House Of Cards

A new winner is emerging on the international poker circuit – young, Indian, geeky and cool. Are we bluffing? Find out here

We all dream of winning big at poker game, never mind that we don’t know how to play. It sounds so cool: raising a bet, calling a bluff and taking home wads of money. It seems to be a sport for masterminds. Remember those scenes from Casino Royale and Friends?

But who plays poker here in India? Surely it must be just phoren-returned NRIs right?

Wrong. Despite poker being legal only in Goa, Daman, Diu, Sikkim and Bangalore, more than 16,000 players, aged 20-45, sit at the card tables every week. About 5 lakh players also play online after working hours, says Ankur Dewani, head of Asia business development at PokerStars, a Canadian online poker cardroom. Many have played other card games before, but the most successful of them tend to have one thing in common. They tend to come from a maths or engineering background, bringing a level of discipline so essential to winning the game. Take a look at how they’re calling it.

A Lucky Hand Like everybody else, Kolkata-based Aditya Agarwal got hooked to the game after watching tournaments on TV. In 2015, he placed 71st at the World Series of Poker, beating thousands of other players. Anand Subaya, on the other hand edits films by day (Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara, 2011; Talaash, 2012; Happy New Year, 2014) plays poker by night. He remembers attending one online tournament that lasted nine and a half hours. Luckily, his editing job has made him used to sitting for hours at a stretch.

“Poker is a game of skill not chance, so it is not gambling,” says Dewani. “Since bluffing is part of it, people find it attractive: you can bluff and make money.” Agarwal agrees, adding that it calls for an understanding of numbers: probability theory, variables, averages and the like. It is however, a hard way to make an easy living, he believes. “At the end of the day, it’s your skills versus the opponent’s and the game is not as easy as it seems,” he says.

The Devil You Know Skills are paramount when you’re playing a live game – when you’re facing a flesh and blood opponent rather than a faceless table online. The only way to raise your chances in the game is to gather as much information about your opponents as you can, says Dewani. If you can’t pick up clues from your opponents’ body language, you may as well go back to playing teen patti, adds Subaya.

Dewani breaks down players into four profiles: tight passive, loose passive, tight aggressive and loose aggressive. The tight player chooses his cards smartly, the loose one plays the hands he’s given. Passive players bet less, aggressive ones put more money into the game. The best players combine the tight and aggressive styles. They’re not afraid of betting, can call a bluff easily, are patient and wait for the best opportunities to strike.

How do you know what style your opponent may have? “If the chips are stacked neatly, he or she could be a conservative player. If they’re spread out, she or he could either be an aggressive or a loose player,” Agarwal says. If the opponent’s pulse is visible on his neck, she or he’s possibly tense. Leaning forward is a sign of strength, while leaning backwards is a sign of a weak or relaxed player.

If a player is fidgety, keeps checking her or his phone, or orders food, chances are her or his hand isn’t good, says Dewani.

Agarwal watches videos to help him prepare, but even regular people watching helps. Looking at actors through the day on screen has made Subaya a good judge of body language. And grab a pair of sunglasses, not to look cool, but to hide tell-tale ticks that might give away your own state of mind. Pupils dilate when the body reacts to a tense situation, which explains why so many professions prefer to stay covered up.

Online, you can size up your opponent by her or his betting pattern. “If two people bet $20 and one of your opponents suddenly bets $100. He’s either bluffing or has a very good hand,” explains Dewani. “If you play long enough, you will know which it is.”

Just remember to stay focused. Don’t stray to other tabs on your browser. Subaya sometimes plays on his phone and remembers the frustration of doing well in a game, only to lose because his phone ran out of battery life.

Wanna Go Pro? Get fit. As in any other sport, professionals play for long hours and need their strength. “You can’t be crying over back pain or strained eyes. Players eat healthy and exercise well,” says Dewani.

A clear mind helps. Eating before the game makes you sleepy, drinking can be a disaster and sleeping well is important. Keeping your composure at the table and maintaining that famous pokerface is really important. Dewani recollects when he got angry during a game, needled by his opponents. He folded his hand, only to realise he would have won had he kept calm and played longer.

And most importantly, manage your finances, because poker can be addictive. Play for free initially, suggests Agarwal. Involve money only once you’re confident. “You should ideally win more than what you invest. I’m still trying to learn how to manage that,” says Subaya. That doesn’t mean the game doesn’t come with losses. Subaya remembers losing Rs 1,55,000 in one game. “It’s okay if I lose money, that’s part of the game. But it’s important for me to figure why and how I lost the game,” he says.

Keeping your composure at the table and maintaining that famous pokerface is really important.

Can poker pay the rent? Agarwal knows of many players who’ve left well-paying jobs to play poker full time. “They earn more in their games than in their salaries,” he says. Dewani paints a rosy picture too: “These players are their own boss, they can travel places and earn more than they invest.”

But you don’t need to be a game theory expert to know that poker is a zero sum game. For somebody to win, everybody else has to lose. Can you bet and bluff your way to the top? Are you the smartest guy at the table? Are you disciplined enough to make it? That’s what’ the money’s really on.

>PLAY LIKE A PRO

• Watch  *All In: The Poker Movie (2009): A story about the growing popularity of poker, and the crackdown on online gambling *High Roller: The Stu Ungar Story (2003): Based on the true story of the rise and fall of poker legend Stu ‘The Kid’ Ungar *Poker tournaments on ESPN

• Read: Super/System by Doyle Brunson: To understand strategies and game plans. Brunson is regarded as the father of poker playing.

• Learn *If you’re a beginner, play by the book *Teen Patti and Poker are different. You will lose your money in no time if you play poker the same way you play Teen Patti. *Calling time on an opponent means giving him or her 60 seconds to decide on his or her next move. It is generally done when a player takes more than 10 to 15 minutes to make a move. Calling time before that is considered rude, unethical even.

>HOW DID POKER GET SO POPULAR?

Rewind to 2003, the year an American named Chris Moneymaker invested less than $40 in a small tournament, won the game and got a seat at the World Series of Poker, the biggest pokertournament in the world. He wound up winning $2.5million. The tournament was televised and every single person in the world who watched it and thought they were good with numbers started playing the game. This was called the ‘Moneymaker Effect’.

>WORD PLAY

• Fake your way through the game by learning some of the jargon:

• Buy in - The minimum amount of money required by a player to sit down in a particular poker table or tournament.

• Blinds - Compulsory bets that must be played before any cards are dealt.

• Call - Matching the amount of the previous bet.

• Heads up - A hand being played between only two players.

• Loose - Playing a wide range of hands, including weak ones

• Pot - The money at stake for players to win in a given hand.

• Tell - A detectable change in a player's behavior or demeanor that gives clues to that player's assessment of their hand.

• Showdown - When more than one player remains after the last betting round, remaining players expose and compare their hands to determine the winner. Fold - To discard your hand and lose interest in the current pot.

• Flush - A hand comprising five cards of the same suit. All-In - To run out of chips while betting or calling.

>GAME ON Live poker is legally played in Goa, Bangalore, Sikkim, Daman and Diu. It is illegal to play in other parts of the country. However, you needn't travel all the way to play a game--you can even legally play a game online, sitting at home in pyjamas. You can play the game on Texas Hold'em Poker on Facebook or sites like PokerStars.com

>POP IT UP Here are movies and TV shows that had poker scenes you intensely watched and laughed at:

• Casino Royale (2006) James Bond (Daniel Craig) needs to bankrupt Le Chiffre (Mads Mikkelsen), a terrorist financier, by defeating him at a high-stake poker game in the climax scene. Both go all-in and there’s one hundred and fifty million in the pot. The showdown begins, players reveal their cards and Bond wins with a straight flush.

• Ocean's Eleven (2001) Rusty Ryan (Brad Pitt) teaches a small group of actors how to play poker in the beginning of the movie and Daniel Ocean (George Clooney) joins in. They both later plan to rob casinos in Las Vegas.

• In Time (2011) Will Salas (Justin Timberlake) and Philippe Weis (Vincent Kartheiser) go heads-up in a high-stakes game of poker. Salas bets 50 years of time in a world where time is literally money.

• Friends: The One With All The Poker Phoebe (Lisa Kudrow), Rachel (Jennifer Aniston) and Monica (Courteney Cox) insist to participate in a boy's poker night. Hilarity ensues when teaching them poker rules, the girls loose crushingly and Monica demands a rematch.

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