Tag Archives: opponent

Poker Tournament Strategies To Improve Your Skill

July 13, 2019   Game type   No comments

Poker tournament strategies are used to beat a specific kind of opponent at any time. It is about adjusting one´s playing style so that one´s opponents have no idea about which hand a person holds right now.

For most people poker tournament strategies are something that doesn´t seem to be necessary. Because we are talking about professional poker in this article, it should be clear that a serious player needs a strategy in order to succeed with this kind of game. The main goal of poker is to make money, beat one´s opponent and win more hands on average than other players. But it´s about losing less money as well as it is about winning the biggest and most profitable pots in any game.

If you seat down at a poker tournament and grab your Kem cards, you have to know what to do next. Once the Kem cards are dealt, you have to have a clear concept about which hand you are playing in a specific spot. At the first it is recommended to only play well decided and planned hands in a tourney. Don´t go crazy and try to plan mediocre or bad hands just because you get impatient now. You must be patient, and start observing the opponents to your left and write. The best poker tournament strategies recommended starting observing 4 opponents at a time. When does your opponent fold, when does he bet, and when does he raise on the flop or turn? That is what you need to figure out.

It is smart to fold most of your dealt Kem cards at the beginning and start paying attention to the most active player at the table. Try to figure out how he plays a strong and weak hand. If you are not in a hand, folded your cards, you have to focus on putting him on a hand every single time. If he wins pots without having to show a hand, you have to figure out what he could have. Try to concentrate on how he reacts, what he does when he folds or bets etc. These are the master skills that you need to take control of if you want to be successful with poker tournament strategies. If you are looking into your Kem cards and decide to play a hand, make sure to play it wisely.

Once you get more experienced in tournaments and are able to estimate players rather quickly you can play a wider range of hands. But as long as that is not the case you need to fold most of your hands that are weak. The next time you pick your Kem cards and want to play a hand make sure to consider all of these poker tournament strategies recommended in this article.

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Tips on How to Play Various AK Starting Combinations on No Limit Hold’em Short-Handed Tables with Small Buy-ins. (Page 1 of 3)

July 11, 2019   Game guide   No comments

This article discusses how to play when you start out with an Ace-King combination. This combination is very strong whether you are dealt two cards of the same suite or off suite. There are only two starting hands in Hold’em that are stronger than AK – AA and KK. Other hands are at least the same strength as AK. However, though this hand is so powerful, it can cause problems for those who are inexperienced and don’t know how to play it right.

How to play with this hand:

1) It is not wise to play with the whole buy-in on the pre-flop if you are playing against an unknown opponent. 2) You should play your whole stack on the pre-flop if you are playing against an unknown opponent if he has stack no more than 60BB. 3) Raise on the pre-flop or re-raise if there has been a raise.

The following examples are all taken from real games.

Example 1. Standard drawing: top pair, top kicker (TPTK) and a flush draw on the flop.

NL50 Stacks: Hero ($51), button ($65)

Hero is in the first position with AKo, all black. You raise to $2, button calls your bet, the rest of the players fold.

Flop: Ad-6h-2h*, pot ($4.75)

You have a top pair on the flop, a top kicker and there are two hearts on the board. In this situation you should bet approximately the same size as the bank to protect your hand against a flush draw. If there is a rainbow on the flop, 2/3 of the bank is enough so as to not frighten the contender with an ace and lower kicker off.

Hero bets $4.50 and the contender calls.

Turn: 7h, pot ($13.75)

There is a flush draw on the turn, you have a bad position and it’s difficult to find out if your opponent has a flush or not. If you check, you show weakness. By doing so, your opponent, especially if he is an aggressive player, will easily win the pot, even if he has a weaker hand than yours. The best advice in this position is to bet a little more than half a bank. After a bet like this, your opponent, even an aggressive one, wouldn’t dare bluff. With that kind of bet, your opponent won’t be able to guess if you have a flush or not.

You bet $7.50 , your opponent raises up to $15 (Hero bets $7.50, Button raises to $15).

Your opponent made the minimum possible raise (this kind of raise is also called a flat raise). You only need to raise $7.50 in a pot of $43.75. You have very good pot odds now, but you have a bad position and you know for sure that the river will not improve your hand. If your contender is not bluffing, having two pairs will not save your game. You can also be sure that if your opponent is bluffing, he will continue bluffing on the river. You will have to fold whether he bluffs or not. You know that your bet on the turn reduces the possibility of bluffing. The best thing is to believe your opponent has a flush.

Example 2. WA/WB – way ahead/way behind

The example called WA/WB is a combination you’ll often see in poker. It means you are either strongly ahead or, on the contrary, strongly behind the opponent. In other words, the chance of changing one way or another is very small. NL10 Hero – BB ($9.60), CO ($12.80)

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