Your two cents matters to me

Hi how are you folks doing today? i'm new to the game of poker and i really want to learn how to play it , i mean to play it good.I know that practice makes perfect but in my case it's kind of hard for me to practice and that's because i live too far from the casino.I 've been thinking on playing it online , hoping that is a faster pace . If you or someone you know has a lot of experience playing online and know of some decent sites where i can try out for free first and can allow me to observe some money games that will be great , one more thing , i read a post somewhere talking about online casinos for newbies and it mentioned sites like heracasino and fulltilt and others but i can't think of their name right out. I like to hear your opinion , thank you.

Im pretty much a newbie too, ive been playing for a few months. I started out on 888 and moved to PKR which is where ive stayed so far. Both sites offered the practice tables where you can play with "fake money" which is really useful. Im on the same road as yourself and the general consensus seems to be practice, read and practice. Good luck and maybe I will see you at a table someday

Full Tilt has play money games so you can practice, and you can observe the real money games.

PokerStars is the largest online poker site. It has play money games as well, and you observe watch the real money games.

Cardschat runs some sweet money-added games on UltimateBet as well. Last time I think there were 16 players, and it paid 9 places.

Other popular sites that accept players in the USA include:
Carbon
Cake
Bodog

Toss $50 bucks on a site (I use FT) and just expect to lose it, this is the cost of learning the game. You will win some and lose some, but don't expect to build a 10k roll on your first run. Think of it as buying a nice night out to dinner.

Stick to pot/drawing odds in touchy hands and don't try to play anything fancy like they show on tv and you will be fine.

See ya at the final table!

One day, you will

^--please don't do that and waste your money.

Here are my suggestions:

-Download either Pokerstars or Full Tilt poker and play their play money tables for a while

-Read books. The one I always suggest to people is Phil Gordon's little green book, it's a good book to learn the basics and you can pick it up on amazon for really cheap.

-Read the golden archives and look around the Ring Game hand analysis/Tournament hand analysis area to get a feel for different kinds of situations and what you should do.

-Don't get into cash games until you feel comfortable with your game

I played playchips & the occasional home game for years and only recently deposited. I have a couple million play chips on FT, and do think the experience helped. You have to see a lot of hands to learn that bad beats are part of the game and sometimes folding that beautiful hand if the right play.

Once you practice for a while with play chips and can wind consistantly with those fools, find a friend that already has a FT account and have them transfer you $10 or so. THis way you can practice with real miney before making your deposit. I did this and was able to figure out how much of the bonus I could clear to determine how much to deposit.

I see most people recommended full tilt or pokerstars but i think they teach you to play badly. Most people on their sites do plus there is soo many people on those sites. I do recommend full tilt for their academy if you go to their site they should have a link to it up top. There are alot of lessons you can take to help you get started. You should try a site that has fewer players to start, I like Carbon it tells you on top the cards what hand you have can be usefull if you are new to poker. Just make sure you know the ranks of hands. Visit the web sites of what ever site your playing and it will tell you how each game is played and the ranking of hands. Do this before you get into a game you do not know how to play. Good luck hope to see at the tables, I will try to take it easy on you. Hope I helped.

Hi Freakshow.
Here's what you should do. Download FullTilt, PokerStars and UltimateBet. (Download the .com site, NOT the .net site). By downloading the .com software, you will be eligible to play freerolls and win real money to build your bankroll. There are many other smaller sites, like Cake, Carbon, Bodog, DoylesRoom, Reefer, etc., but maybe just start with the 3 biggest first, as I described. Once you download the software, there are lots of freeroll opportunities to win real money. Why practice with "Play Money" games when you can risk nothing and pactice with freerolls and end up winning real money to begin building a bankroll. Along with reading through the CardsChat forum for poker instruction, may I recommend checking out RoundersRadio.com. They do Internet radio programs about poker where you'll learn more about the game and they also give passwords on air to their private freeroll games. I also recommend checking out the Full Tilt Poker Acadamy. By playing the "Sit-n-Learn" challenges, you can win yourself into a monthly 5K freeroll. I've only ever deposited money on PokerStars, but this summer I decided to try to see if I could build a bankroll in other sites like FullTilt, UB, etc. without actually depositing. It's gone pretty well. So far, I'm up to ~$220 on Full Tilt. Good luck.

I recommend you try watching some trainin poker videos, i learned most of my play from them, there are very good to get started and also for more advanced players, you can search some of them at youtube.

Goodluck.

I would download a pokersite of your choice. Full Tilt poker and Pokerstars are the most popular. When you download them I suggest playin fake $ for a while till you learn the rankings of the hands and the basics of the game. It will help you in the long run instead of jumping right in and losing your real $. Try it with play $ for a while and when you feel comfortable(1+ Month later) i would try playing low limits and even then dont expect to get rich. It takes some practice and exprience to become a good poker player.

If you learn enough to play solid ABC poker quickly, you shouldn't lose much money playing low-level buyins and/or micro-ring games. So rather than automatically starting with play chips, which will expose you to the worst poker imaginable, consider starting at a level you can easily afford.

Assuming you become a winning player reasonably quickly, which isn't hard at low levels, it won't take much time to recoup $50, $100 or even more depending how much you play and how quickly you improve.

I play at fulltilt, but be careful. Playing online can give a player a detatched feeling from his money. you might find yourself calling when you shouldn't for example. Check out full tilt it is free to play and you can watch live real money games. Pros play there to so you can watch them if you want. have fun.

why dont you try one of the no deposit bonuses, there a lot of no deposit offers now, you ussually get 25 or 50$ and have to reach certain requirments in order to withdraw the money, but it is great for practice and if you loose you learned your lesson but for free. If you are interested in any of these offers feel free to pm me

888's Pacific Poker also has a hand indicator so you know exactly what hand you have. Ther are play money tables too...

This is horrible advice. Play on Full Tilt or Pokerstars for play money. Honestly, there is no investment involved with that. If you can consistently win at play money tables you could easily start the micros. .01/.02 NL these players usually don't have much skill and about 65% of them have blown almost all their deposit and that is why they are playing the $2NL. Then there's 30% who stricly play the micro micro games because there's little to no risk in losing a larger BR. and then you have 5% who are building BRs.

The waters are infested with fish and donks. If you do deposit just know that skill levels of players are typically better the higher you go in stakes online.

I personally don't mind driving 45 minutes to my card room. Because, the payout is instant. Unlike having to wait for a check to be mailed to you and having to go through the hassle of ID and Credit Card verification.

Online is convenient but you really need a HUD, such as Holdem Manager or Pokertracker, to really make it profitable. And don't EVER EVER try to bluff a donkey on the river in micros.

As several others have said, download the site of your choice (Full Tilt for me) and start by playing play money.
If you are really new to poker this will at least allow you to play the game and watch what can happen. Be careful there are a lot of players who will push all in with anything BECAUSE it is play money.

Full Tilt (as well as other sites) have Freerolls that can help you start a bankroll without depositing. It is VERY difficult but it can work. I started my Bankroll through FR's and have never deposited and still have a substantial BR on FT.

The freerolls are also full of donkeys who will push right away, 1st hand, with just about any two cards but this can help you develop patience at the table (an essential part of any good players game)

Remember what you see on TV is usually on 10% of the hands played at a tourney so patience is very important.

Also stay active here on CC and eventually you will get an invite to one of our FR's and you will find a smaller field, better play and the possibility of building a bankroll

Good Luck

Fulltilt is the best overall imo. And I agree with the others that tossing $50 in is not good advice at all. Build your bankroll from freerolls whilst learning the game and spend the $50 on books.

Playchips are a good place to start. Not so much for learning poker strategy but for learning good bankroll management policies(BRP). If you can't win upto 1m playchips or more then you probably aren't using a good BRP. Playchips are also good for you to get used to reading flops and getting a basic understanding of the game. I play on fulltilt and was able to build a big BR using playchips and freerolls. They acually got a $40 freeroll that pays real money for an entry fee of 500k in playchips. I was able to win over $20 in these and some more $ from the CC freerolls to help me move into cash games.

Well I kind of agree with Irishlatent

playmoney is fine for getting a feel for the software but it can also lead to bad habits

Read the posts on Cardschat, use proper bankroll management and assuming you can genuinely afford to lose it make a deposit. A little cash can go a long way at low limits and if you can develop a solid game there is real satisfaction to making a profit from your leisure time

you can also try NLOP its free and some cash prizes

i play on full tilt