Poker is a card game played with a standard deck of 52 cards. There are four suits (spades, hearts, diamonds and clubs), and the highest hand wins. Some games include wild cards, which can take on whatever rank and suit their possessor wishes (dueces or one-eyed jacks, for example).
When playing poker, players put money into the pot voluntarily, called “raising.” This occurs before the players receive their cards and is done to encourage them to play. The player to the left of the button makes the first raise, and then each player has the option of calling the raise or folding. The amount of money a player puts into the pot is known as their “pot size.”
Once each player has two personal cards in his or her hand, another round of betting starts. This is usually triggered by 2 mandatory bets, called blinds, placed into the pot by the players to their immediate left. These blind bets create an incentive to play and also help to establish the value of a hand.
Some players are very conservative and tend to fold early, whereas others are risk-takers that will bet high early on in a hand. Identifying these players is useful because they can often be bluffed into folding by more experienced players. Also, pay attention to the tells that the players display – shallow breathing, flaring nostrils, blinking excessively, and a sweaty palm are common signals that a player is holding a strong hand.