Online poker you can play anytime you want — 24/7 365. You may play it altogether comfort, right from your own home, wearing what ever you like (or nothing at all), sitting, reclining, or jogging on a treadmill (although we don’t recommend it). You can set the lighting, temperature, and ambience to be just as you like it. In many ways, with online poker you simply have more control.
You have no other people to contend with (at least not in-person) — nobody hovering over you, talking at you, pushing you, crowding around you, giving you unsought advice, or shooting you nasty looks. You don’t have to smell smoke in the event that you don’t want to. You have no sexy waitresses tempting you with mind-altering drinks and otherwise distracting your attention away from the game at hand (pun completely intended). You should not have to drive anywhere (and with fuel prices what they can be, that alone preserves your bankroll tremendously), nor do have to get dressed up or tip your dealer — all of which save you time and money.
Another advantage of online poker is that you can play against people from throughout the world. Think about it next time you sit down at an online poker table — not everybody there even speaks the same language. And globetrotting on the net gives you access to more casinos and poker rooms than you may ever find in one single place, even if that one place happens to be Vegas!
Online poker players get to pick from an inordinate variety of cardrooms, game types, and table stakes. Moments ago, we mentioned the ambience of the environment where you’ll be sitting down with your computer to play online poker (probably your home), but online poker provides you with almost just as much control in determining the ambience of the cardroom itself.
Whether you enjoy an Old West setting, a Hollywood setting, an Egyptian setting, a jungle setting, a resort setting, and on the main page and on…you can almost definitely find an online poker room designed around what ever theme suits your tastes. Likewise, you may find rooms more very likely to have more (or less) experienced players, faster (or slower) action, higher (or lower) stakes, etc.
Through the same token, however, when playing online poker additionally, it helps to be aware of its perceived disadvantages as in comparison with playing traditional “offline” poker. A simple awareness of the difference alone will make you a more suitable player.
For one, you don’t get that intimate, face-to-face contact with other human beings. But do not rule online poker out as a social outlet altogether. More and more online poker rooms are fostering a real experience of community amongst their players with attractive and appealing member’s clubs, player forums, and sponsored land-based events.
For some poker players, the game just isn’t the exact same without the feel of the cards within your hands and also the weight of the chips as you place them within the center of the table (or perhaps the sound of them clinking while you pull the pile towards you after a big win). And you can’t substitute a number, however large or small, for the visual impact of the chip stacks — red, blue, and white — increasing or receding in front of you and expect the same effect.
But probably the largest deal that makes some offline poker players leery of playing online poker is the inability to read the additional players. Most expert poker players depend upon inadvertent visual cues given by their opponents — tells — as to the specific strength or weakness of their hands. There is one thing to be said for the amount of information you may glean through looking your opponent within the eyes (thus the prevalence of sunglasses at the poker table) and watching their hands, their posture, their facial expressions, etc. Fortunately, on the contrary, there are numerous of tells you can look for in online poker as well, you just need to know where (and how) to look. But that’s a subject for another article.
As for this article, we leave you through an analogy. If you like going to the theatre for your shows, the arena for your concerts, and the stadium for your games, get thee to a brick-and-mortar casino for your poker playing enjoyment. If you like Tivo even though (or if perhaps you just ain’t got the dough for the theatre, arena, and stadium tickets), then online poker is your ticket.