Poker is a game that requires serious concentration for hours at a time. You must avoid alcohol, conversation and distractions. You must be centered, hydrated and well fed to make the best decisions. Learn proper bet sizing for the stakes to minimize your risk and maximize your winnings. You must also know how to read tells, the unconscious habits of other players that reveal information about their hands.
To play poker you must have ‘chips’ (money to bet with). Each player is dealt two cards and then 5 community cards are revealed in the middle of the table (“the flop”). Each player must try to form the best five card hand using their own 2 cards and the community cards. The highest hand wins the pot. Ties are broken by looking at the highest card in each hand.
The second stage of the hand, called the turn, adds an additional community card to the board. This makes it a total of 4 cards face up and the second betting round takes place.
On the final table players will often tighten up and it is a good idea to exploit this. If you have a great hand on the flop you can bet forcefully and steal blinds and orphaned pots from these tight players. This will allow you to build a huge stack with which to go deep in the tournament. Aggression is important in poker but you must balance it with survival and chip accumulation.