Preflop - Poker Strategy
The
preflop poker strategy all starts with your first 2 cards.
A good starting hand is the first and foremost key to
winning at online Texas Holdem, period.
The
majority of the online poker community tends to overlook
this crucial element essential for winning consistently.
Sure, anyone will get lucky every now and then with a
7-2 off suit, but to win consistently you must condition
yourself to play only hole cards with the best possible
winning percentages.
So what is a good starting hand? Ace/Ace - Ace/King
Suited - King/King? There are numerous books and
resources on the internet that will give you an
ANTICIPATED good starting hand along with the win
percentages for each, but here is what they don't tell
you: The strength of a good starting hand depends
greatly on the number of players left in the game AND
the number of callers. If there are 10 people seated at
the table, then a good starting hand will be quite
different from a good starting hand with only 3 players
sitting at the table.
David "Einstein" Sklansky was the first author
to have both ranked every 2-card starting hand and group
them along with recommendations on how to play them. The
top 16 ranked starting hole cards are fundamental to
solid play. They constitute about 7% of all hands you
will be dealt.
Table
1 - Sklansky's Group 1 hands AA KK QQ JJ AKs
Ace/Ace
and King/King are substantially more powerful than the
Queen/Queen.
Table
2 - Sklansky's Group 2 hands TT AQs AJs KQs AK
The
overall power of Ace/King is actually slightly greater
than that of King/Queens, so I would reverse the order
of these two hands within this Group
Out
of the 10 hands in these two groups your decision to
raise should not be treated equally based upon the
following:
-
Raising Ace/Ace, King/King, Queen/Queen, and Ace/King
should be aggressive before the flop because these cards
can lose their value in large multi-way pots.
- Raising Ace/King, Ace/Queen, Ace/Jack, and King/Queen
should be moderate because they do play well in
multi-way pots.
- Raising Jack/Jack should only be done on a tight
tables in order to run out hands such as Ace/Nine. This
type of hand can also lose value in multi-way pots.
- Raising Ten/Ten is generally not recommended.
Always
consider the fact that your starting hand strength also
depends on your table position, or how many people bet
before and after you do. As a general rule, you should
stick to the conventional best starting hand percentages
when there are 8 to 10 players with 2 to 3 callers. When
the field is narrowed down to 5 players or less, you
should play your starting hands more aggressively. For
example, the Ace/King suited is often considered to be
the second best starting hand with a full table. If
there are less than 5 players left, any Ace hole card
with a decent kicker can give you the same winning
percentages as the Ace/King suited would have. The
concept is very simple, you are playing the mathematical
odds implied via the 52 cards in the deck along with the
probability that fewer players will equal less chances
that someone will draw an Ace. In short, the fewer
number of players holding cards at a table, the greater
your chances of winning are.
If you are in a late position at a full table and have
seen one player wager a large bet, and there are one or
two callers, most often you can bet at the very least
ONE of them is holding a strong starting hand with high
win percentages (such as an Ace with a high kicker,
suited sequence cards, or heavy pocket pairs, etc).
If, at any given point of the game, you have five or
more players seeing the flop, then a good starting hand
can often times change to small sequence cards such as a
five/six or a small suited pairs. Reason? When over half
of the players at a table call a hand, the high cards
such as Aces, Kings, and Queens are usually tied up as
hole cards thus not showing up on the flop, turn or
river. This is an excellent opportunity for small pairs,
lower straights, or any flush draw to win a big pot. As
a general rule, you should never bet the minimum when
you have an excellent starting hand unless you intend to
"limp in" and get more callers for the hand.
There are times when limping in can win you some big
pots, but you shouldn't let slow playing become a
dominant strategy. It is good to bet at least 3 to 4
times the minimum in order to run out any possible draw
hands or players who rely on luck and chance to win a
big pot early in the tournament.
Once
you have mastered the basic concept of good starting
hands for every scenario, you will become a better all
around Texas Holdem player!
|
