TAKING YOUR SEAT
Once a seat is available, you name will be called out or you’ll be paged. When you respond, you’ll be told at which table to take a seat.
Usually the tables are numbered on signs hanging over the table which also gives the poker game and limits and the buy-in. sometimes they are numbered on a small plaque, face-up on the table next to the dealer.
Buying Chips
In some cardrooms players buy chips from the dealer, and in some the brush will take your money and get chips for you from the cage.
Some rooms have chips-runners who carry chips around in a pouch to sell to players. If you’re not sure of the procedure in your cardroom, just get out your money, and someone will get you some chips.
Again, you just might need to ask. The minimum buy-in in the smallest games in most cardrooms is $40. Typically a minimum buy is either $40 or ten times the smallest bet allowed.
I recommend you buy either $100 or about twice the amount of the minimum buy-in, whichever is larger.
Rebuys
You won’t be able to go into your pocket to buy more chips during the play of the hand.
So, you always want to make sure you have enough chips before a hand is dealt, and it’s always a good idea to have a few more chips than you’ll probably need.
You can buy chips between hands. If you haven’t run out of chips, there is usually no minimum amount to buy for an add-on.
How Much Money to Bring?
One of the worst things that can happen to a poker player is to be in a good game, have a short run of bad luck, and run out of money.
It’s a good idea to make certain that you have enough cash to cover any normal runs of bad luck. Generally I like to have between three to five buy-ins in my pocket for a poker session.
For a game where the normal buy-in is $100, I won’t play I don’t have $300 in my pocket, and I like to have $500.
That might seem like more money than a winning player would need, and it usually is, but the nature of poker is such that you will lose more pots than you will lose more pots than you will win.
The amount of money in the pot when you do win will more than make up for the amount of money that you might lose in three or four losing pots.
The fact remains that it’s not unexpected to lose quite a few pots in a row.
Often, in the better games where the players are a little loose and wild, you might lose of pots in a row.
Sometimes the pots get big enough in these games that you can break even by just winning one out of ten pots that you contest, but if you don’t have enough money in your pocket to keep playing you won’t have that opportunity. Bring enough money.
Posting the Blind
When you first sit down, you won’t get a hand right away. Because the two blinds take the place of an ante, you won’t be eligible to be dealt a hand until you have posted a blind.
Blinds are put up in turn, so you’ll have to wait until the blind position moves around to your seat. Because Holdem is typically played without an ante, in most games you won’t be dealt a hand until you’ve posted a blind.
You will have the option of posting an amount equal to the bigs blind (as an extra blind for that hand) or simply waiting until it’s your turn in the normal rotation of the button to post the big blind. Most players just wait.
At some cardrooms this rule is not enforced at the lower-limit tables. The reason for the rule is to prevent players from taking shots by sitting in at a table, getting free cards until it’s their blind, then getting up and cashing out.
Entering a Public Cardroom / The Play of the Game / The First Betting Round
