Poker

We’ve all seen it a hundred times. That annoying player who, whenever the game gets short-handed, turns into what appears to ba a maniac. He’s betting, he’s raising, he’s re-raising - and completely dominating the game. To the beginner, or tho those inexperienced in short-handed play, he appears to have no idea of how to play. You wonder, ‘What’s he doing raising with K7 offsuit - he must have no idea!’ But yet he wins - and wins well. What’s his secret then?

The secret lies in one word: aggression. The short-handed player must - absolutely must - be able to play a solid aggressive game. Whilst you can do well playing passively in a full ring game, where others do the betting for you, when the game gets short-handed (five or less runners), you must be able to change your playing style and be able to bet aggressively hands you wouldn’t even have considered playing in a full game. Unfortunately, if you don’t, the aggressive players will run roughshod over you, controlling the betting to their advantage, and you will find your stack diminishing rapidly.

This is often bad news to poker players, as it takes them out of their comfort zone. However, it is also exciting, fun, full of action and - if one develops and hones the unique skills of short-handed play - can be extremely rewarding. Short-handed games have more variance, which means they have more risk - but with increased risks, come increased rewards.

Playing aggressively encompasses more than simply betting or raising more than you would in a full ring game. It’s about knowing when you have the best hand (remember, in short-handed play, you must lower both your starting hand requirements and the hands you would take to a showdown) - and about taking advantage of those who play too conservatively. You want - through your aggressive betting - to make these people fold at incorrect times and, in doing so, incorrectly give up their equity in the pot. Roughly two out of three times, the flop won’t even give you a pair. The skilled aggressive player realises this, and takes advantage of players who don’t. Skilled aggressive players also know how to determine whether they are in front of their opponents, and thus when to speed up and slow down in their betting.

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Poker is not just a mathematical game. It is also a game that entails a lot of psychological combat. Three of the most important psychological weapons in poker are bluffing, semi-bluffing, and slowplaying.

Bluffing

Bluffing is much more useful in a no-limit game than in a limit game. In a no-limit game, a player’s entire stack is at risk each hand. In a limit game, players know they can only lose so much if they call to the river.

Bluffing is almost useless in a low-stakes limit game (anything less than $2-$4). Rarely will a hand not be called to showdown, so there is no point in scaring people out of the pot. Bluffing becomes a much more powerful tool at high-limit games. When you play at a higher limit, it’s best to bluff when you ‘represent’ something and there are only one or two opponents in the pot. For example, betting at the flop with a high card on the board represents a pair, and raising with a flush draw out represents the flush.

Semi-Bluffing

Semi-bluffing is the name for bluffing when you also hold a drawing hand.

Your Hand

Board

You currently only have ace high, but you may hit a spade flush or make a pair of aces or kings. If you bet with this hand, you are bluffing, but you also have a high likelihood of gaining a strong hand on later betting rounds. Semi-bluffing can be a very useful technique, especially in no-limit games.

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The Chip Basket Analogy - Imagine for a moment that our poker chips, our entire bankroll, is kept in a basket.? Every time we win a pot, we add a few chips to our basket.? In the perfect world, we would always be searching for a larger basket, as our solid poker play fills that basket to overflowing!

However, the reality is, most poker players never fill that basket up, no matter how small.? In fact, many look in the bottom to find only dust and are forced to make a deposit after deposit just to keep a bankroll going.

Why?? Chip leaks.? ? Every mistake, every losing tendency, every ???why not, it’s only? money??� rationalization? is a small hole in your basket that lets those hard earned chips fall right out of the bottom.? Some of us have more leaks than others, but we all have them.? The key is discovering and plugging those leaks as quickly as possible.? Over time, if we plug away faithfully, the wins will be greater than the leaks and we will indeed be shopping for? that bigger basket.

So what are some of the most glaring chip leaks?? I have listed a few below that are very common and very devastating to your bankroll.?

Playing too many hands.

This one is elementary.? The best statistic to view here is your flop percentage.? If you are seeing 30% or higher flops over a large number of hands? in? a standard, full Texas Hold’em table, then you are playing way too many hands to be a profitable player.? A good flop percentage is 20-30%, and most tight aggressive players are much closer to the 20%!

Folding is no fun, but neither is losing money.? One basic fundamental of winning poker is always putting your money in when you are ahead.? This concept is what every slot machine or lottery is based upon.? By being selective and waiting on good cards, your starting hands are almost always a bit better than your opponents.? This edge, no matter how slight, will pay dividends over the course of hundreds and thousands of hands.

Calling when you know you are way behind.

Also referred to as ???chasing.???? Calling with bottom pair on the flop against a tight player who only bets top pair, for example.? This leak is also very evident in 7 Card Stud.? A player with an open pair of Aces will be called down by a player with a smaller pair.? The hapless loser is chasing, hoping that he catches a second pair and the aces do not.? In the long run he is just feeding his chips to the rest of the table!

An old poker axiom applies here.? Have the best hand or best draw.? If you have neither, fold!

Drawing to the 2nd best hand.

This chip leak is not so obvious.? Many players feel it is ok to draw to a straight, even when there is also a flush draw on board.? This mistake is just as much a loser as calling with bottom pair.? ? If he improves and you do not, you lose.? If you both improve, you lose.? The only way you can win is if you make your draw and he misses his.?

To go with our basket analogy, for every chip you win this way, you are most certainly losing two more through this glaring hole in your game!? Best hand or best draw, no exceptions.

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The Hutchison Point System for Texas Holdem is an excellent beginners guide to starting hand selection.? While learning this system will not make you a favorite at next year’s World Series of Poker, it will most definitely give the? new Texas Holdem player an idea of the value of the pocket cards he or she is holding.

Why is this important?? The main reason players lose money in poker is because they play too many cards.? This system limits the number of starting hands to cards that have a much better than average chance of winning.? While this guide will not help you with many aspects of Holdem, including flop, turn and river play, it will simplify the process of which cards to hang onto and which to dump before the flop.? This, in my opinion is the biggest challenge for players new to the game, and thusly a good edition for the general strategy section.

The Hutchison Point System

After being dealt your pocket pairs, assign the following values:

Ace = 16 points

King = 14 points

Queen = 13 points

Jack = 12 points

Ten = 11 points

All other cards are worth their ???face value.??�? (ie. 5 of hearts is worth 5 points, etc)

Additional Qualifiers:

Pocket Pair = +10

Same Suit = +4

Connected = +3? (ie. 9-10, or Jack-Queen.? No gaps.)

One Card Gap = +2 (ie. Jack-King)

Two Card Gap = +1 (ie. Jack-Ace)

What the numbers mean:

If your total is:

30+? ? Premium cards, that can be played from any position, if there are no raises.

27+? ? These cards can be played from Middle or Late position, provided there are no raises.

25+? ? Should only be played from late position, if there have been no raises.

To raise or call a raise, you should have a point total of:

34+? ? In early position

31+? ? In middle position

29+? ? In late position

Examples

Ace-Ace: ? That would be 16+16 for the two aces, and an additional +10 for their being a pocket pair.? Thats a total of 42 points.? Obviously strong and playable!

Queen-Jack suited:? 13 + 12 for the cards, +4 for suited, +3 since they are connected.? A total of 32.? You could call the big blind with this hand in any position, but if there is a raise, you should only call the raise in middle or late position.

10-6 suited:? 11 + 9 for the cards, +4 suited = 24 points.? Fold them!? This is a perfect example of a hand that many beginning players will call with, hoping for a flush or miracle straight draw.? They will almost always lose, and even when the straight or flush is made, there is good chance that a higher straight or flush will take the pot.

Hutchison Statistics

The creator of this formula states that in simulations, only playing 30 point hands yielded a win rate of 17% in a 10 handed game where every hand is played to the river.? Obviously, if you played every random hand, you would have an average win rate of only 10%.? Thats a 70% increase.

In conclusion, one should note that the game of Texas Holdem is extremely complex, and a simple formula such as this certainly does not do justice to all of the other variables that determine winning and losing players.? But even given the complexity of the game, it cannot be emphasized enough that the #1 mistake that beginners make is playing too many hands.? If you have only lost money so far in Holdem, this is almost certainly at the root of the problem!

The Hutchison Point System makes? starting hand choices much easier to? decide upon? and should result in a much healthier bank roll for the beginner in low limit holdem.

For the full article and disclaimers by Edward Hutchison, click the following link:

Hutchison System Page

The need for you as a student of poker, to observe and take notes on your opponents cannot be stressed enough.? If you have good starting hand requirements, you will fold a great majority of your hands.? This will give you plenty of time to study your opponents and see how they play.? Most online poker tables allow you to ???right click??? a player’s avatar and fill in notes about him, that will be saved on their server, and thus, there for you to browse? when you see the player again.

However, during the course of a game, you can fill up a huge amount of space.? This can become cumbersome, and make the notes almost not worth reading, as they become a jumbled ream of random thoughts.? ? I think the reader would agree then, that a good way to organize these notes would be most helpful!

Recently, I stumbled across and purchased a book by 7-time Texas Hold ‘em champ Phil Hellmuth, titled Play Poker Like the Pros.? In it, I found Hellmuth’s strategy for characterizing poker players as animals.? This organizational strategy is both humorous and effective, and after adding it to my game, I have been able to cut down on? the endless reams? of note taking.

Hellmuth classifies poker players in 5 general catagories, only 4 of which most of us will ever get the chance to play against.? They are the mouse, jackal, elephant, lion and eagle.? Their poker characteristics are as follows:

The Mouse

The mouse is an ultra conservative player who plays very strict starting hand requirements (see Hellmuth’s Top 10).? The mouse will bet, but rarely ever raises a bet or reraises.? The mouse almost never bluffs.? If a mouse actually does raise or re-raise, it probably means they have an almost unbeatable hand.? The mouse’s weakness is that he or she is simply too predictable.? When the mouse starts to raise, good players typically fold their hands, and in the mouse loses out on some chips they may have won, had they not earned themselves such a stodgy reputation.? This character type is also referred to as a rock? For the record, mice tend to make more money than they lose, espeically at low limit loose games.? Their pots are not always the largest in the world, but they take down way more pots than they lose, due to their conservative play.

The Jackal

I have found jackals to be pretty common animals in low limit, online poker rooms.? This type of player plays alot of cards, and bets and raises with abandon.? He is the direct opposite of the mouse.? The jackal’s chip stack often resembles a roller coaster ride, as it will climb when he has great cards, and then fall back to near nothing when he has a string of bad cards.? You can make alot of money off a player like this.? Do not ever be afraid to call a jackal, because since they play loose, you will catch them bluffing with trash often.? A jackal is destined to lose his money if he ventures far beyond 50 cent ante poker, where good players see him for the loose player that he is and take advantage of his weaknesses.

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When you see a flop, you will generally be in one of three situations.

Situation #1: Your hand totally misses the board.

Your Hand

Board

You have nothing, so you should check and fold. Another possibility is to bluff.

Situation #2: You hit the flop well and hold a strong hand.

Your Hand

Board

In these situations, you should generally bet or raise.

Situation #3: You have a drawing hand

The third possibility is that you currently do not hold a strong hand, but it is possible for you to make a strong hand if the turn or river brings you a good card. This situation is known as “drawing.”

Your Hand

Board

In this situation, a spade will make you a flush, and an Ace or King will bring you top pair.

When you are drawing, there are several tools that will help you make your decisions. One important tool is “pot odds.” Calculating pot odds is fairly simple. First, you must count the number of outs you have. An out is a card that will improve your hand.

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The first thing that you must learn in Texas Hold’em is which starting hands are good and which ones should be folded preflop. Although the answer depends on the number of people in the game and the type of game, here is a general guide to use when you are just starting out and want to win at low limits. I suggest starting at a fixed limit of $1-$2 or lower.

Note: the following guidelines are only for fixed-limit Hold’em

Hands to raise withThese are premium hands that you want to jam the pot with preflop:

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The online poker room PartyPoker, is the world’s largest poker room, advertising over 40,000 players online actively playing. PartyPoker.com has been online since 2001, is licenced and regulated by the Kahnawake Gaming Commission, is easy, safe and secure, offers prompt payouts and lots of games (Hold’em, Omaha, Omaha Hi/Lo, 7 Card Stud, 7 Card Stud Hi/Lo) at many different limits. You may make your deposit in PartyPoker via money transfer, wire transfer, Neteller, FirePay, Visa, MasterCard, Diners Club, PartyPoker’s own affiliate IGM-Pay/Pay-Pro, or Citadel Commerce, so you have plenty of options.

Party Poker’s cashouts can be via check, IGM-PAY, which performs a direct deposit into your checking or savings account, or Neteller. PartyPoker does not charge for deposits or withdrawals, but the financial service (ie - your credit card) may charge you service fees.So depositing and withdrawing is very quick and simple. I personally make my deposit with my Visa debit card and make my withdrawals using IGM-Pay, directly depositing back into that same checking account.

So Party Poker offers Limit, Pot-Limit, and No-Limit Texas Hold’em games. The stakes for pot-limit and no-limit range from a $25 max buy-in, up to $200. The limit Texas hold’em games have a range of $0.5/1 up to $30/60, with plenty of players at just about all stakes.

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Probability is a huge factor in texas hold em. Players use odds to determine their actions. The chances of finishing a flush or a straight, the probability of getting an overcard, the percentage of times you’re going to flop a set to match your pocket pair are all important factors in poker. Knowledge of these statistics is key to winning. In online games especially with very few (if any) tells, statistical knowledge becomes the main factor when choosing whether to bet, call, or fold.

Here are some terms that you’ll hear on this site and whenever you’re talking about poker odds…

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There’s more to poker then simply playing the cards you’re dealt…

While playing the game, many players pass the time by doing many different tricks with their chips. Learn how to perform the “Shuffle”, the “Twirl”, the “Knuckle Roll”, or even the unbelievable “Butterfly” in this great website!

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