Tag Archives: rank

Poker Jargon For Beginners – Describing The Hand You're Dealt

If you have had a look at a poker dictionary, you will realize that getting used to all that vocabulary is a matter of months or years. Reading those long, long lists is definitely the last thing you should be doing if you want to get acclimatized to the jargon.

The best way to get used to terms is to split them up according to contexts – what terms are used to describe players? How do cardsharps (what are cardsharps?) talk about hands that are good or bad? Do cards have nicknames?

Here, I’ll be telling you how to value the cards you are dealt. The ranking of a hand is decided according to two factors.

A. The type of hand. The royal flush is the highest hand, and the order of ranking is –

• Royal flush • Straight flush • Four of a kind • Full house • Flush • Straight • Three of a kind • Two pairs • One pair • High card

B. The ranking of cards in the hand. Aces can be ranked high or low depending on what type of poker is being played. However, the type of hand is more influential in determining the ranking than the rankings of individual cards. C. Now, we move on to the types of hands. Remember – each hand contains five cards.

• Flush – Five cards belonging to the same suit, regardless of the number

• Straight – five cards in consecutive order of numbering. For example, 3-4-5-6-7. The arrangement of cards in any hand does not affect its value

• High card – One card of high value is present in the hand. Aces are usually the highest valued, followed by Kings, Queens, Jacks and so on.

• Royal Flush – 10, J, Q, K, A all of the same suit. No suit is ranked higher than the other

• Four of a kind – Four cards of the same rank, with a fifth card of different rank

• Full house – Three cards of one rank, and two of another rank. A hand with three sevens and two fives, for example, will be described as “Sevens full of fives”. This will be ranked higher than “fives full of sevens”, as sevens are valued higher than fives.

• Three of a kind – Any three cards in the hand have the same rank

• Pair – two cards which share the same rank. There may be two such pairs in the hand, when it is called “two pair”. Pair, like any hand that depends on the rank of cards, does not depend on suit.

As you see, unless you have a Royal Flush there is absolutely no way to tell how likely it is for your hand to be a winner just by looking at your cards. This is what makes poker such an involved and interactive game of strategy – smile or frown at the wrong time, and you may end up giving the game away.

Oh, and if you didn’t know it already – a “cardsharp” is an expert card game player. That’s the first of the poker terms you will come to know.

Mastering the Best Poker Hands

Hand rankings are important when it comes to poker games. Having the best poker hands will help you know when the right time to lay your cards will be. You will also know when the best time for you to wager higher bets. Rankings should be taken into serious consideration, as winning in poker is always about getting the best hand and knowing the right time to raise bets. Read this article for a thorough explanation of poker hand rankings. Learn this and be a better poker player. It’s time to cash out on your poker enemies!

Poker hands have their own different values in the game. As a player, you should know which are the highest and the lowest. If you want to emerge as a winner in poker games, you must take note of the hand rankings and their value to your game.

There are 52 cards in a deck that are ranked from highest to lowest, This starts with the ace, king, queen, Jack, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2. Although, in other countries like Europe, they played Italian poker with a deck of less than 52 cards. Low cards are disregarded. A hand consists of five cards. Cards which are not included in the hand do not affect the ranking. Individual cards are ranked A, meaning the highest. The poker hand does not affect the order in which it is arranged by deal, prescription or picture; it still has the same rank. Poker hands are categorized from highest to lowest as Straight Flush, Four of a Kind, Full House, Flush, Straight, Three of a Kind, Two Pairs, One Pair and High Card.

Straight Flush consists of five cards in sequence all with the same suit. Four of a Kind consists of four cards of one rank, and an unmatched card of another rank. Full House is a three of a kind and a pair. A Flush is five cars of the same suit. Straight is five cards of sequential rank. Three of a Kind consists of one card in hand, and two on the flop. Two Pairs is when your best five cards create a pair twice. One Pair contains two cards of the same rank, plus three other unmatched cards. High Card happens when no two cards have the same rank, the five cards are not in sequence, and are not all in the same suit.

In determining the best poker hands, different variations should also be considered. There are variations like using decks with a wild card or bug, lowball and stripped deck variant. If a Joker is used as a bug, it creates a variation to the game. The Joker plays to be the weakest when it comes to lowball, while it becomes a full wild card in non-casino settings. Sometimes, a stripped deck is played in Five-Card Draw poker. This variant is popularly known as “seven-to-ace” or “ace-to-seven.” This can be played by a maximum of five players. This only contains eight or nine different card ranks.

When playing games in situations where the lowest hand wins, there are some exceptions in the rules of the ranking. These may not be a standard, so you should talk about it with new players before the start of the game. The most common rules are as follows: straights and flushes do not count as combinations, aces count as low, below the twos. Another is that a hand always belongs to the highest category into which it fits. In standard poker, ranking of suits is not a rule.

Now, your knowledge about poker hand rankings widens. Just remember not to lose hope if you didn’t get any good combinations on your first deal of cards (some of the combinations are frequently seen while some combinations are hard to get). Not all cards are laid all at the same time in the game of poker. You will get extra cards and lose some cards throughout the poker process. So, you shouldn’t lose hope and must not show any weakness because showing weakness is one of the best pokers tells that your enemy can use against you. Keep playing, just concentrate and see the money coming.