Pokers, wild cards, and special rules may be introduced into any of these games to create such aberrations as Baseball, Follow the Queen, Anaconda, and scores of other variations that have Beyond Beginning Poker 3 spiced up home poker for decades. Paradoxically, the two types of players who favor these exotic poker variations are generally amateurs who want a lot of action and hustlers who prey on these amateurs because their long experience allows them to adjust more easily to unusual games than their amateur opponents can.

 

However, before a player can become an expert at exotic games, he must understand the basic concepts of standard games. Another significant distinction among poker games is their betting structure. Most home games and most games in Las Vegas, Gardena, California, and elsewhere are limit games—that is, games in which limits are set on the minimum and maximum bets. Normally, in the smaller-limit games of Las Vegas, such as $l-$3 seven-card stud, there is no ante, and the low card starts the action for 50 cents. In subsequent rounds, the high hand on board may check or bet $1, $2, or $3. In the higher-limit Las Vegas games and in the limit draw games of the card rooms of Gardena, the betting is rigidly structured.

 

In Gardena the bets double after the draw. In Las Vegas they double in the later rounds of betting. In $5-$ 10 seven-card stud, for example, there is a 50-cent ante, low card starts the action, or brings it in, for $ 1, and on the next round the bets and raises must be $5, no more and no less. With an open pair after four cards, a player generally has the option of betting $5 or $ 10, but anyone who raises must raise $10. After the fifth, sixth, and seventh cards, the bets and raises must be $10 whether or not anyone has a pair showing.