Poker

Why you should learn to play poker

(Adapted from a 8-minute speech during the June 2019 Ultraworking Marathon)

Today I’m going to talk about why you should play poker.

Hold’em rules for those who don’t know how to play: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_hold_%27em

Why poker is a skill, and why it’s applicable to life:

• There are two ways to win a poker hand: You can have the best hand, or you can convince other people that you have the best hand when you actually don’t. In a job interview, who gets the job? The person who is the best candidate, or the person who makes the interview think they are the best candidate? Who wins an election? The person who will lead the country to greatness, or the person who convinces the most people that they will lead the country to greatness? It’s good to be the best candidate AND convince people that you’re the best candidate, but both are valuable skills independent of each other.

• It’s a game of imperfect information, just like life is. Everyone has the same access to some of the information, and everyone has access to some information that no one else has. Finally, there is information that may or may not be available to anyone, depending on whether or not they know where to look. To win and poker, and to win at life, is to use the information that you have to make the best decision possible.

• You have to put your money where your mouth is, and you get rewarded or punished very quickly based on the quality of your decision. It’s easy to say “I think you’re bluffing,” but more difficult to put your money at risk based on that belief. In life, everyone has opinions, but being right doesn’t do anything for you unless you acted on your opinion. This goes for whether or not you go to school, start a business, invest in a company, learn a skill, etc. It doesn’t matter if you can pick stocks if you don’t buy them, it doesn’t matter if you have a great idea for a business if you don’t put your time and money at risk to make it happen.

• Poker is a game of odds and calculated risk. Every decision you make has an impact on whether you win or lose, and how much. Just like in life, you win when you can avoid taking foolish or unnecessary risks. You win by taking calculated risks, minimizing your losses when the risk goes badly for you, and maximizing your gains when the risk goes your way.

• It teaches patience. Tournaments can go for hours, or even days in larger events. A single episode of impatience or impulsivity can knock you out of a tournament and lose you a lot of money. Just like in life, you have to be consistent and strategic over an extended period of time to win.

• Poker teaches you to get out of your own head and pay attention to other people. When starting out, it’s good enough to learn to play your cards well, learn a little bit about odds & position, and not make any terrible mistakes. However, to get to an advanced level, you have to learn to play your opponents, not your cards. You’ll learn to pick up on people’s betting habits, their non-verbals, and their strategies, and with this information you can win more of their money and avoid letting them win yours.

If this sounds interesting to you, You can play online for free, and your town probably has a few bars that have weekly free games. It’s great fun and the skill transfer to life is wide-reaching and profound. Finally, winning your friends’ money by outplaying them is usually more rewarding than the money itself.

How to organize a poker tournament

1. Use an application like Tournament Director
2. Input the variables such as:
3. • number of players
4. • buy in
5. • desired tournament duration
6. • desired chip denominations and starting stack
7. In a location easily visible to all players, display the important information about the tournament so there is no question or argument about the rules. This information should include:
8. • Chip color/denominations
9. • Rules about re-buys, add-on, etc.
10. • How the pot will be split (winner take all, 50/30/20, etc.)
11. • Protocol for disputes, muck hands, refereeing, etc.
12. • Protocol for chipping up
13. Start the blind timer and the tournament

Lesson plan for new players

(Developed September 2019 for the HD5 Fundraiser)

The Object and How to Win

The object of Tournament Poker is to be the last person in the game, or as close to last as you can be. You do this by winning other people’s chips, and not losing all of your own.

The tournament is divided into a number of rounds, and within each round you’ll play multiple hands.

In each hand, there are two ways to win chips:

• Have the best hand at showdown (the end of the hand, when the remaining players reveal their cards)
• Be the only person not to fold (turn in your cards)

The Hands

The hands, in order from best to worst:

1. Straight flush
2. Four of a kind
3. Full house
4. Flush
5. Straight
6. Three of a kind
7. Two pair
8. One pair
9. High card

How to make a hand:

• You make your best 5-card hand with any combination of your two cards (“hole cards”), and the 5 community cards.
  • You can your 2 cards + 3 from the community cards, or 1 hole / 4 community, or even all 5 community cards and neither of your own
  • a hand is only 5 cards - “3 pair” is not a playable hand

The Structure

The structure of each hand:

1. Post blinds (“blind bets”, that get the action started)
2. Deal everyone their 2 hole cards
3. Complete the betting round
4. Deal the “flop” (“burn” one card, then turn over the first 3 community cards)
5. Betting round
6. Deal the “turn” (burn 1, deal the 4th community card)
7. Betting round
8. Deal the “river” (burn 1, deal the 5th and final card)
9. Betting round
10. SHOWDOWN!

Actions

Every time it’s your turn, you can perform 1 of 3 actions:

• Bet/raise - increase how much money everyone has to put in the pot to stay in the hand. The minimum bet is the big blind, and the minimum raise is the amount of the last bet/raise.
• Check/call - match the current amount that you’re required to put in the pot
• Fold - Turn in your cards and get out of the hand without putting any more money in the pot

Dealer, Blinds, and Turn order

• The Dealer is selected randomly at the start of the tournament
• Each hand, the Dealer chip moves 1 player to the left
• The person on the Dealer’s left posts the small blind, and the next person on the left of them posts the big blind
• Play always proceeds to the left of the dealer. At the start of the hand, the blinds have already acted blindly, so it goes left from there, but the blinds will still get to act voluntarily before the end of the bettng round. On subsequent rounds, action starts to the left of the dealer.

Basic Strategy

• The later your position in each hand, the more information you have, since others have to act before you make your decision.
• Styles can be classified on two axes:
  • Tight/Loose: how much risk a person is willing to take - do they only play when they have good cards (tight), or will they play more hands and hope to get lucky?
  • Passive/Agressive: is the person more willing to bet & raise, or more likely to let someone else drive the action and just call or fold?
• Reading the board: As you gain more experience, think not only about what you have, but about what cards others could have that could beat you. For example, if you have 4-5 and the board has 3-6-7, you have a straight, which is a good hand. But are there 3 cards of 1 suit there? Or even 4? If so, someone could have a flush, and your straight is no good anymore.
• Reading other people: Does a person seem confident or timid? Do you believe them? Do they want you to call their bet, since they really have a hand, or do they want you to fold because they’re not sure if they have the best hand? Be careful, people will try to trick you by acting confident when they’re really weak, and vice versa.
• Made hands vs. Drawing hands: A Made Hand means you got something - you’re already holding a high pair, or even something better. A Drawing hand means that if the right cards come out, you will have something good, but if they don’t, you have nothing, or a small made hand that won’t beat much.
• Bluffing. It’s a risky move, and could lose you a lot of chips very quickly. Use sparingly!
  • Example: you have 4-5, and the board is 3-6-K. If a 2 or a 7 comes out, you’ve got a straight, but if not, you have nothing
• The Rule of 2 and 4 for estmating your drawing odds: Count how many cards could come out that will complete your hand, and multiply it by 2 for your odds of hitting it on the Turn, and 4 for your odds of hitting it on the Turn or the River. Be careful! If you miss it on the turn, you’re back to the rule of 2, and might have to put even more money in the pot to see that last card.

General Advice for Beginners

• Play conservatively to start out. Get a feel for what kinds of hands are common, and how people bet. Even if you fold the best hand, you’ll still be around to play another one if you fold without putting too much in, but if you go all-in early and lose, you’ll be out. (Don’t worry though - you can re-buy in if you get knocked out early!) * If you have a small hand, try to keep the pot small, and if you have a big hand, try to make the hand as big as possible! You don’t want to get half your chips in if you just have a pair, but if you have a full house, you want to try to get as many players to put as much money in as possible. Don’t overplay it though - if you bet too big, everyone could fold, and then you miss out on all the chips they would have put in if you had reeled them in a little slower.
• Don’t bluff, or bluff VERY RARELY. You will get called sometimes, and it’s a fast way to lose a lot of money. Also, if you bluff a lot, people will catch on, and your bluffs will become less effective. NEVER bluff all-in unless you’re ready to go home.

Etiquette:

DO:

• Make your action as clear as possible:
  • keep your chips close to you, and put your bet towards the center.
  • verbally state your action. If you say one thing, and do another, “verbal is binding.” Example: you say “Bet 20” but accidentally put in a 100 chip - your bet will be 20 (and you might have saved yourself 80 chips!)
• pay attention and be aware of when it’s your turn and how much has been bet to you. It’s totally fine to ask if you’re not clear whose turn it is or what’s happening, but don’t be the person who’s on their phone the whole time and slows down the game for everyone
• Stack your chips in such a way that everyone can see how much you have. Poker is a game of information, and how much everyone has is part of the “information everyone has access to” category. Mixing up chips in a stack, hiding a stack of high-value chips behind a bigger stack of lower-value chips, etc. is called a “dirty stack.” You’re supposed to lie and deceive in many ways in poker, but this isn’t one of them.

DON’T:

• Play out of turn - including folding!
• “Help” the dealer, unless asked. This includes making change, pointing out who’s got what, etc. If you think the dealer made a mistake, point it out, but don’t do their job for them or it can get confusing and slow down the game.
• “Splash the pot” (toss your chips into the pile). This makes it hard to see how much you put in and whose chips are whose.

REALLY, REALLY DON’T:

• Talk about your cards, other people’s cards, or anything else about the hand while there’s still action.
• Show your cards when you fold
• Do anything else that gives players information they’re not supposed to have while the hand is still in play. For example, if you fold, and the flop comes out 10-J-K, don’t say “Dangit, I would’ve had a flush!.” Try not to even groan or slap the table in frustration.

Questions?

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Billy Shane Ethan