Important Rules For 5 Card Stud Poker

If you want to succeed with anything, it is important to know the basic set of rules. That is also the same with gambling. Without prior knowledge in the rules set, you will be nothing more than a mediocre sitting at the table, hoping for a fluke. But if you really want to hit the jackpot and get more than a fluke or two, you need to familiarize yourself with the rules and by familiarizing, you also have to memorize it by heart.

The simplest and most initial form of poker is the 5 card stud poker. This is probably the game where all poker rules were born. If you want to be a successful and seasoned poker player, you have to master the rules of this game first to achieve the confidence to play the more complex forms of poker.

Here are the rules:

1. The first bet on the table is called the 'ante.' This bet is done by all poker players and is non-refundable. The 'ante' makes up the pot for which the game is played.

2. The 'bring in' is done by the player who holds the door card with the lowest value. The 'bring in' is commonly half the value of the lower wager.

3. If you are not playing for the bring in, betting on the first round is initiated by the player with the door card of the highest value.

4. Each player has four options to choose from in every betting round. A player can make a bet, or make a check to evaluate how the other players are doing. At this point, the player can make a bet or raise the bet. Fold and leave the game is also an option. Players who feel that they don't have very strong hands and very little chances of winning leave the game. Players who stay or survive the game are dealt for the next round.

5. Individual cards have different values and each hand's value is computed according to the value of each individual card. Low cards are those from 2-9. They are computed for their face value, hence, 2 spade is worth 2 points. High cards include the Jack, Queen or King. Ace is the card with the highest value, 6.

6. The river card is the last card dealt to a poker player. After the river card is dealt, the last round of betting is initiated and players are required to call their final decisions at this point.

7. The player with the highest value at the end of the game wins the pot. The pot increases because it is the sum of all the bets made in the previous rounds. Rarely would you see a table where all players survived the end. More often than not, only one or two players are left at the end of the game. If the surviving players have the same type of hands, the individual value of the cards are taken into consideration.

Of course, knowledge of the rules is not enough to make you a winning poker player. Practice. Doing so will enable you to find your groove and eventually, you'll learn strategies that can get you closer to the pot.

Amid crackdown, al-Jazeera endures

Though few foreign news organizations have escaped the onslaught of attacks against journalists in Cairo by supporters of Egypt's regime, none has faced quite so many challenges as the pan-Arab al-Jazeera satellite network.

Since the country's pro-democracy protests first erupted Jan. 25, the network's phone lines have been cut, nine of its staffers have been detained at various times, its satellite signal has been repeatedly blocked and on Friday, al-Jazeera said in a statement, a "gang of thugs" stormed its bureau, smashing equipment and setting it ablaze.

Yet throughout, al-Jazeera has remained on air, broadcasting live pictures of the masses gathered in Tahrir Square with pre-positioned cameras and airing phone interviews with analysts and correspondents across the country.

And in what represents perhaps an ultimate act of defiance to the effort to shut the network down, demonstrators in the square have rigged up a giant screen so that even those protesting can follow al-Jazeera's supposedly banned coverage of the event.

"The people are gathered here today with one message only: 'Leave, Mubarak,' " declared news anchor Jamal Rayan on Friday night, in a typically emotive telling of the day's events.

"This is a pilgrimage by the Egyptian people in homage to democracy," added Rayan, who famously wept on-air two years ago during Israeli strikes in the Gaza Strip.

It is such unapologetically passionate coverage that has earned the network a devoted following across the region as well as the ire of many of the region's leaders.

Its bureaus have been shuttered in Bahrain, Kuwait, Morocco and most recently Tunisia, until the government there was toppled. The network has not had an Iraq bureau since the government expelled it in 2004, citing its shamelessly sympathetic coverage of the insurgency.

The network's sister channel, al-Jazeera English, is run as a separate entity, and there has been no attempt by the Egyptian authorities to shut down its signal.

But it is the Arabic version that remains the most popular television news service in a majority of Arab countries, said Fares Braizat, of the Qatar-based Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies, who has surveyed viewer preferences across the region.

"Al-Jazeera has given people a voice that they didn't have before," he said.

The network is partly funded by the Qatari government, itself as autocratic as any in the region, in just one of the curious idiosyncrasies that have endowed the tiny emirate with clout beyond its size. On numerous occasions, regional leaders are known to have placed frantic calls to Qatar's emir, begging him to curtail al-Jazeera's coverage - most recently Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh this week.