A little over twenty years ago, with an assist from Lynne Loomis, I wrote four short beginners book which we called the Fundamentals. They covered the subjects of craps, blackjack, video poker, and of course poker. And over the years, we have produced several updates to these books with the latest one for the Fundamentals of Poker just being completed.

Our current plan is to produce the latest version of our beginner’s poker guide in our magazine and then to keep it on www.twoplustwo.com in an effort to help any new players that may come here looking for some guidance as they start their poker careers. So without further ado, here’s the first section of the Fundamentals of Poker.

Introduction

Poker, in its many different forms, is one of the premier gambling games throughout the world. It offers excitement and action, demands great skill from an expert player, and contains a certain element of luck. But most of all, it’s fun to play.

This book discusses various aspects of the many different types of poker that are popular in casinos and public cardrooms. Emphasized most, however, are seven-card stud and Texas hold ‘em in both the limit and no-limit forms, as these are the most widely played. Other games covered in the Fundamentals of Poker are Omaha hold ‘em, Omaha eight-or-better, pot-limit Omaha, seven-card stud eight-or-better, razz, ace-to-five lowball draw, and deuce-to-seven triple draw.

In addition, we’ll talk about some basic ideas which are important to all forms of poker. These include the ranking of hands, poker etiquette, and elemental poker concepts.

In today’s cardrooms, the stakes range from very small to extremely large, where thousands of dollars can cross the table in the course of one hand. But to help you get started, we have concentrated on the low-limit games. In fact, if you choose to play on the Internet, games exist where you can play for pennies in addition to games where only play money is used. These are excellent places for someone new to poker to start.

Poker tournaments also have become popular in recent years. The most prestigious is the World Series of Poker, which is currently held at The Rio Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada, where a new World Champion is crowned each year. Major poker tournaments also are hosted by the large card casinos throughout the world, and countless small events are regularly scheduled in legal cardrooms throughout the United States, in many foreign countries, and on the Internet.

The wide array of live-action games and competitive events available continues to promote the increasing popularity of poker. And since the game is not only fun, but also potentially profitable once you gain enough skill, it’s well worth learning to play.

The material in this book covers play in live cardrooms as well as on the Internet. However, some of the advice, such as “Protect your hand,” clearly applies to only one of these locations – live cardrooms. We’ll leave it to the reader to discern when the advice only is applicable to one specific place and when it applies to poker in general.

If you want to learn more about poker than what the Fundamentals of Poker offers, we have included a chapter on “Recommended Reading” at the end of this book. However, be forewarned that some of these books can be quite challenging. But if you become a serious poker player, many of them are certainly worth reading and you might discover that improving your poker game is a challenge that can last a lifetime.

In addition, there are many websites on the Internet where poker information and poker discussion is available. Our favorite is www.twoplustwo.com. It’s the home of the largest poker community on the Internet and contains over 100 discussion forums pertaining to many different subjects including a large number of forums devoted to specific aspects of poker. But we also need to let you know, so that there is full disclosure, one of the authors of this book is the primary owner of this site.

The authors wish to thank the following for their advice and assistance: Jim Albrecht, Binion’s Horseshoe; Mike Byrne, Fort McDowell Gaming Center; Donna Harris, and John Sutton, formerly of The Bicycle Club. Also, special thanks to Terry Cannon, Dan Harrington, David Sklansky, Ray Zee, and Ed Miller.

And finally for this “2+2 Internet Edition,” which is also the fifth edition of this book, we want to give a special thanks to David Sklansky. Some of the newest material that appears came directly from him, and with David’s help this book is now more complete.