Can you clarify that, in simple terms?
In Texas Hold’em each player gets two hole cards, then there are five community cards (BOARD) dealt to the centre of the table that all players share. The first three cards in the community are the FLOP. The fourth card is the TURN, the fifth card is the RIVER.
The NUTS is the best possible hand, one that cannot be beaten. It will depend on the BOARD. If there are three suited cards and no pairs in the community, the nuts would be an ace flush. If there’s a pair in the community, the nuts would be a full house.
So, the rule says that if you have the best possible hand when all community cards are dealt, you must raise the bet.
The rationale is that checking behind with the nuts is slowplaying, which is cheating.
Note that
- This rule is NOT obscure. It’s common.
- The rule is usually not “you must bet with the nuts.” It’s that you must, specifically, bet or raise if you are the last to act. If you and I are heads up and you have the nuts, but you act FIRST, checking is a legitimate play, since you may wish to lure me into betting, so that you can check raise me.
I wouldn’t consider slowplaying to be cheating.
If you only have to play if you’re the last to act, I’d think any player would do that, anyway. If another player calls, you get more money, and if everyone folds then you don’t have to show your cards (which means you aren’t revealing useful information to the other players). There’s no downside to betting with the nuts if you’re last to act. A rule requiring it seems superfluous.
That’s a circular argument. It’s against the rules because it’s cheating, but it’s only cheating because it’s against the rules. It doesn’t provide a rationale for it being against the rules in the first place.
Slowplaying is legitimate strategy and not against the rules except in that one particular circumstance.
According to this page, the rationale is that it prevents collusion between players.
The reason for this discrepancy involves what are known as pot odds. The amount you stand to win versus to the amount you have to risk compared to the probability of hitting the hand you believe will win.
The money in the pot just post flop is rarely enough to make a 1 in 12 shot worth chasing but it is frequently enough to make a 1 in 6 shot worth chasing.
So Peter is correct that it is frequently worth chasing an open ended straight draw but rarely worth chasing an inside straight draw and the ratio is much more than the 2 to 1 difference in the plain odds of hitting one or the other.
Yes it prevents a kind of collusion sometimes called soft playing, not slow playing.
Slow playing is taking a long time to pretend to consider your options when you are the last to act and have the nuts hand - as if to drag out the drama or watch your opponent squirm while you already know you are going to win the hand. That is considered to be among the ultimate breaches of poker etiquette and might even lead to injury in some private games. But I don’t think there is an official rule against it in most casinos.
I thought slow playing was when you have the nuts, but make a small bet or check. The object is to sucker your opponent into raising, so you can re-raise.
Yes that’s the most common use of slow play and I think the one RickJay was using but definitely isn’t against the rules in any casino. Checking when you are the last to act no longer has any chance of luring an opponent into making a bet so it is called soft playing. Usually done in a tournament where the two players, after driving everyone else out of the hand, would prefer to help each other make it into the money than knock each other out.
Slow *rolling *is the most common term for what I described above and is also often called slow playing. It actually might be against the rules somewhere as it is such a show of bad sportsmanship.
This is enlightening. I’ve always thought it was a universal truth that “small” meant nothing higher than a ten (no face card involved) and “baby” meant playing an ace low was required.
Thanks.
Particularly in big buy-in tournaments many players often “have a piece” of each other – some may simply be an agreement to give some percentage of their winnings to the other player; this helps to cut down the luck factor – some may be “sponsored” by another player paying some or all of their entry fee – sometimes a group, say of five players, may agree to pool all winnings and split them five ways.
In all such cases it is to the benefit of the involved players to eliminate others not in the “corporation” while taking as few chips as possible from those in the group.
I agree that ‘soft playing’ is a more appropriate term than ‘slow playing’ for this behavior. It is pretty common in cash games where friends or spouses soft play each other when no else is left in the hand and doesn’t have any effect on others in the game but it does have an effect on tournament standings where each player’s chance to win is directly correlated to the number of chips they have.
Poker tip of the day from an old pro regarding small straights: When playing 7 Card Stud, don’t draw to any straight that will contain an 8. You’re not gonna make most of those straights, some of the straights you do make are gonna lose to higher straights, and you’re more likely gonna make a pair or two. Two pair is the most common winning hand and if you are playing high cards your Kings Up is much more likely to win the pot than Nines Up.
Why an 8 Turble. I would think 8 9 T J Q would be a good straight.
More precisely, the nuts would be a hand that contains two cards of that suit, one of which is the highest denomination outstanding - yes?
But only the highest possible one, right?
With a pair on the board the nuts would be four-of-a-kind not a full house.
Good point. But if you have the third card, and a pair , your opponent can’t have quads, so it’s still unbeatable.
Unless as Xema mentioned there is any other card on the board higher than the pair - for example if the board is 559 and you hold a 9 and a 5. In that case a player can’t hold 55 for quads, but if they are holding 99 they would still have the higher full house. Chances are good you will lose a lot on a hand like that when it happens, and it does.
I’m not sure of the reason for this in 7 card stud either but a well known texas holdem tip is that if you hold Jack Ten, any straight that the board could complete will always be the highest possible. Whether the board has 789 or 89Q or 9QK or QKA if you make your straight it will always be the top straight. Those are the only two cards in the deck where that is the case. (other than AK but in that case you can only ever make one straight anyway). I suspect the thing about 8’s in Stud is something similar, except meaning it has lots of ways to be the lower straight, although I can’t at the moment think of how.
Why wouldn’t the same also be true for JQ or QK?