Video Poker Instruction - Poker Terms, Dictionary - Letters S Thru Z

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S

• Scare - A card that can turn a high value hand into garbage.
• Secondary Payoff - We always have the hope of a big payoff, but much of the EV of the play comes from smaller payoffs when we miss the big one. You could draw two cards to a Royal Flush, but end up with a high pair, two pair, three of a kind, a straight or a flush which are all secondary payoffs.
• Sequential Royal Flush - A royal flush in order, either left to right or right to left such as 10h, Jh, Qh, Kh, Ah. Some video poker games have a separate large jackpot for one of these hands. The odds of getting this are around once in 2.5 million hand, so don't hold your breath waiting for one.
• Sevens Wild Video Poker - In this video poker game, sevens are the wild cards and there are bonus payouts for four sevens, a royal flush with a seven and a hand with five of a kind.
• Short Run - A limited amount of time when probability theory will be marked by streaks or fluctuations.
• Spill - When you win a hand that would put you over 1,000 credits, many video poker machines won't continue to add credits to your machine. They will start spilling quarters into the hopper to pay off that hand.
• Straight - Five cards in an unbroken sequence (7c, 8h, 9s, 10h, Jd), but all of the cards are not of the same suit.
• Straight Flush - Five cards of the same suit in an unbroken sequence (7h, 8h, 9h, 10h, Jh).
• Strategy - A method for playing the hands that you encounter as you play. This method is mathematical based on the paytables for each particular version of video poker.
• Strategy Card - A strategy table printed on a card or sheet of paper that many players use as a reference while you are playing. Some casinos may frown upon or downright prohibit this, but online casinos have no way of controlling this since you play at your home or office.
• Strategy Table - A listing in table form of predetermined actions or strategies to take based upon your current situation in any particular hand.
• Suit - In a poker deck, each card that is not a wild card is in one of the four suits - Clubs, Diamonds, Hearts, or Spades.

T

• Three of a Kind - A hand containing three cards of the same denomination - 10,10,10, Jack, Queen.
• Tens or Better Video Poker - A Video Poker game with a pair of tens as the minimum winning hand.
• Tilt - To play wildly or recklessly. A player is said to be 'on tilt' if he is not playing his best, playing too many hands, trying wild bluffs, raising with bad hands, etc.
• Triple Play - Some video poker machines let you play three hands at a time which is a triple play machine. There are also other multi-play video poker machines where you can play ten hands at a time.
• Trips - Three of a kind like 7 - 7 - 7 - 3 - Q.
• Two Pairs - A hand that contains any two pairs of cards, such as having two queens and two tens and one ace.

U

• Under Dog - A person or hand that is not mathematically favored to win.

V

• Video Poker - Video Poker is a machine or computer version of the popular table game of poker. Video Poker has set paytables and you are playing a machine so there is no bluffing. Pairs are strong in almost every game type. It is the set paytables of the game that gives the knowledgeable player the advantage in forming a video poker playing strategy.
• Video Poker Machine - The actual machine or physical thing that you see to play video poker.

W

• Wild or Wild Card - A card that may be used to substitute for any other card in the deck, such as a deuce in deuces wild video poker.
• Wild Royal - A wild card to make a royal flush.
• Winning Hand - This is a hand that you get paid for having.

X, Y, Z

• Zilch or Zip - Nothing or Zero. You are dealt a hand that has no cards worth holding, or a final hand with no payoff. This is also called a garbage hand.

Dictionary Pages: | A Thru D | E Thru M | N Thru R |

Click here for our list of recommended Video Poker Casinos.