Home Game – The Dealer Button

Beer? Check. Cards? Check. Chips? Check. Table? Check. Okay, looks like you've got the essentials to get your home poker game off and running, but what about a Dealer Button? If you are playing poker, especially if you are playing Texas Hold'em Poker, you really should use a dealer button to help keep the game flowing. So what kind of dealer button should you use?

If you are playing at a casino you don't have to worry about such things- the cards, chips and the like are all supplied for you. If you are playing at an online poker room like PokerRoom, once again it's all taken care of for you. But if you are the one running the game, you have to take care of these things for your fellow players, and they will appreciate the use of a dealer button in the game.

A standard dealer button is pretty easy to spot- essentially an oversized chip, these place markers are typically white with the word "DEALER" printed on it in black, but anything can be used if everyone knows it is supposed to serve as the dealer button. This object marks the dealer position in Texas Hold'em, no matter who is actually dealing the cards, so everyone at the table knows who is first to act and it what order.

Sure, you could use a coaster or the card deck box or some similar object, but as the buttons are only a few bucks it's a nice investment. For a few more dollars it would make sense to look into a dealer button "plus."

There are a lot of these out on the market now, ranging from around $10 to $20, and are essentially dealer buttons with mini timers built in them. The simplest offer a start and stop count-down timer like you would find on a cheap digital watch, and is really all you need to help keep track of the blind levels. For just a bit more, however, you can get something like the Ultimate Dealer Button, which does that and also lets you indicated what the blinds are and a few more tricks.

(Editor's Note: Or if you get tired of the whole argument, just head for PokerRoom and play NLHE tourneys there.)