The Archives Of The GGPoker Blog – Part 7 – December 1st, 2018 through January 31st, 2019

Originally posted: December 4th, 2018

The History of Strip Poker: Undressing the Game

It’s not often an assignment lands on my desk and immediately brightens my day. There’s a definite ‘forbidden thrill’ in sitting up to the fullest in my chair to obscure my saucy monitors from prying eyes during research. Finally, I’m getting paid to use incognito mode.

A far cry from awarding endless ticket bushels while hepped up on caffeine, this job is something new entirely. What picture I must paint of myself by proximity to this perverted project of pornographic poker, in which the earliest mentions of strip cards will be dragged screaming from the unstirred dust of history. You don’t get these lessons in school.

Let it go to the record that no games of strip poker were conducted during preparation. No dignity was harmed in the making of this project.

Murky origins

Every generation thinks they invented randiness. Sure as seasons changing, there has existed always, throughout the vast breadth of history, games of skill and chance on which were wagered articles of clothing, played with the express purpose of a sordid eyeful.

Any poker variant can be adapted – or perverted – to strip. More often, simpler games with fewer betting rounds are chosen, like five card draw, or in this case, five card draw a cloth across your exposed bits. Read on to find out how strip poker was played throughout it’s life time.

Really, the only difference between poker and strip is the use of garments instead of chips. Nobody can pinpoint the exact creation date; it’s as difficult bottling lightning than sourcing the first corrupted mind to coin the concept. The term strip poker was coined in 1916, although reports exist of it being played in Louisiana brothels since the early 19th century, where it first rose to prominence. Initially, it was thought to have been created to allow young men with empty pockets continue playing high-stakes tournaments. A single gender game removes the presumed sexual element, at least in times where homosexuality was punishable via a litany of cruel, unusual penances. More likely, greedy men feltside got a whiff of innocence off the green boys with jangling purses and retconned rules to suit their stacks. There are no formal rules to the game, instead party hosts or individual players will devise their own set of deviant directions they wish the game to take.

Mixed Games

Powered fops across the swell played mixed games involving men and women, causing parlor windows to steam the length of England. This iteration, upon reaching America, was confined to unlicensed casinos and brothels, or on the trundling steamers and military encampments spreading cardgames like a cloak from coast to coast.

Another equally likely origin claims the game was invented by horny teenage boys trying to pry their innocent female roommates from their strides – definitely believable.

Regardless of where the game originated, it experienced massive popularity spikes in 40s, 50s and 60s. Fearing that an imminent missile salvo would churn to world to a toxic desert, people embraced the wild freedom a game such-like offered, which their not-too-distant ancestors could never have admitted to indulging. From students drunk on independence and older married couples spicing up Suburbia, strip poker was the new pet rock, albeit bawdier.

Nowadays, swingers parties reportedly use strip poker as an icebreaker, although I can’t imagine shyness as an issue in those circles! In our modern age of rocket cars and robot shoes, strip poker is regularly played online via webcams, normalized by shifting sensibilities and unexiled from the mound of taboo practices.

The world’s largest strip poker tournament was held in Cafe Royal in London in August 2006. The prize fund was £10,000 and 196 participants took part.

How To Play Strip Poker Variants

Fast Strip Poker involves everybody but the hand winner removing an article of clothing. Medium strip poker involves only the person with the worst hand removing an article of clothing. Slow Strip Poker involves playing regular poker until someone runs out of chips. At this point, all players left without chips must begin betting clothing instead.

That’s about the height of strip poker for now. In our age of webcams and handheld voyeur cameras, strip poker seems less-sordid and more-accessible than ever, with numerous sites hosting different variants; some in which players are randomly matched to other webcams every five minutes, or organised games are played over secret Skype chats. Wherever your cards fan to the tune of dropping pants, from the steamboat to the aristocrat’s parlour, know you’re playing part of history.

PLAY POKER!

In endeavoring to catalog single player card games, one first finds that the word Solitaire must be included in every entry. For the word itself defines the content, meaning ‘a game for one player’. Alternate definitions describe a single inset gem. Think a dagger with a lone ruby in the pommel, which would be called ‘a ruby solitaire’.

Something to wager with once the shoes are gone, eh?

Let’s find our own diamonds.

1. The Idiot

Hopefully named after the Dostoevsky novel and not the intelligence quotient of its players, this Swedish game is simple yet devilishly difficult. It starts with 4 decks. One card is taken from each pile and laid down. If there’s more than one visible card in each suit, the lowest is removed, and so on, until only 1 visible card remains of each suit.

Four new cards are laid on top of the existing ones, rinse and repeat until there’s none left. Once a pile is exhausted, the top card from another pile can be moved to the empty pile. The overall objective is to get all four Aces in the bottom of each.

2. Solitaire

The king of hermetic card games; Solitaire is a staple of office workers and computer idlers worldwide. Patience games, while typically performed singly, can involve upwards of 2 players. In case you’re not familiar with this hour-whittling, dangerously addictive game, it involves manipulating and sorting cards. The most common variant involves dealing shuffled cards in a prescribed arrangement, while the player seeks to re-order the deck by means of shifting cards by suit and rank. If you haven’t yet, do.

3. Canfield – solitaire

Canfield to our American counterparts, Demon to our European contingent, is a solitaire variant reputedly named after the casino in which it was invented. Canfield players take misery in their stride, given the extremely low percentage chance of victory in a given game.

To play, thirteen face cards are dealt face up and then turned down. These are the reserves, and only the top can be played. A card is then placed on the first of four foundations to the right of the reserve, from whence all cards of the same rank must also start the other three foundations. Someone wins when all cards are placed on the foundations, statistically very unlikely, which Mr. Canfield knew deviously well.

4. Chain solitaire

Another patience game involving careful planning, with a higher likelihood of finishing. The objective is to make chains with cards while obeying the rules of regular solitaire; the cards need be in ascending or descending order, alternating between red and black cards.

5. March Same Rank

Similar to the above, only a slight variation whereby players seek to discard all cards by matching cards of the same rank, devoid of suit rank or colour.

6. Napoleon at St. Helena

If ever a man knew about whiling away the lonely hours, it was Napoleon. When not spurning the advances of his wife, setting the foundations for modern Europe, or drastically changing the meritocracy of his enormous armies, he played cards between rebellious power seizures.

Two full decks are required, shuffled together to start. The object of the game is putting Aces at the foundations as soon as they become movable, then discovering ways to build up all eight foundations from Ace through King, while moving a single card at a time. Variations include Lucas, Maria, Limited, Streets, Indian, Rank and File, Forty Thieves and, a personal favourite, Roosevelt at San Juan.

7. Devil’s Grip

While researching these articles, I found that the games were recommend for players 8 and upward. I don’t know about anyone reading, or whether we have among us genetically modified children with enormo brains visible atop their head in glass belljars, with nodes and whirring electricity boxes writhing like a Gorgon’s hair, but at age 8, my only skill was eating paste and pressing against windows so I resembled a pigboy. Fair play to anyone nailing these endless variants before double figures. You’re probably my boss now.

The object of the game is to place the entire deck into piles on the grid; jacks on top, queens in the middle, kings in the bottom. I’m not sure whether it’s a statement on the monarchy and the risen workman, or whether it just falls that way for entertainment purposes. I’m choosing to believe the latter, extolling my own virtues are a revolutionary while I do.

8. Klondike

Klondike is the standard North American and Canadian solitaire variant, so much that the word ‘Solitaire’ is substituted entirely for ‘Klondike’.

During the Gold Rush in the early 19th century, before poker ascended to become part of the cultural zeitgeist, it left the military encampments, travelling back thither with those who’d learned, who then taught their friends and so on in this fashion until GGPoker.ca. A mass exodus of fortune-seekers left Eastern safety towards the Western and Northern Frontiers, spreading solo games like wildfire.

Lonely prospectors whiled away long evenings with games of patience and chance. Klondike experienced unprecedented growth around this time, when shimmering ingots and untapped veins were found plentiful beneath the clod.

All that glistens.

9. Spider Solitaire

Spider Solitaire is the standard boredom killer every PC comes equipped with. Whether it’s a long bus journey, sitting in for a package or brain games to make your thinking muscles bulge, Spider Solitaire makes fine company. Similar to other patience games on this list, the objective is to build cards of descending suit sequence from King to Ace. Once you’ve nailed one, it’s automatically jettisoned out the airlock to one of the 8 foundations. The game is won when all cards are played, with 8 separate King to Ace rows.

10. Beleaguered Castle

Rotten animal corpses are flung across the walls using catapults. Wells are poisoned. Rivers choke with bodies. Arrows darken the sky. Inside, the terrified denizens, frozen by the hiss of arrows tearing the air, which to their frightened ears sound like soaring serpents.

At least, they’re the images conjured in the mind upon hearing the name. In action it’s less complicated. There’s more maneuvering of rows and careful cunning, less sallying forth and breaching boundaries. A row of aces, first removed from the deck, are aligned vertically, forming the foundations of each row. Eight rows of six cards are placed either side, like the wings of a plane. If you’re playing with physical cards, it should resemble tiered seating leading to a central walkway once set.

Once all the dealt cards are built onto the foundations, rising to tear the clouds like Babel. There are several variants, each with a more fantastic name. Take Castle of Indolence for example, which wouldn’t sound out of place played in the longhall where Beowulf slumbered awaiting Grendel’s arrival, or a game advertised on the swinging sign outside the Prancing Pony.

Other Medievally-titled iterations include Citadel, Streets and Alleys, Selective Castle, Siegecraft and Stronghold.

11. Seahaven towers

Here’s one available in physical and video game format. Seahaven Towers, although sounding like a Westerosi town name, involves cards built down in suit, with kings or sequences beginning with kings exclusively filling empty tableau spots.

12/13. Pyramid/Pile of 28

No, it’s not a Sherlock Holmes title. Pile of 28 is dynamic and simple to set up, with the final goal being that all cards are removed from the pyramid and paired to a combined value of 13 points.

In Conclusion

The list goes on forever. Every casino has its own twists. Every windblown shack that ever hosted a game wrote their own rules. Try the ones we’ve listed. If you don’t enjoy them, choose from a million others, some slightly altered, others unrecognizable from the initial iteration.

Whichever you prefer, we hope you’ve learned something. Next time you’re on a train, idling funneling cards and staring at the window, wondering which of the fifty new single player card games might serve for such a trip, spare a thought for GGPoker.ca.

Originally posted: January 10th, 2019

$45K Omaha Poker High-Roller Club

Omaha High-Roller Club is back baby!

With a gargantuan $45,000 worth of BLADE high-roller tournament tickets for the top five, Omaha High-Roller Club is well and truly back with a bang.

Running for 16 days from January 16 through January 31, Omaha High-Roller Club is all about the Omaha Featured Tables.

How does Omaha High-Roller Club work?

It’s simple:

Play at the Omaha Featured Tables at one of the four available stake levels
Earn points for your play (1 HRC = $0.01 rake)
Points totals are tracked on the HRC Leaderboard
The top five players on the leaderboard at the end of the promotion will be awarded a combined total of $45,000 worth of BLADE tickets

Whether you’re coming along to throw down the gauntlet and compete for the top spots with some adrenaline-fueled high stakes Omaha poker action, or whether you’re coming along to rail the titans of poker going to war (insert an ‘Omaha beach’ joke here 🙂 ), this one has guaranteed excitement written all over it.

What are the prizes?

Rank	Prize	Value	Total Value	Guarantee	Total Guarantee
1	1 x BLADE $10K	$10,000	$17,500	$200,000	$475,000
	1 x BLADE $5K	$5,000		$200,000
	1 x BLADE $2.5K	$2,500		$75,000
2	1 x BLADE $10K	$10,000	$12,500	$200,000	$275,000
2	1 x BLADE $2.5K	$2,500	$12,500	$75,000	$275,000
3	1 x BLADE $5K	$5,000	$7,500	$200,000	$275,000
3	1 x BLADE $2.5K	$2,500	$7,500	$75,000	$275,000
4	1 x BLADE $5K	$5,000	$5,000	$200,000	$200,000
5	1 x BLADE $2.5K	$2,500	$2,500	$75,000	$75,000

BLADE?

BLADE is our new High-stakes tournament series launching on Jan 14, featuring $8,000,000 in monthly guarantees. BLADE covers both Hold’em and Omaha poker variants, 9 daily events, and a monster Sunday schedule of 14 events.

Promotion Terms & Conditions

Players must be aged 18 and above to participate in this promotion.
This promotion runs from January 16 through January 31.
Players will be auto-registered to the aforementioned BLADE events, and will not be able to refund their tickets, which will have 30-day expiries.
The promotion terms and conditions are subject to the site terms and conditions, which can be found here.

GGPoker standard rules apply.
www.begambleaware.org

Originally posted: January 22nd, 2019

What makes a good online gaming app?

Hey everyone.

Like the weekday shopper says to the familiar staff sighing at their tills, I’m back with another list.

Hitting the App-alachian Trail

Your journey toward hitchless online gaming begins with a simple step, be it games or poker apps: always shop around. Don’t settle for the first app store listing. Find a service you like the look of, peruse all their available information and google before installing.

Helpful hint: Always check past those initial 5 star reviews, less savoury ones may wait below. You can put lipstick on a pig, but don’t try telling me it’s Helen of Troy.

Two cherries on top

Switching over to a new online gaming app provider can be a real treat. New games, bonuses, opportunities, pools and prizes, friends you haven’t met yet, but how can you get more value from switching?

As with internet service providers or gas/electric companies, many businesses offer lucrative incentives for willing transfer.

Contact your gaming operator directly to inquire what extra goodies you can claim. With poker, check for deposit bonuses, sign-up rewards and Twitch partner codes to use while registering.

Paid or free

Paying is not always an issue. Sometimes in order to get the optimal service, money must find new masters. The question is not ‘should I be paying’, it’s ‘what should I be paying for?’

Many services, unwilling to deter entirely the sizable population portion who’ll never pay for anything app-related, offer a free version of the app featuring basic functions with none of the flashy, whirring dials.

When buying paid apps, all the above apply doubly so. Check for reviews and reports from other users or email the site directly for info requests before letting money change hands.

Responsible Gaming

It’s not much talked about. It all happens behind the scenes, mostly thanklessly. Hours of procedures and documents for fringe, niche cases that might never arise, but somebody has to do it.

Occasionally, for one reason or another, things can go awry and when they do, you want the operators of your chosen app putting the ‘responsible’ in RG.

Dependable processors

Certain sites boast they serve innumerable countries, but always ensure you’ve checked which available processors are serving your region before depositing your bankroll.

Better safe than sorry, or stuck in transaction limbo.

Mobile/tablet support

In this rapid-fire age of inseparable connectedness, of morning tweets and long commutes, we need more than ever a way to consume content on the go. For busy go-getters like our players, up at the crow and out like a nightwatchman at dawn, with little time for idling between professional and personal commitments, a mobile option is a must.

Security

Where are your documents being held? Are your funds separated from the pools? Are the server farms safe? How easy would it be to swipe my details? Not necessarily FAQs to pursue and potentially scare away your chances at creating an account on the site, but things to keep an eye out for. Consider your account and passwords, note how staff interact with you during sensitive cases.

Content

Follow trusted brands on social media. See what type of content they’re putting out. We live in the content age. Everyone and their aged parents has a blog, a Youtube channel and a Twitch stream, provided their neknominations didn’t kill them.

With a continuous assault of new clickables arriving like waves on the shore of night, and everybody knowing all the tricks of the trade, how do you know what’s worth your click? So many different companies offer similar services, you can now take your pick choosing a brand voice you enjoy and engage with. Say you want to talk about video games in the evenings. You use Discord all day in work so that won’t suit. Two apps, identical in function, with wildly varying content streams. Bland content from one, arbitrary lists matching those found elsewhere with slightly altered copy. Exciting, engaging videos from the other, fresh from their minds direct to your brain cake, with strong ambassadors besides.

Easy choice? Easy choice.

Closing statements

Pandas, newspaper and Clark Gable films come in black & white. The rest is grey shades. It’s all about finding the perfect balance to suit your needs. Whereas one person might have negative experience using an app or on a site, another freshly-arrived might find it suits perfectly for the tasks in question. Find what works for you.

All of the above can be condensed into two concise notions:

Read – read everything they got. Research, research, research. If you get stung with your pants down, the responsibility is partly yours to share
Ask – there’s no such thing as stupid question

Choose ‘em wisely

Originally posted: January 30th, 2019

GGScout: 9 Poker Players to Watch in 2019

I can think of no single pursuit of vigour in which the young do not eventually consume the old. Even such contests which reward more brain stem flexing than any swiftness of ankle or litheness of form keep this system.

Poker is no different. There’s a moment, indefinable and unmarked, but a moment nonetheless, where your brain, once kingly amongst muscles, is no longer the best.

You get it right? Young eat old. Old grease wheel. Young become old. Disenfranchisement ad infinitum.

Like a first-time hostage negotiator reports to his sergeant, I’m back with another list.

The old guard

As Lestat pronounced parading the corpse of his latest date-cum-victim around the yawning sitting room of their palatial plantation home, ‘there’s life in the old girl yet.’ Yes, youth cyclically devours aged flesh, but that doesn’t mean the old guard aren’t still kicking. John Juanda, Erik Seidel, names familiar to poker veterans and perhaps not so to fresh blood, are very much involved. But here is our top 10 poker players to watch in 2019.

Daniel Negreanu

A veteran always one step ahead of the game. A household name. Who else?

Requiring little introduction, Negreanu is the casual beholder’s ‘face of poker’, and will likely remain so. Kingpinlike, Negreanu runs his poker empire on smiles and confidence, which written seems a sinister introduction, implying mistruth or rouguery, but not so; he’s just that charming.

A brilliant ambassador whose uncounted hours of hard work have elevated poker from a steamboat fancy to a high-roller’s dream.

He’s got it all; experience, sway with the big dogs, poker schools and weekly lessons, televised games. The RealKid has some RealPower.

Joey Ingram

When Joey isn’t setting the world to rights investigating purportedly dodgy poker practices or conducting exciting patter-filled interviews, he’s an Omaha player. Nay, omaha lover.

Joey’s best work comes as an ambassador for this lesser-played, much-loved variant, spreading the good word where he can. The gospel according to Joey.

In the wake of the McGregor/Khabib debacle Joey released several deep-dive videos to much fanfare, covering everything from the dolly incident to who hit first; Conor, Khabib, Han or Greedo?

Tonkaaap

Tonkaaap has a Medieval monarch’s name and a bankroll to match. First name Parker, as close to poker incarnate as one gets without summoning dark arcana (see Hellfire club).

Surname Talbot, eerily similar to ‘tell me about it’ as in ‘tell me about that amazing poker upstart’. Ba-dum-tssh.

After chopping the PS Sunday milly, Tonkaaap’s stream experienced enormous growth and record viewership, which mutated and eventually grew into the online force it is today.

Forget Mounties, this Canuck is mounting an assault on the poker world, and he’s taking everyone along for the ride. Get involved early, reserve your bragging rights before creamlike, he inevitably rises to the top.

Patrick Clarke

Roddy Doyle helps me remember this guy’s name. Got it yet? That’s right. Other Doyle fans will instantly recognize the name from beloved 90s Dublinovel (patent pending) ‘Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha’ which features more swearing than a dockside dalliance with the devil after days of drinking dozens of daiquiris in dank dwellings.

Patrick, like ourselves, hails from the Emerald Isle. Armed with charm, skill and the gift of the gab, Patrick Clarke leaves his leafy hometown of Ardee for the glitz and prospective riches of the Las Vegas strip, a dragon’s hoard in all save name.

1,1712th on the all-time money list, 15th all time for Ireland, with $25K+ live cashes to his credit, when Patrick isn’t charming everyone at the felt, his achievements speak wordless volumes about the skill of his chosen craft.

Max Silver

Poker player. Snapshove innovator. Poker trainer. Crypto enthusiast. All the hallmarks of the modern online entrepreneur. Max Silver is UK-born but currently bringing pride in poker back to the Ireland’s capital and primate city.

Shove your Las Vegas, we’re bringing poker home. Over $4 mil all-time. 13th UK all-time. Max Silver is gold.

Stephen Chidwick

Stephen Chidwick is a man on the move, jetsetting from tournament to tournament, collecting riches and building his already-strong brand. Originally from Perfidious Albion, Stephen has his sights set on worldwide poker domination.

David Peters

The second American on this particularly euro-centric list. While our transatlantic counterparts can’t avail of online poker, it’s still where the big money is at. Poker, for most of us, is a game. It’s an institution in the States, a measure of character and cunning from president to pauper alike. Peters has obviously taken this to heart, with over $30 million all-time cashes and no signs of slowing. 2019 is David’s year.

Steve O’Dwyer

Currently residing in Dublin, Steve O’Dwyer has little left to prove. $26 mil all time. $1,872,580 single live cash record. 8th on the all-time money list. Accolades list tall as a beanstalk, and still going! It’s not all about winning, but it helps.

IrEgption

Whip me up a fresh batch of Canada balls, and don’t spare the Hortons. IrEgption, like an experienced Risk player, is conquering the world one territory at a time from Canada downwards. After an amazing 2018 (you can see his graphs on Twitter and a yearly rundown on 2+2) 2019 kickstarted with a $56K cash at PSPC. Starting as he means to continue, monied to lunacy and basking in the sunshine, expect big things as the months pass.

There’s no limit to his options. Commentary gigs under his belt, a rep as an established personality, successful and entertaining Twitch stream plus all the rest, 2019 is the year Egypt rises. I R Egption.

In Summation

Many of the listed players have Twitch, Twitter or whatever else profiles for you to follow along on their adventures, keep your fingers on the pulse of the online poker industry or just generally make yourself green with envy at their lavish, patrician lifestyles. You next? You next.

Part 6 – Oct. 1st, 2018 to Nov. 30th, 2018 Part 8 – Feb. 1st, 2019 to Mar. 31st, 2019

Whether you’re a fan of high-stakes cash games or the excitement of multi-table poker tournaments, GGPoker is the premier destination for poker enthusiasts. For those aiming to compete for a prestigious WSOP bracelet, push through the ranks for a WSOP Circuit ring, or simply hone their strategies in classic games or poker formats, GGPoker has something for everyone. The platform offers a seamless online poker experience, with innovative features like Smart HUD, PokerCraft, and integrated staking, designed to elevate your game. Whether you’re grinding your way up in daily cash games or competing for life-changing prizes in major online series, GGPoker provides the best environment to play, improve your poker skills, and succeed in the world of online poker. And if you are not sure where to start, you can always play free poker games and learn at the GGPoker School.

GGPOKER

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