Official poker is played at cardrooms and tournaments across the world, involving hundreds of players at a time for thousands of dollars. It combines luck with great skill, making it a game of both chance and strategy. The best players make the most money, but it is possible to lose big as well.

The cards used in poker are standard 52-card packs, with one or two jokers added for variety. A single deck of cards is dealt for each hand, but in tournament play and some club games, two packs are used to speed up the deal. The dealer for each round deals a card from the top of one pack and then shuffles that stack and passes it to the next dealer who deals from the bottom of the other stack.

After the flop is dealt, another betting round takes place with players having the option to check, call the bet of an opponent, raise (or re-raise), or fold. The betting ends when all players have folded or matched the highest bet of any player.

At any time, a player may call the clock on another player who is taking an inordinate amount of time to act. When a player calls the clock, a floorperson comes to the table and gives the challenged player one minute to act. If a player has no action after the timeout, the hand is dead and the player cannot receive any odd chip.