Nex
Flush
Heyo,
I was recently talking with a work colleague who is in a regularly playing D&D group. The group members don't know anything about poker, but she knows that I'm fairly deep into it. She said recently one of their players made a suggestion to "try out" poker, and asked me if I was interested. I didn't immediately say yes because I wanted to properly prepare first.
D&D groups usually consist of 4, maybe 5 players and a dungeonmaster, so I'd expect this to be a shorthanded round including me.
Now I'm not particularly fond of teaching people the very basics they could easily learn online for free (i.e. basic rules of poker, hand rankings, maybe even basic etiquette). I'd much rather have this as a prerequisite and start right with basic play strategy. So what I am thinking about doing is send them a couple of YouTube videos that give a general introduction to the rules ahead of the night so they can prepare a bit.
Many years back, when I wasn't into poker yet, I myself was in such a "try out" poker night where basically noone had any idea about the subject. Needless to say, it was a complete mess, nobody learned anything, and it wasn't particularly fun. (Did I mention it also included dice chips aka. "how much is this color worth again"?)
I would like to try my best to give those people a well-structured introduction of proper poker, beyond the bare rules. Basically a night that has a realistic chance of getting at least a few of them hooked on it.
My personal opinion is that poker with no actual monetary risk leads to bad play and a "I don't really care" attitude. They likely won't be willing to risk more than 40, maybe 50 bucks for the whole night, so I figured FL Holdem at 25c/50c or NL Holdem at 5c/10c might be appropriate for starters. This would give them a good amount of hands or full buy-ins. I'm not sure however what implications starting with either FL or NL exactly has. My fear with FL is that people get a bad habit of just calling down to the river with nearly any two because it appears to be so cheap, and my fear with NL is that people might still be intimidated to lose a full $10 in a single hand and hence play extremely tight, in turn barely creating any action, and with that, barely any good example hands to learn from.
NLHE tournaments ($10-$20 buyin, 70%/30% pay) are also a possibility, but I see multiple problems in regards to having newbies start with this as their very first game of poker, so I'd rather save this up for a little later:
I am considering Limit 7 Card Stud at 25c/50c (5c Ante 10c Bring) as the first alternate poker variant after NL/FL Holdem to introduce them to after they've been learning for a while. Omaha would be overkill I believe - merely a fancy money merry-go-round if FL, and brutal on peoples' money if PL. The smallest denom in my nice chip sets is 5c which means 5c/10c is the lowest I can go, and while this might give a good amount of play in NLHE, in PLO the money is probably gone far too quickly for some.
If someone here already has experience in introducing newbies to poker, I'd love to hear about your approach, ideas and findings!
I was recently talking with a work colleague who is in a regularly playing D&D group. The group members don't know anything about poker, but she knows that I'm fairly deep into it. She said recently one of their players made a suggestion to "try out" poker, and asked me if I was interested. I didn't immediately say yes because I wanted to properly prepare first.
D&D groups usually consist of 4, maybe 5 players and a dungeonmaster, so I'd expect this to be a shorthanded round including me.
Now I'm not particularly fond of teaching people the very basics they could easily learn online for free (i.e. basic rules of poker, hand rankings, maybe even basic etiquette). I'd much rather have this as a prerequisite and start right with basic play strategy. So what I am thinking about doing is send them a couple of YouTube videos that give a general introduction to the rules ahead of the night so they can prepare a bit.
Many years back, when I wasn't into poker yet, I myself was in such a "try out" poker night where basically noone had any idea about the subject. Needless to say, it was a complete mess, nobody learned anything, and it wasn't particularly fun. (Did I mention it also included dice chips aka. "how much is this color worth again"?)
I would like to try my best to give those people a well-structured introduction of proper poker, beyond the bare rules. Basically a night that has a realistic chance of getting at least a few of them hooked on it.
My personal opinion is that poker with no actual monetary risk leads to bad play and a "I don't really care" attitude. They likely won't be willing to risk more than 40, maybe 50 bucks for the whole night, so I figured FL Holdem at 25c/50c or NL Holdem at 5c/10c might be appropriate for starters. This would give them a good amount of hands or full buy-ins. I'm not sure however what implications starting with either FL or NL exactly has. My fear with FL is that people get a bad habit of just calling down to the river with nearly any two because it appears to be so cheap, and my fear with NL is that people might still be intimidated to lose a full $10 in a single hand and hence play extremely tight, in turn barely creating any action, and with that, barely any good example hands to learn from.
NLHE tournaments ($10-$20 buyin, 70%/30% pay) are also a possibility, but I see multiple problems in regards to having newbies start with this as their very first game of poker, so I'd rather save this up for a little later:
- Tournament requires much more dynamic play even at a basic level of understanding; more and more trash hands get playable and have to be played as the blinds go up. I figure newbies who don't have a solid basic hand selection yet would quickly get confused with the ever-changing minimum hand requirements in each phase. Cash is much easier to learn in this regard.
- Some players might be intimidated by the multi-hour time frame of a tournament where they essentially can't leave early without sacrificing their whole buyin. With cash game in contrast, they can have a break at any time they want and also cash out whenever they want, creating a bigger sense of freedom.
- Play would probably be very tight having the knowledge they are out for the whole night if they bust, so in the end it will probably be a luckfest and the winners are decided by who has the better starting hand once the blinds force people all-in preflop. Of course one could work with rebuys, but then again a rebuy costs them significantly more money. Adding bounties (maybe a $10+$5 format) might help reduce the perceived risk and encourage a rebuy because even if people don't make it ITM they could still end up with cashing a bounty.
- Players who bust early can't do anything but watch (unless there's rebuys and they are willing to fire another bullet), and while for some newbies this might not be an issue - they could still learn things by merely watching - some others might quickly get bored. With cash game in contrast they can rebuy at any time, without negative impact on game dynamic, and keep playing actively. (Late rebuy in a tournament is a worse proposition for the low-skilled rebuyer than at the beginning due to rising blinds)
I am considering Limit 7 Card Stud at 25c/50c (5c Ante 10c Bring) as the first alternate poker variant after NL/FL Holdem to introduce them to after they've been learning for a while. Omaha would be overkill I believe - merely a fancy money merry-go-round if FL, and brutal on peoples' money if PL. The smallest denom in my nice chip sets is 5c which means 5c/10c is the lowest I can go, and while this might give a good amount of play in NLHE, in PLO the money is probably gone far too quickly for some.
If someone here already has experience in introducing newbies to poker, I'd love to hear about your approach, ideas and findings!