the aggressor and take control of the match at all costs. The moment you do this and make your opponent fold their hands straight away while they wait for something to move in with, you have them on the run, and the momentum is with you.

For players who are new to the strategy of trapping, it can often be difficult to know when the right time is to set a trap. First and foremost I should point out, that the type of player you are up against is just as important as your situation in a hand when it comes to trapping.

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Let us say for example that you flop a flush in a Holdem game, and are thinking of trapping an opponent. I would certainly advocate the play in some circumstances, as the danger of the flush is so glaringly obvious with a suited flop. If you wish to trap with this type of flop, and you find your opponent raising I would go ahead and reraise rather than flat calling. The reason for this is that often you might be against an opponent drawing to a bigger flush (unless you already have it yourself). Whenever you consider setting a trap you should always be considering what chance there is of your plan backfiring. Of course you want your opponent to catch up a little, but if they make a bigger hand than you somehow, then you will find yourself in deep trouble and end up wishing you had played the hand strongly.

If you happen to be against a type of player who has been playing very conservatively and folding most hands, I wouldn’t advise slow playing here because the chance of your opponent bluffing at the pot are minimal. If we take our aforementioned scenario of flopping a flush, the danger is too much for this type of player to even attach much value to top pair either, so you are often better just raising and taking the pot there and then I feel.

Your prime target player for slow playing, is an aggressive player with chips to burn. You can easily get this type of player to try and force you out of a pot in this situation if you show weakness. So in general terms you should have a mental note of which players might be susceptible to this type of play, and always be aware of how your trap can plausibly backfire.

In essence, these two types of game involve the same hand rankings and betting patterns and many other things, but this does not mean that every part of the two games are the same. There are some professionals out there who specialise in cash games rather than tournaments and vice versa.

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One key difference between the two games is that with cash games, you can bring more money onto the table if you are losing, which is something you cannot do in tournament play other than in rebuys. Another point to make is that if you are losing in cash games you can stand up and leave the table whenever you please. the same of course applies to if you are winning.

I certainly think that as a player, it is good to have this choice, and this can be used to your favour.
The difficulty some players find in tournament play is that if they take a bad beat, they still have to try and collect their thoughts and continue playing effectively with what chips they have remaining.

As much as I like the freedom of cash games, and the option to sit at a table or leave as and when things might be going your way or not, I prefer tournaments. Multi tables especially have the feeling of a marathon about them. It is all about surviving longer than the player next to you, and trying to do so at their expense.
As your game develops, you should find your own strengths and favourite types of tournaments. Everyone has different preferences, and being at your favoured type of game can often spell the difference between success and failure.

In general, the amount of time an opponent takes to decide on what play to make is out of your hands. In online play, each player has a clock which runs on each decision they make, and on some sites this seems to run out rather quickly. Pokerstars has a system where a player can ask for more time on occasion, and live play has no set limits on time.

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Having said this, any player at the table can decide to call a clock on an opponent who has already taken a long time deciding. In this instance a floorman will be called over to give a set amount of time to make the decision.

Players usually will be lenient in this type of circumstance, giving 5 or 10 minutes at least before considering calling a clock, as they do not know how difficult a decision there is being made, and all understand the importance of these instances in tournament play. There are phases in online play, as well as live play, where someone might play for time and run the clock down when they are getting close to the money. Even though this may be the case, as a player I always feel obliged to give a person the benefit of the doubt, as it seems impolite to call a clock on a fellow player.

If you do become impatient and want to begin calling clocks on players who you believe are running the clock down, be warned, the moment you have an important decision to make, they are likely to do the same to you.
This is why usually, I will be very accomodating when it comes to players taking time to make a decision, especially if it is for their tournament life.

As any player who plays live tournaments knows, part of the enjoyment of the game is sitting down with some friendly faces, and having an enjoyable evening playing cards. This side of the game is perhaps one of the things that has helped it grow into the phenomenon it is today.

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Thousands of players turn up for the World Series each year, and although many of them are there to simply make money, you do not get the same jesting around and talking between the more lively characters at a table, in any other game.

Of course this part of the game gives an extra dimension to the play itself, and is unique to poker. You do not for instance, see chess champion Gary Kasparov laughing and saying " I know why you moved that bishop there, this is how you’re trying to set up your checkmate" or berating his opponent for a poor move before crushing him with a deft movement of his hand. But this is poker, and you will sure see this kind of banter from the likes of Phil Hellmuth and co.

Great players in the past have used the social side of poker to their advantage, with Mike Caro, saying that a man you have been very kind and friendly to moments before, is always easier to bluff on the next hand.
Whatever it’s possible advantages, or the joys that pokers social side gives the game, the online world can never recreate this feeling of enjoying a drink and a game of poker with friends. For this reason amongst others, I feel that live poker will always be the best form of the game.

In general terms poker sites are almost always regulated by gaming commissions who ensure that everything is above board and fair for customers. The transactions are of course dealt with on secure pages also, to ensure no illegal activities take place.

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Looking at the rules of individual sites in terms of what players are, or are not allowed to do whilst playing onsite, are a slightly different matter. There are general rules which every site enforces universally, such as no collusion between players. You cannot for instance sit down at a Sit n Go tournament with your friends and be speaking to each other away from the poker site and informing each other of your hands. You may ask how something like this could possibly be enforced, and how a poker site would know. Most often there is no site representative available to watch each and every table, so for aspects of collusion, and other rule breaking behaviour too, the players are relied upon somewhat.

Players who know what they are doing, will always notice a player making very strange plays, and if a player happens to making these type of plays regularly, and profitably, they are likely to be reported. They may of course not be breaking any rules, but operators onsite will view transcripts of the hands, and be able to percieve with a good degree of accuracy, if somthing untoward has taken place.

Most rules in online play are just a case of common sense, and of course, etiquette.

No abuse of players is tolerated as you might expect. If you lose, lose with dignity.
If you sit and play poker fairly and as you know how, and are friendly to (or ignoring) the players around you, you will not ever break any rules. That’s all you really need to know, although if you want to make sure of the precise rules they can usually be found on the site with which you are playing.