In my continuing self-education as a no-limit Hold ‘em player, I think it’s fair to say that few players have been “short-stacked” in tournaments as often as me. Be it a one-table sit and go type of match or a multi-table tournament with hundreds of players, my conservative style of play will frequently find me as the low stack with four people remaining at a 9- or 10-player SnG or 11th of 11 players when the tournament pays the top 10 places. Lately I’ve been able to improve on that, but it took time to get beyond being eliminated “on the bubble”, which is – as you probably know – a frustrating experience. But take heart, fellow students; the day will come when you’re first among the final 4 at an SnG or in the top five of a multi-table tournament when everyone gets in the money. It has happened to me and, if you maintain the discipline I’m trying to teach here, it’ll happen to you, too.

Let’s face it; when you’re the smallest stack at the table, your opponents want only one thing: your financial demise. If three are paid and you’re in fourth place, knocking you out gets everyone else “in the money”, so the attacks on your stack are going to come from all directions. I know, I’ve been there plenty of times and, while I cannot take credit for inventing the betting technique I’m going to explain here, I will say that I have used it to great effect; most recently at a multi-table satellite tournament where I was 9th out of 9 players, but went on to win it.

Almost all of the advice you’ll read or hear about playing when short-stacked (which I define as having less than 7 Big Blind bets remaining) is to pick a spot and push all-in, hoping to get lucky. Well, I’m not one to depend upon luck – I welcome it, but never depend upon it. Unless you have a really great hand like pocket Aces or Kings, my advice is to avoid a pre-flop “all-in” bet, which looks like sheer desperation and attracts callers like blood in the water attracts sharks. To add to your problems, you’ll probably have to play a less-than-great hand like K-10s, A-x offsuit, etc., which is not the type of hand your opponents usually see you playing if you’re using my starting hands matrix.

So the trick here is to decide that you’re going to go all-in and (ideally) do it when you’ll be first to bet on the flop, which means you’re either in the blinds or in early position. Your 3 times the Big Blind raise from early position or from the blinds might induce everyone to fold, but more likely one or two players will call with “premium” hands, just as they might if you weren’t short. But here’s the difference: when the flop comes, you then go all-in regardless of what effect it had on your hand. There’s a possibility, especially if you have only one opponent, that the flop did not improve his or her hand, just as it may not have improved yours. But at least now your opponent has to think about what to do and we all know that forcing our opponents to make decisions may inspire them to make the wrong one. If your opponent does make a hand, the result is the same whether you pushed pre-flop or only raised the bet; you’re toast. But if the flop missed your opponent completely, s/he just might fold. Sure, it’s a long shot, but it doesn’t cost you anything to try – you’ve already decided to put in all your chips. The downside here is that everyone may fold if you bet 7 times the Big Blind bet (“folding equity”), but that might be offset by having more than one player call, thus giving you the chance to win more if this works.

The bad thing about being short-stacked is that your opponents know they likely won’t have to risk an amount above what you’ll be pushing out there, so they’ll often call with any kind of decent hand, especially if they have one of the bigger stacks. In a way, that’s good because you might well be a favorite in the hand, but the best you can do is double up if only one other player calls. By making a more modest raise, hopefully you’ll get multiple callers, which automatically reduces your winning probability, but it reduces theirs as well, yet you may still be the favorite to win the hand. It’s a fair trade to make in an effort to increase your stack by more than double.

Probably the ideal time and place for this bet is when you’re in the Small Blind and the player on the Button raises, but not enough to put you all in. Rather than re-raise, which may cause the Big Blind to fold, just call. If the BB also calls, that’s a bit worrisome, but it’s now a nice pot and you’ll be betting first. After the flop cards are shown, you push all in and cross your fingers for luck. If it’s a rag flop like 2, 5, 9 “rainbow”, your all-in bet might cause the others to fold, especially if they’re playing big cards that aren’t paired. Remember, the player on the Button is making an almost-obligatory raise and the Big Blind likely has a “random” hand, so you have a decent shot at winning. As I told you earlier, the last time I used this bet I was 9th of 9 players and in the Small Blind. The Button raised, I called and the Big Blind folded. The flop was nothing special and I went all in, which caused the Button to fold. I scooped the pot and it was enough to get me back in the game, which I went on to win. I remember that I had made a pair of 7s on the flop, but it didn’t really matter because the hand ended with my bet. Was I lucky? Perhaps, but it wasn’t my cards that won the hand – it was the way I bet them.

“Okay, GM” I hear you say, “it worked that time, but will it work against experienced players?” Fair question. Of course, nothing is going to work all of the time, but let me quote you a passage out of a great book, “Harrington on Hold ‘em” (Two Plus Two Publishing, 2004 – Vol. 1) that was co-authored by Dan Harrington who is the WSOP Champion for 1995 and who made it to the final table in both 2003 and 2004. In discussing a hand where the short-stack (Player A) opens the betting with a minimum raise, he says this on Page 94:

“A had only $6000 left, just 2.5 times the pot. He had only a couple of rounds left before he’s blinded away. With any kind of reasonable hand, Player A could easily have justified shoving all his chips in the pot and rolling the dice. But he didn’t. Instead he made the minimum raise. That’s what a player does when he wants other players in the pot against him. He wants to make sure he gets some action before he gets all his own chips in. Conclusion? Player A has a very strong hand.”

(Source: GameMaster)

Another mandatory bet in Hold ‘em poker is the Small Blind (SB), which is usually – but not always – half that of the Big Blind (BB) bet. So, in the typical $10/$20 game that we use as the “base” game in these lessons, the BB bet would be $10 and the SB will be $5. This 50% “rule” doesn’t always apply, however. In a $3-$6 game for example, the SB is often $1, not $1.50 and that difference has considerable impact on playing your hand from the SB position.

Obviously, the SB bet requires a lot more thought than the BB bet, primarily because it costs you a certain amount of $$$ to “complete” the bet, even in an unraised pot. As you learned in lesson 5, the primary decision to be made when playing in the Big Blind is how to deal with a raise, while the easiest decision to make in the BB is to check. In the SB position, the easiest decison is to fold, but if you do that too often it’ll end up costing you a lot of $$$. So we have to find a balance point that defines when we fold or complete the SB. I don’t want to imply that we’ll never raise or reraise out of the SB because there are times when that’s the proper play, but 90% of the time our decision will be to either fold or complete. Often the decision to fold is made because the bet’s been raised, but there will be times when we’ll fold simply because the cards we have don’t warrant any further investment.

Proper play from the Small Blind is complicated by the fact that if you decide to complete the bet and stay in the game, you’re still vulnerable to a raise from the BB player, plus you’ll be the first player to act on the next round of betting. Every round of play is different, of course, but you could easily find yourself completing the SB in an unraised pot and then the player in the BB raises. If all the others still in just call, you must now make a full-size bet to stick with the hand and it’s against someone who has raised in early position. That usually indicates a very strong hand or it’s a bluff by someone who wants to win the pot without a showdown, although that doesn’t usually happen in limit games. Let’s say you’re in the SB of a $10/$20 game, so your investment is $5 and you decide to complete the bet with another $5 and then the BB raises. The bet is going to come around to you at $10, assuming no other player re-raises the BB (not likely if they didn’t raise the first time around, but not impossible, either), so now what do you do? As you may have guessed, the mathematics of the situation hold the answer to this dilemma.

Betting the SB isn’t as cut-and-dried as betting the Big Blind because your initial investment is obviously smaller and a lot more depends upon the “texture” of the game. I don’t like discussing stuff like “texture” because it’s subjective in nature, but there’s no getting around it in poker, so let’s just deal with it. The game you’re in may be “loose”, in the sense that 50% or more of the players are seeing the flop, even when the bet’s been raised. That’s not the only definition of a “loose” game, but I think you get the idea. (By the way, don’t get the words “loose” and “lose” confused, as do so many people on the ‘Net. The word “lose” means to not win, such as, “I always lose when I play the slots.” The word “loose” means not tight, like “The lugnut on that wheel is loose.” With me? The English lesson is over.) Anyway, a loose game will typically see a lot of preflop raises (and calls), which can be a profitable situation for the wise player who plays good hands, whether from the blinds or not.

But when it comes to playing in a loose game from the Small Blind, you often have to decide if you’re defending your blind from someone who’s trying to “steal” it or from someone who’s playing a real hand or even someone who’s just throwing their $$$ away. And that’s just a loose game. If the game you’re in is “tight” or if the pot has been raised by a player who seldom bets any opening hand, it’s another matter entirely, of course. In a loose game with a lot of callers, you must pretty well figure that it’ll take “the nuts” to win, but if you’re up against just one other player, top pair will often do the trick. See what I mean about “texture”? I could go on and on about this, but what it really boils down to is that a single, set-in-stone strategy for playing the Small Blind bet isn’t really feasible. You’ll have to make some adjustments “on the fly”, so to speak, but I can at least give you a good, solid starting point.

(Source: GameMaster)

Because poker is a long-term activity, whenever your opponents call a bet where the odds aren’t favorable for them, you make a profit. Of course, they might make the hand and beat you, but in the long run, you’ll eventually collect on situations like that. It’s like doubling an 11 versus a dealer’s up card of 6 in Blackjack; you won’t win each time you do it, but over thousands of hands like that, you’ll profit handsomely.

That’s important stuff, but so is what you make your hand “say”, as discussed above. When you break it all down to its basic elements, the reality is that your opponents have no idea whatsoever of which cards you’re actually holding. You can just as easily raise with 2-3o as you can with A-A and, if you knew no one would ever call you, do it every hand. The fly in the ointment, so to speak, is that you might have to show your hand at some point and 2-3 isn’t going to hold up against the types of hands that will typically call opening raises. But that doesn’t mean you can’t make your hand say one thing when it’s really something else. See my point here?

Most beginning players are concerned only about their own hand; if it’s strong, they bet it, if not, they fold. As you gain experience, you begin to think of your hand in comparison with your opponent’s hand. For example, if you open the pot with a raise because you hold K-K, someone calls and the flop comes A, Q, 9 rainbow; if that caller bets into you after the flop, you have to at least consider the fact that s/he holds an Ace. You don’t know for sure, of course, but it’s a definite possibility. The real crux of this problem is: What does your opponent think you hold? You raised, which indicates a “big” hand and if you can somehow convince your opponent that you hold a hand that can beat a pair of Aces, you can likely make him or her fold. Of course, if your opponent holds A-A, nothing you do will move him or her off the hand. And a lot of players will not re-raise you if they hold A-A, because they want to “trap” as many players as possible. But the odds greatly favor your opponent holding just one Ace, which still beats you at this point, but can ultimately be defeated by another King, a Straight, a Flush or Two-Pair. What if you now raise your opponent? What you’re basically saying is, “I see the Ace and it doesn’t scare me.” Now, your opponent has to stop and consider your move, unless s/he has a set of Aces, in which case s/he will likely re-raise you, if not go all-in. At least if that happens, you’ll pretty much know you don’t have the best hand and can fold with a clear conscience. This is the point where my favorite “rule” kicks in: I seldom go all-in unless I hold the top two-pair on the board. While two-pair at the flop cannot beat Trips on their own, they’ll turn into a Full House 16.5% of the time and any two pair will beat even a pair of Aces in the hole.

What you should be trying to do with your bets is convince your opponent that you hold something other than what you actually hold. If you’re strong, you want them to think you’re weak and if you’re weak, you want them to think you’re strong. Ultimately, such a strategy will extract the maximum number of $$$ from your opponents – you won’t win the most hands, but you will make the most profit – and that’s the real goal when playing poker. Letting your hands do the talking is a big step in that direction.

(Source: GameMaster)

In most games of Hold ‘em poker, the big blind (BB) is a full-sized bet for the first round of play. For example, in a $10/$20 game, the BB is $10, which basically means you only have to check in order to see a flop. No matter how bad your cards are (yes, even the proverbial “worst hand” of 7-2o), you should never fold a big blind hand in an unraised pot, because lightening does strike at times and you’re already commited to the $$$ anyway. Of course, you may raise or reraise if you wish and we’ll talk about that in just a bit.

However, the most important decision for a player in the BB is usually whether or not to call a raise (or two or three) and/or re-raise. A lot of players feel they must “protect” their blind bet from others who would steal it, so they automatically call any raise even though they may have that 7-2o as pocket cards. And don’t kid yourself; it’s very worthwhile to try and steal the blinds, especially when you consider that the expected value (EV) for a hand in a somewhat “loose” $10/$20 Hold ‘em game is about $1, maybe $1.25. So, let’s say a player on the button, who bets in front of the blinds pre-flop, has a decent, though not great hand like A-6s and s/he has noticed that the players in the blinds usually fold to a raise. If everyone else has folded up to this point, the player on the button (the “acting” dealer for this hand) should raise with the idea of stealing the blinds. Unfortunately, such a tactic won’t work every time, so the expected value of such a play is somewhat less than the $15 in the blinds ($5 in the small blind and $10 in the big blind), but whatever the EV is, it’s more than $1 and is undoubtedly many times higher than the EV for A-6s played all the way through from the button. Even if our semi-bluffer has to play out the hand, s/he’s not sitting dead in the water with cards like A-6s, so the pot can still be won, even if one or another (or both) of the blinds call the raise. But we’ll talk more about that when I discuss playing from the button in a future lesson.

Let’s get back to our hand in the big blind. Most of the time all we have to do is check the hand and we’ll see the flop. But what if the bet has been raised from the button? Or from the first bettor (“under the gun”) or a player a little further along? Should we automatically call the raise? Of course, the answer is a resounding “no”. Like most other situations in poker, what you should do depends primarily upon what cards you hold. You’ve already made one bet and those $$$ are gone if you fold, yet you have to remember that for the rest of the hand you’ll be betting first, so you still need some decent cards to call one raise, let alone two or more. Then again, with the right cards, you can not only call several raises, but actually reraise and start building a “monster” pot. But monster pots are won by monster hands, so let’s not get ahead of ourselves here. Because of the unique status of the big blind bet, I’m going to give you a separate list of minimum starting hands to use when you’re in that position. As you know from Lesson 3, most hands that you’ll get aren’t playable at all, but because we’ve already made a full bet in the big blind, it’s okay to loosen up a bit when a raise has been made in front of us.

Like all of the other starting hands, these have been determined through mathematical analysis (mostly simulations) on the Turbo Texas Hold ‘em software that I’ve talked about before. There are no guesses, no “gut feelings” or any other voodoo involved here; either a hand is profitable or it isn’t. If it isn’t profitable, you won’t find it in this list. In fact, I may have been a little too tight, because trying to hit the averages for something like this isn’t easy. But if you’ll go with these hands, I think you’ll like your long-term results, so at least give it a try. As I’ve discussed before, the list of hands I’m going to present here will eventually be a part of my Hold ‘em Poker Basic Strategy Matrix, which we’re building layer by layer.

I’ve arranged the hands for this list in three categories: hands that can raise and/or reraise, hands that can call any number of raises, but not reraise and hands that can call just one raise, otherwise fold. Any other hand not on this list should check in an unraised pot or fold if raised. Rather than listing each separate hand, I’m once again showing the minimum, based upon the high card in the hand so any hand that is better than the minimum may also be played. For example, in the case of a Queen, the minimum to raise and/or reraise is Q-Q; the minimum to call all raises is Q-xs and the minimum to call one raise is Q-9o, which includes Q-10o and Q-Jo. (Remember all the symbols? Here’s a quick review: “x” means any card, “s” means suited and “o” stands for off-suit or unsuited). Any other hand with a Queen as the highest card should check, but fold if raised. It goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway: If a hand can raise or reraise, it can obviously call all raises and if a hand can call all raises, it can call just one. Remember, just because a hand can raise or reraise, that doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll do it, although you’ll likely be making a mistake if you don’t. A lot of people like to “slowplay” hands like A-A or K-K, but they’re also the first to complain when someone – a player who may have folded to a pre-flop raise – beats them by drawing out to a Flush.
Okay, enough preaching, here’s the list:

Notes and comments:

Take a look at the first line, which covers hands where an Ace is the highest card. Reading over from the left, you can reraise any raises if you hold A-A in the big blind. The “slash” tells you that a hand of A-Ko or higher (which is A-Ks) and AQs can raise from the big blind if the pot hasn’t been raised yet, but you should just call if another player has raised in front of you, particularly if that raise came from an early position. Continuing to the right, you can see an Ace that is “suited” with any other card can call any number of raises, but if the other card is not suited, then A-10 is the bottom limit. That includes A-Jo and A-Qo, but any other combination should call only one raise, as is indicated in the third column. So, if you have A-3o and are facing two or more raises, you should fold. I know that will seem either wrong or downright amazing to many of you, because most players in limit Hold ‘em games will cling to A-xo like it was life itself, but that’s a serious mistake whenever two or more raises have been made in front of you. The math doesn’t lie (neither do I, for that matter). As you work down the ranks (remember – Jack, 10, 9, etc. are “ranks”), you’ll see that our play tightens up. For a hand where 10 is the higher card, we do not raise from the big blind with 10-10, but we do call any number of raises with it; in fact we’ll also do it with a 10 that is suited with any other card. But, if the other card is off-suit, then 10-8 and 10-9 should call only one raise, otherwise we fold. This means you should fold any hand of 10-7o or lower if the pot has been raised. Of course, if there hasn’t been a raise, you’ll check with 10-anything, because you already have a bet in the pot. And yes, you’re reading it right; you can call raises with 9-xs from the big blind.

The 8 is the mid-point of the ranks; 6 ranks are below it and 6 ranks are above it, so hands where the higher card is 8 or less must be played “tightly” to avoid turning them into losers. Oh, I know all too well about losing a big hand to someone that held 8-2o all the way to the river, but those are the people that pay our rent, so don’t get too upset when it happens. That stinging sensation will gradually fade. But if the bet has been raised, you simply must fold hands lower than 8-7o, no doubt about it. A glance at the chart will show you that hands where the higher card is 8 or less and are off-suit should call a raise only when they’re connected, that is, there are no gaps between the low card and the high card. If they’re suited, we do allow a litlle gapping because we have some Flush potential. But as we get down to the 4s and 3s, we don’t even allow for that, because most Flushes are won by the Ace or King, so our 2 or 3 has very little potential in that regard.

Speaking of 2s and 3s, you should take note of the fact that, even as a pair, those cards have very little potential. Call one raise maximum with them and if you don’t improve on the flop, drop them like a hot potato. Sure, I know the first time you do that, the card you need to make a “set” (trips where two of the cards are in the pocket) will sure enough come on the turn, but in the long run – we are in this for the long-run, remember – you’ll save a lot of $$$ by getting away from those hands quickly. They’ll either work or they won’t. Most of the time they won’t. Just a quick note on playing Q-Q and J-J from the big blind: I didn’t place a “re-raise/raise” indicator on them because it’s really a borderline play. Certainly you can feel comfortable in making the first raise of the pot with them, but you probably shouldn’t re-raise unless you think someone’s trying to steal the blinds; in that case, blaze away with both barrels. However, if the small blind folds behind you and there has been only one raise from a player in late position (on the button or within two places of it), then re-raising either Q-Q or J-J may be a worthwhile move. Again, it all depends. If the player who raised has cobwebs on his chips (as one author very fittingly puts it), then calling is probably your best play. Remember, even a pair of Queens is all but useless if an Ace or King comes on the flop. Okay, get your homework, then go play a lot of poker!

(Source: GameMaster)

A. Call This is the “smooth call” you hear about and it gives away the least amount of information about what you’re holding. Of course, you have very little information about the bettor’s hand at this point, so this is probably the weakest play you can make unless you hold a really strong hand like a “made” Straight, Flush or Full House. The problems this play produces are several, not the least of which is that it’ll probably slow down – or kill completely – the betting on the hand. In my (admittedly limited) experience, a lot of players will put you on a hand of Ace-something if you were the opening raiser and, if an Ace doesn’t fall on the flop, they’ll bet into you, whether or not they made a hand. If you call at this point, they’ll usually check on the turn, unless they put you on a draw. Of course, a draw may be the farthest thing from your mind, but if the board supports the notion, that’ll likely be the first hand your opponent puts you on. If s/he thinks you’re on a draw and has a hand like top-pair, top-kicker, then you can pretty much figure on looking at a big bet if the turn card doesn’t help a perceived Straight or Flush draw. If your opponent cannot, because of the flop’s “texture”, put you on a draw and bets on the turn, s/he either has a real hand or is “firing the next barrel” of a bluff. Your response will largely be determined by what you hold, the pot odds offered and your perception of what the bettor holds, plus the response from other players still in the pot. Besides folding and calling, you can choose to:

B. Raise This play really gives no information about your hand, but it can gain a lot of information about your opponent’s hand. Because you raised pre-flop, people perceive you as holding a strong hand of some type. But as I mentioned earlier, if an Ace didn’t flop most of those who will bet into you are figuring you “missed”, while they may or may not have made a hand. Your raise goes a long way toward confirming your hand was, and is, strong. This is a point where the size of your raise also “talks.” A minimum raise says one thing and an all-in raise says something else. To be sure, either might get called, so you can’t always go all-in and expect to win the hand, but nether can you expect to chase away many players with just a minimum-sized raise. You really want your raise to accomplish one of two things: force your opponent to fold or force your opponent to make a bad decision. As an example of the latter, let’s say your opponent is on a Straight draw and has bet into you as a semi-bluff. If you just call, you might be “pricing” the pot, thus making a draw profitable. But if you raise, you’ll alter the odds and, if your raise is big enough, your opponent may fold just because the favorable pot odds are no longer available. Oh, I know many of the “newbies” out there don’t give a damn about pot odds, but that doesn’t mean you should ignore them, too.

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

The other day I was dealt an exciting hand that got me thinking about longshots – both the kind you want to hit and the kind to avoid – so this lesson is the result. I was dealt the Ace and Queen of spades as my pocket cards in a game of Hold ‘em and, as you hopefully know by now, it’s a pretty good way to start. But it got even better when the flop came: Ks, Js, 9d. Now I had a 4-card Royal Flush and needed to catch only the 10 of spades to complete it. “Only” is a relative word, of course because the odds against me catching the 10 of spades on the turn was 1 in 47 (I’ve seen 5 cards to this point, so 47 are left and only one of them is the 10 of spades). Of course, any 10 would make a Straight and any spade would make a Flush, but darn it, I wanted the Royal!

My interest in completing the Royal was not just ego-driven, because the casino where I was playing offers a bonus to anyone who finishes a hand with a Royal. So, not only was I guaranteed to win the pot for the hand (you don’t even have to worry about a tie with a Royal), but I’d also get $500 thrown in as well. I knew the odds against me making it were huge, I’ve drawn to enough 4-card Royals at Video Poker to know that, but at least here I had two shots at it – one on the turn and one on the river. Because it wouldn’t matter when I got the card, only if I got it, I started to think about, first, what I was going to buy with the $500 (I ‘m an optimistic rascal) and second, what kind of expected value is added to our poker hands by such bonuses?

You all remember “expected value” (EV), right? It’s a mathematical calculation based upon what will happen over many hands of play in the case of poker and Blackjack. In other words, we won’t always win with pocket Aces in Hold ‘em, but over thousands of hands we’ll win enough so that we can put a value on it. For example, if we win with AA 50% of the time, on average, then this starting hand has an EV of 50% of all the $$$ we bet in that situation. Of course we can’t pin down the exact size of our bets because it’ll be different from hand to hand, although over a period of time we can probably come up with a fairly accurate average number. But in the case of a Royal Flush bonus, we know it’s a fixed amount so all we have to do is calculate how often we’ll get one and that’ll give us an EV per hand.

Why is it important to know how much EV is added to each hand by a Royal Flush bonus? Well, it isn’t really, but it’s a simple calculation, so why not? Every little bit helps, you know, especially when you’re starting out. Combine bonuses like these with the fact that most online poker rooms have fairly low rakes (compared to brick-and-mortar card rooms), plus there’s no dealer to tip and you have a definite leg-up over your “real-life” counterpart. If nothing else, the cost of gaining some experience at poker will be somewhat lower if you do it online rather than at a brick-and-mortar card room. But I digress.

Just what’s a Royal bonus worth, anyway? To figure it on a per-hand basis, we need to calculate the probability of getting a Royal and that will tell us how often we can expect, on average, to get one. To draw a Video Poker analogy here, we know that a Royal will occur, on average, about once every 40,000 hands in a 9/6 Jacks or Better game, which means the probability is 1 divided by 40,000 = 0.000025. Because that Royal will usually pay 800 for 1, it means that Royal Flushes add .000025 x 800 = 0.02 or 2% to the total return of a 9/6 Jacks game, which is 99.54%. In other words, if there were no Royal “bonus” in a Jacks VP game, the return would be only 97.54%. So does that mean we should expect to get a Royal once every 40,000 hands at Hold ‘em poker? Sadly no, because of the way the game is structured. At Video Poker, you are dealt 5 cards, may hold or fold any or all and then are dealt replacement cards, so you have a “universe” of 10 cards from which to make your Royal.

In Hold ‘em, you are dealt 2 pocket cards that you must keep if you want to keep playing the hand, then 5 more cards come if the hand is played to the end. The universe here is obviously only 7 cards, so it’s probably not too difficult to imagine that we can’t expect to get a Royal once every 40,000 hands. However, there is more than one way to make a Royal in Hold ‘em, just as there is in Video Poker. The first of those is to get a Royal dealt to you. This can happen at VP because you receive a 5-card hand and the probability of that occurring is 1 in 649,740. Well, the same thing can happen at Hold ‘em, because you can be dealt two suited Royal Flush cards in the pocket and then the flop can fill your Royal. The odds of that happening are exactly the same as getting one on the deal in Video Poker:1 in 649,740. Talk about long shots, eh?

But don’t dispair because there’s a much more common way for it to happen and that’s to have the Royal unfold like the one I had. Two suited Royal cards in the pocket, two on the flop and then draw the fifth on either the turn or the river. I’ll spare you the background math, but the probability of being dealt two suited Royal Flush cards is 1 in 33 (33.15 to be exact), then getting two of the three you need on the flop is 1 in 139 and finally, getting the 5th card on either the turn or river is 1 in 23 (23.25 to be exact). Multiply those three together: 33.15 x 139 x 23.25 and you get 1 in 107,133, which you can safely round to 1 in 100,000. If you’ll receive a $500 bonus for hitting a Royal, you can expect it to happen about once every 100,000 hands, so it’s worth $500 divided by 100,000 = $.005 or about a half-cent per hand.

So, how did my hand work out? If you remember, I had A-Q spades in the pocket, the flop came Ks, Js, 9d, so all I needed was the 10s. The turn was 3d, the river was 3h and I lost to a player holding Kc, 3s. Yep, he had a Full House and I had a busted Flush. Hey, that’s how it is in poker sometimes. Don’t worry, I’ll get over it, so lets talk about some other longshots.

These are the type of longshots to avoid. Or, if you won’t avoid the situation, at least make sure that the “pot odds” are rewarding you. In Lesson 2, I presented a chart of the various odds of completing a hand, such as a 4-card Flush and so forth. The hands presented there were the types of hands you’ll run into all the time, unlike the Royal Flush we discussed earlier. The hands I’m going to discuss here are also the type you’ll run into a lot, but in most cases you shouldn’t play them and the numbers will show you why. For example, you may find yourself with some pretty nice pocket cards like Ah,10h and the flop comes 2s, 6d, 7h. You don’t have much, other than a 3-card Flush draw and a double-inside Straight draw. But, were you to get the Flush, it would be the “nuts” and would beat any Straight that forms. But, with 2 cards to come, can you get what’s called a “runner-runner” to fill the hand? Certainly that’s possible, but the exact odds of success are pretty much against it happening, so you can waste a lot of $$$ in trying. Meantime, the guy with pocket Kings is betting every round and unless another Ace falls, he’s probably going to win the pot.

If you have a 3-card Flush, that means there are 10 cards of that suit remaining in the deck (remember that we don’t count anything we can’t see, so even though other players may also have cards of that suit, they don’t matter for purposes of calculating our odds). So, with 10 cards of the remaining 47 (52 minus the 2 pocket cards, minus the 3 cards on the flop) being cards that will help us and two chances to get them, it doesn’t seem like too bad a deal. But don’t forget that both of the last two cards have to be hearts (in this example) or we’ll have a hand worth basically nothing. Sure, you might win with an Ace-high, but don’t bet on it. Literally.

Nope, we need to hit two running hearts for this to work and the odds against that happening are an amazing 24 to 1. Believe me, I had to double-check my figures when I got that number because it seemed just too high to be correct, but it is. The quick mathematical solution is to figure the probability of getting a heart on the turn (10/47) or 0.212 and multiplying that by the probability of getting a heart on the river (9/46) or 0.195. Well, multiply 0.212 by 0.195 and you get 0.0415. Remember how I showed you to convert probability to odds in Lesson 2? First, subtract the probability of 4 from 100 and you’ll get 96. Now divide 96 by 4 and you’ll get 24 to 1 as the odds against. This obviously means that the value of the pot at the flop is going to have to be 25 times the bet you have to make in order for it to have a positive expectation. I’ve seen such a thing, but it’s very rare, so most of the time you should be folding your 3-card Flushes.

Now I realize there may be other reasons for staying with the hand, but the odds against making various hands that I outlined in Lesson 2 will guide you there. And certainly, if you had the same pocket cards but the Ace were a Jack, then “fuhgedaboudit”, because you wouldn’t be drawing to the “nut” Flush. Yet, a lot of players, particularly in low-limit games, will cling to a “suited” Ace (an Ace plus any card of the same suit) in the pocket until the bitter end. Don’t forget this: A dollar you don’t lose is a dollar earned. The object of this lesson is to cut down on the number of long-shot bets that we all make from time-to-time. Don’t get me wrong; if the pot odds are there, go for it. But if they’re not, then fold.

Okay, enough preaching. Here is a list of various hands you might find yourself with after the flop. In other words, you’ve seen five cards, two are yet to come and now you have to make a decision to bet or fold. This chart is really just a continuation of the chart I presented in Lesson 2:

Notes and comments: I’ve included the Ace-high hands because I’ve seen so many players hold onto their Aces with a death-grip, as I mentioned above. Now don’t get me wrong; Trip Aces will win most hands of Hold ‘em, but as this chart shows you it’ll happen only once every 33 times you hold a single Ace at the flop. For me, this type of chart removes the guesswork, “intuition” or whatever you care to call it, from the game. If the pot odds warrant the play, do it, otherwise fold. Oh, I fully realize that the first time you fold a 3-card Flush, the turn and river will bring the cards you needed, but that’ll be the exception, I assure you. As a quick review, the “Bet Multiplier” is something I presented in Lesson 2 and it’s a quick way to see if the bet you must make to stay in the hand has a positive EV. In a $1/$2 game, for example, if the bet you must make to stay in the hand is $1 and you’re drawing to a 3-card Flush, the pot should be at least $25. If the bet you must make is $2, the pot has to be $50 or you should fold.

(Source: GameMaster)

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)

Strip poker is a variant of the card game of poker, in which the rules require players to remove articles of clothing in response to various events.

Rules

The game can be played based on any variety of poker, with the same number of players, dealing and betting rules, etc. There are a number of ways in which the rules can then be developed into strip poker. For example, at the end of each hand:

• The player with the worst hand must remove a piece of their clothing; or
• The player who loses the most money in that round must remove one; or
• The player with the best hand may remove it from them; or
• The player with the best hand may choose which player must lose an article; or
• All players except the winner of the hand lose an article. Note that this makes for an extremely brief game, unless fully-nude players are required to perform some action when they lose a hand, in which case it may even continue after all players are nude.
• Alternatively, whenever a player runs out of chips, they must trade a piece of clothing for a new (usually fixed) number of chips.
  • If players are then allowed to “buy back” clothing when they have won more chips, this can result in a zero-sum game, where there is no long-term net loss of clothing. (With two people, this will have the consequence that only one of them is missing clothing.) (Note that “buying back” may be disallowed, so that the aggregate nudity is always increasing.)

As a further variant, players who have lost all of their clothing, achieving nudity, must perform sex acts.

Popularity

There are no known professional associations. The U.S. TV show Strip Poker is in fact a general knowledge quiz, albeit one where contestants take (some of) their clothes off; though it involves cards in poker hands, the resemblance to the actual game is distant.

The prefix “strip” can be added on to a game title with a subsequent nudity-inducing adaptation of the rules (examples: strip Candyland, strip chess, strip solitaire).

While a popular subject for pornographic fantasy and video games, genuine research into strip poker as a form of sexuality is lacking. The element of risk and of (mock) coercion fits in with a general sexual approach of domination and submission and/or humiliation.

Strip poker and other sexual games can occur:

• as part of a mature sexual relationship, where the objective is to provide variety alongside intercourse (possibly introducing more adventurous/deviant forms of intercourse)
• as a ritual of courtship (in some circumstances it may be more acceptable for partners to enter intimate situations as part of a game)
• as recreation amongst adults with no intention to move towards sexual intercourse
• as part of a pornographic display (whether as part of prostitution or not) which combines sexual titillation with the normal interest of seeing a game played
• as a party game for youth
• as the basis of television game shows such as Räsypokka (Finland - 2002) and Strip! (Germany – 1999)

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.