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*Low Stakes Online Poker Tournament Strategy Game
*Low Stakes Online Poker Tournament Strategy Free
*Low Stakes Online Poker Tournament Strategy Games
*Low Stakes Online Poker Tournament Strategy Rules
*Hesitant to play online poker tournaments? Apply these simple yet smart game strategy and start witnessing big changes in your game in no time! Also, discover some fine poker opportunities along the way to collect big winnings this month.
*Let’s take a look at some ways that you can win tough low stakes games. Optimal Strategy To Beat Low Stakes Poker Games There is one flaw that a lot of the skilled players in low stakes games have, and that’s some hesitation at putting down big stacks in the middle of the game if they don’t have the nuts.
When you play poker online regularly, it’s important for you to identify and profile your opponents on the low stakes felts. If you have done your homework, you probably know that they fall into two categories mainly: the tight-passive regs and the loose recreational players aka ‘calling stations’.A complete guide to beating the low stakes no limit hold’em games
’Although poker is not an easy game to fully master, beating the low stakes poker games from 2nl up to 25nl is not hard at all.’
Now, the above statement is by no means meant to be disparaging to those micro stakes no limit players who are struggling to make a profit in online poker. It is actually supposed to be an encouragement to read this lengthy poker strategy guide instead.
Because playing winning poker is all about making fewer mistakes than your opponents and because the majority of players at the low limits make an awful lot of mistakes, you don’t have to be a very talented player to beat the micro stakes consistently. All it takes is some knowledge of the basic poker strategy fundamentals and a recipe that makes the pieces of the puzzle fall into place. A lot of the poker strategy fundamentals have been explained in other articles on First Time Poker Player, which will be linked to throughout this article, and this micro stakes poker strategy guide is meant to be that recipe for beating the low limit poker games.Ingredients of this micro stakes poker strategy guide:The basic poker strategy fundamentals
If you are unfamiliar with the basic poker strategy fundamentals and the basics of proper starting hand selection, betting and folding, then I would like to recommend you to read the poker strategy guides on First Time Poker Player listed below. Otherwise, by all means feel free to skip them. I know it is a lot of reading, but I wouldn’t recommend them if I didn’t honestly think they could be very helpful in grasping this guide and eventually could lead to some serious micro stakes ownage (although I understand I’m slightly biased here :-)).The dynamics of micro stakes online poker games
The poker strategy guides above provide you with the knowledge needed to understand why a certain play would be better or worse than another. This should help you to not only make fewer mistakes yourself, but also to recognise mistakes of other micro stakes players at the table. And it’s these mistakes of your opponents to which you have to adapt your poker strategy in order to beat the low stakes games.
The majority of your opponents at the micro stakes have a pretty poor understanding of the basic poker strategy fundamentals. They don’t pay attention to their and your position; most low stakes poker players are way too passive and love to slow play; they often don’t read the board very well and they don’t pay attention to pot odds. And if these players try to pay attention to anything of the above, then there’s a great chance they’re doing it wrong.
As a consequence many of your opponents at the micro stakes:
*
are too loose:they limp/call with easily dominated hands in early position; they call raises and reraises with hands that are too weak; they call too much with their draws and low stakes poker players tend to overvalue top pairs with a weak kicker any pair.
*
don’t get enough value for their strong hands:they don’t have a betting plan during the hand and by being too passive and slow playing too much with their strong hands you can often get away very cheap where you could have actually been stacked.
*
give great (implied) odds:you can see cheap flops (in position) with drawing hands like suited connectors, because your opponents raise too little and too small; you can often draw very cheap post-flop and when you hit your draw, you will often get paid more than enough to justify your call on an earlier street.
*
don’t pay attention to what you are doing......when they are not in a hand with you: they don’t notice the mistakes of others and therefore your ’table-image’ is not something you will have to worry about and adjust your play for. And if they do happen to notice some mistakes in your play, then they probably don’t know how to exploit that and punish you for it anyway.
*
are weak:they don’t bluff very often at all when they are facing a bet. Therefore a raise often means what it looks like: a strong hand. However, this does not necessarily mean that micro stakes players don’t bluff much at all. There are also plenty who like to bluff in the worst possible spots when they are given the chance to do so (for example when you ’show weakness’ yourself by checking to them).
*
often have a very unpredictable range of hands:there is no logic in the hands they play from whichever position nor with what hands they continue after the flop. Note that having an unpredictable range of hands does not mean that your opponents at the micro stakes are therefore unpredictable themselves. When they start raising then it is still very likely that you are up against a strong holding. Whether that is a slow played set or a flopped bottom pair rivering trips does not matter!
Of course, this list of characteristics of the majority of the micro stakes players is quite a generalisation. You will encounter players who are very (too) tight, but play their good hands aggressively. You will also encounter players who actually know what they are doing and have a nice win rate, but don’t feel the need to move up. The point is though, that you will encounter many more bad players than good ones, and the list above should immediately give you an idea of how to win enough from those bad players (which, by the way, also includes the too tight/aggressive ones) that you don’t have to worry about the other micro stakes players.Beating the micro stakes
Now you know how a lot of the bad low stakes players play poker we can take a look at how to take advantage of their mistakes. Because micro stakes players play too many hands and often call too much with them it should not come as a surprise that a successful micro stakes strategy can completely revolve around the following two key aspects:
*Getting the most value from hands in which you know you have a great edge
*Avoiding marginal and unprofitable situations
Although this is really what beating the micro stakes is all about, I suspect that the above two lines did not cause you to have that ’aha moment’ we’re after yet. Therefore we will take a closer look at the following aspects and tactics:
*Starting hand selection
*Value betting
*Slow playing
*Folding
*BluffingStarting hand selection at the micro stakes
Proper starting hand selection is a crucial aspect of the micro stakes poker strategy mentioned above, especially when you still need to improve your post flop play. You can create a big edge on your opponents and avoid a lot of marginal situations just by playing tight. Certainly with all the loose opponents at the micro stakes it isn’t difficult to consistently see the flop with better hands and create situations in which you are generally way ahead of the range of hands of your opponents. This highly reduces the risk of you making a costly mistake. If you are unsure about what starting hands to play in which positions and/or situations and you haven’t read the starting hands guide yet (especially the parts about factors to consider for proper starting hand selection and groups of playable Texas hold´em starting hands), then I really recommend you to do so.
Some important take home messages regarding starting hand selection at the micro stakes:
*Play extremely tight in the blinds and in early position.
*If there’s a raise in front of you, be very reluctant to call with easily dominated hands like QJ, AT, KJ etc.. This is especially true when it’s an early position raise, because hands like AK, AQ and high pocket pairs will be a great part of the range you’re up against and those hands all have you dominated. When in doubt with these kinds of starting hands: just fold.
*Make sure you know how to set mine correctly and don’t spew away your chips by just going to the flop every time you hold a pocket pair.
*If you want to play more speculative hands like suited connectors, suited ace-low or so called ’one-gappers’ (like J9) than do so in late position either by raising when you are first to act (mainly to steal the blinds) or by calling with multiple players in the pot already to see a cheap flop. Know what you should be looking for when playing these hands: be able to easily let go of your one pair hands and play your big (combo) draws and pair + draw type of hands very strong.
*Going all-in pre-flop with AK is generally not a good idea at the micro stakes.
*Proper starting hand selection is only the beginning of a winning micro stakes poker strategy. You can be great at selecting your starting hands, but if you don’t play them right you’re probably not going to get very far. If you regularly find yourself in situations post-flop where you don’t know what to do, try to play a little tighter and only start opening up your starting hand range when you feel your post flop play is getting better.
*Try not to rely on starting hand charts too much.Low Stakes Online Poker Tournament Strategy GameValue betting at the micro stakes
So, with a tight starting hand selection you can manoeuvre yourself in situations where you know you have a great edge on the range of hands of your opponents. Step two in your poker strategy should be to get as much value in these situations as possible and for that, you have to value bet. You are value betting when you think that you are ahead of the range of hands of your opponent. As long as that is the case then you are value betting, even if your opponent happens to have a hand that beats yours. You should especially be looking to value bet in situations where you expect to be way ahead of your opponent’s range of hands. If you think you might be ahead, but only slightly so, then you don’t have to value bet thin. Just check and see what happens.Example 1:Hole cardsBoard You have raised in late position with AJ, the big blind calls and you flop top pair-top kicker (TPTK). This is an excellent situation in which a bet is clearly a value bet. Your opponent could very well be calling your flop bet with weaker top pairs like TJ, JQ and JK, with a 7 or medium pocket pairs. If the turn brings a Q or K, then a bet can still be a value bet, but it would be a lot thinner. Your opponent is now unlikely to call with the medium pocket pairs or a 7 and his top pair could very well have turned into two pair. So unless you know you are dealing with a typical calling station, a check with the plan to call a reasonable bet on the river (or make a value bet yourself when a low card comes and you are checked to again) is probably a better option. Example 2:Hole cardsBoard You opened the pot in middle position and get three callers. You’re way ahead with your set and when you bet you are very likely to get called by someone holding an ace, some sort of a straight draw or a flush draw. So you should bet and you shouldn’t be shy in doing so either (just bet close to the size of the pot). If you get raised you should not just call and let any draw see another card, just try to get it all-in right there on the flop. Example 3:Hole cardsBoard The value of a great starting hand like AA or KK drops dramatically when a flop like TJQ comes, especially in a reraised (3-bet) pot. Now the majority of the hands in your opponent’s range (TT-QQ, AA, AK) have you beat and a bet would not be a value bet anymore. Be able to slow down in these kinds of situations and try to go to showdown without investing your whole stack.
By the way, you can also value bet pre-flop. Every time you raise or reraise your opponents with a great starting hand, then you are essentially value betting.
Remember that the majority of your opponents at the micro stakes are too loose. They’ll call too much and too often, so don’t be afraid to value bet three streets after the flop with a hand like TPTK. As long as you start slowing/shutting down when you actually get raised, then you’ll get a tremendous amount of value from some of the most bizarre holdings. Also, make sure you always buy-in for at least 100 big blinds and re-load when you fall below that to be able to take full advantage of your good hands.Slow playing at the micro stakes
Because you’ll often get called when betting for value, there’s very little need for slow playing at the micro stakes. Often slow playing a strong hand will only result in missing out on a lot of value from draws or strong second best hands which became worthless when scary cards (or scare cards so you will) hit the board. Therefore you should not slow play a big hand when:
*Your opponent is likely to have hit a pair
*The board is wet and potential draws are out there
Example 2 from the previous section about value betting would be illustrative for both these conditions.
This doesn’t mean that slow playing should not be part of your micro stakes poker strategy at all, however. Sometimes you flop a hand that is just so big that it will be the nuts on the river regardless of the cards that come and your opponent is unlikely to have hit anything at all. In such a situation slow playing could let your opponent ’catch up’ to a second best hand with which he (or she) will donate some money, or it can induce a bluff from your opponent. This is also a reason to be more inclined to slow play versus very aggressive opponents who like to bluff you off of your QQ or KK on an A-high flop, when in fact you’re calling with top set and a big smile on your face instead.Example 4:Hole cardsBoard Great… You flopped quad aces. Unless your opponent has a decent pocket pair or a very rare 5th ace a bet will probably only get your opponent to fold. Slow playing here is fine. Note that with only one ace on the flop (top set) the situation would already be a little bit different, since your opponent could hold the last ace for a top pair and value betting might be better than slow playing. If you would hold AK on the flop from this example, then you should clearly not slow play and just value bet instead. Pocket pairs will only give you a lot of action when they improve to a full house and thus have you beat and you would get a lot of value from any ace by just value betting in that situation anyway.
Don’t think that, when you flop a monster like in the example above, slowplaying will be too suspicious, because you would have made a continuation bet otherwise (in other words: that you need to ’balance your play’ so that you’re not only slow playing monsters and c-betting all other non-monster hands). Most of your opponents at the micro stakes just don’t pay attention to your playing style enough for that to be an issue.Folding at the micro stakes
Contrary to slow playing, folding is an essential part of a successful micro stakes poker strategy (or of any poker strategy for that matter). You can only avoid marginal and unprofitable situations by folding enough. We have already seen this when discussing starting hand selection and post flop it’s essentially the same.
A lot of players at the micro stakes don’t play back at you and don’t bluff when they raise you, they simply have it. Do you have 77 on a 6-high flop and your c-bet/value bet gets check-raised? Just fold. There’s just too little value in continuing with the hand unless you know you’re up against a total clown. The same goes for top pairs with a medium kicker, top pair on a paired board etc.. Those are all marginal situations at best when you have to start making decisions for a big part of your stack. Sure, you’ll sometimes be folding the best hand, and this weak approach is probably not the optimal strategy. But it’ll save you money more often than not, and the real profit should come from the hands where you know you have a big advantage anyway.Bluffing at the micro stakes
If you have already read some other poker strategy guides or tips for beating the micro stakes, then you have undoubtedly read that you should not bluff at the lower limits at all. But not bluffing at all at low stakes = not good. In fact, you should be bluffing at the micro stakes all the time. However, before you start shoving those chips in the pot with all your no-pairs and missed draws, it might be advisable to first keep on reading.
Firstly, continuation betting sensibly is an important part of playing winning poker, also at the micro stakes. And since c-betting with your missed hands to take advantage of your initiative will often enough be a bluff, you should be bluffing a lot. Continuation betting sensibly does not mean that you should be firing away on the flop by default when you were the pre-flop raiser, however. You have to look at the board, the number of opponents you’re up against and the playing style of your opponent. Be less inclined to c-bet when you completely missed against more than 2 opponents, very loose opponents or on very wet boards (9hJcTh, for example) which have very likely hit your opponent’s range. Also, when your c-bet gets called, just shut down. Don’t keep on firing in the hopes of getting a fold, that’s just a waste of chips. Very rarely you could try a second barrel when an ace or king hits on the turn, but your default play should be to shut down.
Secondly, there will be plenty occasions at the micro stakes where you can semi-bluff with draws, especially on the flop where you have the most equity to win the hand. It is important to realise that most draws, even big combo draws, lose a lot of their value when the turn card is a blank (does not complete the draw). Therefore it is advisable to try to see the river as cheap as possible once the turn did not help your hand, either by check/calling a reasonable bet or by checking behind.
Thirdly, there will be a lot of situations where you are up against an obviously weak hand, but you are unlikely to win when going to showdown. Then a little ’stab at the pot’ might be effective.Example 5:Hole cardsBoard You are in the big blind (bb) with a trashy hand and the small blind (sb) just calls and checks the flop. Obviously the sb is very weak her
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*Low Stakes Online Poker Tournament Strategy Game
*Low Stakes Online Poker Tournament Strategy Free
*Low Stakes Online Poker Tournament Strategy Games
*Low Stakes Online Poker Tournament Strategy Rules
*Hesitant to play online poker tournaments? Apply these simple yet smart game strategy and start witnessing big changes in your game in no time! Also, discover some fine poker opportunities along the way to collect big winnings this month.
*Let’s take a look at some ways that you can win tough low stakes games. Optimal Strategy To Beat Low Stakes Poker Games There is one flaw that a lot of the skilled players in low stakes games have, and that’s some hesitation at putting down big stacks in the middle of the game if they don’t have the nuts.
When you play poker online regularly, it’s important for you to identify and profile your opponents on the low stakes felts. If you have done your homework, you probably know that they fall into two categories mainly: the tight-passive regs and the loose recreational players aka ‘calling stations’.A complete guide to beating the low stakes no limit hold’em games
’Although poker is not an easy game to fully master, beating the low stakes poker games from 2nl up to 25nl is not hard at all.’
Now, the above statement is by no means meant to be disparaging to those micro stakes no limit players who are struggling to make a profit in online poker. It is actually supposed to be an encouragement to read this lengthy poker strategy guide instead.
Because playing winning poker is all about making fewer mistakes than your opponents and because the majority of players at the low limits make an awful lot of mistakes, you don’t have to be a very talented player to beat the micro stakes consistently. All it takes is some knowledge of the basic poker strategy fundamentals and a recipe that makes the pieces of the puzzle fall into place. A lot of the poker strategy fundamentals have been explained in other articles on First Time Poker Player, which will be linked to throughout this article, and this micro stakes poker strategy guide is meant to be that recipe for beating the low limit poker games.Ingredients of this micro stakes poker strategy guide:The basic poker strategy fundamentals
If you are unfamiliar with the basic poker strategy fundamentals and the basics of proper starting hand selection, betting and folding, then I would like to recommend you to read the poker strategy guides on First Time Poker Player listed below. Otherwise, by all means feel free to skip them. I know it is a lot of reading, but I wouldn’t recommend them if I didn’t honestly think they could be very helpful in grasping this guide and eventually could lead to some serious micro stakes ownage (although I understand I’m slightly biased here :-)).The dynamics of micro stakes online poker games
The poker strategy guides above provide you with the knowledge needed to understand why a certain play would be better or worse than another. This should help you to not only make fewer mistakes yourself, but also to recognise mistakes of other micro stakes players at the table. And it’s these mistakes of your opponents to which you have to adapt your poker strategy in order to beat the low stakes games.
The majority of your opponents at the micro stakes have a pretty poor understanding of the basic poker strategy fundamentals. They don’t pay attention to their and your position; most low stakes poker players are way too passive and love to slow play; they often don’t read the board very well and they don’t pay attention to pot odds. And if these players try to pay attention to anything of the above, then there’s a great chance they’re doing it wrong.
As a consequence many of your opponents at the micro stakes:
*
are too loose:they limp/call with easily dominated hands in early position; they call raises and reraises with hands that are too weak; they call too much with their draws and low stakes poker players tend to overvalue top pairs with a weak kicker any pair.
*
don’t get enough value for their strong hands:they don’t have a betting plan during the hand and by being too passive and slow playing too much with their strong hands you can often get away very cheap where you could have actually been stacked.
*
give great (implied) odds:you can see cheap flops (in position) with drawing hands like suited connectors, because your opponents raise too little and too small; you can often draw very cheap post-flop and when you hit your draw, you will often get paid more than enough to justify your call on an earlier street.
*
don’t pay attention to what you are doing......when they are not in a hand with you: they don’t notice the mistakes of others and therefore your ’table-image’ is not something you will have to worry about and adjust your play for. And if they do happen to notice some mistakes in your play, then they probably don’t know how to exploit that and punish you for it anyway.
*
are weak:they don’t bluff very often at all when they are facing a bet. Therefore a raise often means what it looks like: a strong hand. However, this does not necessarily mean that micro stakes players don’t bluff much at all. There are also plenty who like to bluff in the worst possible spots when they are given the chance to do so (for example when you ’show weakness’ yourself by checking to them).
*
often have a very unpredictable range of hands:there is no logic in the hands they play from whichever position nor with what hands they continue after the flop. Note that having an unpredictable range of hands does not mean that your opponents at the micro stakes are therefore unpredictable themselves. When they start raising then it is still very likely that you are up against a strong holding. Whether that is a slow played set or a flopped bottom pair rivering trips does not matter!
Of course, this list of characteristics of the majority of the micro stakes players is quite a generalisation. You will encounter players who are very (too) tight, but play their good hands aggressively. You will also encounter players who actually know what they are doing and have a nice win rate, but don’t feel the need to move up. The point is though, that you will encounter many more bad players than good ones, and the list above should immediately give you an idea of how to win enough from those bad players (which, by the way, also includes the too tight/aggressive ones) that you don’t have to worry about the other micro stakes players.Beating the micro stakes
Now you know how a lot of the bad low stakes players play poker we can take a look at how to take advantage of their mistakes. Because micro stakes players play too many hands and often call too much with them it should not come as a surprise that a successful micro stakes strategy can completely revolve around the following two key aspects:
*Getting the most value from hands in which you know you have a great edge
*Avoiding marginal and unprofitable situations
Although this is really what beating the micro stakes is all about, I suspect that the above two lines did not cause you to have that ’aha moment’ we’re after yet. Therefore we will take a closer look at the following aspects and tactics:
*Starting hand selection
*Value betting
*Slow playing
*Folding
*BluffingStarting hand selection at the micro stakes
Proper starting hand selection is a crucial aspect of the micro stakes poker strategy mentioned above, especially when you still need to improve your post flop play. You can create a big edge on your opponents and avoid a lot of marginal situations just by playing tight. Certainly with all the loose opponents at the micro stakes it isn’t difficult to consistently see the flop with better hands and create situations in which you are generally way ahead of the range of hands of your opponents. This highly reduces the risk of you making a costly mistake. If you are unsure about what starting hands to play in which positions and/or situations and you haven’t read the starting hands guide yet (especially the parts about factors to consider for proper starting hand selection and groups of playable Texas hold´em starting hands), then I really recommend you to do so.
Some important take home messages regarding starting hand selection at the micro stakes:
*Play extremely tight in the blinds and in early position.
*If there’s a raise in front of you, be very reluctant to call with easily dominated hands like QJ, AT, KJ etc.. This is especially true when it’s an early position raise, because hands like AK, AQ and high pocket pairs will be a great part of the range you’re up against and those hands all have you dominated. When in doubt with these kinds of starting hands: just fold.
*Make sure you know how to set mine correctly and don’t spew away your chips by just going to the flop every time you hold a pocket pair.
*If you want to play more speculative hands like suited connectors, suited ace-low or so called ’one-gappers’ (like J9) than do so in late position either by raising when you are first to act (mainly to steal the blinds) or by calling with multiple players in the pot already to see a cheap flop. Know what you should be looking for when playing these hands: be able to easily let go of your one pair hands and play your big (combo) draws and pair + draw type of hands very strong.
*Going all-in pre-flop with AK is generally not a good idea at the micro stakes.
*Proper starting hand selection is only the beginning of a winning micro stakes poker strategy. You can be great at selecting your starting hands, but if you don’t play them right you’re probably not going to get very far. If you regularly find yourself in situations post-flop where you don’t know what to do, try to play a little tighter and only start opening up your starting hand range when you feel your post flop play is getting better.
*Try not to rely on starting hand charts too much.Low Stakes Online Poker Tournament Strategy GameValue betting at the micro stakes
So, with a tight starting hand selection you can manoeuvre yourself in situations where you know you have a great edge on the range of hands of your opponents. Step two in your poker strategy should be to get as much value in these situations as possible and for that, you have to value bet. You are value betting when you think that you are ahead of the range of hands of your opponent. As long as that is the case then you are value betting, even if your opponent happens to have a hand that beats yours. You should especially be looking to value bet in situations where you expect to be way ahead of your opponent’s range of hands. If you think you might be ahead, but only slightly so, then you don’t have to value bet thin. Just check and see what happens.Example 1:Hole cardsBoard You have raised in late position with AJ, the big blind calls and you flop top pair-top kicker (TPTK). This is an excellent situation in which a bet is clearly a value bet. Your opponent could very well be calling your flop bet with weaker top pairs like TJ, JQ and JK, with a 7 or medium pocket pairs. If the turn brings a Q or K, then a bet can still be a value bet, but it would be a lot thinner. Your opponent is now unlikely to call with the medium pocket pairs or a 7 and his top pair could very well have turned into two pair. So unless you know you are dealing with a typical calling station, a check with the plan to call a reasonable bet on the river (or make a value bet yourself when a low card comes and you are checked to again) is probably a better option. Example 2:Hole cardsBoard You opened the pot in middle position and get three callers. You’re way ahead with your set and when you bet you are very likely to get called by someone holding an ace, some sort of a straight draw or a flush draw. So you should bet and you shouldn’t be shy in doing so either (just bet close to the size of the pot). If you get raised you should not just call and let any draw see another card, just try to get it all-in right there on the flop. Example 3:Hole cardsBoard The value of a great starting hand like AA or KK drops dramatically when a flop like TJQ comes, especially in a reraised (3-bet) pot. Now the majority of the hands in your opponent’s range (TT-QQ, AA, AK) have you beat and a bet would not be a value bet anymore. Be able to slow down in these kinds of situations and try to go to showdown without investing your whole stack.
By the way, you can also value bet pre-flop. Every time you raise or reraise your opponents with a great starting hand, then you are essentially value betting.
Remember that the majority of your opponents at the micro stakes are too loose. They’ll call too much and too often, so don’t be afraid to value bet three streets after the flop with a hand like TPTK. As long as you start slowing/shutting down when you actually get raised, then you’ll get a tremendous amount of value from some of the most bizarre holdings. Also, make sure you always buy-in for at least 100 big blinds and re-load when you fall below that to be able to take full advantage of your good hands.Slow playing at the micro stakes
Because you’ll often get called when betting for value, there’s very little need for slow playing at the micro stakes. Often slow playing a strong hand will only result in missing out on a lot of value from draws or strong second best hands which became worthless when scary cards (or scare cards so you will) hit the board. Therefore you should not slow play a big hand when:
*Your opponent is likely to have hit a pair
*The board is wet and potential draws are out there
Example 2 from the previous section about value betting would be illustrative for both these conditions.
This doesn’t mean that slow playing should not be part of your micro stakes poker strategy at all, however. Sometimes you flop a hand that is just so big that it will be the nuts on the river regardless of the cards that come and your opponent is unlikely to have hit anything at all. In such a situation slow playing could let your opponent ’catch up’ to a second best hand with which he (or she) will donate some money, or it can induce a bluff from your opponent. This is also a reason to be more inclined to slow play versus very aggressive opponents who like to bluff you off of your QQ or KK on an A-high flop, when in fact you’re calling with top set and a big smile on your face instead.Example 4:Hole cardsBoard Great… You flopped quad aces. Unless your opponent has a decent pocket pair or a very rare 5th ace a bet will probably only get your opponent to fold. Slow playing here is fine. Note that with only one ace on the flop (top set) the situation would already be a little bit different, since your opponent could hold the last ace for a top pair and value betting might be better than slow playing. If you would hold AK on the flop from this example, then you should clearly not slow play and just value bet instead. Pocket pairs will only give you a lot of action when they improve to a full house and thus have you beat and you would get a lot of value from any ace by just value betting in that situation anyway.
Don’t think that, when you flop a monster like in the example above, slowplaying will be too suspicious, because you would have made a continuation bet otherwise (in other words: that you need to ’balance your play’ so that you’re not only slow playing monsters and c-betting all other non-monster hands). Most of your opponents at the micro stakes just don’t pay attention to your playing style enough for that to be an issue.Folding at the micro stakes
Contrary to slow playing, folding is an essential part of a successful micro stakes poker strategy (or of any poker strategy for that matter). You can only avoid marginal and unprofitable situations by folding enough. We have already seen this when discussing starting hand selection and post flop it’s essentially the same.
A lot of players at the micro stakes don’t play back at you and don’t bluff when they raise you, they simply have it. Do you have 77 on a 6-high flop and your c-bet/value bet gets check-raised? Just fold. There’s just too little value in continuing with the hand unless you know you’re up against a total clown. The same goes for top pairs with a medium kicker, top pair on a paired board etc.. Those are all marginal situations at best when you have to start making decisions for a big part of your stack. Sure, you’ll sometimes be folding the best hand, and this weak approach is probably not the optimal strategy. But it’ll save you money more often than not, and the real profit should come from the hands where you know you have a big advantage anyway.Bluffing at the micro stakes
If you have already read some other poker strategy guides or tips for beating the micro stakes, then you have undoubtedly read that you should not bluff at the lower limits at all. But not bluffing at all at low stakes = not good. In fact, you should be bluffing at the micro stakes all the time. However, before you start shoving those chips in the pot with all your no-pairs and missed draws, it might be advisable to first keep on reading.
Firstly, continuation betting sensibly is an important part of playing winning poker, also at the micro stakes. And since c-betting with your missed hands to take advantage of your initiative will often enough be a bluff, you should be bluffing a lot. Continuation betting sensibly does not mean that you should be firing away on the flop by default when you were the pre-flop raiser, however. You have to look at the board, the number of opponents you’re up against and the playing style of your opponent. Be less inclined to c-bet when you completely missed against more than 2 opponents, very loose opponents or on very wet boards (9hJcTh, for example) which have very likely hit your opponent’s range. Also, when your c-bet gets called, just shut down. Don’t keep on firing in the hopes of getting a fold, that’s just a waste of chips. Very rarely you could try a second barrel when an ace or king hits on the turn, but your default play should be to shut down.
Secondly, there will be plenty occasions at the micro stakes where you can semi-bluff with draws, especially on the flop where you have the most equity to win the hand. It is important to realise that most draws, even big combo draws, lose a lot of their value when the turn card is a blank (does not complete the draw). Therefore it is advisable to try to see the river as cheap as possible once the turn did not help your hand, either by check/calling a reasonable bet or by checking behind.
Thirdly, there will be a lot of situations where you are up against an obviously weak hand, but you are unlikely to win when going to showdown. Then a little ’stab at the pot’ might be effective.Example 5:Hole cardsBoard You are in the big blind (bb) with a trashy hand and the small blind (sb) just calls and checks the flop. Obviously the sb is very weak her
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