Continuing our series of online poker tips, here is our second most important piece of poker advice;
#2. Don’t Play when drunk.
Drunk includes any form of inebriation, but it also includes any other thing that can affect your mental or emotional state.
Trying to play good poker after having had an enormous row with your wife or girlfriend, boyfriend or all of them, can be detrimental to your bankroll just as much as if you have had too much to drink.
Having said that, a lot of poker players like to have a drink while they play, especially online.
If that is your thing, then by all means have a drink or two while playing. There is a big difference between having a couple of drinks to relax and being drunk. Generally, the best advice here is to be sure that your current mental state is suited to playing your best game of poker.
One of the most important reasons for being in control of your mental state when playing relates to our poker tip #1 Playing less and winning more. Even though you may be playing less hands they still have to be reasonably good hands, or you need to be a reasonably good card player, in order for this advice to help you to win more at online poker.
As an online poker player you must always be aware that you need to protect your online bankroll. Doing anything that might put that needlessly in jeopardy is to be avoided, and that certainly includes not playing while drunk, but also includes anything that can have a bad affect on your ability to judge what is happening at the table, and how it relates to you and your cards.
If you are already drunk, and must absolutely play poker or you don´t know what will happen, you could always consider playing at the play money tables that most, if not all, online card rooms have available.
I realize that advice probably won’t suit most cash game players though, so my next best suggestion for protecting your bankroll while playing when drunk is to limit your games to only multi-table tournaments, and keep the buy ins reasonably low. Low enough so that losing a few of them won’t cripple your online poker life, but not so low as you won’t take the game seriously.
If you don’t think that either of those tips will be of any help to you, then my last suggestion is that if you know that you will be drunk, and will be unable to resist the temptation to start playing at some point, then before all this happens I suggest that you log in to your poker account and withdraw most of your bankroll, only leaving whatever amount you would be comfortable with losing.