Real money vs. Play money

TreC

How much different is playing online when you are using real money as opposed to play money? I have only played with play money online right now and plan on getting the free chips so I'm wondering what to expect. It seems with play money everyone always sees the flop and about 90% see the river card. I try to play really tight and may only see the flop 1 in 5 times or even higher. I find I'm constantly folding when nobody else does. I think the only thing I'm learning with play money is patience.

ScottyZ

You will not learn anything useful about poker playing for play money.

ScottyZ

TreC

Thanks for the advice. I was getting the feeling like that when I was winning some hands only to find people staying in for the river only to show a low pair or just one big card.

DJP

Free money = people who call everything lol

mikeiwo

Really the only thing you can learn from the play money games are the idiosyncracies of the site's software. I do actually find it helps just to familiarize.

Other then that, it is just a free for all.

Mike

ScottyZ

Sorry for the curt response TreC... I was watching 24 at the time.

The main problem with playing for play money is that your opponents generally have no incentive to play well. Therefore, you're not going to learn how to play against (even somewhat) reasonable opponents.

There are a couple of good ways to practise poker for free. One way is software (I like Turbo Texas Holdem). Another way is playing online at

http://www.cs.ualberta.ca/~games/poker/

While admittedly the latter is still for play money, at least the bots will play a reasonable game against you. The U of A group also has a relatively new software package (which I haven't tried myself) available at

http://www.poki-poker.com/

ScottyZ

Jay

ScottyZ wrote:

You will not learn anything useful about poker playing for play money.

ScottyZ

Basically...

ice

moneys the incentive. Gotta play for something or else everyone is playing Bingo and not Poker.

Tilter

Playing poker for play money just gives you an idea of how to play. You can play tighter on play money and make some play money, but only by playing real money (not 1c/2c tables) will help you to gain more experience!

I have heard of a site in which the play money competition is so hard, it beats some of the real money competition on most sites, but I don't recall.

DJP

Just had another thought on free games. I do believe you can learn a few things from them.

In the sense that you will play the same way that you would if it was real money. Sounds strange, but after I began to improve my game a few people actually asked me why I played so tight since it was only fake money. I responded by saying that I didn't want to ruin my real game by playing differently. lol The table would usually tighten up after a question and answer like that too. lmao I wonder why? lol

Also the emotional aspect of my game (or rather me) has benefitted as well. Nothing crushes emotion from your game better than playing a few thousand hands of poker. lol Unless you're assimilated by the Borg. 8)

HellmuthFan

If you continue playing the way you normally do I guess you could better your game. But normally I hate playing for fake money because people always call and hit their sets or full houses on the river. Playing in freeroll tournaments online are good because everyone is trying to win those so it may keep people a little more honest. Even if you play the $.25-$.50 games I find people still play more "normal" as there is money involved.

Glenn

Tilter

If you'd like to get experience, i suggest you try www.7sultanspoker.com, they give you $10 Free REAL money to try (no credit card required), and you can try to build your stack from there.

From there $10 alone, I build a bankroll to $800 by purely playing 0.25/0.50 NL PL and Freerolls.

HellmuthFan

They just give you $10 free in real money??

Glenn