The game involves a lot of skill and techniques because each player is allowed only two separate cards and the other five cards are commonly used by all the players. Strategizing and careful evaluation of each move are integral to the game. Prior to the No Limit Texas Hold ‘Em variant coming into style, the 7 Stud version of the game was all the rage. As Texas Hold ‘Em gained more and more repute, especially during the 2000s, it began to take the place of 7 Stud Poker as the most in-demand game in casinos across the United States.

The aim of the game is to win the money that is placed as bets by the players themselves. Unlike some other versions of poker, the cards that are being dealt in the game are not in individual sets for each of the players but to be shared between them. As this lessens the influence of the players on the cards they control, the strategy shifts from having power over the card hands to learning to manage with the two separate hole cards and shifting combinations of the shared cards in order to be able to control the money at stake.

The game progresses in a number of stages that are normally known either as deals or as hands. At the closure of each hand the pot of money collected thus far is given to the one player who is at the top of the game at the time. When one player emerges as holding the supreme combination, he or she is declared as the winner of the hand and the deal is closed and he or she receives the money pot. If the winner is not chosen because of a direct victory, he or she is chosen on the basis of the exclusion principle. In other words, when only one remaining player is left in the game because the others have declared their hands to be “folded”, the one left still playing is decided to be the winner.

Unlike the common perception, victory at individual rounds is not the aim of playing Texas Hold ‘Em. Rather, the focus is on being able to make the largest possible profit by concentrating on making decisions of betting, timing, folding and calling the cards such that one lasts throughout the game and reaches the end with the returns on each bet being more pronounced each time.

Good call? That’s not a good call imo – I call Gavin Smith a calling station. I like Peter Feldman’s bet there – I don’t like that call at all. But hey: I’m wrong.

Tom Dwan overbluffs a pot, possibly putting JC on an Ace – but honestly – he can’t be sure enough to risk THAT much in that spot, right?

JC makes a ridiculous laydown. He obviously overthought it.

via abdellatif poker

Rummy: Rummy is a long but an interesting game that can be played with four to six players. Rummy is a good option especially when you have a couple of novice players. Deal out seven cards to each player and keep the remaining on the table facedown. This is the deck from which players draw cards. The objective of the game is to match 3 like cards and 3 sequential cards in each player’s deck. Each player gets a turn to place any card they want from their hand next to the card that’s placed face up and draw a new card from the deck. If another player wants cards from the discards they can pick it up, any other cards that are placed on top of it. When a play makes a matching set they use their turn to place it down on the table in front of them. The winner of the game is the first person to complete all the matches and sequences and get rid of his hand.

Senior / Junior Poker: Set up mini tournaments among the senior expert players to find the most skillful of the lot. In the same way you can go the next step and even have a mini tournament in which the novice players lock horns with the other novice players, competing with eachother in a quest to win that mountain of chips!

These 2 games are sure to pep up your party once the guest becomes tired of the regular poker and is looking for a change.

WTF GUYS.