I’ve been playing Texas Hold’Em on Facebook courtesy of Zynga. It’s a cute flash game. Nothing like a real money game at a casino or a home game with friends of course. It is not hard to get virtual money. You don’t have to pay any real money. Which gives the tournament games an interesting dynamic. Most people just go all in at the first round. And, if they fail (like they usually do), then they start another first round tournament game and try again. These games start immediately, so there is no real discouragement to people using these tactics. Of course, I hope to have pocket Aces when against these people. Usually, I wait for a very strong hand to call people going all in.

Of course, there are bugs with this game. It doesn’t keep the odd chip whole when more than one person wins an all-in bet. This fractional money gets even more distorted due to rounding errors as it keeps getting split. I have also seen it make you call an all-in bet when you already have all your money in. “Call 0?” is definitely a broken behavior.

Of course, I am going to call with the second best hand in this situation. And, if you have the Ace and King of Hearts, then good luck to you…

Finally, after a lot of playing, I win the third round of the tournament! This gave me a chance for a free trip to San Francisco.