|
|
Conform to the
pace of the game. Old-fashioned poker players like to take every
step with the greatest deliberation, with close figuring before
betting and excursions into psychological analysis before deciding
whether or not to call. In distinction to this, the public game
in a licensed club or gambling house moves with machine-like precision,
and if you pause for as much as ten seconds you will be subjected
to impatient prods from the other players. If you are by nature
a slow thinker, you may suffer a bit in the fast games, but not
as much as from violating the custom of the game.
Don't be a stickler for the laws in an amateur game. The players
commit the most horrible crimes known to poker: they drop out of
turn; they want to look at your hand when you bet and didn't get
called; they relinquish a pot and then want to reclaim it when they
find out they had the best hand after all.
Let them get away with it. I assume your principal desire is to
be a winning player (that is the purpose for which this book was
written), and in such a game you will win just by avoiding the more
horrible of the mistakes that are made all around you. Be content
with that. They will eventually kick you out of the game because
you win too much, but if you don't hurt their feelings by insisting
on strict interpretation of the laws, you will last quite a while
longer.
|
