Even before the online poker boom, one of the game’s elder statesmen was calling no limit Texas Hold ‘Em poker the “Cadillac” of poker games. You’ve got to be skilled at limit games before you even consider no-limit and even seasoned pros admit they still have something to learn after playing the game for a few years. Don’t let that scare you off, though: no-limit hold ‘em is the most fun poker game and it can be extremely profitable if you take the time to learn some basic strategic tips.

Know Your Pot Odds
Pot odds are crucial to the no-limit player. Understanding what odds you are getting if you call a bet and how much you’ve invested to win a pot is crucial to the game. Since you can decided the size of the bet, you need to know if you are getting good odds or handing them off to another player. Spend some time researching and learning how pot odds work and know why calling an unraised pot preflop with 55 is a good idea that can go south quickly.

Know The Difference Between Limit and No-Limit
Check-raising for value is a lot less valuable in a no-limit game than in a limit one because you could be giving your opponent’s hand a free card. If you’re playing limit poker, you’ll lose just a little bit if they hit their mark, but in no-limit, check raising means that you could lose your entire stack in seconds because you didn’t follow the next bit of advice.

Know When To Be Aggressive
In general, betting is better than calling in a no-limit poker game. When you are betting, you’ll win if you have the better hand or if your opponent folds If you call, you can only win if your hand beats your opponents. When you bet, you determine the pot odds and if you call, you are accepting someone else’s odds, and we’ve already discussed the importance of knowing and owning the pot odds.

Know Your Opponent’s Cards
It takes time and patience to learn how to read someone else’s cards, but you can get there by asking yourself three questions with each hand:
• What does the other player have?
• What does the other player think I have?
• What does the other payer think I think they have?

Know Your Opponent’s Brain
The three questions above are a key component to setting up traps that allow you to whittle someone’s stack down. Let’s say you overbet the pot with a flush draw and then flip the script by checking when you hold the flush. They will either fall for your trap, pushing extra chips into the pot to secure a victory from you because he thinks you had top pair, or he’ll recognize your cleverness and check-fold you on river.

This strategy addresses the second question above and keeps both of you on your toes and can help you get money from better players instead of fish, who you should be dominating anyway, right?

This entry was posted on Monday, January 11th, 2010 at 7:34 am and is filed under Poker. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.