Monthly Archives: June 2010

How to Choose a Cash Game for Maximum Profit

There are so many thousands of poker players at each online poker room that you will likely play against several new players each time you take the table. These guys are unknown quantities and as such you will not have had the opportunity to gain an impression of their style of play. Are they loose, or tight? Do they play like a rock or do they have a tendency to go for gutshots. If you’ve played against a poker player online before, you can gain a picture of your opponents play. If not, you are walking into the unknown and that can cost you money. To be able to maximise your chances of making money at an online cash poker game there are two main areas that you need to analyse carefully; your opponents and the table stats. Prior to taking a seat at a cash game there is a great deal of information you can view about the specific table itself. It is important that you analyse the data at your disposal so you can make an informed decision as to whether the table is worth entering.

How to Select a Cash Game Table

Obviously the first thing that you need to do when in the poker room lobby is to select the stake that you are comfortable with. Once you have done this, it will likely leave you with 10’s of different tables to choose from. Most people will just click on a table at random and start playing away. On a number of levels this is an extremely foolish thing to do. It is akin to a racing driver turning up on race day expecting to win a race without having completed any practice laps or preparation. One of the great things about playing poker online is the amount of data you can get before you have even started playing on a table. In the lobby area you can usually check various statistics for each table such as –

  • Number of players
  • Names of players around the table
  • Chip stack of each player
  • Average pot size
  • Percentage of players seeing the flop
  • Hands played per hour

Based on the statistics on each table you can make fairly safe assumptions about the kind of game being played on each table. For example – If a table has a high average pot size with a high number of people seeing the flop on average, it would be fair to assume that the table consisted of some loose players that will call and raise frequently. A table with a large pot size but few players seeing the flop will usually mean there are some tight, aggressive players on the table. Typically these players won’t play a hand unless they have strong pocket cards so will often raise pre-flop and when in a hand the player will raise very aggressively. If there is a small pot with a high percentage of players seeing the flop, the game will usually be full of passive players that call the blinds and fold on the flop. Based on your read of the table you should opt for the table that will suit your table to the greatest extent.

Choose Your Opponents Wisely

A great facility that is present in most if not all online poker room software is the ability to view a live table whilst in play. If you are considering joining a cash game, you should watch the game carefully for a while and try to get an impression of the table dynamic. Is there a large stack in there bullying the other players? Can you spot a tell in any players? Is there a fish in there that you can exploit? By taking a few minutes and actually viewing a few hands you will be able to get an idea of what type of players you will be playing against free of charge. Most importantly if you spot weakness in one or more players, you may well have found the table to join. Some players take notes on their opposition if they find that they have come up against easy pickings or a highly skilled player to avoid in future. Simply writing down your findings can be fine. Alternatively there are notes fields which you can utilise which will allow you to write notes against a player you are playing against and the software will store the information for you. Poker room software will even allow you to search for particular players to see if they are online and if so what table they are on. So if you have been taking notes on weak players you might want to have a search for them to see if they are playing so you can join their table and take their chips. There is no mercy in online poker!

In Summary

When you have narrowed down the tables you want to play at based upon your stake value, there are two considerations to take into account – table stats and your opponents. If you have preferred opponents based either on their style of play or general lack of ability, try to seek them out using the online poker site search facility. Players tend to stay at similar stake levels when playing cash games so if their stake value is the same as yours, there is a chance they could be online at the same time as you. If so, try to join their table and focus your attention on bullying them out of their chips. If there are no preferred opponents online, you will need to do your homework on the actual table stats. For example, if you’re a tight aggressive player you might want to choose a table that has a high percentage flop rate and high pot value – in other words a table that likely features loose players. The best scenario is to have a favourable table that features your preferred weak players. If you happen to get this, set a few hours aside, stay out of the chat box and watch those chips fly!

When to Slow Play a Poker Hand

Slow playing a monster hand can be a hugely satisfying play. It can make you heaps of chips if done right and give you the satisfaction that you have managed to get one over one of your opponents. You’ll feel like a master bluffer and your opponent will feel like a plank. The bad news is that the slow playing of poker hands as a strategy is a losing one.

You will often see headlines and articles about how smart it is to slow play pocket aces. Don’t get me wrong, before the flop you will inevitably be favourite with pocket aces – the only time you won’t be an outright favourite is if someone else on the table also has pocket rockets. To slow play when you know you are a favourite before the flop is to almost take away your advantage. Yes, it may help to get the stragglers on the table to throw some chips in, but it is also giving them the opportunity to hit a hand on the flop. To check or call with AA pre-flop is a very weak play in my opinion as you are opening yourself up to straight draws, flush draws and trips on the flop. To intentionally slow play AA to only get hit with trip 5’s on the flop would be a crime.

My advice is if you have the temptation to slow play a hand, don’t do it. By definition if you are considering slow playing a hand it must mean that you have a pretty decent starting hand in the first place. If this is the case, get your chips into the pot with a raise. By doing so you will likely eliminate players with weak starting hands pre-flop (who won’t then have the chance to luckily make a hand post-flop) and the fewer players there are in the pot, the greater your chance of taking the hand. The only time when I would advocate slow playing a hand is if you are up against a single player who you believe you have strong information on. If you are confident that they have an obvious read, then slow playing against them might be an option. In all other circumstances, slow playing a hand might eke out a few more chips from loose players but in the long run it is highly likely that a slow play strategy will lose you more chips than you gain.

Is Online Poker Legit?

Beginners that have never played online Texas Hold ‘me will often question whether online poker is legit or not. This is understandable in many way as both gambling and the online world often don’t have the best of reputations, so when combined there can be possible room for concern. In terms of the legality of online poker in the UK (where this blog is written from), online poker is perfectly legal with the UK government seemingly wanting to make the UK a hub for online gambling (which they can then regulate and tax to the hilt no doubt). Although in the largest market for online poker, the US, it has recently been made illegal to play poker online for real money. Whether this restriction stays in place is debatable, but if you are an online poker player in the United States at the moment and you want to play for money, you’re going to have a tough time finding a game.

There are occasional cries from players of collusion or that the games are fixed. Strangely this tends to be after a series of bad beats! Due to the sheer size and popularity of online poker at the moment you are going to get a range of players online all with varying degrees of skill and strategy. This will include the “kamikaze” type players where “all in” is their personal mantra. You will lose to these players. Even if you have a solid game and statistically you are a massive favourite, you will still lose hands against these clowns. This scenario is one which it would be easy to cry foul, or claim that the game is rigged. Simply put, if it was proved that a poker room was fixing a game it would potentially be the end of poker online. Period.

Online poker is extremely highly regulated through numerous different gaming regimes and in all honesty you will have a much higher chance of playing in a fair poker game online than you would in a real world casino. Don’t underestimate the sophistication of the monitoring systems in place at the various online poker rooms. You are downloading their own custom software to play poker so they can integrate as many monitoring systems into the software as they can possibly manage. Due to them having access to all poker hands player on all the tables, as well as user details, IP addresses, bank details, etc, any player attempting to collude with a friend or gang of players to scam the poker rooms should expect to be caught extremely quickly.

Play Money Texas Hold ’em

If you’re new to Texas Hold ’em you might not have come across the term “play money” before. Simply put, if you are in a “play money” poker game you are playing with fictional money – you may as well be playing with Monopoly money because it won’t earn you a penny.

Many online poker rooms use the .net version of their domain name to promote the “play money” games and the .com version to promote real money games. For example if you go to http://www.partypoker.net you will be able to download their poker software and play freeroll tournaments and play money poker games both Sit N Go and cash game varieties – none of which will cost you any money to play and won’t cost you any money if you lose. Whereas, if you go to http://www.partypoker.com you are going to the real money site. To play here you will need to deposit money into your bankroll and play with the big boys.

My advice regarding play money games is to join them so that you can familiarise yourself with the poker software that the poker room uses. Each poker room such as PokerStars, FullTilt, PartyPoker, etc all use slightly different forms of poker software. The design, and features will roughly be the same, but there will be minor differences that you should familiarise yourself with. It is best to get used to the features when it is not going to cost you money.

Familiarising yourself with the poker software is the only time I would advise joining a play money Texas Hold ’em poker game. If you’ve been involved in a play money game yourself you’ll be aware that the standard of play is laughable. In fact, by practicing in play money poker games you will actually learn so many bad habits that you will likely emerge a worse player than when you entered. If you are ever tempted to practice your game I can’t emphasise enough not to join a play money cash game.

Some of the freeroll tourney’s can be quite good practice once the wheat has been cut from the chaff, but play money cash games are inhabited by some very “special” people. People that I wouldn’t choose to have dealings with even online! It’s possible to play $0.01/$0.02 cash games online so you could play very comfortably with a bankroll of only $4 or $5 therefore negating the need to go with play money games.

Don’t Play Poker in a Bad Mood!

Playing Texas Hold’em can be a highly emotional business, so to play in a bad mood can only heighten your sensitivity to certain situations.

A negative emotional state can really affect your game and your judgement. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve been there, done that. If you start a game in a stinking bad mood, the moment you play a nice starting hand, bet correctly, lead all the way to the river and your opponent gets a one-out outrageously lucky card to make their hand you can feel like the entire world is against you and you want personal retribution against that lucky sh*t that beat you on the river. Of course, the correct reaction is to shrug, be safe in the knowledge that you played the hand correctly and that statistically you should win more than you lose in that situation given the loose play of your opponent.

Ultimately luck does play a part and bad beats will happen. Once emotion takes hold of your poker you start to lose objectivity and you can begin to form online vendettas where you are hell-bent on knocking out particular players rather than focusing on building up your own bankroll.

If you feel yourself in this type of mood whilst playing it is best to allow your blinds to be posted automatically and take 5 minutes away from the game to calm down and reflect on your real aims for the game. Hopefully, you are able to refocus and get your game back on a controlled, calm and confident footing. To succeed at Texas Hold’em you need to be able to control your emotions and remain disciplined, waiting for that monster hand to appear.

Best Table For Playing Texas Hold ‘em Online

When playing Texas Hold ‘em online you can play games that have a pre-determined number of players at the table. The number of players around a table is an important factor to take into account because depending on the number of players present you will need to adopt your strategy accordingly.

If you are playing in a single table Sit N Go tournament you will usually be able to select the size of the field that you want to compete against. This can range from heads up play (2 players against each other) through to 9 or 10 players around a table. Even though you will start with a set number of players in a Sit N Go, this will slowly dwindle as players are eliminated so you need to be constantly aware of numbers at your table.

There are numerous strategies specific to Sit N Go’s which I’ll go into later.

With cash Texas Hold ‘em games you will be able to see the number of players around a table prior to joining, however, the numbers can increase or decrease over time as people lose all their chips or decide to leave, or other players decide to join in the action. This can complicate matters somewhat, but if you join a solid cash game the numbers shouldn’t change too often so you can get into a poker player rhythm based on the play of your opponents and how many there are of them. As a general rule, if you find yourself on a cash game table with a relatively small number of players such as 4-6, the blinds will come around to you a lot faster than a full table so you can see your chips dwindle quickly. Also, statistically with fewer players involved it will mean that you will need to play hands of a lower value than you would play if there were 9 players involved.

Tables with 5 or 6 players often attract higher quality players because to be successful you need to be able to play lower hands well which means having solid post-flop play and be able to bully players out of the pot through aggressive pre-flop raising. If you fit the bill, then this size of table would be a good option for you. However, if you simply want to see more action quicker by playing in small tables then you need to be very careful and ensure that you show some patience when selecting hands to play.

Larger tables containing 8, 9 or 10 Texas Hold ‘em players are usually more suited to beginner or intermediate players as there is more time to decide whether to play a hand and assess your opposition and the blinds come around a lot slower meaning that you can take your time and only play premium starting hands. However, as larger tables can be rife with beginners and less confident players, it can be an excellent place for proficient players to pick off the weaker ones.

Find a table with a couple of loose callers and you can often clean out their bankroll. Although if a table has several kamikaze callers you might need to be a little more wary and modify your strategy to a very solid, rock-like game. You may not yet know which size of table suits you best if you are just starting out. Play a few sessions against a different number of players and see which you feel comfortable with and most importantly which number of players you regularly win the most against. There are some poker professionals that base their careers on heads-up games and do very well from it, whilst others flourish against full tables. Only time and experience will dictate which size table fits your style of play.

Choosing an Online Poker Name

When you start playing poker online it is a pre-requisite that you give yourself a name that the other poker players can refer to.It may seem like a trivial matter to choose yourself an online poker name, but in actual fact if you choose this detail carefully it can potentially give you a psychological advantage against the other players on your table.

Poker is a game of skill, luck and bluff so if you can gain any type of psychological advantage over other players you should go for it. Now conventional wisdom would suggest that you pick an online poker name that could portray you in a certain way to the other players. For example, a player that decides to call himself “All-In-Bob” would want the other players to think that he was a loose, aggressive player that favours the all-in move. Whereas the reality will likely be that this name has been chosen to give the impression of a loose player, but in fact the players’ natural game is the complete opposite and the name was chosen to try to bamboozle his opponents. Generally speaking, this is the trap that most beginners will fall into.

Remember that players will often play in many poker rooms online and will usually use the same user name in each one. If you are serious about building up a persona as an online poker player you do not want to give your opponents any type of read on you. It is pointless trying to give yourself a macho or dainty poker user name if you are in it for the long haul. Try to go with something as neutral (including gender neutral) as possible so there is no chance of anyone getting any type of read on you as a player at all. After all do you want to be referred to as “MsPokerFairy” for the rest of your online poker playing career?

What Are Sit N Go Tournaments?

Sit N Go (or Sit and Go, or SNG) is essentially a small scale (usually) single table poker tournament which will start when a pre-determined number of players have joined the table.

Standard Sit N Go’s can feature as few as 2 player’s heads up straightaway or up to 10 people playing. All players will start with the same number of chips. Often 1,000 – 2,000 each and the game will progress until one player has accumulated all the chips on the table. Depending on the number of players starting the game, a percentage of the buy-in (the fee it costs to play the game) will be awarded to the winner and sometimes second and third place finishers. If the Sit N Go tourney is a heads up game between two players only then the winner will take the spoils, but if there are 10 players the payout will usually be shared between the first second and third placed players. A common split is 50/30/20 if three placed are paid out upon. If two places are paid, a common split is 75/25. All of the major online poker venues offer a wide variety and Sit N Go games ranging from buy-in’s of a few dollars to several thousand dollars at a time.

At any one time PokerStars will have tens if not hundreds of Sit N Go’s running at any one time so you will always be able to find a Sit N Go tournament at any time of the day or night to play in. It is great practice to play against set number of poker players at any one time as you can choose the size of the Sit N Go tournament that you enter. You may prefer playing on a small scale against 6 players in total, or you could join a larger Sit N Go that contains 40 starters. Sit N Go’s are excellent practice for the final table of MTT’s (multi table tournaments) and as the buy-in fee is fixed they can be good practice for beginners that are initially too anxious to play cash games with their own money.

Psychologically the thought that you buy-in to a Sit N Go and that buy-in is the most money you will lose can be a comfort to some player and can leave them uninhibited, whilst the constant worry of a run of bad beats in a cash game can make some players (usually beginners) play with fear. There are also forms of Sit N Go’s called “turbos” or sometimes just known as “fast”. These are games where the poker player has less decision time and the blinds go up quicker. These can be a thrill if you are short of time, but they can see a lot of loose, aggressive play and as a consequence can sometimes be the equivalent of a crap shoot. There are definite strategies specific to Sit N Go tournaments that are in vast contrast to cash games for instance, and we will cover those in the Sit N Go strategy section.

What Are MTT’s Or Multi Table Tournaments?

Multi table tournaments are a form of poker which involves hundreds if not thousands of poker players all playing simultaneously across a number of tables online. Poker room software will regularly move players to different tables when participants have been knocked out and each MTT will continue until a single player retains all the chips at the end of the tournament.

Usually in large MTT’s the payout starts when you reach the final 10% of players and the prize will gradually in increase as you get to the winner. So provided that you manage to finish in approximately the top 10% of players, you should get a payout.

Probably the most famous MTT is the World Series of Poker which costs several thousands of dollars to enter (although there is no shortage of players). In 2009 there were 6,494 entrants and the winner Darvin Moon picked up a cool $8,546,435 winner’s cheque.

Texas Hold ’em MTT’s are generally the largest MTT’s in poker simply because Texas Hold ’em is currently the most popular form of poker in the world today, so competition amongst MTT players is fierce. There are regular online multi table tournaments with varying buy-in levels. Unsurprisingly the MTT’s that are the cheapest to enter will typically include the highest volume of players. In fact many online poker sites offer freeroll (free to play) MTT’s which can sometimes involve a real money prize or more commonly will offer the winner or the top finishing players an entry into a “satellite tournament” or tournament that other players have actually paid to enter and will involve some form of cash prize or prize incentive. These MTT freerolls can be tempting to enter, particularly for beginners, but the odds of finishing with a top placing in a field of 9,000 for the popular PokerStars daily Texas Hold’em MTT freerolls for instance are not high and the amount of time it will take to actually complete the tournament with such a large field is not a good return on investment in terms of your own poker playing time in the opinion of most.

Satellite tournaments are MTT’s that cost a relatively low fee to buy-in and will allow you to qualify for big multi table tournaments. For example, there may be a tournament that you would like to play in but the buy-in is too steep, say $1,000. There may be a satellite tournament on offer that costs $50 to enter and the top finishers will qualify for the $1,000 buy-in event free of charge. It is worth looking out for these paid satellite events as they can provide pretty good value and a challenging level of play. In fact, the majority of players that play in the World Series of Poker now do so by qualifying via a multi table satellite event.

Texas Hold’ em Cash Games Explained

Texas Hold’em cash games are online poker games that are played with chips that are worth actual real money as opposed to tournament poker where there is a set buy in fee and the chips are effectively worthless outside of that specific game.

The main derivatives of Texas Hold’em cash games are NL (no limit) and PL (pot limit) – both of which are self explanatory.

To join a cash game online you will need to buy-in to the game from a portion of your bankroll that is equivalent to the rest of the cash game players to stand the best chance of success and throughout the game “antes” and “blinds” (mandatory bets) can be taken at the start of the hand as well as the poker room “rake” which constitutes a micro payment and is their cut of pots that are won. This is largely how the poker rooms make their millions. There are however, generous offers known as “rakeback” deals whereby players can claw back portions of their rake by virtue of high volumes of hands played.

All the online poker sites offer cash games as these are the bread and butter games of the poker rooms. Casual players can play in games with as low a value as $0.01/$0.02, whereas the more serious action in the poker rooms can be at the £200/$400 NL levels.

As with Sit N Go’s there are a variety of options open to the cash game player and it is up to you to see which suits you best. You may find that you are successful in cash games with 6 people on the table, but when you move up to 9 players you struggle. Or you may prefer to play heads up cash games. Either way, there are options whichever type of player you are and if you are a beginner or even an intermediate player that plays on a casual basis, the tips and strategies on this blog will help to define what type of player you are and at which level you will stand the greatest chance of success.