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Texas Hold'em : Basic Strategy
There is a strategy that can
beat any holdem poker game. Not all strategies will work interchangeably.
Because you are just learning, the assumption is that you will be starting
out at low limit texas hold'em poker games. This article is to help you form
a strategy that will beat that game. As you move up in limits and find
tougher opposition, your hold'em strategy will also have to evolve.
Beating low limit texas holdem
isn't easy. In many ways forming a strategy that consistently wins at
middle limit is easier. To begin with, there are many books about texas
holdem but most are aimed at the upper limits. Using the same strategy at
lower limits often will result in a loss, not a win. Next when you are
learning holdem at the low limits, there are rarely any good players to
learn from so you get a warped view of how the game should be played
correctly. If a player was really good and capable of winning, they would
have progressed up the limit ladder to bigger games. You may run into a
good player now and then but it is rare compared to the vast amount of poor
uninformed players feeding the poker community. Lastly, when you are first
starting out, you have no knowledge or bankroll to build upon. Your
foundation is little or nothing since there isn't much out there to read or
learn. Now with that all said, it is possible to beat low limit holdem and
by no means should you think that you need to start higher. The learning
curve may be sharp but once you get over the hump you'll find that moving up
the ranks is easier then first starting out. You should find comfort in the
fact that all the other players are facing the same challenges you are.
Taking the step to learn strategy as opposed to just haphazardly playing
gives you a major advantage. A study was performed on college students and
their post graduate goals. Of those that actually set goals, more then 90%
achieved them. Right now because you are reading this you are on your way
to becoming a winning player. And as soon as you do win a few times and
leave with other peoples money, I'm sure you'll be hooked!
Why do some players win and
others lose when everyone gets the same amount of cards? Luck plays a very
small role when you start thinking about how many hands a player plays in
the course of a year. And remember that each player has the same chance of
getting lucky too, so even that isn't biased. Poker is almost exactly like
investing in business. The best investor is a person who takes calculated
risks and puts their money into ventures that they think have a good chance
of succeeding. Have you ever seen a successful investor that put his money
into every stock and continued to do so despite the fact that it has lost
all chance of improving? That seems crazy right? But if you play cards
you'll see people doing that every day in every hand. They will start out
with a hand that would take a miracle to win. Then after seeing the flop
with little or no help, they invest more into it either ignoring or
oblivious to the fact that another player has a better hand. This continues
until the showdown where the majority of the time a smarter player/investor
gladly takes their money. Notice that I used the word "majority". What's
great about poker is that occasionally their miracle happens and they win a
pot in spite of their bad investing, in spite of the odds, and in spite of
their lack of skill. The reason this is so great is because once they win a
little here and there playing badly, they won't stop. In psychology the
strongest type of conditioning is random reinforcement. The bad player
getting lucky sometimes makes him a liner of the skilled players wallets for
life. So as you have guessed, you can't be a winning player if you play
every hand. A much more selective strategy is necessary. You need to
"tighten" up, meaning playing fewer but better hands then your opponents.
You need to take calculated risks and put your money behind them. Another
analogy is a sniper. You wait for your cards, your mark, and when it makes
itself visible you fire, kill, and take the pot. A bad players approach is
like a soldier using a machine gun firing away into the distance. Sure
something may hit but this isn't the movies, eventually you'll run out of
ammo (chips) so you better take your shots more wisely.
So what hands should you play?
Is it just a matter of playing the right hands and avoiding others and a
win is guaranteed? If it was only that easy! *smile* Poker strategy is
purely situational. Always and never do not exist. The best player is the
one that can adapt to different games, different players and even different
hands. Because of this it is hard, if not impossible, to give exact rules
that can be followed to win. That's the downside. The upside is that
because it is so dynamic, the majority of people you will be playing against
in your starting phases won't know what to do and will be playing completely
wrong.
This article is going to
approach winning at low limit hold'em with a number of angles. The first of
which is to break poker hands down into a few main categories so you can get
a conceptual perspective. The second angle will be to give some specific
scenarios to solidify what the categories. The third will be a list of
hands. The next angle will be to talk about different games and how tight
or loose to play in them so you know how to adapt your style to each game.
We will finish up by talking about different types of players, how they
play, how you should play against them and how you can learn from them.
The low limit hold'em
hand categories are: Big Pairs, Draws, and Milking Hands. Every hand you
play can fall into one of these categories and this will decide how you'll
play it after that flop.
Big Pairs: A big pair
is how you guessed it, top pair or an over pair. For example a big pair
would be when you have AK, and the flop is AQ6. Notice that you have top
pair. Another example would be having QQ and the flop is T63. When other
people with lessor hands are trying to beat you, you are in a way defending
your position. You want to make it as costly as possible to try to draw out
on you. If you have the best hand now, everyone is drawing against you.
Some people may have legitimate draws, others may be long shots but either
way, you have the winner now and want to keep it that way. "Big Pair" hands
work best when there are few people against you. The more people in against
you, the weaker they become because you have more people drawing and there
will be less safe cards that won't help them improve. So when you have this
type of hand, you want to play in such a way that will reduce the
competition. For example if you have AA or KK preflop, the reason that you
raise in a low limit game is to lower the amount of people in.
Key Point: Big Pair hands don't like lots of opponents. They win most
when there are few players against them.
Draws: A drawing hand
is a that still needs cards to improve to the winner. Some legitimate draws
you will run into are: open ended straights, flush draws, small pairs, etc.
An open ended straight is a hand where either end can hit and you will
complete your straight. An example of this would be having KJ and the flop
is QT4. Notice that if you hit either a 9 or an A, you will have the
straight. An example of a flush draw would be having 9Tclubs and the flop
is AcQc4d. Notice that it only takes one more club to make the flush for
you. The last draw mentioned was a small pair. These are really draw hands
because they need to hit to win usually. For example having 55 and the flop
being A53. You would have hit your draw. You'll want to read the section
on things to stay away from if you are tempted to go for gutshot straights,
backdoor flushes, and catching your pocket pair after the flop.
Key Point: Draws favor lots of opponents since they hit infrequently.
Because of this, to make them profitable, lots of players need to be in the
hand (or lots of money).
Milking Hands: You
would like to see these hands as often as possible but they are rarer then
having top pair. A milking hand is any hand that you have the nuts, two
pair or better. The "nuts" is the best possible hand. For example, let's
say that you have Ad5d and the flop is Qd9d2d. You now have the best
possible hand and for someone to beat you, they would have to pair the board
or get very lucky. Your goal now is to extract the most money from them you
can. Often this will be best accomplished by not giving away your hand too
early and reducing the number of opponents. Instead you can "slow play",
meaning not raising until later betting rounds where the bet size doubles.
Another example would be if you have 88 and the flop is A84. Notice that
there is no immediate danger in letting people draw cheaply against you so
you can just call. Then on later rounds a raise or check raise is used to
get as much from them as you can. You'll find that hitting sets like the 8s
above makes a lot of money since the hand is so well disguised. The flush,
straights, fullhouses, etc will still win but the set is the hardest to read
if you are on the other end.
Key Point: You want to make the most money on these hands that you can.
The specific hand will dictate how you will want to play it.
Now let's go over some
specific hands and how you would play them this way and why:
You pick up American
Airlines/Pocket Rockets/Pocket Aces: AdAc You are in middle position with a
couple callers in front of you. You raise. The reason you raise is because
this falls into the Big Pair category and it doesn't do well against lots of
opponents. If someone raised before you preflop, reraise them. There is
nothing to fear yet.
One more person calls in back
of you and the other players call making it four of you. The flop comes
back: QdJd4h
The first person bets, on
person calls and it is now your turn. The best move here is to raise and
try to continue to limit the compeition. They could have anything at this
point and reading hands is very hard at low limit. Most likely they either
have a Q or a draw (straight or flush). If they do have a draw you want to
make them pay as much as possible for it. You raise, the person in back of
you folds and the other two people just call.
The turn is: 5h making it
QdJd4h5h
They check to you, you bet
again and they call.
The river is a 6h making it
QdJd4h5h6h
They check to you, you bet and
they both call, you win.
Using this example, there are
other legitimate hands that could have been in there with you. For example
if someone had KT they would have an open ended straight draw. If a 9 or an
A came, you could be in trouble. Another good hand here would be having two
diamonds like Kd9d. Notice that if another diamond came you would also be
in trouble. If you had either of those hands, you would be drawing and
trying to improve. You wouldn't want to pay too much money to see the next
cards and you would hope everyone would stay in the hand.
We can interchange a number of
hands for the AA and you would play it the same way. Some of these would be
KK, AQ, KQ, QJ, etc. You would be playing the hand like what we mentioned
above as a Big Pair.
What if we had 44 in the above
example, that would now give us a set. The poor guy with the AA wouldn't
know what hit him, same thing if we had our QJ, or JJ. These would be
considered Milking Hands and you would do your best to extract the most best
as possible. We already mentioned the drawing hands.
Now let's go over a list of
hands. These hands are not from any book and they aren't supposed to be
exact rankings of what is best. These are geared to low limit loose games
and the point is to help you understand how you would play each and what you
are hoping for, and what can beat you.
* AKs means AK of the same suite.
AA, KK, QQ, AKs, AK, JJ
- These are premium hands and no matter what game you'll play you'll be
happy to look down and see them. These fall into the category of Big Pairs
and you'll raise and reraise with them preflop. AA doesn't have to worry
about over cards hitting but when you have KK, QQ, and JJ you will often
find yourself with an A on the board and you'll have to decide whether to
continue. If lots of people are in, usually someone has the A. When you
have AKs or AK, you'll raise and try to catch an A or K, or other draw on
the board.
AQs, AQ, AJs, KQs, KJs, JTs
- These are also quality hands. And even if someone raises before
you'll, you will most likely play. A late position raise with these hands
isn't a bad move. Whenever you are suited, you have a much better chance of
winning, especially in low limit games where big hands win since so many
people are in. Raising a hand like KQs if you are on the button and
everyone is in is a great move since you have a good drawing hand
(straights, flushes, big cards like a Q or K, etc). These hands pretty much
play themselves but be careful for the occasional person who is tight and is
only raising with AA or KK. You wouldn't want to bring AQ against one of
those hands. This kind of read will be hard though so don't beat yourself
up if occasionally you lose AQ to AK. One thing to note here before we go on
to the lessor hands is that just because you have a good preflop hand
doesn't mean that it is going to win. You're going to still fold a lot of
hands after the flop since you won't improve much. With these hands though,
when you do catch something it will be strong.
AJ, KQ, KJ, KTs, QTs, J9s,
TT, 99, 88, 77, 66, 55, 44, 33, 22
- These hands are middle hands that you won't want to call with heads up
against another raiser. You want more people in to justify them since you'll
need good flops. If you have a small pair, you'll be looking to catch one
on the flop. Don't chase it after though since the odds of you catching it
are worse then 1/20. To catch another one of your pocket pair on the flop
is about 1/8. When you have a hand like AJ, KQ, etc you'll be hoping to
catch one of those cards and it be the highest on the board. If you have a
hand like QTs, J9s, KTs, etc you'll be in there for a variety of hands such
as straights, flushes, two pair, etc. Becareful though playing hands like
J9s and catching merely a J or 9. Often times your kick won't be good and
you'll lose to a hand like AJ.
89s, 78s, 67s, 56s, 45s,
34s
- These hands are called suited connectors and they are similar to the
hands above like J9s, QTs, etc. When you play these hands they are Draws.
And if you remember from above that means that they favor lots of people in
the pot and you like to play them "in the back" (late position). A great
example would be to have 89s on the dealer button, the last position, and 5
people were already in before you (raise or not). You are getting great odds
on this hand to play it. You are hoping to catch an openended straight
draw, a flush draw, or even two pair. You can also run into hands like 889
on the flop when you have 78s, or you could even flop the nuts like this:
89s and the board is JT7. What you don't want to do is get caught up
chasing down draws with these when the odds don't justify it. Also you
don't want to play these against few opponents for more then a bet. For
example a really bad way to play would be this: you have 89s and no one
calls except one really tight old lady in front of you who raises. You call
(bad move) and you end up heads up with her. The flop comes back Qs4d3d.
You have nothing but a backdoor flush draw (meaning both cards have to hit,
which is over 1/20 to do so). She bets, you call and go for it. The turn
brings Qs4d3dAs. Now you think you may be lucky so you call again hoping to
catch another spade (which is still worse then 1/4). You miss it and she
wins since you have nothing. You played really poorly, going against the
odds. Your 89s plays well against a lot of people so that the draw is worth
while.
A5-ATs, A5-A2s, K9s-K5s,
Q9s-Q5s, J8s, T8s, 97s, 86s, 75s, 64s, 53s, 42s
- these are marginal at best hands. The only exception would be the ATs.
It would probably be best if you avoided them at first until you become
more comfortable in the game playing good hands. If the game is very loose
though, with lots of people chasing the whole way to the river, these hands
can be profitable. We play A5s and below and ATs and above because they
both have ways to hit straights as well as the flushes. Notice that A6s
can't make a straight using both cards. When you play this type of hand you
really aren't looking for the A since your kicker will rarely be good.
Instead you are looking for the straight, flush or two pair. Because they
are such long shots you'll want lots and lots of bad players in the hand to
justify the call preflop. The same goes for hands like K9s, T8s, etc.
You'll play these hands in late position, when you see lots of people are
in and it costs you very little. Don't get trapped though. If you play a
hand like T8s and the flop comes back T high with no other draws for you it
would be all right to just get out. There are to many cards that can come
and beat you. You would much prefer to see a flush or straight draw.
Before continuing, how do the
hands above fit into our three categories?
Big Pair hands include things such as AA, KK, AK, QK, etc. Any situation
where you have the top pair or over pair would be this.
Drawing hands would include lots of hands above like suited connectors,
small pairs, etc.
Milking Hands really can be anything where you get hit hard on the flop and
these would be two pair or better (three of a kind, sets, full houses,
straights, etc).
Position:
- Position plays a big role in poker, even in low limit. The reason
last place, on the button, is so great is because you get to see what
everyone else does before you. The best players play tight in the front and
loose in the back. You wouldn't want to play some of the hands above in
first position, "under the gun", but you would play them in the back. A good
example of a hand like this would be T8s. In a really loose game with
everyone in in front of you, you would play it. Also position changes how
you play individual hands. You would play JTs anywhere in a really loose
game but you might raise it in the back preflop just because it is the type
of hand that does well against lots of players. So when you think of your
starting hand selection, you want to play tighter in the front, and looser
in the back. How tight and how loose will be up to you since you'll have to
see the game before setting those guidelines.
Blinds:
- Playing out of the blinds is different since you are already in the
hand some. You'll play looser here but not too loose and how loose or tight
depends solely on how many people are in the hand. If you have a hand even
as weak as 79 off suit in the big blind and everyone is in (a "family pot")
with a raise then you would call. The reasoning behind this is that you are
getting great odds for your money. This same approach is true across the
game. The less money out there, the better hand you have to have since you
aren't getting good odds. The more money in the pot the weaker your hand
has to be to play since if you do win even a small percentage of the time
you'll profit.
So know that we know a little
about starting hands, how do we know how loose or tight to play in a game?
That's a very hard question and the better you get the more you'll be in
tune with the answer. There is no absolutes though and you will lose hands.
What I'll try to explain here is how to size up a game as being a loose one
that you'll get away with some lessor cards or a tight one where if you
played those same hands too much you would get slaughtered. If you sit down
at a game and see lots of people in preflop, even with a raise, then it is a
pretty loose game. For example if you consistently see 4/5 or more people
in before the flop then it is pretty average. If you see almost everyone in
every hand and going all the way to the river then you have a really loose
game. In contrast if you see a game where about 3 people are in preflop
with a lot of raising then it is a pretty tight game and you probably will
want to play something else. In very tight games you'll see one person
raise and another person battle it out with them. In those games having
four people in is a "family pot" while in a regular low limit game a family
pot is only when everyone is in (all 9/10 players). That isn't as rare as
you might imagine. When you are first starting out and you see that the
game is very loose, it wouldn't be a bad idea to still stay away from hands
like 57s, etc. You would still want to play KJs, QTs, JTs. If you can
discipline yourself to only play those loose hands in the back (late
position), then you would be playing ideally. Even a hand like A5s in the
back is a great hand if everyone is in. So here are some general guidelines
for how loose to play:
Average Game (4/5 people in the flop): play your premium pairs, small pairs,
big cards and suited connectors.
Very Loose Game (7+ people in the flop): play just about anything we
mentioned above in the correct position. Wait for the flop to give you a
really good hand or draw and then make them pay.
The key point here is to
remember how loose your cards before the flop are depends on two things:
your position and the amount of people in the hand before you. The more
people in, the weaker your hand can be.
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