Lessons in Texas Holdem Poker (Limit)

by: Gabriel James

Want to know how to get the upper hand at Texas Holdem Poker? Take in these tips by semi professional player Gabriel James.

Texas Holdem Poker, in the Limit variant, is a measured, mathematical game. You will need strategies that are designed to help you make the most money for the least effort. There is no magic formula but I will be giving you tips on how to maximize your earnings potential.

Everybody knows you need to have good starting hands to be successful but that is far from the end of the story. There are many other important points that need to be addressed.

In this article I will concentrate on small stake limit holdem cash in both live and online games.

The Home Texas Holdem Poker Game

Johnny Moss once said he’d bet his own grandmother in a hand! And this is where a major problem exists as money brings out the worst in some people.

I think home games have their place when played for friendly stakes or for small buy in tournaments. However, as soon as the stakes go up sometimes friendships go out the door. I’ve heard from several of my friends involved with boy’s poker nights (small fee tournaments) that have moved to cash limit, and finally moved on to No Limit cash. The major reason for these moves being the involvement of Jack Daniels! Usually it works out fine but on a few occasions friendships were tested. If you are going to play at home make sure you play for fun or small money.

On Texas Holdem Poker – Online

What a great concept – any day, anytime you can find a game waiting for you for any stakes you please.

Want to play a sit and go tournament for $5, sure no problem.

Want to play $300/$600 with the best in the world then - yes it’s out there.

In order to win the most, you need to select the correct game to sit down in. As I said, this article is for the small stake Texas Holdem Limit player, so any statistics I produce have that in mind. I say small stakes which I take to mean $0.5/$1 tables up to $5/$10.

Log on to your online poker site and arrive in the lobby. Order the tables by stake and scroll down. You see five tables that are ten handed and so you decide to go on the waiting list.

Do you wait for the next available seat?

That depends. If all of the tables have average pots of Seven Big Bets (a big bet is the value of the bets on the turn and the river, which in Limit Texas Holdem play are double the size of the pre flop and flop bets) then it doesn’t matter which one you wait for. If all but one table have less than five big bets and there is nobody in the queue for the table with more than five big bets then it is worth waiting for that one.

Why do I put emphasis on average pot size? Well, the bigger the pot the more you stand to gain when you win a pot. The tables that have five big bets or less are probably full of “Rocks” (tight players) and you will not be able to extract the maximum value for your hand, or they will fold to any aggressive play you show them. Therefore your earnings per hour will decrease at these tables. Go for other tables with the highest big bet per pot average.

More Methods For Picking A Table With Texas Holdem Poker

Another way that you can see which table to choose is to look at the statistic “average seen flop”.

This is the percentage of players that have seen the flop per hand. Some online poker sites display this in the lobby. If you are playing small stakes Limit Texas Holdem, any table average with 35% or higher should have your mouth watering.

Some poker sites allow you to maintain a buddy list. I highly encourage you to do this. Say you were playing $2/$4 Texas Holdem and a player on your table is constantly calling down cold calling pre-flop and showing down things like 6 of clubs 4 of spades from early position they need to be added to your buddy list.

When you next log on you can check your list and see if they are playing. Even if they are playing higher, it may well be worth moving up to take their money. This is especially the case if you can sit to their left and make isolation raises to get them heads up with you. (I digress into poker statistics which we will get onto in due time).

This is only the beginning and I’ve just brushed the surface into how to maximise your earnings starting with game selection. At first, it may be about the right tables. Try these tips and look for more of my suggestions about Texas Holdem Poker.

Solution to Guess That Hand! (8/20/2006)

Thank you for your wonderful comments on my last Guess That Hand.

Let's recap the hand. You woke up to big slick (A-K offsuit) and threw in a strong pre-flop bet and a strong continuation bet on the flop. Both times you were called, and you ended up slowing down on the turn and your opponent bet into you and made you fold.

The hand the opponent had was... A-Q. Yes, you had him dominated throughout this hand, but his superiour position (sitting on the button) gave him enough of an advantage to take down this monster pot. Let's explain why through the eyes of the opponent.

**************
"I'm on the button, and I wake up to a decent A-Q. I have a strong bettor in middle position. Should I call and see a flop? I know he either has two big cards or a decent pocket pair. I'll just call."

"He bet out again on this flop big. His pot sized bet makes me think he is stealing this pot with two high cards, as a pocket pair would more than likely not bet that much into this pot. I'll call and see if he slows down on the turn."

"Bingo! He slowed down on the turn when it didn't hit him. Now he must assume I'm on a pair and have him beat. I'll bet out half the pot, because a pot sized steal is unneccessary here. He'll fold to almost any sized bet here. Plus the illusion that I'm pricing him into this pot for cheap might make him think I'm sitting on a big hand like a set and want to be called."
*************

This illustrates quite well that our man on the button could have had any two cards and probably would have taken this hand down. Having position on a player is very important because a good amount of time in a heads up situation, you are going to have both opponents miss the flop. Continuation bets are the defense that early position has, but if they at all waver and become scared of the person in position, the pot can be stolen away very quickly.

This is why you often hear poker pros say that they won't play certain hands in early position, but will play them in late position. The position not only allows you to garner more information from your opponents and their betting patterns, but it allows you to try a few tricky plays that might win you more money than if you had that same hand in early position.

"Play the player, not the cards."

Guess That Hand! (8/20/2006)

Welcome to another addition to Guess That Hand! The last one was a great success so here comes another one. I would also like to continue to extend the invitation to others to send me some hand examples that they consider themselves to have made a great call, a questionable fold, or was just a fun hand with a few hard decisions. If you are lucky, you might find yourself on the next edition of Guess That Hand!

Tireur(at)Gmail(dot)com

I do this to reduce spam in my mailbox just replace the (at) with @ and (dot) with .)

**********************

Online Cash Game:
No Limit Texas Hold 'Em
Small Blind $5/ Big Blind $10

You are sitting in middle position with $985 in chips in front of you. Everyone folds over to you, and you look down at Ace-King offsuit. This is the first hand you've entered a pot in this game so far. So you have relatively no read on anyone.
(What do you do? Bet or Call?)

You like what you see, and you raise it a standard 4 times the big blind or $40. Making the pot $55. It folds over to the button who after thinking for a while calls the $40 bet. The pot is now $95.

The flop is dealt. 2 of hearts, 5 of diamonds, 9 of clubs.
(What do you do? Check or Bet?)

The flop is trash and doesn't help your hand, but doesn't neccessarily hurts your hand either. You figure your opponent hasn't hit anything either and you lead out with a pot sized bet of $100. Your opponent again thinks for a while and calls your bet. This scares you that he would call your large bet, and you begin putting him on a pocket pair or a set. The pot is now at $295

The turn is dealt. 10 of spades.
(What do you do? Check or Bet?)

You are scared of his flop call, and the turn doesn't help your hand. You decide to check the board to him. After a little thinking he now makes a half pot bet of $150.
(What do you do? Call, Raise or Fold?)

You figure he has atleast a pair right now, and you figure out your pot odds and the odds of hitting your king or ace on the river. You have 6 outs and 46 cards left in the deck. You have approximately 7.5 to 1 chance of hitting your out on the river. The current pot odds are a little under 3 to 1. You aren't getting the odds to play this hand any further. You decide to fold this hand.

What hand do you think the button had?

How to play Omaha HoldEm 8 or Better.

Rules:

Each player is dealt 4 cards face down, and the rounds of betting take place exactly like Hold Em. With the UTG being the person to the left of the big blind and the button being to the left of the small blind, and betting taking place preflop, flop, and then big betting takes place on the turn and river.

How do you use the 4 cards and the 5 cards on the board in Omaha/8? Well you must use 2 cards in your hand and 3 cards on the board. You can use 2 different cards in your hand for the low as well, and a low must be 5 cards under 8 that are unpaired, so if the board comes off with 3 over 9 cards then you and your low hand should pack the bags and leave. This has some far reaching implications, and can be confusing and costly to Hold Em players. Here are some examples of mistakes and things to look out for.

You have A234 unsuited and you have the Ace of Spades. The board comes to the river with 4 spades, and you think back to the old Hold Em days and say,"Weee I got the nut flush!" And in fact you don't have jack squat, you MUST use 2 cards in your hand and 3 cards on the board. So unless you have a suited card in your hand, you will not see a flush by the river. I've made others pay for that mistake before when they thought their ace would complete the flush.

You have A234 again but this time the ace is suited. The board comes 44558 and completes your flush. The flush is all you have in this hand, but you may wonder, but wait I have a fullhouse right? Wrong. You have to use 2 cards in your hand and 3 on the board, so your 4 makes trips, and you have used 1 card in your hand and 2 on the board, and you can't use the other 5s to complete the fullhouse. However in this hand you have the nut low, and the nut flush if no one has a fullhouse either. And this should be called down to a showdown.

You have A224. The board comes A2478. First thought for many beginners is that, hey I hit the fullhouse right? Wrong again. You have trips on your 2s and you can't use the Ace or the Four in your hand to complete the fullhouse with the board. Just like Hold Em, you must have a paired board in order to have a fullhouse possible. You do however have a horrible low hand with A-2-4-7-8, but chances are someone will have Ace-3, 3-5, 3-6, Ace-5, Ace-6, and even 5-6 has you beat for the low here.

So now that we are past the rules and some practice hands of situations that people can get into trouble with, I'll get into the most important part of Omaha/8 which is picking your starting hand. You'll want to be tight, because there are only certain hands that can be profitable in this game.

The object of making money in Omaha/8 is to "scoop" pots, or take the low AND the high. How do you do that? With the Ace of course. Have one or even two suited aces gives you a great chance at the nut flush and when paired up with a couple low cards under 5, can win you the low as well.

So here are my requirments for starting hands. A2xx A3xx 234x A45x and High hands that you can choose could use the blackjack point system. Don't play with anything under 40 in your hand, 10 through king counts at 10 points and the ace is 11 points. And be prepared to throw this away if any 2 low cards hit the board, not counting the ace.

The importance of "backup" cards in Omaha/8:
Lets say you have A289, not a great hand, but you may not know why, and I'll explain here. Lets say you have this hand and the flop comes 378, wonderful right? You just hit the nut low on the flop with your A2. Turn comes a King, you're still in a good shape. Then the river comes down with a deuce, and ruins your low. We in the Omaha Biz call this a counterfit card, when a card pairs our low card and totally screws us. Now we still have a low, but it is a horrible low now. Ace-4, Ace-5, Ace-6, and 4-5, 4-6, 5-6, all have us beat now. Why do they have us beat you may ask yourself?

Ace-2 (our hand) = A-2-3-7-8
Ace-4 = A-2-3-4-7
Ace-5 = A-2-3-5-7
Ace-6 = A-2-3-6-7
4-5 = 2-3-4-5-7
4-6 = 2-3-4-6-7
5-6 = 2-3-5-6-7

So this should explain how low is calculated. They go from highest card to lowest card, if someone is tied they go to the next card, and if they are tied to continue down the line until someone wins or they are tied.

So how do we try and avoid these bankroll busters? With backup cards, that's what! So lets take our hand and now turn it from A289 and turn it into A234, the best hand for picking up a low. Flop comes 268, you hit the nut low again. But how? Didn't we counterfit our 2? Yes, but we have a backup, the 3 and the 4. Now we have A-3 and that still gives us the nuts. Turn comes Ace, oh no that counterfits another card right? Yes, but now we have the 3-4 which still gives us the nuts. The river comes with the 5, now we have the best possible low at Omaha/8 with the A-2-3-4-5. And we have the 2-3-4-5-6 straight. However with a board like this the best possible high hand is going to be the 9 high straight if someone has the 7-9. And this brings me to the next part of my lesson, the dreaded and hated 9. You may not hate it right now, but you will begin to hate it after I tell you how evil it is.

Having a nine in your hand doesn't seem so bad right? It connects with several cards in your hand if you wanted to make a straight with it, so it can't be all that bad right? Couldn't be more wrong, the 9 is an evil and sneaky card that can snatch away profit before your very eyes. Why?

Well if you use a 9 in your hand to make a nut straight, then a low or fullhouse is possible on the board. And you either split the pot with a low, or you give up all your money to the fullhouse.

If you use a 9 in your hand to make a straight and no low or fullhouse is possible, then a higher straight is possible with the board.

These reasons are enough to tell you not to chase after straights that use the 9 in your hand. If you do have a chance at a nut straight, you are chasing after half the pot. Or drawing dead to a higher straight or fullhouse.

So I hope this helps "prime" those newbies looking to break into this fabulous game. Remember this game is full of fish that haven't a clue about the strategy above, and will be throwing away their money to you. So if you play good tight poker, then you should profit regardless of what happens. And a major reason this game is so wonderful to unlocking bonuses is that fish like to call and make monster pots. Seeing the pots in these games reach 2 to 3 times bigger than they would normally be at those limits in Hold Em isn't uncommon.

So enjoy, and any comments, questions, suggestions or whatever are greatly appreciated.

Solution to "Guess that Hand! 8/9/06"

Welcome back everyone, hope you all are having a wonderful Friday. I have decided to post the solution to the previous blog a little earlier than planned. I got so much feedback on the post from my favorite poker community over at www.poker-strategy.org that I wouldn't want to make them wait until Sunday to get the solution.

Another note about "Guess that Hand!" is that I am opening an invitation to any and all to send in suggestions for "Guess that Hand!" If you have any good hand examples or just some poker concepts that can be taught well through a hand example, please e-mail me at "Tireur at Gmail dot com".

***************

Props go to Gaspar98 who actually played a hand just like this very simmilarly and "sorta" called the hand.

The hand held by our opponent was actually A-A. The player had developed a table image of being a Maniac who will be ultra aggressive with a very wide range of hands. This poker strategy keeps his opponents from being able to make good reads on him. More importantly it frustrates players and begins to make them play more recklessly than they should, increasing opponents mistakes.

This shows a thought fallacy that occurs far too often for the beginner players. They believe that a maniac will never wake up to A-A, and it gives the LAG a very huge advantage over other players. They can not only push people off of marginal hands with their ultra aggressive play(stealing pots in the process), but when they wake up to a huge hand, their is a much better chance of being paid off by the showdown.

In this particular example it could have easily of been a set that this guy was holding as well. The lesson is that you need to play back at the LAGs, and make them respond to you, not the other way around. This will allow you to garner more information from your opponent and possibly avoid a monster vs. monster pot situation where you will lose your entire stack.

Also in this example, you would more than likely have lost your whole stack, no matter the outcome of the board, except maybe if an ace hits the flop. It was more or less a way to illustrate that you must give everyone at the table, no matter how terrible or how good they may be, respect for the fact that they can pick up a premium hand.

Another beginner pitfall illustrated here is that too often a big hand is played slow and a small hand is played fast. Big hands should always be played fast except in the rare cases of trapping a monster. Small hands should almost always be folded or checked unless you think you can steal the pot with a bet.

****************

This will bring me to my next lesson dealing with playing hands at different speeds. As I said before, big hands should be played fast 90% of the time, and small hands should be played slow 90% of the time. When should this change? Here are a couple examples.

You have A-6 suited in the big blind. It's limped into by one player in middle position and you check. You hit your nut flush on the flop. You have to act first, betting into such a scary flop tells that player you either have the flush or you are not scared of that flush draw. This show of strength will often make any hand fold, however, if a call is made on a bet you know that you are facing a semi-decent hand who may be drawing to a full house.

If you check instead, this may induce a bluff. The middle position player may decide that you don't have the flush and will try and represent the flush himself. Now you can either check-raise him and probably take down a decent sized pot, or you can just "smooth call." Holding the absolute nuts and maybe in a few *second to the nuts* hands should you ever "slowplay" them like this, because you may be giving your opponent a free look at the turn and river which can spell disaster for your hand.

----

Picking your spots to bluff are a little more difficult. You must go through a mental checklist before deciding to bluff a certain hand.

1. Do I think the opponent has anything? (Is he weak, did the flop scare him or help him?)
2. Is my opponent(s) a calling station? (Does he call with any hand, even marginal hands?)
3. Given my current betting patterns, can I represent a big hand, or atleast a hand that can beat my opponents?(Does bluffing here make no sense to my opponent which will alert him to a bluff?)

If you answer no to 1 and 2 and yes to 3, you can safely bet here. Number 2 is the most important for a beginner to understand before trying to bluff, never try and bluff a calling station, most of the time it won't work. Number 1 is quite important, but if you can represent a hand that you think beats his hand, then bluffing may very well win you the hand. And if your betting patterns are erratic and confusing, it may be easy for another player to put you on your bluff and call you down.

Here is a good method for learning to bluff successfully once you learn to figure out whether or not your opponent can be bluffed. Think of a hand that you can *realisticaly* hold (nothing crazy like quads or something) that you think has your opponent beat. Now just play the hand as though you had such a hand and were betting it quite aggressively.

That is all for today, I hope you all have a wonderful weekend. Please continue to leave your wonderful commentary, and I will be posting another entry hopefully next week sometime.

-Tireur

Guess that Hand! (8/9/06)

Well here is the first interactive fun thing I'm going to try and do at the site. I will take you through a hand in the eyes of someone sitting at a NL Hold Em table, showing their cards to you and showing you what their thought process is. We will go through the play and then about a few days later I will post the results to this quiz.

*****

You are sitting on the button at a $5/10 NL Hold Em cash game and have a healthy stack of about $1,000.

It folds around to a loosey goosey sitting directly to your right who raises it $40.
(This player has been raising almost every other hand and playing incredibly loose, he can have any two cards at this point.)

You look down at your cards and wake up to pocket Kings. (Woohoo what a hand to wake up to!)

1. ** What do you do? (Fold, Call, Raise?) (Pot size of $55, $40 to call)

You end up calling and the Blinds fold. You think he has a poor hand and would like to trap him with your premium pair.

The flop comes down (2)(3)(Q) rainbow. A wonderful flop for you. And you lick your chops when Sir Loose raises it up another $100.

2. ** What do you do? (Pot size of $195, $100 to call)

You decide to just call again, hoping to sink that hook in as far as possible before setting it.

The turn comes and it is an (8) of hearts giving the board no possible flush draw. Now you think you are in great shape, you feel he has paired the Queen or something like that. He again comes out betting with $300.

3. ** What do you do? (Pot size of $595, $300 to call)

Once again you just call.

The river comes (7). Now there are no straights or flushes possible and you feel you have the best hand. Now he comes in and raises you all-in for an additional $560. You have him pinned on a hand like A-Q or something like that.

4. ** What do you do? (Pot size of $2000, $560 all-in to call)

You end up calling and showing down.

What hand do you believe he has? And what would you have done differently all throughout this hand?

Please post your comments and stay tuned as I will post the results on Sunday August 13.

Books, and the future of the blog.

Hello everyone, hope all is well this weekend for anyone reading up on my blog.

Today I thought I'd talk about some poker books as I mentioned them in my last blog. I've become quite the reader of books that don't pertain to academics in the last few months. Good and bad come from this, I'm at least reading for once, but it's not the books that I should probably be reading. However, from all this reading I've come across a wealth of knowledge that may still pertain later on in life, especially if this poker thing blows up for me (I'm an optimist, if I wasn't I wouldn't be playing poker). I'd like to share at least my thoughts on several books I've read thus far.

Currently reading: Take me to the River by Peter Alson

Take me to the River has turned out to be a pleasurable read so far (I'm about half way through it) as it tells the story of a man who is bound to get married very soon but has decided to go to the 2005 WSOP event before the marriage is to held. With a 15 thousand bankroll and a few friends, he tells his story from the eyes of a semi-professional poker player who has observed the game of poker evolve from it's underground roots to it's gold laced present. The story is enough to keep any level of poker player interested, and the more savvy of us can pick out a few very good tips, ideas and strategies from the text as well.
I highly recommend this book to anyone who is actually interested in my blog.

Books I've read: One of a Kind

Again by the same author in junction with another author tells the story of one of poker's greatest players. The story is about the original "Kid Poker", Stuey Ungar. A card playing savant who had a craving for any action, whether at the poker table or at the bookies. The man had turned a self-destructive personality into a winning poker player, but not before his personality got the best of him and he ended up dyeing of a heart attack from his years of drug abuse. A great story for anyone, poker player or not, with many life tips mixed along with a few poker tips.
Highly recommend this book to anyone who likes to read stories about weird but strangely interesting characters.

The Philosophy of Poker

A great mix of philosophy and poker with more of an emphasis on poker that anything else. It's a book written by mostly card playing college professors and the like. It's a book that Aristotle, Einstein, and Karl Marx would write if they were card playing aficionados. Great book for reaching down into the nitty gritty details of poker away from the statistics and basic strategies. The book delves into psychology, sociology, and intangibles of poker.

Highly recommend it to any poker player out there.

Great books on the strategy of poker:

Dan Harrington on Hold Em Volumes 1 through 3.

Quite possibly the greatest books ever written on tournament No Limit Hold Em. Tells the secrets the pros never wanted anyone to know or never knew how to articulate into words. If you want to be a serious tournament player, then you must know these books inside and out.

Super/System 1 and 2

The bibles of poker. Should be in every poker player's library.

Theory of Poker

David Sklansky letting the whole world know exactly how the math in poker works. Again, if you are a serious poker player, this book should be read or at least all the concepts contained within should be known.

*************************

As is suggested by the title of this blog entry I have something in store for the blog in the future.

First I am going to start something that may create more traffic and more interaction with the site. I am going to start something along the lines of "How would you play it?" and "Guess that hand." I will walk through a particular hand and a particular way of playing that hand, and will leave it up to the viewers of my site to not only guess the hand, but try and point out possible mistakes they see in the play. Should be fun, I'll give it a try within the next week, keep on the lookout for that.

Secondly, I'll be throwing up a blog on some other poker variations such as Omaha H/L and such. I'm admittedly not as much of an expert on other games as I am with NL Hold Em but I know enough that I can post a primer of sorts on them.

Thirdly, I may start occasionally letting everyone out there know exactly how my own poker career is faring. I'll post my current bankroll and any occurrences, and will probably be followed up by a snippet of knowledge I may have gained from playing with that bankroll.

That about wraps it up this Sunday afternoon, have a great week everyone and please keep checking on the site for updates.

The The Lost Art of Reading: Opponents, Cards, and Books.

In personal blogger space, I have finally moved into my new apartment and slowly but surely making it feel more like home and a little less chaotic. I will be returning to poker within the next week I would imagine, schoolwork allowing.

******

The Lost Art of Reading. What do I mean? Well the poker amateur community has been so bombarded by books, television, and everything else poker, that we have strayed away from the basic strategies of poker.

An example. You can pick up any poker book, and probably watch an episode of Full Tilt's Learn From The Pros, and they will all have general strategies for any given hand. "You have this hand, you fold it in this position, and you play it like this after the flop...", etc. What happened to the old saying, "Play the players, not the cards."

So should you stop reading books on poker? Of course not, you can never suck up enough information, whether you consider it good or not. If it's good information, you follow it and expand on it. If it's bad information, you learn about it and adapt to it if you see it at the poker table.

Where people get caught up in is that they consider every poker book a bible of sorts and that there is no bad information on poker. I'm not going to convince you that any information I give here is good or not, it's up to you to decide. A good poker player, however, can discern between good and bad advice and can learn from both.

*******

The Art of Reading boards and opponents. Now I am not an expert, for that you should go talk to Daniel Negraneu or any other successful professional poker player. However, I can give you pointers and tips to becoming a successful reader.

Reading the board. Too often someone will look at a board and see if it hit them at all, and may forget that they have to analyze their opponent and see if it hit them as well. This is where you must start going through a list of hands that you have beat on this board and a list of hands that you are beat on this board. This mental list is important, and must be analyzed constantly.

Reading the opponent. You must first decide whether your opponent is loose, tight, passive or aggressive or you have insufficient information to apply a label to your opponent.

For example, you are playing some No-Limit Hold 'Em with someone at the table that you know is tight and passive. They suddenly come out of early position with a rare raise, now you not only know that he is a tight player but that he rarely raises any hand preflop. You must now place him on a hand like AA, KK, QQ or AK, as you would suspect him not to raise with anything else.

Another example, you are playing against a loose aggressive player, like a Gus Hansen. If he is playing aggressively, chances are you will have no clue as to what hand he may have in the hole because he does this with a wide range of hands.

Getting inside your opponents head. Not literally of course, no Hannibals running this site. This is the ultimate read, where you try and get inside his thought processes. You see the hand through his eyes, figure out what hand it would take for him to have such a betting process, for him to take his time with certain decisions and not with others, etc.

If you get into this mindset, and your reads are spot on, you are in "the zone." This happens from time to time, and probably more often for the pros. This is as good as it gets when it comes to reading your opponents.

******

Bringing it all together.

Read books, but more importantly read your opponents. You can read all the strategy in the world, but if you can play as though you know exactly the kind of hand your opponent is holding, you will play brilliant poker no matter what.

So next time you sit down at a poker table, do this mental checklist in your mind for every hand. Explain every action your opponents are making based on a list of possible hands they can be holding and what strategy they are bringing to the table.

If you get too shortsighted and begin to play like a robot programmed by the 10 poker books sitting in your bookshelf, then you will become no more than a mechanized fish for me to figure out and take all your money.

Poker: Not far from a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors

First I would like to let everyone know that I'm still alive and kicking. I took a short break for the last month and a half. Summer, School, Moving around, hanging out with the fiance. Ultimately poker has taken a backseat. However, I haven't stopped thinking, reading and watching poker. In the last month I've come across a very unique thought: Poker is not much different than Rock, Paper, Scissors.

******

Poker is a game of out-thinking your opponents without out-thinking yourself. Staying one step ahead in the thought processes of your opponents is the exact place to be. If you start thinking two or more steps ahead of your opponents, you often will over-think and do exactly what your opponent wants you to do. An example:

You have a pair of Tens. It's raised from early position for a standard raise, you called, and the flop comes down 4 6 9 rainbow. Completely harmless to you, however your opponent leads out again with a big bet. So what level of thinking do you go to? It will more than likely fluctuate between whether he has a larger pocket pair than yours or has something like AK or AQ. If you think he is continuation betting than he probably has AK or AQ, something you have 75% of the way beat by this point. If you think he is betting a bigger pair than you are more 80% to lose the hand.

So you then go into the thought processes and figure out why he would bet this way. Would he bet this way with a large overpair like AA KK QQ or JJ, or would he slowplay it. Does he think that you think he would slowplay a hand like that, and in thinking so bets it so as not to slowplay the hand. Suddenly it becomes a game in which you are thinking about what your opponent is thinking about your thinking. These levels of thought processes have the potential of being infinite in size, but often most people don't go much further than let's say the 3rd or 4th level of thinking.

So lets say that he does have AK, he is continuation betting, and that's all he is thinking. If you think that he thinks that you think he would slowplay AA or KK you may actually fold here. And in going two steps ahead of your opponent you end up acting just how he hoped. In believing that your opponent is aware that you think he would slow play a big pair and in betting trys to do the opposite is going 2 steps ahead of the thought process the opponent is actually in.

Lets change this again, lets say that he has pocket kings. The opponent knows that he is well known for being a slowplayer, checking and calling with monster hands in hopes of trapping. He believes that if he bets here, people will assume he is bluffing, because if he had a big overpair he would probably check. In this case, your thought process works perfectly, you believe that he is changing gears and is no longer slowplaying his big pair, and you fold. You are exactly one step ahead of your opponent in terms of thought levels, and made the correct play.

**For more insight on Poker Thought, see Jonathan Ellis's Article in "Philosophy of Poker", "Thinking about Thinking about Thinking about Thinking (about poker)"**

So how does this relate to Rock, Paper, Scissors? Most would consider Rock, Paper, Scissors to be a game merely of luck, you just happen to pick the one of three choices that beats the one of three choices of your opponent. Is this true however? Not entirely. I've never seen a person play Rock, Paper, Scissors that wasn't trying to predict what the opponent was going to throw next (he has thrown rock three times in a row, he's probably going to throw scissors next).

It becomes a mind game trying to predict what hand his opponent would throw out next, and counter games insue where he the opponent does the opposite of what his opponent is trying to predict.

Again, quite confusing thinking about thinking, but this brings us once again to the original question. What does poker have to do with Rock, Paper, Scissors?

The answer is your table image and current play style. Does everyone think you are playing tight, loose, passive, aggressive? And in reality what kind of poker are you playing? Fortunately in most smaller limit games played among amateurs and rookies alike, their table image matches exactly with their play style. Unfortunately even with this information, the amateur can't take advantage of the other player because he himself doesn't know how to "change gears," or throw a scissors instead of a rock. Here's an example:

Let's say that a professional poker player sat down with a table of amateurs, and he knows how to "change gears." He's been playing tight the entire game, giving up his blinds to preflop raises, but betting his good hands hard. The entire table thinks he is tight, and they all think that every time he plays he has a good hand. This pro knowing that the table has adapted to his tight play can now change gears, suddenly playing as though he is getting a large influx of good cards, he begins stealing the far majority of the pots on the table, and it takes quite a few rounds before the other players at the table even realize what he has been doing.

Some professionals have become famous for their table image, and no matter where they may go, that table image sticks with them. One example would be Gus Hansen, whom most believe to be one of the loosest most aggressive players out there. He can easily sit down at a table and play tight pick up a hand, play in his classic aggressive style, and quite possibly get called by someone with a marginal hand thinking he is merely just bluffing like always.

This is merely the tip of the iceberg for table image however. The best players will actually change gears according to whomever they are playing. Often times this is the best strategy against amateurs because they are unable to change gears and if you can constantly change your strategy and betting patterns according to whomever you are playing you can make them pay for that mistake. Some further examples:

You are up against a calling station in a pot and your hand hits nothing. Where in most cases you would lead out with a bluff guessing no one else hit the flop either, you decide to merely check knowing that you can not bluff this person out of the pot.

You are up against a maniac and hit a great hand. Where you would normally bet into a calling station, you check to him knowing that he may very well bluff all his chips into your stack.

You are up against a pro, he reads very well especially based on betting patterns, and you suspect he considers you to be an amateur, someone whos aggressive when he bluffs and slowplays his big hands. You suddenly hit your huge nut hand, where in most cases you would slowplay, you decide to overbet the pot and act as if you are bluffing, possibly sucking in your first professional victim.

These are the thought processes that often occur at a poker table, and fortunately at many tables devoid of professionals you probably only have 20% of the table thinking this way(if even that high). If you can be part of that 20%, you can have a very profitable time indeed, and if you sit at a high stakes table with a bunch of pros, you have to think this way just to survive.

Poker is a game not unsimilar to Rock, Paper, Scissors. However, poker makes it much harder to switch between Rock, Paper, Scissors, and even more difficult to figure out what your opponents are playing as well.

If they are playing loose and passive (calling station) you should wait for a monster hand and continue to bet aggressively into them and hope they call off all their chips with a mediocre hand.

If they are playing loose and aggressive (maniac) you should wait for a monster hand and slowplay them into bluffing off all their chips.

If they are playing tight and aggressive (Classic ABC poker) you should probably play looser, trying to steal pots, and folding when they show aggression back.

If they are playing tight and passive (Rock) you should play loose and very aggressive, hoping to steal many pots from them, and if they do end up calling, slowing down because you know they probably have a decent hand.

If we were to make comparisons to Rock Paper Scissors, the maniac can be seen as the scissors, Classic ABC Poker the paper, and the Rock is well the Rock. Tight Passive works well against maniacs, Maniacs work well against ABC Poker, and ABC Poker works well against Tight Passive opponents.

*Note the calling station is probably the least desirable of all the playing styles, and usually holds no real advantage over any other playing styles, it's only possible use in a poker game is to make your opponents think you are a horrible player thus creating a favorable table image.*

What needs to be known is that no one single style of play is perfect, but adapting quickly to your opponents play style is as close as you can get to playing perfect poker.

Poker Diversification: Bankroll Management

Poker shares one very important aspect to any kind of investment, and that is no matter how good you may be, you must prepare yourself for unlucky events. A good investment banker will not put his entire line of credit on one company or industry, and conversely a good poker player will not put his entire bankroll into a single game or on a single hand.

To illustrate this example I will bring up a wonderful movie, Rounders, arguably the first great movie about poker. The constant heads up battles between the main character and Teddy KGB shows us perfectly that if not managed well, your entire bankroll can disappear in a matter of seconds.

For those who did not see the movie, the movie's main character, Mike is shown in a heads up game with Teddy KGB an underground poker room owner. Mike has risked his entire bankroll on this game and a well played hand by Teddy KGB catches Mike completely off guard and he ends up losing his entire bankroll in a single hand. Later in the movie Mike is shown again in consecutive back to back heads up matches with KGB and ends up winning back his money and then some.

What must be learned from this is that no matter how good you may be at playing poker, you will lose on occasion to players worse than yourself. For example if I were to play a heads up match with Phil Hellmuth, I may still have a 30% chance of winning, even though I may be a worse player then him. Thus if we play 100 heads up matches I will probably win 25 to 35 games and he will win 75 to 65 matches. This means that he must have a sufficient bankroll size in relation to the amount of money he has risked in this match so that his risk of losing all his money is reduced to near nothing.

Rounders is a classic example of short term poker meets with long term poker. If you play with your entire bankroll every time you sit down at a poker table, then you will go broke eventually. Mike has played great poker from start to end, but his swings from good to poor bankroll strategy meant that he went from a nice sized bankroll, to being in debt, and back again to having a nice sized bankroll.

******

So now that we know how important bankroll management is, how exactly should we manage our bankroll?

Well it takes discipline and often just a basic strategy, and I will lay it out plainly here. First I will present 3 levels of riskiness when determining your bankroll strategy and apply them to all forms of poker. The variations exist because some types of poker inherently have higher levels of variance (variance: the difference between winning sessions and losing sessions).

******

3 different levels of riskiness:

Gambler: You play mainly for fun, but you have fun when you win, and losing your bankroll isn't going to be a huge deal as it's money well spent.

Conservative: You play for fun, but you are very determined to build a bankroll as high as possible without ever putting anymore money into poker.

Ultra-Conservative: You may play for a living, or you are a beginner poker player, thus variance will inherently be larger because you have not experienced enough decisions to always make the right decision.

******

Basic terminology used when describing your bankroll strategy:

BB is referred to in fixed limit poker as the "Big Bet," not to be confused with the "Big Blind." For example if you look at a fixed limit table online, you will see 1$/2$ games, the small blind is 50c and the big blind is 1$, and the Big Bet is 2$.

Buy-In is used for Pot Limit and No Limit poker games. This is basically the amount of money you buy into a certain PL or NL game. I advise personally that you should buy in for the maximum at all times in a PL or NL game, some exceptions exist, but unless you are a very advanced poker player it usually pays to play with the maximum buy in.

*Note for No Limit and Pot Limit*
Most online poker rooms make the standard max buy in 100 times the big blind. So for a .5c/1$ No Limit Hold Em game, the max buy in is 100 dollars. This may change at your local casinos that are known for having strange buy in structures, and thus you may have to adjust your bankroll strategy slightly in relation to the structure.

******

Texas Hold'Em Fixed Limit:

Ultra Conservative: 500xBB
(For example you should have a bankroll of 1000$ to play the 1/2$ fixed limit game)

Conservative: 300xBB
(This would translate into a 600$ bankroll at 1/2$)

Gambler: 150xBB
(300$ bankroll at 1/2$)

Texas Hold'Em No Limit and Pot Limit:

Ultra Conservative: 40 Buy-Ins
(At a .50c/1$ No Limit game with max 100$ buy-ins you should have a bankroll of 4000$)

Conservative: 25 Buy-Ins
(At a .50c/1$ No Limit game with max 100$ buy-ins you should have a bankroll of 2500$)

Gambler: 10 Buy-Ins
(At a .50c/1$ No Limit game with max 100$ buy-ins you should have a bankroll of 1000$)

*Note I will not continue to include these examples in further poker variations, as I'm sure you have an understanding of the math behind this strategy by now*

Omaha Fixed Limit

Ultra Conservative: 300xBB

Conservative: 200xBB

Gambler: 100xBB

Omaha Pot Limit and No Limit

Ultra Conservative: 30 Buy Ins

Conservative: 20 Buy Ins

Gambler: 10 Buy Ins

Omaha High/Low, 8 or Better Limit

Ultra Conservative: 200xBB

Conservative: 100xBB

Gambler: 50xBB

Omaha High/Low, 8 or Better Pot Limit and No Limit

Ultra Conservative: 25 Buy-Ins

Conservative: 20 Buy-Ins

Gambler: 10 Buy-Ins

7 Card Stud

Ultra Conservative: 1000xBB

Conservative: 500xBB

Gambler: 200xBB

7 Card Stud High/Low 8 or Better

Ultra Conservative: 300xBB

Conservative: 200xBB

Gambler: 100xBB

SNGs (Sit and Go Tournaments, or Single Table tournaments)

Ultra Conservative: 50 Buy Ins

Conservative: 25 Buy Ins

Gambler: 10 Buy Ins

MTTs (Multi Table Tournaments)

Ultra Conservative: 300 Buy Ins

Conservative: 200 Buy Ins

Gambler: 100 Buy Ins

******

Bringing it all together.

Now that you have your strategy, you must implement it into a long term strategy of making your bankroll larger.

I will use myself as an example, I started with a 50 dollar bankroll, I play No Limit Hold Em and I would consider myself Conservative when managing my bankroll.

Now with a 50 dollar bankroll, you can only play .01/.02 cent No Limit Hold Em. At those limits you will be buying into games for 2 dollars. This is exactly 25 buyins for my bankroll, this is perfect for starting my bankroll.

As soon as my bankroll reaches 100 dollars, I can move up to the next limit, .02/.04 cent No Limit. The buy in is now at 4 dollars which is exactly 25 buy ins for your bankroll.

Again when my bankroll reaches 200 to 250 dollars, I will now move up to the next limit, .05/.1 cent where they buy in is 10 dollars.

You will continue this process all the way up the ranks. Along the way you will gain much needed experience and your skill will probably increase with the limits thus keeping your winning rate around the same, and increasing profits over time.

This includes moving down the ranks as well. If you currently have 1000$ and play the .25/.5 cent No Limit Hold Em games, and suddenly have a bad run and end up down to 750$, you should consider moving down to the .1/.25 cent game again until you have 1000$ again. This is suggested to reduce your variance, but if you happen to lose half your bankroll, you must move down in order to stay in compliance with this bankroll strategy.

*****

Quick note about multi tabling. Multi tabling will require you to have a larger bankroll than suggested above but not as much as you may think. If you single table at the conservative level, then you should consider moving to ultra conservative if you play 4 tables at the same time (this usually translates in moving down only one level in limits).

One thing to note about multi tabling is that you will increase your profits even though you are moving down the limit structure, and thus I highly suggest for anyone serious about online poker to learn to multi table effectively.

*****

This is all for bankroll strategy, I hope you all learn how to manage your poker money like a pro, please comment and come back again.

-Tireur

A Quick Easy Guide to Odds in Poker.

Understanding odds in a poker game is vital to a successful poker player and must be learned by all who are serious about winning. I will present and explain the three vital statistics that make up a poker game, pot odds, implied odds, and "outs".

Hand odds (outs) or more specifically the odds of making your hand, or odds of your hand being beat on the next card. This represents those percent numbers next to people's hands when you watch poker on television. This is vital not only in determining whether your hand is good or not, but the odds of making that straight, flush or higher pair.

When playing a game, you can only guess the kind of hand someone else may have and thus the only true odds you can calculate are your own odds of making a hand or odds that someone else may make a hand (if you suspect they are on a draw).

To calculate these odds you take the number of "outs" that you have, these are cards in the deck that can still help you, and multiplying by two. This is the odds that one of your outs will hit the very next card.

For example: You hold Jack Ten off suit (both cards have different suits), the flop comes KQ2 rainbow (3 different suits). You determine that you are more than likely up against a pair of kings or queens. Thus in order to win this hand you will need to complete your straight with an Ace or Nine. You have 8 outs in this situation, 4 aces and 4 nines. This means you have a 16% chance or about 1/6 odds to make that straight on the turn. You have 32% or 1/3 odds to make that straight by the river.

Similarly with a flush draw holding 4 of the same suit, you have 9 outs in the deck to hit one of the remaining flush cards. This would translate into 18 percent or just a little better than 1/6, again you double this to figure your odds of hitting this hand by the river.

********

Pot odds are where you take your knowledge of counting outs and apply them to deciding when to call or fold your draw. Pot odds are actually much easier to calculate than your figuring out odds based on your outs.

Pot odds are simply the amount you must wager to win a certain amount of money. For example if you have a pot with 6 dollars in it, and someone raises 2 dollars you will be getting 1:4 on your money. You are wagering 2 dollars (your call) to win the 8 dollars in the pot (6 in the pot plus the 2 dollar bet). To display your pot odds as a percentage: 1:4 = 1/(1+4) or 20%.

So what exactly does this mean? Well traditionally you should only call this bet if your hand has 20% or better odds of winning or 20% or better odds of making your hand on the next card. For example with our straight and flush draws in our previous example, neither would be adequate for calling on the flop. Or are they? In my personal opinion you have an adequate hand to call this 1 to 4 pot odds bet and this will lead us to the next topic: Implied Odds.

********

Implied Odds are similar to Pot odds, but they are the odds based on money you could win by the end of the hand. For example, both you and your opponent have 10 dollars in the game, and he bets the same 2 dollars into the 6 dollar pot. Thus he now has 8 dollars in front of him, and there is now 8 dollars in the pot, thus you have the potential of winning 16 dollars in total, giving you 1 to 8 or 12.5% on your money.

If you believe that you can extract much more money out of your opponent by the showdown if you do make your hand, then this is now an adequate call with a flush or straight draw.

If you are playing a Fixed Limit game, then implied odds become much more difficult to accurately calculate. This is a very important thing to remember when playing limit, pot limit and no limit poker.

*****Edit June 5th*****
I was asked to further explain implied odds in fixed limit games and why it's more difficult to calculate them and use them in your poker math. The reason is that it is very difficult to calculate whether you will have someone who will call you down, reraise you, or fold by the river. Thus relying on implied odds to make your decisions is much more speculative.

In my own personal opinion you should only rely on pot odds when making plays at fixed limit poker. And often because of it's fixed limit structure you will be given correct odds to chase your flush and straight draws anyway. If you really want to include implied odds in your decision making process then I suggest taking your current pot odds and making it slightly bigger. For example if your pot odds on the turn with a draw is 1/6 you can probably safely say that your implied odds are around 1/7 or 1/8. Again I personally wouldn't advise making too many decisions on implied odds in fixed limit poker.

********

Bringing it all together:

Learning the math of poker takes some time and practice, but it’s vital to your play. It will keep you from chasing hands given bad pot and implied odds, and seemingly chase hands that you might not have before.

---------------

What may be more important to note is that you should always make the pot odds for your opponent large enough to cause them to make mistakes and chase hands they shouldn’t if they figured the math correctly. This is why it’s general practice to bet 1/2 to full pot bets if you are going to bet or raise your hand. 1/2 pot bets will give your opponent 1 to 3 pot odds, and full pot bets will give your opponent 1 to 2 pot odds.

This is why it’s very important to bet your big hands aggressively, because players calling these bets with inadequate hands will be seeing flops, turns and rivers without the right pot odds and in the long run will lose money to you.

----------------

Implied Odds will explain why we will see small pocket pairs for cheap before the flop. For example, lets consider we hold pocket 8s in a 1$/2$ NL game. Everyone in the game will have stacks ranging around 200$, thus you are getting 1 to 100 implied odds to limp pre-flop, and you are still getting stellar implied odds to see a flop for 2-5x the big blind (1-50 to 1-20).

You will connect with your set around 1 out of 8 times, and you will make that set on a “non-scary” board (a board with no straight and flush potential) around 1 out of 10 times (note: rough estimate). Thus this makes these hands incredibly profitable when you make your set as you are more than likely going to be paid off by the showdown if played correctly.

********

In conclusion, learning these basics will help to make you a good poker player. However, if you just enjoy playing poker, and enjoy the gambling aspect of the game, then by all means disregard all the tedious out counting and figuring out your odds and play however you like.

If you do count your outs and figure out your odds, but happen to lose, don’t fret, if the math adds up, you made the correct play and you just didn’t get lucky. To avoid tilt, you must focus on your long run results, and realize that if you played that hand 100 times over with random flops, turns and rivers that you will net a profit.

Your long term results rely on good play. Short term results are at the mercy of lady luck.

------------

One thing I’d like to note is that you should never tell someone what to do at the poker table, everyone is at the table for their own reasons, whether it’s to play seriously or for fun. To tell anyone differently is rude and unnecessary, and if I personally owned a poker room I would not hesitate to eject a player for being rude or berating another player’s game. Let the gamblers be gamblers, and let the fish swim.

Anyone who berates the play of another player can never be classified as a good poker player, as it’s analogous to the shark advertising to the pool of fish that he’s on his way to eat them, and telling them they should swim faster. It will only make it that much harder to win their money if you criticize the play of another at the poker table.

How To Play Texas HoldEm

Basics -

A poker table can have between 2 to 11 players sitting playing Texas Holdem. Often a max table is either going to be 9 or 10 though. And shorthanded is often referred to a table with 6 or less players.

We now have the blinds and antes. Blinds are forced bets after the "Button" which is the person who acts last on subsequent betting rounds. So at a ten player table we will have one person sitting on the button. The person directly to his left will be the "Small Blind." If the minimum bet on the first round of betting is $10 dollars, then the small blind has been forced to bet $5 dollars. Directly to the left of the small blind is the big blind, who is forced to bet the minimum, or $10 dollars. Antes are forced bets that are often imposed late in tournaments, it involves making everyone at the table throw in a small forced bet.

Next after everyone has thrown in their forced bets, the dealer deals 2 cards to every player. These are known as your "whole cards." You have a round of betting, starting with the player directly to the left of the "Big Blind" and continuing left around the table until everyone has bet/called/folded. The dealer then deals 3 cards face up. This is known as the flop. A round of betting will ensue. Then the dealer will deal down 1 card or the Turn or Fourth Street. A round of betting agian will ensue. Finally the dealer will deal down 1 last card or the River or Fifth Street. The final round of betting will occur, and then the players will show their hands and the best 5 card hand made from the 2 cards in your hand and the 5 on the table will be the winner.

Poker hand rankings are the same as they have ever been througout the ages. But I'll throw them up here anyway. The strengths are going to be in decsending order.

High card - The highest card in your hand that isn't paired. (Jack)
Pair - Two cards of the same rank (Jack - Jack)
Two pair - Just like the name says, two pair (Jack - Jack, Queen - Queen)
Three of a kind - Three cards of the same rank (Jack - Jack - Jack)
Straight - 5 cards in consecutive order in rank (Ten - Jack - Queen - King - Ace)
Flush - 5 cards with the same suit (5 clubs, hearts, spades, diamonds)
Full House - A three of a kind coupled with a pair (Jack - Jack - Jack - Queen - Queen)
4 of a kind - Just like Three of a kind but with one more card (Jack - Jack - Jack - Jack)
Straight Flush - 5 cards in consecutive order in rank and all the same suit.
Royal Flush - Same as a Straight Flush, but it's highest card is the ace. The best hand in poker.

*******
Before I publish my first strategy guide for this ever popular Texas Hold'Em I must make something clear that most books will not tell you. You will not be a successful poker player copying someone's play style exactly, you can idolize them and aspire to be as good as them, but you can never be as good of a poker player without making your play style unique to yourself.

Advanced:
Play Style

So instead of promoting a certain type of play style, I will describe some common play styles. I will then attempt to help you understand the strengths and weaknesses of certain hands.

First before going into great detail about play styles, I have to mention that your play style is not going to be specific to these ones I'm describing below. Your style will change according to the game and limit. How you attack a certain table, or a certain player is truly your personal play style, these are just common ways of attacking poker.

Tight Aggressive - The most recommended but hardest to adopt:

Picking good starting hands and betting aggressively when you have the probable best hand. This means no slowplaying unless you have a hand with a lock (meaning 90% or better chance to win by showdown).

The basics of this style is to wait for good hands and bet to make the impatient ones at the table pay to play their sub par hands. Very good style when playing at a table full of loose players. Will work best against loose weak players, who play lots of hands but don't bet or raise often. Loose Aggressive is a little harder to play against as it's hard to sense whether you are up against a good hand or not.

Loose Aggressive - The controlled Maniac:

Playing any and all hands very aggressively, putting the pressure on constantly. This style is not the most recommended online as it is hard to pick up on tells, and it's easy to be slowplayed into a monster pot you can't win. This works well at live games as a good player reader can pick up on tells and can sense weakness or strength.

Loose Passive Preflop, Semi-Tight Aggressive postflop - The sleeper - (Credit to WaffeHo, the "HoDa" for this style)

You play many hands preflop, limping to see a flop, and then turning the heat on with aggressive betting to either grab a pot that hits no one, or to figure out whether your flush draw or straight draws are any good. This is a wonderful style for putting folks on tilt(a player who is very mad at the game and is playing subpar poker). Be wary as this style works on very specific tables where everyone is very timid with their money and willing to see flops cheaply but can be outplayed postflop.

*****************

As I stated before, these styles are not exclusive to anyones game, you must change it up according to the game and your table image.

Table Image - How the rest of the table sees you, "the biggest bluff of the game."

This is very important for good poker players and is often how tournaments are won. Most pros adopt a tight image (play very few hands) then later in the game or tournament you have an upsurge of aggression and begin playing more hands. Your image dictates that you have good hands when in fact you are holding marginal hands. This can result in just enough stolen blinds and pots to make a good session a great session, or a 15th place tournament result into a top 5.

Some more unique pros such as Gus Hansen, adopts a very loose aggressive image. This makes them difficult to read, but more importantly it makes the amateur player believe that you will always have trash cards. So when you do hit your big AA hand, chances are you will be paid off handsomly by the showdown.

*********

Bringing it all together:

A winning poker player mixes his game up, often you have a certain way of approaching most games, working at getting a table image, then exploiting it to it's full potential. It isn't about being unpredictable, it's about looking predictable but mixing it up with a few unpredicted hands that win big.

*********

Now to the starting hands. Often times it's given information in most poker books to give you a list of playable preflop hands, but offer no more information. I will attempt to explain why certain hands work and others do not.

The classic monsters - AA, KK, QQ

These hands hold special importance in being favorites preflop, thus you are 95% sure you have the best hand during that round of betting. It's often good practice to bet these as such to make bad hands or hands that are 2:1 or worse underdogs to you to draw on you with inadequete pot odds (pot odds are the caluculations of the money bet for money won).

These hands are not invulnerable and thus must be protected by good bets, but a good poker player must know when to fold them if someone is representing a hand that has yours beat.

The high card hands - AK, AQ, AJ, KQ, etc.

These hands hold the value of either being in great condition (having a bad hand like A9 or KJ dominated because of the smaller kicker, the second best card) or nearly 50/50 to hands like JJ, TT, 99, etc.

Again these hands should be played aggressively because they are even more vulnerable to losing to bad hands, and thus you must make bad hands pay to see flops.

Drawing Hands - JT, Axs, 56s, small pocket pairs, etc.

These hands are the connectors, and suited hands to either small connectors or suited to an ace. These hands are small favorites to hitting big hands such as straights, flushes and straight flushes. They also help disguise your play a little more often, as small hands aren't expected to be played very often.

These hands should see flops cheaply, to figure out whether you will even have straight or flush draw potential. Smaller pocket pairs are the same, you want to see the flop cheaply and hope you make a set (three of a kind) which is one of the most profitable hands you can receive.
Use caution and don't chase a hand you aren't getting the correct pot odds to chase, this is why hands such as these shouldn't be played by beginners as they often misjudge their odds of hitting their hand.

Trash Hands - 72o, T2o, K4, etc.

These hands are the unsuited and even suited hands that have both cards too far away from each other to give you much chance of hitting a straight, a pair that will stand up, or a flush that can win. Unless you are really intent on making everyone at the table think you are a fish, these should normally be thrown away the second you see them. And these will probably account for nearly 60% of the hands you will see in hold em, if not more.

********

This concludes my very first strategy article. I hope this proves helpful for beginners and amateurs alike. I will have more articles to come dealing with more advanced topics including betting, pot odds, implied odds, and tilt.

Please leave some comments and feedback! And have a wonderful rest of the weekend.

Welcome to Poker by Tireur.

As you can guess I am Tireur and I love poker. Tireur pronounced tee-rare is a french word literally meaning "shooter," and has been my online alias for many years now.

Poker became my passion after I applied my quick learning abilities from video games to online poker. I quickly turned around a small deposit of money into a sizable bankroll, I am far from a perfect poker player, but I am a winning poker player.

I currently specialize in No Limit Texas Hold'Em as seen on television, but I am proficient in other forms of poker including Omaha Hold'Em Hi/Lo, 7 Card Stud, 7 Card Stud Hi/Lo, and Razz.

My site will be dedicated to making my visitors better poker players both online and in your local casino. My strategies will not only help you specialize in your favorite game, but expand your general poker knowledge that will go to making you a better poker player at any and all games.

So welcome to my blog, and I hope you bookmark me, visit often, and contribute through comments and feedback.

Have a wonderful weekend.

Tireur