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Dec 13, 2012  So, if re-stealing is a bluff and requires your opponent to fold for you to win the pot, it's essential to understand the factors that contribute to you getting the fold you're looking for. When looking for spots to re-steal you should consider the player you suspect of stealing, as well as your table-image, position and what kind of cards you. Sep 21, 2008  All players are eligible to win this pot. The two players on the side are now free to play and bet as usual into a side pot, which only they are eligible to win. (This means there can be two winners in the hand - a side pot and a main pot winner.).

Table Of Contents

Since Spin and Go tournaments made their debut on the PokerStars poker software in 2014, an impressive number of casual players and recreational players took to the tables in the hope to turn lower stakes games into some of the biggest paydays in online poker.

If you are one of them, you know that winning big at Spin and Go tournaments isn't easy. Not only 2x multipliers are the most common result of the Spin & Go lottery, but also your usual Texas Holdem strategy might not be good enough to help you beat your opponents on spin and go games.

To increase your win rate and become a good Spin and Go player, you need to revisit the poker basics, adjust your range, and approach each poker hand from new angles.

You need to forget about your hand history as you know it, and learn to play Spin and Go games.

This is what you find on the PokerNews advanced strategy guide to playing Spin and Go games on PokerStars in 2020.

The best game strategy to win Spin and Go tournaments isn't necessarily the same that helps you do well in other poker games. Spin and Go strategies require a different approach to preflop strategy and a game plan you can develop only if you begin to get the ins and outs of the fast-paced lottery sit and go's.

Before we analyse together all the specificities that make Spin and Go tournament specials and we learn to play Spin and Go games together, let me give you one last word of warning.

This is not the average strategy article you find on most poker coaching and poker training sites.

Here on the 2020 Guide to PokerStars Spin and Go Poker, you don't waste precious time on a theoretical approach to Spin and Go tournaments. You get actionable poker tips to attack the games and turn the jackpot sit and go's into the most exciting (and rewarding) online poker games out there!

Register on the PokerStars website and use these poker tips and strategies to win your first Spin and Go games!

What is Spin and Go Poker?

Spin and Go's are a fast-paced version of 'sit and go' tournaments that similarly have no set starting times, only requiring the needed players to register for the tournament to begin.

Spin and Go's are most commonly offered as three-player tournaments with 'lottery'-style prize pools that have become an increasingly popular option for online poker players. Indeed, sometimes they are referred to as 'Lottery Sit and Go's.'

The format first appeared on Winamax in July 2013 under the name Expresso. Soon after came similar poker games on other platforms, including Twister on the iPoker network, Jackpot on Full Tilt, Twister Poker on TitanPoker, and the Spin & Go games on PokerStars.

Spin and Go's are an excellent example of the kind of innovative games that can be easily introduced in the online environment. Meanwhile, live poker can sometimes be restricted not only by physical limitations but also by whatever gaming regulation governs the operator.

The 'lottery' aspect of the game comes in immediately after enough players have bought into the game for it to begin.

Rather than having the prize pool be determined by the buy-ins, in Spin and Go's the payouts are randomly determined.

Spin and Go's are typically 'winner-take-all' tournaments with the payouts generally ranging from twice the buy-in to much higher amounts — even 1,000 or 10,000 times the buy-in. (Deal-making also usually is not allowed.)

This randomness adds some excitement for players at the start created by the prospect of enjoying what could be seen as a huge 'overlay' in the event.

A typical feature of the Spin and Go poker format is a 'turbo' or 'hyper-turbo' structure.

In most cases levels last three minutes, players start with small starting stacks of 500 chips, with each blind level and antes going up very rapidly, ensuring a swift end to the tournament.

In some cases, the length of the levels is connected to the 'prize pool multiplier.' For instance, on PokerStars if the prize pool is 2x the buy-in, levels last two minutes. If it is from 3-5x the buy-in, levels are three minutes, 10-25x the buy-in four minutes, and 120+ the buy-in five minutes.

How to Play Spin and Go Tournaments

Most sites have sped-up versions of Spin and Go's, such as Winamax where they offer Expresso Nitro and PokerStars where the game is called Spin & Go Flash.

In both, players start with just 300 chips and play one-minute levels as in hyper turbos. That's why they're given names like spin and go flash tournaments — they are over in a flash.

You register for these tournaments much like you do any poker tournament on most poker sites.

Once in the lobby:

1. Select it
2. Choose which type of Spin and Go you want to play

Looking at PokerStars as our example, you'll find not just the standard Texas hold'em Spin & Go games.

On PokerStars you find also pot-limit Omaha games and other variants like Spin & Go Flash (the flash games mentioned above) and Spin & Go Max.

This last one is a version featuring 3 to 8 players, a triple prize spin, and a hand countdown after which the game goes to 'all-in mode').

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You'll notice a variety of buy-in levels. On PokerStars, real money games start at $0.25 and go up to $500. You can see with each buy-in what the maximum prize pool could be, should you happen to get lucky.

The multiplier on these games goes up to 10,000x; thus, the biggest possible prize pool in a $0.25 game is $25,000, and so on. You can also choose to play a certain number of games at once. On PokerStars, the maximum is five.

Once you've chosen your buy-in level and the number of games you want to play, click 'Play Now' and you will be immediately seated at a table.

Before the game starts, the prize pool will be determined by the randomizer, which on PokerStars is shown as a slot machine-like spin of numbers.

Then you're dealt your first two hole cards, and the game begins. In other words, first you 'spin'... then you 'go'!

How Much Can You Win?

The 'lottery' aspect of Spin and Go's means sometimes players do 'win the lottery,' so to speak, and enjoy enormous winnings.

Special promotions by sites have made it possible for players to win even more than is usually possible in these games. For instance, in December 2019 a player on PokerStars won $2 million in a $5 buy-in, limited edition 'Jackpot Spin & Go.'

Payouts and probabilities change with the stakes in Spin and Go's. Not only do the higher buy-ins yield bigger prizes, the probabilities slightly vary as well.

Also, when it comes to spin and go rake at the higher buy-ins, the rake is usually less than at the lower buy-ins.

To keep things relatively simple and to give you an idea of how the payouts work, let's look at the current prizes and probabilities for the lower stakes Spin & Go's on PokerStars.

As you can see, close to half the time (almost 49.5%) you sit down to play in a Spin & Go, you'll be playing for twice your buy-in. And nearly as often (41.4%) you'll be playing for three times the buy-in.

In other words, most of the time the winners won't be enjoying 'overlays' or prizes exceeding the amount of money coming from players' buy-ins.

Meanwhile, a little more than 9.1% of the time the prize pool multiplier will be 5x or higher, meaning the prize pool will be bigger than the buy-ins.

Also worth noting — as in most other tournaments, there's a rake taken as well. At these lowest buy-ins on PokerStars the rake is 8%, and it decreases to 5% at the highest.

Are Spin and Go's Profitable?

Spin and Go's are winner-take-all, so of the three players only one is going to come away with a profit. But thanks to the randomized prize pools that profit can sometimes be huge.

Spin and Go's have been around long enough for there to be expert players who specialize in the format, which in and of itself proves they can be profitable.

It is also a game type that attracts a high percentage of novice and recreational players, meaning even just some additional study of structures and strategies can give you an edge that can translate into profits.

Many people enjoy the adrenaline rush of games with rapid outcomes — the gambling industry thrives on that desire — and Spin and Go's certainly satisfy that craving among the poker-playing segment of the population.

The 'lottery' component of Spin and Go's also tends to attract players who play a 'loose' or high-variance style, which also can be beneficial to more disciplined players who are better judges of basic poker strategy and how to manage risk-versus-reward. That, too, can make Spin and Go's profitable.

Some players point to how spin and go rake requirements are higher than what you typically encounter in a cash game or other tournament types, and therefore can cut into potential profits. Also, playing a bunch of spin and go's in a row for the minimum prize pool (2x) can be a little

Register on the PokerStars website and use these poker tips and strategies to win your first Spin and Go games!

Spin and Go Strategy: Tips to Win More

Winning Spin and Go players are often also versed in basic short-handed and heads-up tournament strategies where many of the same principles apply.

Having a good grasp of the poker hand rankings and the starting hand strengths is key as well since the fast structure generally means players become shallow-stacked relatively quickly.

Because of the fast structure, it is imperative to get involved and try to accumulate chips right away. There's also limited time to gather reads on your other two opponents, so pay attention from the start and recognize their tightness or looseness during the first two levels, as that will help you judge how best to play against them.

Three-handed play means the button acts first preflop, and often that means from the button you should be opening all above-average hands and many medium-strength ones as well.

And if the button folds to you in the small blind, you should similarly adopt an aggressive approach.

When you do open-raise, keep in mind the stack sizes start short and quickly get shorter. On PokerStars, for instance, players start with 25 big blinds — 500 chips at 10/20.

The blinds then increase to 15/30, 20/40, 30/60, 40/80, 50/100, and so on. That means early on min-raising from the button and making it a little more when opening from the small blind, but not raising too big to make it hard to manoeuvre post-flop.

That said, there comes the point relatively soon in Spin and Go's when you'll need to move into a push-fold strategy, particularly once the effective stacks have slipped to the 10 BB range or less.

For this, it will help to become familiar with the push-fold strategy — including charts that can guide your thinking when deciding whether or not to jam your stack.

'Just sit down and do your homework with regards to ranges,' advises Nick Walsh of PokerStars Team Online who sometimes live streams Spin & Go's and discusses strategy. ' Have some guidelines on the kinds of way you should be playing.'

'It's little things like adjusting your preflop raise sizes and ranges. Adjusting how wide you're playing from all of the positions is huge,' says Walsh. 'You want to be playing loads of buttons heads-up and defending your blinds extremely wide, but in a controlled manner.'

Walsh also recommends practising smart bankroll management when playing Spin and Go's. He suggests having at least 200 buy-ins per stake level, since 'it's rare that people have swings deep enough to go broke with 200 buy-ins.'

Spin and Go's can be great for those who want to play poker for just a few minutes here and there, or for those who enjoy faster-paced games in which the results come quickly.

And unlike other new online formats that only lasted a few months before being pulled, Spin and Go's have proven themselves to be appealing both to the casual player and the professional poker player.

Spin and Go F.A.Q.

What are the Spin and Go tournaments at PokerStars?

Spin and Go's are a type fast-paced sit-and-go tournaments available at PokerStars. These online poker tournaments feature a hyper-turbo structure, 500-chip starting stacks, and a randomized prize pool that can reach up to 12,000x the buy-in.

What is a 'lottery-style' poker tournament?

In these tournaments, the prize pool is not determined by the sum of the buy-in fees paid by the participants but is assigned, at random, by an algorithm.

What's the maximum you can win on a Spin and Go?

When the biggest multiplier applies, a Spin and Go tournament pays $1,000,000 in real money as the first prize.

Is PokerStars the only website with this kind of games?

No. While the Spin and Go games are exclusive to PokerStars, many other poker sites have similar types of hyper-turbo sit-and-go tournaments with a randomized prize pool.

How many players are in a Spin and Go game?

Spin and Go's are 3-max online events.

Are Spin and Go games profitable?

The multiplier that applies on the prize pool can make the Spin and Go games extremely profitable. This table shows how many chances you have to play for the maximum prize available.

What is the best strategy to win at Spin and Go games?

The best Spin and Go strategy depends on the size of your stack and the blind level.

Most professional poker players suggest to start with an aggressive strategy and try to rake as many chips as possible from the early stages.

In some specific moments of the game, it might be advisable to adopt a 'push-fold' strategy. For a more detailed description of the best strategy to adopt (and a few examples, too) check out these Spin and Go poker tips.

Register on the PokerStars website and use these poker tips and strategies to win your first Spin and Go games!

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  Full Tilt

Poker is a family of card games that combines gambling, strategy and different skills. All poker variants involve betting as an intrinsic part of play, and determine the winner of each hand according to the combinations of players' cards, at least some of which remain hidden until the end of the hand. Poker games vary in the number of cards dealt, the number of shared or 'community' cards, the number of cards that remain hidden, and the betting procedures.

In most modern poker games the first round of betting begins with one or more of the players making some form of a forced bet (the blind or ante). In standard poker, each player bets according to the rank they believe their hand is worth as compared to the other players. The action then proceeds clockwise as each player in turn must either match (or 'call') the maximum previous bet, or fold, losing the amount bet so far and all further involvement in the hand. A player who matches a bet may also 'raise' (increase) the bet. The betting round ends when all players have either called the last bet or folded. If all but one player folds on any round, the remaining player collects the pot without being required to reveal their hand. If more than one player remains in contention after the final betting round, a showdown takes place where the hands are revealed, and the player with the winning hand takes the pot.

With the exception of initial forced bets, money is only placed into the pot voluntarily by a player who either believes the bet has positive expected value or who is trying to bluff other players for various strategic reasons. Thus, while the outcome of any particular hand significantly involves chance, the long-run expectations of the players are determined by their actions chosen on the basis of probability, psychology, and game theory.

Poker has increased in popularity since the beginning of the 20th century and has gone from being primarily a recreational activity confined to small groups of enthusiasts to a widely popular activity, both for participants and spectators, including online, with many professional players and multimillion-dollar tournament prizes.

History[edit]

Poker was developed sometime during the early 19th century in the United States. Since those early beginnings, the game has grown to become an extremely popular pastime worldwide.

In the 1937 edition of Foster's Complete Hoyle, R. F. Foster wrote: 'the game of poker, as first played in the United States, five cards to each player from a twenty-card pack, is undoubtedly the Persian game of As-Nas.' By the 1990s some gaming historians including David Parlett started to challenge the notion that poker is a direct derivative of As-Nas. Developments in the 1970s led to poker becoming far more popular than it was before. Modern tournament play became popular in American casinos after the World Series of Poker began, in 1970.^[1]

Gameplay[edit]

In casual play, the right to deal a hand typically rotates among the players and is marked by a token called a dealer button (or buck). In a casino, a house dealer handles the cards for each hand, but the button (typically a white plastic disk) is rotated clockwise among the players to indicate a nominal dealer to determine the order of betting. The cards are dealt clockwise around the poker table, one at a time.

One or more players are usually required to make forced bets, usually either an ante or a blind bet (sometimes both). The dealer shuffles the cards, the player on the chair to his or her right cuts, and the dealer deals the appropriate number of cards to the players one at a time, beginning with the player to his or her left. Cards may be dealt either face-up or face-down, depending on the variant of poker being played. After the initial deal, the first of what may be several betting rounds begins. Between rounds, the players' hands develop in some way, often by being dealt additional cards or replacing cards previously dealt. At the end of each round, all bets are gathered into the central pot.

At any time during a betting round, if one player bets, no opponents choose to call (match) the bet, and all opponents instead fold, the hand ends immediately, the bettor is awarded the pot, no cards are required to be shown, and the next hand begins. This is what makes bluffing possible. Bluffing is a primary feature of poker, one that distinguishes it from other vying games and from other games that make use of poker hand rankings.

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At the end of the last betting round, if more than one player remains, there is a showdown, in which the players reveal their previously hidden cards and evaluate their hands. The player with the best hand according to the poker variant being played wins the pot. A poker hand comprises five cards; in variants where a player has more than five cards available to them, only the best five-card combination counts.

Variants[edit]

Poker variations are played where a 'high hand' or a 'low hand' may be the best desired hand. In other words, when playing a poker variant with 'low poker' the best hand is one that contains the lowest cards (and it can get further complicated by including or not including flushes and straights etc. from 'high hand poker'). So while the 'majority' of poker game variations are played 'high hand', where the best high 'straight, flush etc.' wins, there are poker variations where the 'worst hand' wins, such as 'low ball, acey-ducey, high-lo split etc. game variations'. To summarize, there can be variations that are 'high poker', 'low poker', and 'high low split'. In the case of 'high low split' the pot is divided among the best high hand and low hand.

Poker has many variations,^[2][3] all following a similar pattern of play^[4] and generally using the same hand ranking hierarchy. There are four main families of variants, largely grouped by the protocol of card-dealing and betting:

Straight

A complete hand is dealt to each player, and players bet in one round, with raising and re-raising allowed. This is the oldest poker family; the root of the game as now played was a game known as Primero, which evolved into the game three-card brag, a very popular gentleman's game around the time of the American Revolutionary War and still enjoyed in the U.K. today. Straight hands of five cards are sometimes used as a final showdown, but poker is almost always played in a more complex form to allow for additional strategy.

Stud poker

Cards are dealt in a prearranged combination of face-down and face-up rounds, or streets, with a round of betting following each. This is the next-oldest family; as poker progressed from three to five-card hands, they were often dealt one card at a time, either face-down or face-up, with a betting round between each. The most popular stud variant today, seven-card stud, deals two extra cards to each player (three face-down, four face-up) from which they must make the best possible 5-card hand.

Draw poker

A complete hand is dealt to each player, face-down, and after betting, players are allowed to attempt to change their hand (with the object of improving it) by discarding unwanted cards and being dealt new ones. Five-card draw is the most famous variation in this family.

Community card poker

Also known as 'flop poker', community card poker is a variation of stud poker. Players are dealt an incomplete hand of face-down cards, and then a number of face-up community cards are dealt to the center of the table, each of which can be used by one or more of the players to make a 5-card hand. Texas hold 'em and Omaha are two well-known variants of the community card family.

There are several methods for defining the structure of betting during a hand of poker. The three most common structures are known as 'fixed-limit', 'pot-limit', and 'no-limit'. In fixed-limit poker, betting and raising must be done by standardized amounts. For instance, if the required bet is X, an initial bettor may only bet X; if a player wishes to raise a bet, they may only raise by X. In pot-limit poker, a player may bet or raise any amount up to the size of the pot. When calculating the maximum raise allowed, all previous bets and calls, including the intending raiser's call, are first added to the pot. The raiser may then raise the previous bet by the full amount of the pot. In no-limit poker, a player may wager their entire betting stack at any point that they are allowed to make a bet. In all games, if a player does not have enough betting chips to fully match a bet, they may go 'all-in', allowing them to show down their hand for the amount of chips they have remaining.

Other games that use poker hand rankings may likewise be referred to as poker. Video poker is a single-player video game that functions much like a slot machine; most video poker machines play draw poker, where the player bets, a hand is dealt, and the player can discard and replace cards. Payout is dependent on the hand resulting after the draw and the player's initial bet.

Strip poker is a traditional poker variation where players remove clothing when they lose bets. Since it depends only on the basic mechanic of betting in rounds, strip poker can be played with any form of poker; however, it is usually based on simple variants with few betting rounds, like five card draw.

Another game with the poker name, but with a vastly different mode of play, is called Acey-Deucey or Red Dog poker. This game is more similar to Blackjack in its layout and betting; each player bets against the house, and then is dealt two cards. For the player to win, the third card dealt (after an opportunity to raise the bet) must have a value in-between the first two. Payout is based on the odds that this is possible, based on the difference in values of the first two cards. Other poker-like games played at casinos against the house include three card poker and pai gow poker.

Computer programs[edit]

A variety of computer poker players have been developed by researchers at the University of Alberta, Carnegie Mellon University, and the University of Auckland amongst others.

In a January 2015 article^[5] published in Science, a group of researchers mostly from the University of Alberta announced that they 'essentially weakly solved' heads-up limit Texas Hold 'em with their development of their Cepheus poker bot. The authors claimed that Cepheus would lose at most 0.001 big blinds per game on average against its worst-case opponent, and the strategy is thus so 'close to optimal' that 'it can't be beaten with statistical significance within a lifetime of human poker playing'.^[6]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

1. ^'World Series of Poker Retrospective: Horseshoe History'. gaming.unlv.edu. Retrieved 2019-01-13.
2. ^Richard D. Harroch, Lou Krieger. Poker for Dummies. John Wiley & Sons, 2010
3. ^Reuben, Stewart 2001. Starting out in Poker. London: Everyman/Mind Sports. ISBN1-85744-272-5
4. ^Sklansky, David. The Theory of Poker. Two Plus Two Pub, 1999.
5. ^Bowling, M.; Burch, N.; Johanson, M.; Tammelin, O. (2015). 'Heads-up limit hold'em poker is solved'(PDF). Science. 347 (6218): 145–149. CiteSeerX10.1.1.697.72. doi:10.1126/science.1259433. PMID25574016.
6. ^Computer program 'perfect at poker' (2015-01-08), BBC

External links[edit]

• Poker at Curlie

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