A. Bet What this basically says is, “I made something on the flop” or, “the flop doesn’t scare me”. Of course, if a pair of Aces came on the flop you’re going to probably scare off everyone, (except a player who holds an Ace) because raisers – particularly those in Early Position – are perceived as holding a hand like A-K, A-Q, etc. If the flop is more like 2, 7, 9 “rainbow” (unsuited) and you bet, you’re basically saying that you aren’t afraid of that flop because you have an over-pair (10-10 or higher in this case). Nobody’s really going to believe you flopped a set (Trips) or a Straight draw if you raised in EP, because very few players raise with 2-2, 7-7, 9-9 or J-8 from there.

B. Check This says, “I missed on the flop” or, “I hit a monster and want you to stay in.” If a pair of Aces come on the flop and you check, almost everyone will check behind you. The likely exceptions are those who have an Ace or those players who like to steal pots when a pair flops. If the flop is more like 2, 7, 9 rainbow, most players really will believe you missed the flop and they’ll feel safer in betting their hand.

C. Check, then call any bet made In this situation, you’re basically saying, “I have a good hand – probably a Straight or Flush draw or two-pair – and want to see if I can improve” or, “I have two over-cards and am (stupidly) trying to catch one of them.” Those who bet after you checked typically have one of four situations: they’re also on a draw (in which case their bet is a “semi-bluff”), have an over-pair (or two over-cards), they made something on the flop (perhaps Trips) or they’re just flat-out bluffing. If the flop is such that it’s “coordinated”, like 8, 9, 10 rainbow then they could be betting a set or a Straight – lots of people will call an opening raise with hands like 8-8 or J-Qs and so forth. Your call is saying that you either missed the fact that Trips or a Straight is out there or they don’t bother you. By just calling, you can be pretty sure that the original bettor will bet into you on the Turn if he really does have a hand and the card doesn’t appear to help you. If s/he somehow puts you on a draw, then you could very well face a huge bet because your opponent (if s/he’s smart) will want to make your draw too expensive to be a proper play. Hopefully you’ll recall that you need pot odds of at least 6 to 1 for an inside Straight draw, 3.3 to 1 for Straight and 3 to 1 for a Flush draw. Of course, if the bettor checks on the turn, it could be a good indication of a bluff, but it’s also a sign that s/he has hand that’s so strong (like a Full House), s/he wants you to “catch up.”

D. Check, then raise any bet made In my not-so-humble opinion, this is the strongest play of all. It says, “I trapped you” or, “Your hand doesn’t scare me.” It also might be saying, “I’m bluffing”, but few players will read that into your actions. You can pretty much count on the fact that anyone on a draw will fold when you do that, unless the pot odds are enormous at this point. You can also pretty much expect some players – usually those trying to “buy” the pot or those with a good, solid hand – to go all-in here. Whether or not you should call obviously depends upon what you hold, and the pot odds being offered. I love to check-raise, but actually use it sparingly because while you’ll win more hands with it, you won’t necessarily earn more $$$ by using it.

Okay, let’s discuss situation # 2 where you entered the pot with a raise, all the others either folded or called, the flop comes and a player acting before you bets. Besides folding, you can choose to:

(Source: GameMaster)

Notes and comments:

While it’s best to memorize this chart, until you do just print it out and have it near you when you’re playing. You can see that as the higher card goes down in rank, the spread between it and the lower card gets tighter. That’s mainly because the only hope you have with a starting hand like 7-6o is to make a Straight and more Straights can be made when there are fewer “gaps” to deal with. For those of you who are Video Poker players, you know exactly what I mean; in fact, I found my experience at playing VP very helpful in recognizing playable situations.

Now look at the minimum hands for the mighty Ace. If the lower card is of any rank and is suited, the hand is playable, but if it’s unsuited, it should be no lower than a 10. As you’ll find out, most players will cling to A-xo until the bitter end. And you’ll most certainly lose some nice hands to something like A-6o, but in the long run, it shouldn’t be played. To draw an analogy to Blackjack one more time, folding A-6o is like hitting A-7 versus a dealer’s 9; not everyone does it, even though it’s the proper play. It may not “feel” right, but you’ll make more $$$ in the long run if you’ll do it. Math does not have room for “feelings”. Cold, perhaps but that’s how it is.

Pairs: No pairs are listed on here because all of them are playable at one time or another. Just remember that this list (and the pairs) is not a license to play these hands at any time, under any set of circumstances. For example, you’d be crazy to play 10-7s in an early position after 3 players have raised behind you. As I said earlier, this list is as much about what not to play as it is about what’s playable. So stop calling with those Q-3s hands and be patient until I show you the entire matrix. That will incorporate this list and the pairs into a complete strategy that takes into consideration your position, how many bets you have to call and so on. In the meantime, I have some homework for you and that’ll wrap it up.

(Source: GameMaster)

If you’re following my recommendations on starting hands at no-limit Hold’em (NLHE), then you’re entering the pot with a raise probably 90% of the time. In this lesson, I want to discuss what to do when you’ve done that and several other players call to see the flop. If you think about it, the possibilities are fairly limited, so let me list them and discuss each one in order. If you have raised, a lot of what will happen on the flop really depends upon what position you’re in; a raise from under-the-gun (UTG) is usually perceived as being stronger than one from the Button, for example. Of course, none of what I’m going to cover will apply to each and every hand, but generally it’ll happen enough to allow us to draw some conclusions.

Please note that what I’m talking about here is the time when you enter the pot at a full or nearly-full table (7-10 players) with a raise and all of the other players either fold or just call. Situations where you raise and are re-raised are basically covered by the Starting Hands Matrix and I’ll discuss them somewhere in the future; for now let’s stick with the basic concept. If you raise and all of the other players fold or call, there are two primary situations you’ll encounter when the flop is dealt:

Situation #1. Everyone checks to you and you:
A. Bet
B. Check
C. Check, then call any bet made
D. Check, then raise any bet made

Situation #2. A player ahead of you bets into the flop and you:
A. Fold
B. Call
C. Raise

As you undoubtedly know, the vast majority of the time the other players will check to the raiser – it’s done so often that the saying is a part of poker lore. How you play your hand at that point “talks” to the other players and you need to remember that you might want to “say” something different, which is what we call a bluff.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

“The end depends upon the beginning.” I heard that line in a movie recently and it certainly applies to Hold ‘em poker, although that’s not what the movie was about. At best, it’s extremely difficult to make a comeback if you enter the pot of a Hold ‘em game with a bad hand. I see it all the time and it happens, I guess, because so many people feel about poker like they do about Blackjack; “it’s all luck, anyway, so what’s the difference?” Well, if you’ve studied my Blackjack lessons the least little bit, you know it’s not “all luck” by a long shot. Sure, there is a luck factor that we cannot deny (I prefer to call it “variance”) but making the mathematically proper play for each and every hand goes a long way toward reducing the luck factor in Blackjack and that’s what we call playing Basic Strategy. Unfortunately, playing Basic Strategy alone will not give you an edge over the casino – which is why my Blackjack lessons also teach you how to count the cards – but the proper Basic Strategy for a given set of rules in a Blackjack game will reduce the casino’s edge over you to a minimum; generally 0.5% or even less.

Hold ‘em poker also has a “basic strategy” and it begins with the first two cards you’re dealt in the game, your “pocket” or “hole” cards. (I suppose that “pocket” cards is more the poker expression, so I’ll try to use that when I’m talking about a player’s two face-down cards in a Hold ‘em game, but forgive me now and then when I lapse into calling them “hole” cards). Anyway, it’s easy to imagine that if you were always dealt a pair of “pocket” Aces, you would win tons of $$$ at Hold ‘em. Of course, it wouldn’t be long before no one would play against you, but you get the idea. Great cards in the pocket are the start of a great hand. In poker, as in Blackjack, great hands win most of the time. Not all of the time, mind you, just most of the time. We don’t always win with a hand of 20 versus a dealer’s 6 in Blackjack, nor will we always win with AA (“pocket rockets” in poker slang) in Hold ‘em, but it’s still a good way to start.

So, how do you make sure you have a good start for a Hold ‘em poker hand? Well, that’s the beauty of the game of poker. If you don’t like your first two cards, you throw them away! It’s somewhat like the surrender rule in Blackjack, except it doesn’t cost as much. If you’re familiar with surrender, you can stop the play by giving up half your bet and, if surrender is allowed in the casino where you’re playing, you should do it whenever the mathematics say you’ll win less than 50% of the time. But 50% is a fairly steep price to pay for getting out of the hand. However in poker, it’s not nearly that much. In most poker games with 8 to 10 players, you’ll have to post a “small blind” and “big blind” bet only about once every 8-10 hands. All of the other hands you’ll get cost you nothing to throw away, so in, say, a $10/$20 game with a $5 small blind bet and a $10 big blind bet, it’ll cost you only $15 for each “round” of 8-10 hands to toss them. That’s a little more that $1.50 per hand and, with a $10 minimum bet per round, the percentage is only 15-20% if you always fold. It would be stupid to always fold, of course, but I want to contrast this with surrender in Blackjack where it would cost you 50% of your total bets if you always did it.

The point I’m trying to make here is that you do not have to play poor cards in a Hold ‘em poker game, but most beginners do. The wise player enters the pot on his or her own terms or s/he simply doesn’t play. This takes a certain amount of patience that many beginners seem to lack (“Hell, I’m here to play Hold ‘em poker, not Fold ‘em poker”) and you can take advantage of that. Just as it takes patience for the count in a 6-deck Blackjack game to get into positive territory, so it is with Hold ‘em. Good pocket cards don’t come along on every deal, so you’ve got to fold a lot if you expect to make any $$$ from this game. There’s no arguing that the game of Hold ‘em poker is much more complicated than the game of Blackjack, but both use decks of 52 cards and both are subject to mathematical analysis, so it’s actually possible for us to determine which sets of pocket cards are worth playing and which are not.

There are actually EV tables that show the long term statistical results of Hold’em hands. Another site has a copy of this chart, where it ranks poker hands by EV. This gives a numerical value to each hand combination, that easily shows the good vs bad poker hands.

Let me give you a crystal clear example: Which pocket pair do you think will win more, KK or 22? Hopefully the answer is obvious. A pair of deuces can be beat by any other pair out there but a pair of Kings can only be beaten by a pair of Aces. Of course, both are beat by two-pair, a set of Trips, etc. so a pair of anything isn’t necessarily an automatic winner when all five community cards have been dealt. But it’s actually fairly easy to determine which pocket cards will win in the long run and which won’t. It’s not exactly like determining how much we’ll make with a 20 versus a dealer’s 6 in Blackjack, because your position at the poker table, the cards that come on the flop, the turn and the river (Unfamiliar with these terms? See lesson 1.), the other players’ cards, how much is in the pot and a variety of other factors will ultimately determine the value of a starting hand.

But, believe it or not, we can assign some average values to all of those variables and come up with a nice list of playable pocket cards, which I’ll present below.

But before I do that, let me explain my “grand scheme” here. What I intend to ultimately present to you is a Hold ‘em Poker Basic Strategy Matrix, which is very much like the matrix I use in teaching Basic Strategy for Blackjack. But the Hold ‘em matrix is going to be a bit more complicated because it will take into consideration your position at the table, the number of players that called the bet before you, any raises, etc. Complicated? Yes. But remember that I’m teaching you how to play Hold ‘em poker at online poker rooms, so you won’t have to memorize anything! Just print out what I show you and keep it by your computer as you play. Of course, if you are willing to do some memorizing, then the process of evaluating a hand will proceed more quickly, plus you might want to use this information in a brick-and-mortar casino where using a “cheat sheet” may not be appropriate.

Like any other matrix, mine will be built in layers that hopefully have some sort of rhyme and reason about them. But I definitely know where to start and that is to give you a list of the minimum hands you should play. What I mean by that is this: Your pocket cards can only be one of three types: pairs, suited cards or unsuited cards. Obviously pairs cannot be suited; there is only one King of spades in a deck; get two King of spades as pocket cards and there’s a definite problem. Back in the Old West, you’d probably get shot for that. But to continue along, besides pairs (cards of equal “rank” but different suit), you can get suited cards (different rank but same “suit”) or unsuited cards (different suit, different rank) and that’s it. Within all of those various permutations of cards, there are 1326 different two-card combinations that can make up the pocket cards in a Hold ‘em game. Play long enough and you’ll get all of them, but there are only about 250 or so that you should bet on. Except for the pairs, each set has one card that is higher in rank than the other and that’s what forms the basis for my minimum starting hand list. For example, you might be dealt 10c7d (10 of clubs, 7 of diamonds) so the first thing you do is look at the card of the highest rank, which is the 10 of clubs. If the lower card of the two is equal to or higher than the minimum I list, the hand may be played. I say “may” because as we go along, you’ll see that your position at the table, the number of raises you may have to call, etc., will all have an effect on whether or not you play the hand. But if the lower card of the two is outside the “minimum”, you’ll just fold the hand, regardless. So, I guess this isn’t so much a list of hands to play as much as a list of hands to not play.

Let me amplify my example with the 10c7d hand. The absolute minimum hand you should play where the 10 is the high card is 10-7s. This means “10, 7 suited”; in other words, the two are of the same suit, like spades, hearts, diamonds or clubs. Remember that this is the minimum hand, so it’s okay to play 10-8s or 10-9s, because they are “above” a 10-7s. What about a 10-Jack, you ask? Well, that falls under the Jacks hands, because we always work off the higher card, so don’t get confused. Okay, what about 10 and something unsuited? The minimum hand there is 10-8o (10, 8 offsuit). I’m using a small “o” to represent unsuited (“off-suit”) only because that’s the way it’s done by most poker writers. I think it should be “u”, but they got here before me, so I’ll do it their way. Okay, so now we know that the minimum hand with a high card of 10 where the cards are not suited is 10, 8. This means it’s okay to play 10-9o, but not 10-7o. The cards would have to be suited for that. Obviously, 10-5, either suited or unsuited is outside the range, so it should never be played, period.

As you go through the list, keep in mind the rationale for most of these choices. Pairs can be improved in many ways and high pairs (Aces-Jacks) can often win on their own. Two suited cards of different rank can win by turning into a Flush, a Straight or a Straight Flush, or by improving to Two-Pair, Trips, etc. Two pocket cards of different rank and suit are not likely to turn into a Flush, and while they might make Two-pair, Trips, etc., they’ll most likely either make a single Pair or, if all goes well, a Straight. Generally you’ll see that the “bottom” card is at or near the low end of a Straight Flush for the higher card. For example, the minimum hand for a Queen is Q-8s (Queen, 8 suited) because the 8 is the lowest card that will make a Straight or Straight Flush with a Queen. If the Queen and the other card are not suited, the minimum hand is Q-9o. This makes sense, because you’re giving up some “flush power” with this hand; it’ll take four cards of whatever suit the Queen is in to make a Flush and somebody else may have the King or Ace and beat you. Just so we’re clear on this, if the higher card is a Queen and the lower card is of the same suit, Queen-8 is the minimum hand which means it’s okay to play the hand with a suited 9 or 10, also. But if you have, say, a suited 7 (or lower) with the Queen, the hand should be folded. If they’re offsuit, then a 9 is as low as you should go; not even an 8 should be played, let alone a 7 or lower.

Make sense? I hope so, but if not, don’t hesitate to e-mail me your questions. I always answer my mail personally and I try to do it within 2-3 days at the most. You’ll find my address at the end of the lesson.

Okay, so here’s my list of minimum starting hands. Remember that s = suited and o = offsuit or unsuited. Oh, yeah “x” means any card. By the way, this list is for Limit Hold ‘em; No-limit starting hands would be quite a bit different.

(Source: GameMaster)

For example, look at the hand of A-Qo (remember, “s” is suited and “o” is off suit). If you’re in Early Position (see Lesson 11 for the various position designations), you should raise with A-Qo. Now, look at the * (asterisk) next to most of the starting hands, including A-Qo. Down at the bottom, you’ll see this note: * = fold if a player before you raises preflop. So, if the UTG were to raise and you’re next to play, you fold with A-Qo or any other hand marked with an asterisk. About 90% of the time you’ll be either raising or folding. If you’ve read many books on no-limit Hold ‘em, you’ll often see the words “raise or fold” and it’s good advice. Also note that most of the hands have a “Fold” designation in the Early Position column. It means just that; you don’t limp and you certainly don’t raise in EP with A-Jo, you simply throw it away. About the only time you’ll call in EP is when you have 9-9 to Q-Q and the pot’s been raised in front of you. Those hands are just too good to fold, but they’re not strong enough to re-raise.

Let’s continue with A-Qo. If you’re in Middle Position and no one has raised ahead of you, (which would cause you to fold), you’ll raise with A-Qo. If one or more players have limped, you’ll still raise, but you should raise more than the standard 3 times the big blind, which is why I say, “Raise should be 3-4x Big Blind” in a note at the bottom of the matrix. You’ll fold if someone (anyone) re-raises after you. It’s tough to do, I know, but it’ll be the correct play the vast majority of the time. Oh, sure, you’ll get some player who will re-raise with A-10s every now and then, but most of the time you’ll lose if you call the re-raise. If you’re in Late Position, you should raise with A-Qo, assuming no one has raised in front of you (in which case you’d fold), but call if someone now re-raises you. Because the re-raise might come from an early position limper, you might wonder why you’d call and it all has to do with position. You’ll most likely be last to act for the rest of the hand, so it’s profitable to see the flop, then make a decision by how others bet it. See how this matrix uses hand strength and position to dictate the play? I’m sure it’s not perfect, but I will say it works pretty well if you follow it.

Okay, now let’s discuss the hand of A-Qo in the Blinds. You’ll notice that I didn’t make a distinction between the Small Blind and the Big Blind in the matrix. I did that primarily to keep it simple, but also because in most no-limit cash games the Blinds are a relatively unimportant part of the pot. Admittedly, they can be a factor in tournaments, but we’ll discuss that in a later lesson. For now, treat the SB and the BB the same. With A-Q in either Blind, re-raise a Late Position raise, but just call a raise made by a player in any other position. So, if the UTG raises, for example and you have A-Qo in one of the Blinds, just call, assuming it’s a 3x to 4x BB raise. If you re-raise a Late Position (“button”) raise and that player re-raises again, just call. How do you know to do that? You know because there’s not a “RR2″ designation on the hand. Looking at the notes on the bottom, you’ll see this: RR2 = Raise a Reraise. You’ll also see that RR2 applies only to A-A, K-K and A-Ks. So, a re-raise of your raise by a LP player warrants only a call.

Let’s say you’re in the BB with A-Qo and everyone has limped in. Regardless of their position – early, middle, late or SB – you should raise about the size of the pot, but certainly not less than 3 times the Big Blind bet. If someone subsequently re-raises you, it’s just a call because there’s no “RR2″ next to the hand, remember? If everyone folds to the SB and s/he limps by only completing the bet, then you should raise. If the SB raises, that’s a Late Position raise, so you should re-raise. Of course, if you have A-Qo in the SB, it’s the same as if you had it in the BB: re-raise a Late Position raise. But if the BB or anyone else re-raises you, then just call, because A-Qo doesn’t rate a “RR2″ designation.

You can see that there’s a (1) next to Q-Js in the Blinds column. That relates to the comment at the bottom. If everyone has limped into the pot, then raise from the SB or BB with Q-Js or higher. “Higher” refers to every hand above it in the left-hand column, which essentially means you’ll raise in that situation with any of the playable hands I show on the matrix. This situation will actually occur quite often in cash games because people like to see cheap flops, but you’re not going to let that happen, are you? If you get re-raised, just call because Q-Js does not have the RR2 designation.

And that’s basically it for now. Just play your hand as shown for the position you’re in and you’ll soon be holding your own in No-Limit Hold ‘Em. (Poor pun, I know.) When in doubt, fold; there’ll be another hand coming along soon enough. I’m not trying to turn you into a wimpy player, but folding is the best tactic if you’re confused about a hand. In time, you’ll begin to feel real comfortable with this matrix and as the $$$ come rolling in, you’ll know it’s working.

Oops! I almost forgot the ** designation that you’ll find next to the LP column up top. In the notes at the bottom, you’ll see this: **LP = 2-3 players left. This is a reminder that you must “open up” your game when you get down to 2 or 3 players left. As time goes on, you’ll find yourself as one of the last few players in SnGs and, because the Blind bets will be coming around a lot quicker, you cannot sit and wait for premium hands. When that happens, start making all of your plays according to the LP column regardless of the position you’re in. In the case of A-Qo, for example, you’d raise and call a re-raise even if you were UTG at the short-handed table. A-Qo isn’t a great hand at a full table, but it’s not bad when there are only three of you left.

(Source: GameMaster)

Okay, as promised, here’s a chart of probabilities for various hands you might hold at the flop, which means the first three community cards have been dealt. This chart assumes you’ll get to see two more cards – the turn and the river – and further assumes you won’t have to make any futher bets. That’s not likely to happen, of course, but remember that you might make your hand on the turn in which case the numbers become unimportant, because you’ll likely call (if not raise) any bet from that point forward.

If you miss making your hand on the turn, here’s a chart to help you decide if you should call a bet before the river card is dealt:

The numbers to use to multiply your proposed bet in order to compare it with the pot to see if you’ll be betting with a positive expectation are a little on the conservative side, so adjust them if you can live with more risk, especially where you already have a “made” hand, such as Trips, etc. As I explained above, sometimes the hand you’re hoping to improve will be good enough to win the pot, so over-betting a little probably won’t hurt you in the long run, but remember that 4-card Straights and Flushes are basically worthless if they don’t convert, so I’d advise against “pushing the envelope” when it comes to betting those hands.

As I said in Lesson 1, Internet poker rooms are different than their brick-and-mortar counterparts and the instant tabulation of the pot’s value is one of those distinctions. Rather than spending your time trying to figure what’s in the pot, you can spend it by seeing if your bet will have a positive EV and, in the long run, that’ll be worth a lot of $$$ to you.

(Source: GameMaster)

Got it? Good. The first thing you’ll notice is that it’s not very big and certainly not nearly as complicated as the matrix for Limit Hold ‘em. The reason is simple: All of the hands you should play are listed in the first column. If it’s not on here, you shouldn’t play it, period. No A-5 suited, no K-10 offsuit, no 6-7 of any type; you just don’t play hands like that in no-limit Hold ‘em, at least as a beginner. Okay, I know I opened a door here by saying “at least as a beginner” and I know you see Fossilman and Gus Hansen and Clonie Gowan playing hands like that, but remember, they’re not beginners. This isn’t limit Hold ‘em where a dumb mistake can cost you a bet or two – this is no-limit Hold ‘em where a dumb mistake can cost you your entire stack, be it tournament chips or real $$$. Plus, this matrix is designed to have you open the betting with a raise as often as possible, but seldom just call a raise ahead of you.

(Source: GameMaster)

I know that a lot of you are less than thrilled by mathematical dissertations, but it’s all a part of the game and you must have a grasp on at least a few basic principles in order to be successful at Hold ‘em Poker, so please bear with me. I’ll try to make this as simple, easy to understand and brief as possible. If you’re a student of my Blackjack School, you’re hopefully already familiar with the term, “expected value” (EV), but it’s not something you hear about a lot in the poker world. For whatever reason, most poker players, authors, commentators and so forth seem to prefer using “odds” to describe a situation. For example, a particular play may have odds of “4 to 1 against”, which basically means it has a 20% probability of happening.

The terminology of odds have always confused me and because of that, I wanted to teach myself, and you, a quick way of doing calculations in your head, so I’ve decided to go more with probability when calculating EV, rather than odds. I mean, does 5 to 1 odds mean a 16.67% probability or a 20% probability? While there’s not a huge difference between the two, being consistently wrong about how you figure your chances in a given situation will eventually cost you some hard-earned $$$. But for those of you who’d rather deal with odds, let me show you the easiest way to convert probability to odds. Any probability that’s expressed as a percentage can be converted to odds by first subtracting the probability from 100, then dividing the result by the probability. For example, in the case of a 16.66% probability it’ll look like this: 100 minus 16.66 = 83.34 divided by 16.66 = 5.00 or 5 to 1 “against”. In the case of a 20% probabilty, it’ll look like this: 100 minus 20 = 80 divided by 20 = 4.00 or 4 to 1 odds “against”.

What do 5 to 1 odds “against” mean in the real world? Well, it means that for every 6 times you try the whatever you’re talking about, it’ll work once. More confusion, right? The clue for getting a good grasp on this is to add the 5 to the 1 to get 6. Out of 6 attempts, 1 will work, so the odds are 5 to 1 “against.” Isn’t it really just more simple to say you have a 16.66% chance of success? That’s what I’m going to do as I take you through this course, use probability in conjunction with bet size to arrive at EV (expected value, remember?). For example, if your $10 bet has a probability of success of 20%, your EV is $10 x 20% (or 0.20) = $2.00. It’s what we do in Blackjack all the time; a hand of 6,4 versus the dealer’s 7 has an EV of -.476 if you stand (!!!), an EV of +.293 if you hit and an EV of +.406 if you double. It’s just a matter of choosing the highest EV in the play of your hand, so you should double 6,4 vs. 7.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t work exactly that way in Hold ‘em Poker, because your hand is always being compared to the other players’ hands and, as the old saying goes, “Any hand can be a winner in poker”. Rather than measuring the value of a given hand, I’m going to show you how to evaluate the expected value of your bets with the idea that if you make all (or almost all) of your bets in situations where you have a “positive” EV, you can’t help but make a profit. This doesn’t mean you’re going to win every hand, just like there’s no guarantee you’re going to win every time you double 10 vs. a dealer’s 7 in Blackjack. But, if you do it often enough, in the long run you’ll make a profit.

Let me give you a quick example of what I mean. Let’s say that you hold a hand of 10, J offsuit in the “pocket” in a $10/$20 limit game and the flop comes 10, J, 6 (I’m ignoring suits here). You now have Two-pair and, if you choose to play this hand through to its conclusion – two more cards – there is a 16.5% chance that you’ll catch another 10 or Jack, thus ending up with a Full House. Now remember that the math can’t tell you if the Full House you make is a guaranteed winner because another player may have a higher Full House or Four-of-a-kind, etc. when all the cards have been dealt. But, the math can tell you if betting on your Two-pair makes sense. Let’s say all of the pre-flop betting has resulted in a pot total of $60, the bet after the flop comes to you and the pot is now worth a total of $90. Should you make a bet on this hand?

First of all, you have Two-pair, regardless of what happens and that alone may be enough to eventually win, so it has a value of its own, but let’s ignore that for the moment. However, let’s assume that a Full House has nearly a 100% probability of winning the pot, as most Full Houses do. With a 16.5% probability of making a Full House from your hand, the EV of your bet is 16.5% of $90 = $14.85. If the bet you have to make is $10, then you have a definite positive EV and should make the bet. If the bet you must make is $40, it’s not as clear-cut a choice. That’s because players betting after you may or may not add more to the pot’s value, plus you’ll undoubtedly have to make additional bets after the “turn” and “river” cards are dealt. But all we can really do is play our hand one bet at a time, while taking into consideration what other hands are being formed by the other players; don’t forget that the flop, turn and river cards belong to them, too. As we get further into the lessons, I’ll show you how to “read” other players’ hands by how they bet or don’t bet and that will help you in your decision-making process for situations like this where a hand with a positive EV can be suddenly transformed to one with a negative expectation.

Whether or not you make a $40 bet for the hand shown above is immaterial to this situation. What really matters is that you know the probability of making the hand from the flop, forward and you use that to guide your betting. But, and it’s a big “but”, if you choose to make the $40 bet, be aware that it’s probably a negative EV bet at the moment and, if you make them often enough, you’ll eventually lose all of your $$$. I say “probably” because at this point I cannot precisely quantify the value of your Two-pair other than to say that the only hand it beats is a Pair, but that’s often enough to win a pot in Hold ‘em. If we somewhat arbitrarily assign a probability of 20% to the Two-pair winning the pot, then the total EV for that hand is about $33 (20% x $90 = $18 + $14.85), so a $40 bet is a borderline decision at best and a $30 bet seems reasonable. However, a $60 bet would be a real “gamble” and you should know that before you make the call.

Some poker experts like to use “implied odds” when making a decision like this and they want you to figure out how many players will call your bet so the total pot before the next bet comes due can be used to calculate your EV, which they call “pot odds”. Well, that sounds good and is certainly valid if you’re able to predict just who is going to bet and how much they’ll bet. My problems with that concept are many, not the least of which is that it encourages a certain amount of wishful thinking on your part, plus it’s yet another layer of calculation that’s being added to what is already a fairly complex equation. Just as in Blackjack, I prefer to err on the side of conservatism when $$$ are involved, so rather than use implied odds, I prefer to use the odds presented to me as the hand progresses. Let’s continue along and play out the Two-pair we have by making a $30 call after the flop. Now comes the “turn” card and it may well give us our Full House. But, if your luck is like mine, it won’t so we’ll have to face more decisions in betting. (If we made the Full House with the turn card, I’m assuming we’ll welcome and call any bet or more likely, raise the pot for the balance of play.) With the turn card out, we now have to re-evaluate if our hoped-for Full House can still win the pot. Don’t forget that Four-of-a-kind beats a Full House, as does a Straight Flush, so we have to evaluate the impact of the turn card on other players’ hands. It didn’t help us, but it might have helped them.

If you remember, we had a hand of 10, J and the flop came 10, J, 6. Because I’m ignoring suits in this example, let’s rule out the possibility of a Straight Flush, but even if the flopped 10, J were suited, the best anyone could have is a 4-card Straight Flush (called a S.F. “draw”) and the odds are greatly in favor of them making either a Straight or Flush, both of which lose to a Full House, so we can’t spend our time worrying about losing to a Straight Flush. I’ve played thousands of hands and have lost to a Straight Flush only one time. But that little, lonely 6 that came on the flop could be a problem. It’s not inconceivable that some other player has 6,6 “in the hole” and s/he is going to be thrilled to see it, because those Trip 6s will beat our Two-pair if we don’t improve.

But we have set our course and will go forward, although not blindly. By calculating our EV after the flop, we are not done with all of the calculations for this hand, as we would be in a no-limit game where we went “all in”. If a player who has just been passively checking or calling now comes out with a bet or raise after the turn card is dealt, we must take that into consideration when the bet comes to us. In a Limit game where we cannot go “all-in”, which guarantees us to see the last two cards without further betting, we have to – once more – calculate our pot odds to see if it’s a positive EV. Let’s say the the turn is the 5 of spades, a card that probably helped no one, but a player acting before us now bets $20 and the pot is offering us $110 for a $20 call. We still have two-pair, which might be good enough to win the hand, but now – with only one card to come – the probability of making a Full House has dropped to 4 chances of 46 or 8.7%. (See that? We can make our FH by catching one of the two remaining Jacks or one of the two remaining 10s, thus 4 “outs” among the 46 cards we haven’t seen). For a pot at $110, our EV is 8.7% x $110 = $9.57, but we must call with a $20 bet.

But, you may ask, what about the bets we already have in the pot; don’t they have a place in our calculations? The short answer is “no”. Those $$$ are gone, so to speak and we’ll only get them back if we win the hand. Think about it: If we don’t call, they’re lost anyway, so I don’t count our previous bets when calculating EV, only the full value of the pot, thus an EV of $9.57 with only 4 “outs”. You’ll hear that a lot in the poker world; the number of “outs”, so let me take a minute to explain it.

Up to this point in our play, we’ve seen 6 cards; our two “hole” or “pocket” cards and the four community cards on the “board”, three from the flop and the one turn card. That leaves 46 cards unseen and we can only assume, at least for mathematical purposes, that the two Jacks and two 10s that will help us remain in the deck. That, indeed, may not be the case, but we have no way of knowing otherwise unless someone shows us their hand. So it’s just like in Blackjack; if we don’t see it, we don’t count it. Of course, we’re not counting the cards here, so the math is now very simple. Four cards of 46 help us so we have 4 “outs”, or a 2/23 probability of making our hand at this point. Does this mean that the pot now has to be 11.5 times the size of our bet in order for us to call a bet? Not really, because we could have the best hand with two-pair; after all, someone may be bluffing or has a lower two-pair such as 10s and 6s, etc. If this were a no-limit game where we could go “all-in” after the flop, then 6 to 1 pot odds would be satisfactory because no more bets can be made, plus we’re guaranteed to see both the turn and river cards. But in a limit game, we should calculate the pot odds after every card is dealt.

I’m going to give you the percentages of success for making various hands that you may encounter after the flop (5 cards seen), then those same numbers based upon staying with the hand until the end (7 cards seen), but first I want to show you an easy way to check the validity of your bet in the heat of battle, so to speak. If you have a probability of 16.5% in making your Two-pair into a Full House, that means the pot should be at least six times the value of your bet for it to carry a positive EV. Why six? Multiply 16.5% by 6 and you get 99%. A figure of 100% is the threshold of positive expectation, but for me, 99% is close enough because we have some extra EV built into the play due to the possibility of the two-pair winning on their own. Knowing this little trick will allow you to quickly calculate the pot odds in the manner I’ve described above by multiplying the bet times 6 and then comparing that figure to the pot total at the time it’s your turn to bet. That’s very easy to do in a limit Hold ‘em game because of the uniform bet size and not so easy in a pot limit or no-limit game. But for now, we’re discussing limit Hold ‘em, so I won’t confuse the issue.

Let me give you an example of how this works. Let’s say the pot is $90 and you must bet $10, minimum. Well, six times $10 is $60 and the pot is “paying” you $90, so make the bet. Were the pot only $40, you’d be facing a negative expectation of $20 if you make the bet. Conversely, if the pot is, say, $300, you could bet $40 and still have a positive EV. If nothing else, this method of play removes a lot of anxiety from the game; should I call, bet, fold or raise… oh, what to do?

(Source: GameMaster)

Let’s talk about bankroll requirements a bit. My advice to you is to have no less than 20 entry fees in your account. So, if you begin with $5+$.50 SnGs (avoid the $5+$1 SnGs that are out there), you should have at least $110 in your account at the poker room where you’ll be playing. I speak from experience; during my worst losing streak, I ended OTM in 9 straight matches! It happens, but that’s poker. Play the SnGs for a while, at least 3 or 4 months and see if you can add to your bankroll, or at least not deplete it. Then and only then, give some thought to playing regular “ring” games of NLHE. Remember, in tournament play (SnG or otherwise) you can lose only your entry fee. In ring games you can lose every $$$ you have on the table. Notice that I said “every $$$ on the table”, not “every $$$ you own.” I suppose you could eventually lose everything at NLHE, but the way it usually works at the on-line poker rooms, you may start at the table with only a set amount, like $25 or $40 in a $.50-$1 game. Having such a rule keeps some clown from coming to the table with $10,000 and going all-in on every hand; it’s just not any fun. By restricting the amount you can start with, they’re also restricting the amount you can lose.

I mention the ring games only because your tournament experience, coupled with a disciplined use of the Matrix you see here, will turn you into a devastating “cash” player. A lot of the poker books out there say, “Great cash game players are often lousy tournament players” and/or vice-versa, but in my experience they’re wrong. Think about it. In a tournament (SnGs or MTTs), the blinds are constantly rising, so you cannot be overly patient and wait to play only good hands. But in a cash game, the blinds remain the same, so you can afford to wait for the premium hands. A lot of “experts” will say playing only premium hands will not get you much action – everyone will fold when you raise – but the “experts” aren’t playing the $.50-$1 games. The turnover of players is huge in those games, so even though 1 or 2 of the other players may think you’re a “rock”, the vast majority will give you plenty of action. For me, it’s now a case of playing the ring games to get the $$$ for the MTTs I’m playing, or for the occasional venture into the $100+ SnGs. In all of my years as an “advantage player”, I’ve never seen a situation as lucrative as playing $.50-$1 NLHE ring games; pound-for-pound, dollar-for-dollar. Sure I know how to make a hundred bucks an hour at Blackjack, but it takes a minimum of $20,000 to do it right. I can easily make $20 an hour at NLHE on a $400 bankroll. That’s a return of 5% an hour, folks!

Okay, one more comment, then let’s discuss the Matrix: Where to play SnGs, MTTs and NLHE cash games. Although I dearly love Party Poker for all of the “soft” competition there, I do not like their SnG format. They’re the ones who charge $1 for the $5 SnG, which is way too much. Their other levels have a 10% fee up to the $50 level and actually less than that at the highest levels. But, and this is a big “but”, the SnGs at Party start with only 800 tournament chips and I think 1000 should be the minimum, at least for those of you just getting into NLHE. The ring games are very beatable, though so I’ve kept my account there. I guess it’s fair to say that I play mostly at Poker Stars, but I also make the rounds to InterPoker, Royal Vegas and Pacific Poker, primarily for multi-table tournaments. PokerStars.com is a good spot, both for SnGs and cash games, even if they don’t advertise here. Fair warning: the competition there is tough, real tough. But their SnGs start you with 1500 chips and the blinds rise slowly (except in their “Turbo” tournaments, which are basically crapshoots), so skill is a definite factor in their tournaments. The cash games are tough, but not impossible and I like that. Besides the $$$, I want a good challenge when I play. But at the end of the month, I ultimately want the $$$ and I’m getting them at Poker Stars. By the way, my “handle” there is Canada Bill. No, I’m not from Canada. Canada Bill Jones was a riverboat gambler who said: “It’s immoral to let a sucker keep his money.” I kind of like that and, because someone else already had Aceten, my usual handle, I went with the Canada Bill approach. Say hello if you see me.

(Source: GameMaster)

Speaking of moving on, let me give you a quick explanation of how to play Hold ‘em poker. While each poker room may have some slight variations (and you should thoroughly read the rules at whichever poker room you visit), generally it goes like this:

• Any number from 2 to 10 players may be at the table.
• Although the casino deals the cards, the “dealer” for each round of play is designated by a button, marked “dealer” and that person will act last.
• Before any cards are dealt, the player to the immediate left of the dealer must post a bet called the “small blind”, which is typically one-half of the minimum bet for the game ($5 in a 10/20 game, for example).
• The player to the immediate left of the “small blind” also must post a bet. It is typically equal to the minimum bet for the game ($10 in a 10/20 game, for example). This is called the “big blind.”
• The two players making the blind bets, all of the other players and the dealer are then dealt two cards face down, which are called “hole” or “pocket” cards.
• The player to the immediate left of the big blind begins the general betting by either folding (at no cost), calling (matching the $10 “big blind” bet), or raising the big blind’s bet ($10 in a 10/20 game, for example). If this player folds, all of the others must all either fold, raise or call. There are no “free rides” to the next card.
• The betting action continues around the table, clockwise, until it reaches the player who made the small blind bet. That player may, at his option, fold (thus forfeiting the bet), call or raise (assuming the raising limit hasn’t been reached; usually 3 or 4 raises are the limit). If the decision is to call, this player receives credit for the small blind bet that he or she placed, so in a 10/20 game where no other player has raised, the small blind may call for $5 or raise for $15.
• It’s now time for the player that made the big blind bet to act and his or her situation is just like that of the small blind; only the bet sizes are different. If no one has raised, then the big blind can just “check” to be in the pot. However, the big blind may choose to fold because there was a raise, thus forfeiting the bet, or raise, (assuming the raising limit hasn’t been reached) by betting an additional increment ($10 in a 10/20 game, for example). All of the bets are then pulled to the center of the table by the casino’s dealer and, in the case of Internet poker, a “pot” total is displayed.
• When this “pre-flop” betting is completed, three community cards are dealt and turned face up in the center of the table. These cards, called the “flop” are community cards, in the sense that all the players still in the game may use them in combination with their two pocket cards to make the best hand possible. The general betting at this point is begun by the player that made the small blind bet and he or she may check, fold (foolish, because checking costs nothing at this point) or bet. If this player bets, it’s for the minimum amount of the game ($10, for example in a 10/20 limit game). The play now proceeds clockwise around the table to the player who made the big blind bet and he or she must either check (only if the small blind checked), call, raise or fold and that’s true of every other player. The two players “in the blind” must call any raises to stay in the pot or they must fold.
• Once the flop bets are all made, they’re pulled to the center of the table and another community card is dealt. This card is known as the “turn” or fourth street card. It’s placed face up in the center of the table, next to the flop and is available for the use of all the players remaining. Then, another round of betting begins with the first remaining player on the dealer’s left, which may or may not be the player who made the small blind bet. On this round if that player wishes to bet, it must be for the maximum bet in a limit game ($20 in a 10/20 game, for example), although he may check, if desired. If the player does not check, the other remaining players must either call, raise or fold to stay in the pot. Again, the betting goes in order around the table, all of the bets are pulled to the center and a fifth card, known as the river or fifth street card is placed face up in the center of the table, next to the others.
• When the river card, which is the last to be dealt for a round has been placed, the fourth and final round of betting begins with the first player to the left of the dealer. This player may check or bet, as desired. If he decides to bet, it must be for the maximum bet ($20 in a 10/20 limit game). Should this player check, then all others may check until someone bets. If a player does bet, then all the players that checked must either call, raise or fold. I emphasize this because a lot of “newbies” to the game will fold when the bet has been checked to them and that’s a big mistake, because checking is free. No matter how bad your hand may be, you can always fold it if someone acting after you bets or raises, but you just might check yourself into a winner.
• After the betting has been completed, it’s time for the “showdown” and this is where the Internet casinos have a huge advantage over the brick-and-mortar casinos. Because you may use any 5 of the 7 cards you’ve seen (your 2 pocket cards and the 5 community cards) to make your final hand, it sometimes is confusing as to what the best hand is. At a brick-and-mortar casino, you may display your hole cards to the dealer and he or she will figure out where you stand, but that also gives your opponents a lot of valuable information that they can use against you: do you draw to inside Straights, did you raise with a weak hand and so forth. Plus, you might look downright stupid showing a four-card flush that you thought was a winner, but that won’t happen at an Internet poker room because the computer already knows where you stand. If you’ve lost, most of the software programs will tell you so and you can “muck” the hand without showing your hole cards, plus – and I guarantee this will happen one fine day – if you have a winner that you thought was a loser, the computer will tell you that, too. There’s no doubt in my mind that players who are new to the game throw away hole cards that are actually winners because they’re too embarrased to ask for help. This happens a lot with hands that have multiple winners, such as when the 5 community cards make a Full House or Straight Flush. That simply cannot happen in an Internet poker room, assuming you’ve stayed in until the showdown, of course. However, one thing the computer can’t do for you is give you back the cards once you’ve folded your hand.
• Following the showdown, the chips are distributed to the winner(s), the deck is shuffled, the dealer “button” is moved one player to the left, blind bets are placed, the pocket cards are dealt and it starts all over again. Hopefully this made the procedures of the game a little more clear to you, but it’s really just the tip of the iceberg.

(Source: GameMaster)

I’m going to go through this part of our Poker School in basically the opposite way I did the section on playing limit games. Rather than build the Starting Hands Basic Strategy Matrix bit by bit and discussing it as we go along, here I’m going to show you the entire matrix and over a series of lessons discuss why (and more importantly), how I use it. Unlike Limit Hold ‘em, which allows you to make a lot of small errors and still survive financially, No-Limit Hold ‘em (NLHE) isn’t nearly so forgiving. It’s not like you can lose everything you own when playing NLHE, but you can – and will, at times – lose every chip you have on the table. That’s bad, of course, but remember that the same goes for your opponents and they know it. If they don’t, they’ll soon find out, especially if they play against you when you’re using this starting hands strategy.

Before we get into the matrix itself, let me give you some thoughts on playing NLHE in general. What I’m going to show you here comes from my experience at playing on-line, something I began (insofar as NLHE is concerned) in January, 2004. Oh, I had played some no-limit tournaments from time-to-time, but I typically got my butt beat, mainly because I was trying to adapt my Limit Hold ‘em play to the no-limit version. As I noted above, they are two different animals. I was happy with my earnings from the limit games (over 2.5 big bets per hour), but I was playing mainly $2-$4 games, so my earnings weren’t all that much. I suppose I could have stuck with Limit games and moved up to the $10-$20 level and (if I may flatter myself), probably done okay there as well, eventually. But the big $$$ in Poker today is in No-Limit games – especially in tournaments – so that’s when I began to develop the Starting Hands Matrix you’ll see here.

The first thing you’ll notice is that the lowest hand you’ll play is J-Qs, and even then, it’s only when you’re in late position. Believe it or not, that’s not playing “tight” – it’s playing smart because the vast majority of the time, you’ll enter the game with a raise. You’ll see a few times where calling is the correct play, but that’s usually when you’re in the blinds. It really is true: aggressive play pays dividends in NLHE and it took me quite a while to learn that. Does this mean I never “limp” when I’m in early, middle or late position? Well, no, but it’s rare and it usually happens when there’s a “maniac” at the table. But we’ll discuss that in later lessons.

I first began my NLHE play like I did for Limit; at the play-money tables and I urge you to do the same. But, you’ll quickly see that most of those games are a circus, so get yourself a bunch of play-money chips as you become familiar with the Matrix, but don’t think what’s happening is anything close to “real” games. Games played for $$$ are a lot tighter, which will suit the strategy presented here just fine. My suggestion is to begin your real-money play by entering Sit & Go (SnG) tournaments. These are one-table tournaments where each player is given a certain number of tournament chips in return for your entry fee. The poker room takes a portion of those fees (usually 10%) and the balance makes up the prize pool, which is typically paid to the top three finishers; First Place getting 45-50%, Second Place getting roughly half that and Third Place getting back the entry fee and a small profit. SnGs begin when the required number of players sit down (usually 9 or 10) and the blinds increase relatively rapidly – anywhere from 5 to 15 minutes per level – so an SnG will often be over in an hour or an hour and a half. I’ll have a lot more to say about SnGs in future lessons, but remember two things about them: You may watch SnGs at any level of play for free and all you can lose in an SnG is your entry fee. Yet, you’ll be playing honest-to-goodness, genuine No Limit Texas Hold ‘Em against players who want to eat your lunch and that’s a good thing. If you start like I did, you’ll lose most of the time, but it won’t be long before you’re starting to get “ITM” (In The Money), which will defray your expenses.

I have kept precise records of my NLHE play on an MS Excel worksheet and I see that the first month where I played more no-limit SnGs than limit SnGs was April, 2004. I was ITM in 15 of 36 no-limit SnGs, but ITM 20 of 29 limit SnGs that month. The limit games were paying for my no-limit experiences and that’s what I wanted to do. I never expected to show a profit at the beginning of my no-limit play, but it sure was nice to have a way to at least pay for them. Limit Hold ‘em can be played a lot like Blackjack; you have “X” as a hand in “Y” position (EP, MP, etc.) and that has an expected value which is fairly easy to calculate, so it should be played in a certain, almost non-changing way. That “rote” style of play will work to a degree in no-limit games, but only at the lowest levels of play, like inexpensive SnGs and micro-limit tables.

The real fun part (to me) of playing no-limit SnGs is moving up in “class”, so to speak. You start at $5 +$.50 SnGs ($5 goes into the prize pool and $.50 goes to the poker room), then work your way up to $50 + $5 or higher SnGs. Along the way, you finish OTM (Out of The Money) most of the time and must drop back down to get some cash, but you suddenly find that you’re a lot better player in that lower level than you were before. Consequently, it doesn’t take too long to refresh the old bankroll and up the ladder you go again. In May, 2004 for example, I played $10+$1 SnGs for the first time – 14 in all (my other SnG play was limit games) – and I got ITM just 4 of the 14 (28.57%). Well, since 30-33% of the players are ITM in 10- or 9-player SnGs through luck alone, I was running just below that level – average, at best. (Small sample size, of course.)

Anyway, I pretty much stayed with $10+$1 SnGs in June, but I ended the month ITM in 16 of 34, which is a 47.05% ratio. Along the way, I had basically given up on limit SnGs altogether because my no-limit play was now paying for itself. The next month, July, saw me playing mostly $10+$1 SnGs, with some trips up the ladder to $20+$2 matches. My ITM percentage dropped to 10 of 28 (35.70%), but I actually made a profit from my play. Only a few bucks, but that’s still fine with me because I knew (and still know) that I can make a profit from SnGs, if that was what I wanted to do. I can spend the day playing $10+$1 SnGs, get about 5 or 6 of them in and end the day with a profit. Certainly not enough $$$ to live on, but when you consider that my bankroll is never more than $500, forty or fifty bucks a day is a darn good return. I don’t want to encourage anyone who can’t afford the risk, but after an initial loss of less than $200, I’m at the point where I can be fairly certain that I’ll make a profit each month if I stick to SnGs in the $20+$2 or lower range. That’s not what I do, because I’m constantly challenging myself by playing at higher and higher limits, plus I enter a lot of multi-table tournaments (MTTs), which is where the BIG $$$ are. But that’s another topic for another time.

(Source: GameMaster)

If you have never played Hold ‘em poker before, you first need to understand just how it proceeds. Fortunately, it’s one of those games, like Blackjack or backgammon, that’s easy to learn. Unfortunately, it takes a fair amount of time and effort to become really good at Hold ‘em, but don’t worry because it’s not nuclear physics and if you do as I say, I’ll turn you into a winning player. After all, that’s why you’re here, right? And, I should mention (as a little motivator) that the rewards can be considerable. Setting aside all those fabulous multimillion dollar tournaments for the moment, it’s not unreasonable for a very good player to generate a profit of 1 to 2 “big bets” per hour off a minimum total bankroll of 400 big bets, all on a reasonably consistent basis. To use an example, most limit poker games are described by their small bet/big bet size, like a $10/$20 limit Hold ‘em game. What this means is that the minimum bet is $10 in the early part of the game and it goes up to $20 in the later part. Of course, raises are permitted (also with a limit; usually 3 or 4), so you might find yourself betting as much $200 or more on a single hand, which is why you need a bankroll of at least $8000 to play a game like that. But, if you’re good, that $8000 bankroll might very well generate an income of $600 per week, or $30,000 per year, if you play 20 or so hours a week.

I’ll cover bankroll requirements, standard deviation and all that math stuff in later lessons, but let me clarify something about “minimum total bankroll” before we get too far. What I mean by that term is the amount of $$$ you should have set aside as risk capital for this adventure, just like I recommend for playing Blackjack. The reality is that most of you probably won’t set up a separate account for your poker play because you have an alternate form of income (a job) that allows you to “refresh” your bankroll, should it become depleted. If that’s the case, what you need is at least 100 top bets ($1000 for a 5/10 game, for example) on deposit in your casino account and available to you at all times, especially if you’re playing on a regular basis. If you’re nervous about leaving your $$$ at the casino and prefer to deposit before you play, then 50 top bets should (but won’t always) suffice for a 3-4 hour playing session.

These “return on investment” numbers may impress you, but if they also scare you, don’t worry because there are plenty of games where you can play for much less. Naturally, you’ll earn a lot less, but you’ll be learning at the same time, so it’ll be a decent investment. There are plenty of limit Hold ‘em games in the $.25/$.50 format that’ll need a bankroll of only $200. Probably the most popular on-line limit Hold ‘em game is the $1/$2 version, which requires a minimum total bankroll of only $800 and a “session” bankroll of just $200 or so. The beauty of Internet poker is that the casinos have very little overhead, so a low-limit game can be offered at the same cost as a $100/$200 game. And, as you’ll see when you get more into this, the casinos are making a fortune by offering these games. On a recent Saturday night, one poker room had almost 1000 tables in action, so at a rate of, say, 60 hands per hour, and an average rake (percentage of the pot) of only $1 per round of play, they were taking in (literally “raking” in) $1 x 1000 x 60 = $60,000 an hour! And believe me, that’s a conservative figure. Of course, Saturday night is also a peak time for them and I’m sure they don’t do nearly as well on a Tuesday morning, but you get the idea: there’s a lot of $$$ to be made at poker on both sides of the fence, so why not get your share of it?

By the way, the method by which the Internet poker rooms earn their profit makes them a totally disinterested party to how well you do, because any $$$ you make doesn’t come from them, but from the other players. As such, you just don’t hear all the whining, “this game is rigged”, etc. ad nauseum, that you hear about Blackjack and other games at Internet casinos. The on-line poker rooms have a vested interest in seeing to it that you play in an honest game and, while I have no doubt that there are players out there who can and will cheat if possible, the poker rooms claim to have a handle on it, particularly collusion between players, like one being at the same table with a cohort while talking to each other on the phone. In any event, this isn’t likely to happen at a $1/$2 game, but it has to be a concern as you move up in your level of play and protecting yourself is something that I’ll cover as we move on.

(Source: GameMaster)

Also known as “Newmyer’s Seven Nuts”, named for its inventor Chris Newmyer, East Village is a modification / bastardization of Omaha high-low split. Each player is dealt seven hole cards. The player then discards two of these cards, never to be seen again. Then, with 5 hole cards left in his hand, each player “donates” one of his cards. All the players “donation” cards are kept face down, and the dealer “shuffles” these cards with a scramble. These cards will then make up the three card flop, the one card turn, and the one card river. All betting takes place as in omaha, and the game is played high-low split with the 8-or-better qualifier. Each player plays the best five-card hand he can make from exactly two of his hole cards plus three of the five community cards. This game is best played with seven players (it cannot be played with more). If it is played with two, three, or four players, extra cards must be pulled from the stub to be added to the community cards, so that there are always at least five community cards. Note that there are no “burn cards” used in this game.

The best explanation of how to play the game is found at http://www.selfstarterfoundation.com/stealth/newmyerssevennuts_about.html .

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

A big area of growth in the online casino business is, without a doubt, poker rooms. When I say “poker”, I mean the type of poker played at a table with others, not video poker, although as you’ll see they both have a lot in common, not the least of which is the fact that a player can gain an advantage if the conditions are right and you know what you’re doing. Perhaps you’ve played some poker at home with friends or have given it a go at a brick-and-mortar casino or even on-line. I have done all of them, although not extensively, especially when it comes to playing in the poker rooms at the casinos near me. The big drawback for me has been that “live” games are slow, there are a bunch of rules that I’m unfamiliar with (stuff like “no ‘string’ bets”, “don’t splash your chips”, etc.) and I’m not one for looking my opponent in the eye whilst I try to take their $$$. Of course, I sort of do that when playing Blackjack, but I really don’t consider the dealer my “opponent.” He or she is just an employee of the casino, which is my real opponent and, truth be told, most Blackjack dealers are rooting for me to win because then I might tip them.

But my big problem with table poker has always been the fact that it’s so damned slow. A table poker game may proceed at a rate of 35 to 40 hands per hour, versus a Blackjack game that will go maybe 60 hands per hour at a minimum and 200+ hands per hour when I’m alone at the table. I can usually play Video Poker at 500 or more hands per hour, so any game in the 40 hands per hour category does nothing for me in terms of satisfying my urge for “action”. With me, it’s simple: if I have an edge, I want to play as quickly as possible, so long as the speed doesn’t affect the accuracy of my playing decisions. Another consideration has also been the basic fact that it takes a fair amount of skill to make $40-$50 per hour at table poker but that’s fairly easy to do at Blackjack, if you have a big enough bankroll.

On the flip side, the nice thing about table poker is that you don’t have to hide your skill from the casino, because they earn their profits from a “rake” of the bets at a table, so they really don’t care who wins. In fact, skillful poker players are hailed as some sort of folk hero, judging by all the publicity that tournament winners receive at events like The World Series of Poker that’s held every year in Las Vegas. It should be the same for skillful Blackjack players and, to a degree, that’s the case when it comes to tournaments, but I’ve always felt that the casinos are a little leery about hosting such events because of the fear that hoards of card counters will descend upon them, when in fact, card counting is of limited value in a tournament. However, I will say that a good portion – probably a majority – of those who enter the “high stakes” Blackjack tournaments are counters and what else are they going to do in between tournament rounds?

Okay, let’s drop the philosophical stuff and get back to the topic of making $$$ at table poker. I don’t know if you’ve experienced an on-line poker casino, but it was a revelation for me when I downloaded the software of a couple of them. What I found was poker in an automated format. It’s literally click and play with all types of nifty features that would be impossible to incorporate at a brick-and-mortar version: no sweating over the “etiquette” of the game because you can’t break a rule if you tried; the total of the pot is displayed and updated bet-by-bet (helpful when figuring the odds of a play, which I’ll get into later) and you are basically anonymous, beyond displaying your “handle” and, most of all, the game proceeds very quickly, at least twice as fast as most games in a brick-and-mortar casino. I’m constantly fascinated by the technology that is developed for the Internet and on-line poker is no different.

Think of the possibilities. Not sure if a Flush beats a Straight? No, problem, just tape one of those “cheat sheets” to your monitor and you’re set. In fact, you can have all types of helpful information right next to you as you play, which is something neither of us is likely to do at a “real” table. Well, that got me thinking maybe the world needed a “GameMaster’s Poker School” that was designed to teach people how to play a winning game of poker – Hold ‘em poker, in particular – just as I have tried to do with Blackjack. Also, because of the very nature of the on-line games, poker played on the ‘Net is less of a “people” game and more of a “mathematical” game, although I won’t rule out the human element entirely. That said, it’s still a game of probability, expected value and return on investment, just like Blackjack and Video Poker and, like those other games, it’s relatively easy to calculate what can happen when there’s only 52 cards in a deck.

Because all of the on-line poker rooms that I’ve visited up to this point allow you to try out their software in a play-money mode, the opportunities to practice your game against real, live opponents are plentiful and instructive. By their very nature, the play-money games aren’t necessarily a reflection of how things will go for you in a real-money game (the play-money games can best be described as “loose”, in the sense that raises come quick and often and you cannot bluff very effectively), but they do have considerable value. First of all, if you can’t win at a play-money game, you simply aren’t ready for the real-money version. Plus, playing for “fun” gets you familiar with how the software works and it’ll give you the opportunity to not only test out my ideas, but to get organized so that you have the information I’ll give you set up in a way that it’s quickly and easily available.

I should mention that although I’ll be focusing primarily on Hold ‘em poker as it’s played on-line, much of what I’ll show you will apply to “live” poker games as well. In time, if you do as I say, you’ll memorize most of the information you need to win and that should enable you to do well at your local, friendly brick-and-mortar casino, not to mention a poker night with “da boyz and/or gurlz.” And yes, poker has been – for quite some time – a male-dominated activity but the Internet changes all that. Don’t want people to know your gender? Fine, pick an ambiguous handle (“golfnut”, “9 iron” and “wingnut” are some players I met recently) and the world won’t know (or care) whether you’re a man or woman, or something in between; all that matters is how you play. Of course, if you’re “Sexylady”, “Hooters” or “Psychoboy”, people are going to make some guess as to your gender, although they may be totally wrong and I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. In my case, I use “Aceten” as a handle and I really don’t care what people think I am; I’m there for the $$$, period.

Okay let’s get started. Just like my Blackjack School, this will unfold as a series of lessons that present various concepts, show you how to learn them and, as always, will include some “homework” that’ll reinforce what I’m teaching. Just how many lessons this will turn out to be remains to be seen, but my guess is that it will be much bigger than the Blackjack School, which currently stands at 24 lessons. But for starters, here’s what I intend to cover:

• The Basics of Hold ‘em Poker
• Limit Hold ‘em
• Pot Limit Hold ‘em
• No Limit Hold ‘em
• The Mathematics of Poker
• Money Management
• Playing Strategies
• Poker Tournaments

I’ll begin with limit Hold ‘em because that game is, in my opinion, the most popular and is the easiest to learn, plus it’ll form a good base of reference for the other types.

(Source: GameMaster)

Because Manila has five betting rounds, it does not play well at no limit or pot limit. This can be easily modified by eliminating the betting round between the second and third community cards. So, each player is dealt two private cards and a single community card is dealt to the board, followed by the first betting round. Then two community cards are dealt, followed by a second betting round. Then a fourth community card and third betting round, a fifth and final community card and fourth betting round, followed by a showdown as above.

The three-card variant can be played this way as well (as with Manila, the player must use exactly two of his three hole cards with three of the board cards to make a hand).

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.