Video Poker vs. Draw Poker
Video poker is fundamentally a one-player video representation of draw poker. Aside from the fact that all the action occurs on a video screen, video poker has some significant differences from draw poker. To avoid falling into serious traps while playing video poker, it is important to be aware of these differences. This is especially true for players already familiar with draw poker, since they have likely developed particular playing styles and habits. Although the two games have many similarities, the playing strategies are quite different.
The most important point in video poker is that you are playing against a machine with a fixed payout schedule, and there are no other players at the table. In table poker, if your hand is better than that of any other player at the table, you win the entire pot. You could win with a very poor hand, if that is the best there is - or you could lose with a very good hand if someone else has a better one. To win a hand in video poker, it must simply match one of the hands defined on the posted payout schedule. You don’t have to beat anyone.
Another important point is that the rank of a winning combination is usually immaterial. That is, three kings pay the same as three deuces, and an aces-up two pair pays the same as any other two pair. And finally, you can’t fold your hand, so you must draw no matter how bad a hand you were dealt.
Many players who have never seen any video poker strategy information continue to apply their own draw poker strategy. They do things such as keeping an ace or face-card kicker when drawing to a pair. This fools nobody (there aren’t any other players to fool) and, although it doesn’t change the probability of drawing another pair, it greatly reduces the odds of drawing three-of-a-kind, four-of-a-kind, or a full house. In other words: Never keep a kicker.
In the table game a player would normally drop out rather than draw four cards to a single face card. Since dropping is not an option in video poker, holding one face card is frequently done in a jacks-or-better game. For a garbage hand that doesn’t even have a low pair or a face card, it is appropriate to draw five new cards. These situations are all covered in the playing strategy tables.
