Learn the Basics of Playing Poker in Las Vegas

Before you can start playing poker at the Las Vegas tables, you’ve got to know how to play. Even great poker players all begin in the same place: with the basics. Learn the hands, the game itself, the basic strategies, and you’ll be comfortable playing poker anywhere like playing your favorite internet casinos on your desktop or laptop.
Learn the Basic Poker Hands

Basic poker playing begins with the hands, so know these inside and out before you attempt to play in Las Vegas (or anywhere else that costs money). It is called gambling, but there’s no reason to go into it without having a good understanding of the game. By simply mastering the basics of the game, anyone can learn to play the game well, and that’s the beauty of poker.

Ace High: If poker players have nothing that matches, no cards to create a hand, the highest card at the table wins the pot. In poker, the ace is the highest (or the lowest) card in the deck, followed by the face cards and so on.

Pair: A pair of anything can win a pot, if it’s the highest hand at the poker table. A couple of threes, two jacks, any pair will do, but ace-ace is the highest pair of pairs you can achieve. If you get a pair of aces and a pair of threes, you’ve got Two Pair. Two Pair always beats a Pair.

Three of a Kind: Three of a kind is the next step up from a pair or two pair. This poker hand is created with any three cards of the same rank, though of course the aces trump other sets.
Straight: A straight is five consecutive cards. For instance, a player may get the two, three, four, five and six. In a straight, the ace can fall either before the two or after the King. You can use all four suits to create your straight if you wish, as it’s the numbers and not the suit which are needed to create the sequence.

Flush: If you get five cards of the same suit (not the same color, but the same suit – hearts, clubs, diamonds or spades), you’ve got a flush. If two players at the table both hit a flush, the pot is decided by the one with the highest card in the flush itself. If you flush incorporates the king of hearts, your hand will be beat by a player who has a flush with the ace of hearts.

Full House: If you manage to get a Pair and a Three of a Kind, you’ve got a full house. This is a great poker hand, even in Las Vegas where professional gamblers abound as these gamblers are also playing for casino bonus. There are few hands that can beat a full house, but you should always be aware of the competition just the same.

Four of a Kind: There are only four aces in the deck, and if you manage to get them all you’ve got an extremely strong poker hand. It is not, however, the strongest hand you can get.

Straight Flush: The elusive straight flush is the highest possible poker hand in the game, and it falls so rarely that even pros can play for decades without coming up with this combination. This hand occurs when a player gets five cards in a consecutive sequence of a single suit – a straight flush. The highest straight flush possible is ten through ace – a Royal Flush, the only unbeatable poker hand (whether you’re playing in Las Vegas or anywhere else).

Poker in Las Vegas

Las Vegas is like no other city, but luckily playing poker is the same anywhere in any language. Once you know the basics of how the cards line up in your favor to create hands, you can learn how to play poker anywhere you please. Whether you’re gambling for money in Las Vegas or just enjoying a casual home game with friends, the game never changes…only the players.