Poker is an international game, played in almost every country where card games are popular. The game originated in Germany, where it was originally known as Pochen. It was taken to France, where it was known as Poque. It was later brought to New Orleans, where it was played on riverboats. Today, there are hundreds of different variations of the game.
Poker requires two or more players to play. A dealer is chosen for each round, and is responsible for dealing out cards to players and shuffling the deck. Two or more players can share the dealer duties if they wish. Poker usually requires a single pack, but sometimes two or more packs of cards of different colors are used to speed up the game. The dealer chips are passed from one player to another, and the player to the left of the previous dealer will assemble the cards from the dealt pack and shuffle it. Then, the dealer passes the shuffled deck to the player to the right of him.
Players begin each round by making an ante, which is usually a certain amount of money. They then each place their bets into a central pot. The player with the highest hand wins the pot. The game is played in a clockwise fashion. Players purchase chips by “buying in” (bets) to the table. The initial bet is a set amount of money, usually equal to the number of players.