888poker Team

The table stakes rule prevents poker players from betting with more chips than they already have at the table. Before the table stakes rule, players might be able to force their opponents out of pots by betting more than their opponent could afford to lose. We could be playing a game for a few hundred bucks when our opponent suddenly throws his private yacht or Ferrari into the middle. With the table stakes rule, once a player is all in for his effective stack, he has the right to see a showdown without being forced to invest any additional chips.

Suited simply means that two of our cards are of the same suit. For example, the starting hand Ace of Spades, King of Spades in Hold’em is referred to as “Ace King suited” since both hole cards are of the same suit. PLO (Pot Limit Omaha) hands can be referred to as both suited and double-suited depending on whether there is one set or two sets of suited cards.

Stud refers to collection of poker variants that have similar characteristics. Stud games don’t use hole cards but rather a selection of upcards and downcards dealt to each player. Upcards are visible to the entire table while downcards are secret (like hole cards in Hold’em). The most popular Stud variant is Seven Card Stud which involves 5-betting rounds. Stud games are typically played in fixed limit format and don’t make use of a dealer button. The action order is instead determined by the strength of players’ upcards.

Structure typically refers to the features of a poker tournament including level times, blinds, antes, and payouts. It would also refer to any additional features of the tournament such as it being a bounty tournament or a tournament that offers rebuys/addons. Structure may also refer to the distribution of card ranks within our hand. For example, imagine the following preflop hand in PLO; T876. We can describe this as a starting hand that has a gap at the top of its structure.

A string bet is a betting action in live poker games that is illegally split into multiple components. The classic example is the statement “I call your bet….and raise you another 50”. In its current form, the player will be forced to just call the bet, since this is what was announced initially. There are many other ways to string bet, such as placing one chip into the pot and then trying to place additional chips afterwards; only the first chip will count. Repeated string bets could be considered an attempt at angle shooting by the other players at the table.

A straight flush in poker is made by holding 5 cards in rank order, all of the same suit, e.g. 5,6,7,8,9 all of spades. The strength of the straight flush is determined by the card at the top of the structure with the King-high straight flush (9,T,J,Q,K) being the strongest possible straight flush. The Ace-high straight flush in poker is technically even stronger but is given the name ‘royal flush’ as opposed to straight flush. The straight flush is one of the strongest hands in poker, losing only to higher ranked straight flushes or the royal flush.