What do you think of "Play Money"?

Are ''play money" games beneficial to learning players? If you think they are how long should a player wait to move on to real money games.

I guess its good to play and get a handle on the game. The only problem is a lot of people on play money tables turn it into a coin flip. Money tables and tournaments seem to play a little different as money is involved, but as is everywhere you will run into knuckle heads as well.

Waste time better learning somewhere like wpt.com

I believe if your not playing for something everyone just goes all in with out any real skill being involved u get no lessons in play money its better go to site where theirs qualifiers involved i mentioned wpt.com but theirs many others.

I don't think you can learn many things playing on "Play Money". Nobody cares about their chips and all players will go all-in even if they have a good hand or not. You can learn how to play poker reading articles, books and you will improve your skill better. You have many ways to learn how to play this game, just search on google and you'll find.

If you can play real money, play real money. It will always be much better to play real money than play money.

If you decide to play with play money, the biggest problems you will face is 5+ seeing the flop, people calling all the to the river with draws, and you will constantly get value from top pair. These are all things that do not transfer to real money at any stake. The only benefit is it gives you a feel for the game and the rules if you are completely new to poker.

Mostly, I agree with the posters above. Poker is a game where risk is a fundamental component, both managing and leveraging. Without risk, you're not really playing poker.

That said, tournament poker is a little bit different. Because your chip stack represents your tournament life, there is still some element of risk, even if there is no monetary value. If you couple that with an unspoken agreement among the players to take the game seriously, you can have good, competitive tournaments with play chips. Finding a group that takes a play chip game seriously is the key, and even then, you will find players who are 'shove monkeys' anyway. Of course, you find those players even in $5-games, but I digress.

If you want to work on your game, get involved in this community, get your post count up, learn what you can in the process, become a member of the freeroll club, and begin there.

Or find a group that has competitive play chip games (if you can) and join in. You may at least have some fun that way.

What Curt said.

Look at pokerstars Home Games and join a club or 2 or 3.... Most of the clubs have that "unspoken" agreement so that good play is the goal.

Really have to agree with what everyone has said so far. The only thing I can add, is I have noticed that anymore these days, it really hardly matters anymore. I mean, even small amounts of money doing tournaments, it seems that so many people just play rags and call and call. Even trying to play quality hands I seem to always get knocked out with something like 36 off suite. Quite honestly its very frustrating. It is even worse with play money. Very hard for me to try and improve my game without letting myself get on tilt, and getting knocked out playing ace rag.

I wasn't aware of club games for play money. That sounds like an excellent idea. I have a few buddies that I play HU for play money sometimes. It has really helped my HU game.

Well my girlfriend doesn't trust poker sites so I'll have to stick to play money till i can find some free roll tournaments. I'll try to look up club games, I hadn't heard of those before.

Good place to learn the basics of different games, or to just get a feel for a new site. One of the biggest problems faced by most players is an inflated opinion of there own skill level. Play money games always make this worse.
Success at the play tables means nothing as the previous posts well stated.
Enjoy.

ChipsOwnerRO said:

I don't think you can learn many things playing on "Play Money". Nobody cares about their chips and all players will go all-in even if they have a good hand or not. You can learn how to play poker reading articles, books and you will improve your skill better. You have many ways to learn how to play this game, just search on google and you'll find.

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You might learn from reading articles or books, but I suggest you'd rather learn from experience.

Play money is useless to learn, as you are American join a poker stars home club game like others have suggested, most home club games play like real money games.

well either your bankroll is zero or you want to play for fun you can play money, and if you are very basic at poker then you can learn the first steps playing there

If you're first starting out in poker and want to take the steps to becoming a profitable player spending time in play money is a must imo. In my 7 years of playing online around 3 were spent in play money. When I came off my 1 1/2year poker break in Jan 2013 I started out in pokerstars homegames for playmoney and really learned a lot. You definitely learn how to adjust and prepare yourself for real money games. I spent 8 months in play money last year before I even considered real money, what it taught me made me a long term winning player in the real money games. I still dabble in play money a bit myself as it can help. If anyone's keen theres a few home game clubs that run play money games with decent competition that I have played in and still do occasionally, PM me if you'd like the codes.

I think they can be beneficial in some ways...

You can use them to teach you a lot about patience, variance, bankroll management, and how to play against donks and fish without tilting.

Furthermore, when you make a lot of play chips you can actually come up against better players who also have a bit of discipline and this could help your general real money game.

I see some players saying that they can't play with play money because there are too many bad players who don't take the game seriously... but if you can't find a way to adapt and beat the game consistently at the lowest levels possible then what game do you seriously expect to adapt to and beat in the future?

Play money is good for testing style of play.I love play freeroll no stress

I used play money for learning or practice when i started playing online. I usually use play money when i'm running bad or tilting so instead of losing BR u lose ur play money. Whenever you feel your rady for real money games is up to you but i would suggest shying away from how u use play money and real money if that makes sense

I only use playmoney to exercise heads up.

It is the only good thing there I think.

Because HU is about your pride not you money ha ha

This may be a very stupid question, but what are these home game clubs? These are online correct? Forgive the question just curious as these sound like good places to learn a few things.

rumpleduskin said:

This may be a very stupid question, but what are these home game clubs? These are online correct? Forgive the question just curious as these sound like good places to learn a few things.

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After black Friday Poker Stars started what is called Home Games where people can create their own home game using play money, this allows players from USA to be able to play with their friends overseas.

You can create a Poker Stars home game club and invite your friends to play with you.




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rumpleduskin said:

This may be a very stupid question, but what are these home game clubs? These are online correct? Forgive the question just curious as these sound like good places to learn a few things.

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Not a stupid question, after reading the responses to my question I was wondering the same thing. As soon as I can I will check out home game clubs. If they only have these at poker stars it might be a while because I have limited bandwidth and just downloaded Betonline but, it sounds ideal for learning to play.

Hi people, for me, is a waste of time play this kinds of games, cause all go to allin with bad cards and so u not learn anything about real poker !!
I think that these games are good to spend time just for fun

waste of time seems no one plays seriously and will call with any 2 cards

It is a waste of time honestly.