Quick Texas Holdem Strategy Basics

A common misconception about the game of Hold ‘Em is that is all luck. If this were true the same players wouldn’t win on a consistent basis.

There are four main categories of interest regarding strategy in this game. They are selecting good hands to play, using your seat position to your advantage, chasing the right draws, and bluffing at opportune times only.

When playing Hold ‘Em, the two starting cards you are dealt should be able to become a good hand a fairly good amount of the time. Meaning, the hands you play should be able to improve and win on a consistent basis. Playing any two suited cards or any Ace can get you in a jam quickly.

There are two big problems with chasing after a flush with two suited cards. The first is it will probably be expensive to see all five cards from the flop to the river. To pay that amount and not hit a flush would be disaster. The other, less obvious, problem is that you could get out flushed. Meaning someone else at the table could hold two higher cards to the same flush and take the pot. This could cost you a lot of money.

The problems with playing any Ace are also a little obvious. If you choose to play an unsuited hand, you have little to no flush possibilities depending on the flop. And even if you are lucky enough to pair your Ace, you will have to constantly worry about being out kicked. It is important to consider the fact that someone else could easily be holding a power card in addition to their Ace, and you will most likely lose if this is the case.

Aside from staying away from common trap hands, it is also important for every player to understand their position at a table and what it means to them. Depending on where you are in a hand, any type of hand can become better or worse. The last player to act usually has the most help in a hand because

1. Being last to act allows them to see all bets and raises before he is to act. This allows for a better analysis of what others hold.
2. This may seem obvious but the last player will know how many people he is up against.

Conversely, the player who is first to act is usually at a severe disadvantage compared to other players. You will not get to see how anyone else is betting before deciding what the right movie is.

An example of how the person last to act is as follows. Say you hold an Ace Nine suited. A decent beginning hand. If the flop rewards you with an Ace along with a Ten and a Two, then you can gauge where you are in the hand. If you are last to act and see that no one else is betting, there is a good chance you are the only one who hit the ace and the hand may be yours for the taking. If a lot of raising happens before your turn, it may be beneficial to bow out while you still have money to play with. As you can see, playing last in a hand gives a player many tools to decide his play upon.

One of the biggest heartbreakers in the game can be draws. Many players choose to chase their respective draws even after they have not completed said draw after the flop. Drawing hands usually are flushes or straights. A player really has to make sure he is careful he/she does not chase too often and only picks the best hands to do so.

One basic fact that any player hoping to complete a draw should know is that for most draws you have only a twenty percent probability of completing the draw. It is important, therefore, to not burn lasers through the cards with your vision. If other players notice how eager you are to see another card, they will know you are on a draw.

Most draws have a similar chance of hitting so when do you decide which to play? The answer is simple, when the amount of chips in the pot is at least five times as big as the amount your opponent bets, it is probably worth playing out the hand. If you get lucky and hit the card or cards you need, a big amount of chips will be waiting for you. On the other hand, a pot smaller then five times the amount of a bet is probably not worth drawing after.

A quick example of this would be as follows. Say that an opponent bets three dollars into a pot that totals $15. Because the pot is big enough to justify a call, it may be the right decision to make the call and hope for the best. On the other hand if the pot was only $6 after his bet, then there is almost no reason to waste $3 on a call.

Of course the last strategy used in Texas Hold ‘Em, the one most experts consider a skill above luck, is bluffing. A few things to think about are

1. When you play a game of low-stakes there is almost no reason to bluff. With so little on the line people will probably call with weaker hands and beat you.
2. A good bluff should fool everyone including yourself. Make sure you don’t make a fool of yourself and engineer a bad bluff, because people will pick up on it. Time your bluffs with the right amount of people in a hand and you will be fine.