The deck or pack

A card game is played with a deck (common in the US), or pack (common in the UK), of cards intended for that game.identical in size and shape. Each card has two sides, the face and the back. The backs of the cards in a deck are indistinguishable. The faces of the cards in a deck may all be unique, or may include duplicates, depending on the game. In either case, any card is readily identifiable by its face. The set of cards that make up the deck are known to all of the players using that deck.

Although many games have special decks of cards, the 52 cards in the standard deck having that suit and rank. In addition to games that use the standard deck, there are also games that use some modification of the standard deck, for example all cards of rank lower than some rank (e.g., a pinochle deck), or adding a special card, joker, to the standard deck. Many European regions have their own variants of the standard deck having different names and imagery for suits, or having a different set of ranks in the cards.

There are also some card games that require multiple standard decks. In this scenario, a "deck" refers to a set of 52 cards or a single deck, while a "pack" or "shoe" (Blackjack) refers to the collection of "decks" as a whole.

I caution against starting at the high stakes tables no matter how experienced you are in live poker

PokerStars probably offers the most game selection in online tournaments (including single table tournaments). I have seen very good players consistently creamed in the $100/$200 games on PokerStars... not sure if this is because of collusion or not, but it is pretty fishy nonetheless. im not saying 'oh poker is flippin rigged,' but i have heard of people setting up a wall, where there are 3+ people sitting at the table that are in contact with each other, allowing them to know folded cards as well as jam the pot up. don't know if its true, hope its not, but just passing along some possiblities.

Poker news stories.
Poker queries not related to strategy issues (such as issues with rules, questions regarding poker literature, and so on).
Topics regarding poker on TV.
General poker narratives.