The goal for this chapter is to help you understand when you should play certain hands in Seven-Card stud and why. This chapter, hopefully, will show you how you cn use your own common sense in order to determine which hands you should play and why, and also which hands you should fold and the reasons for this too.

The most important thing that anyone in the poker world can learn is that patience is a virtue. More bad plays are made and more money is lost by lack of patience than for any other single reason. Proper selection of starting hands is the single most important thing to learn in Seven-Card stud.

This section will cover: the most powerful starting hands in Seven-Card stud, which cards you should and should not play in certain situations, slow playing your strong hands as an alternative to jamming them on thee first round of betting and paying attention to what cards are n the board and how it can affect the strength of your own hand.

The most powerful starting hand in Seven-Card stud is (A-A) A followed by (K-K) K, (Q-Q) Q, (J-J) J and so on. When you start with three of a kind in Stud, you are said to be "rolled-up" in poker slang.

The next most powerful hand is a pair of concealed aces. (A-A) 7 for example. The reason concealed aces, and other pairs, are more powerful than uncocealed pairs is that these hands are more deceptive.

The premium starting hands are: 1. "rolled-up" trips beginning with (A-A) A down. 2. High pairs, concealed or unconcealed from aces down to jacks and 3. high suited connectors, such as (A-K) Q of spades and (J-Q) K of clubs.

The strong and medium strength starting hands are: 1. Medium ranked pairs lie 8-8 through to 10-10 and 2.medium suited semiconnectors, such as 10-J-K of hearts or 9-J-K clubs.

Although you might feel that when it comes to getting good starting hands, you are at the mercy of lady luck. However, you should realise that you can make starting hands seem more powerful than what they really are through aggression. The hand thats doing the betting always has the edge, because the other hands may fold rather than contest its bet.

The weaker hands could be ands such as 2-2 through to 7-7 and three consecutive cards of low or medium rank like 7-8-9. These hands are really unplayable unless you are aggressive and being the first raiser in the pot.