Royal Flush Poker

The first time deposit bonus you receive at Betfairpoker.com, is based solely upon the points you earn in your first 60 days onsite. The more you play, the more you earn, with the bonus being released in increments every week depending on the amount of points you have earned that week. If you need a further boost to your starting bankroll, referring any poker playing friends you might have to the site, will trigger a $100 bonus for you, and $50 for your friend.

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There is a new high stakes MTT leaderboard in operation currently, which offers the chance to win a lucrative prize package of seats in multiple tournaments onsite.

www.betfairpoker.com is a licensed site with exemplary standards and transaction security, and help and support act with the diligence you would expect too, being available to solve your problems 24/7. The graphics at the tables are functional enough, although not quite to my tastes, but this is not the most important aspect of a poker room of course.

The 7th of December will bring a great opportunity to players, as there is a scheduled $100k gauranteed tournament coming up on this date. This is just one of many gauranteeds scheduled, along with other tournaments at Betfair including 30 freerolls per week, which make up part of what is an interesting daily tournament list. Overall, there are certainly plenty of positives at Betfair, although as with many sites, they should continue striving to better themselves in order to match the efforts and achievements of the best poker rooms around.

It can be very difficult to deal with players who are constantly raising every pot at poker.ladbrokes.com.

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They can’t have a made hand every time they are raising of course, so it is important to choose the right time to re-raise and hopefully win the pot from them.

You can of course end up thinking that such a player is always bluffing, but they are usually aware of the loose image they are creating and so can be prone to raising in the same way when they really do have a hand because they think someone will call having got fed up of their constant raising.

There are different types of serial raiser at www.poker.ladbrokes.com I feel, there are those that bet into flops looking to test the waters and pick up pots, and there are those who are raising heavily preflop and bluffing on the flop to a large degree.

Personally I would rather play against those that let you see the flop, this gives you an opportunity to hit the flop well, then set a trap.

In this instance and many others, there isn’t exactly a time to call a poker serial raiser, it’s more a case of when to re-raise a serial raiser. If you think your hand is stronger at a given point in a hand, then you want to fire back and force the issue there and then.

If you are right and you put them all in at poker.ladbrokes.com, and they then decide to call with the worst of it, then you have to sit back and hope your hand holds up. In general though if you flat call a serial raiser they will lead out and bet on the next opportunity because of the hand due to the weakness shown by you not re-raising. Note the opportunity for slow playing a strong hand here.

If someone is raising heavily preflop at www.poker.ladbrokes.com, then all you can do is wait for what are probably the best hole cards, then go with them. The main thing to remember is that serial aggressors can be trapped, and that they don’t have a big hand every time, the rest is for your judgement to decide.

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Getting involved in a pot with a weaker hand simply because it doesn’t cost you too much can be very tempting sometimes, and can often reap rewards too, but this certainly isn’t always going to be the case. The problem with getting involved with weaker hands is that often firstly, it will quite likely be a multi way pot, with more danger if you hit part of the flop. And secondly if you make somthing like top pair it becomes a little difficult not to lose chips with the hand when you may well be out kickered, or have your hand beaten entirely.
With this in mind you can see how it is easy to get yourself into trouble in this way. But if you are one of those players whose strength is in reading whether their hand is good enough or not, then this type of play isn’t quite so fraught with danger.

The obvious advantage to taking cheap flops is of course when you hit flops as well as you could have hoped and you are left silently thanking the players for letting you in cheaply. Also you might pick up and then complete a big draw on turn or river which gives you a chance to make a semi bluff at the pot too, giving yourself an extra chance to win. Either of these instances can give you a very nice pot, especially when the pot is a multi way one, and can make taking cheap flops a very worthwhile gamble when you have the opportunity to.

Personally I would advise getting involved cheaply if possible, but always be wary, and trust your reads implicitly.

When the point approaches in a tournament where the money places are, there is a natural instinct to tighten up your play to ensure you do not get knocked out before the money. If you have a short stack then I can agree that this is the correct thing to do, because you do not have the strength to use peoples tighter play at this point against them to increase your own stack. So if you are going to move in and attempt to double up, you may as well wait until you have cashed if possible before trying to move in.

With an average sized stack, it is tempting still to lose a few chips in blinds to make sure you make the money. But you do have the power to lean on some short stacks and improve your position. If you can do this without risking everything in front of you then this is a positive way forward, but as always, play the cards as you find them. If you find yourself dealt pocket aces or another extremely strong hand, you can move all in against anyone preflop quite happily. Such clear cut chances to double up, cannot be passed up regardless of how close you are to the money.

If you have a large chipstack then the period of time approaching the ‘bubble’ is when you really should be moving up a gear and exploiting players fears of finishing in that last spot before the money.
However you choose to play in this latter part of the tournament, it is always important to be aware of when this position approaches and look to use it to your advantage if at all possible.

Reading a player online is always going to be slightly more complicated than in real life poker simply because you cannot see the person you are attempting to read. Regardless of this there are still some very strong indicators of an opponents strength to be found in their betting patterns. Being aware of how players around you are reacting to situations is very helpful to making your read of a player, if a player bluffs and shows their cards afterwards for instance, make a note. Similarly if a player is folding their hole cards almost every hand, be very careful if they raise into a pot, they are likely to have been waiting for a premium hand to get involved with.

The simple fact is that whether you are playing a live tournament or an online tournament, a player always raises for a reason. There is always a story behind every pattern of raising in a hand, the tough part of course is deciphering exactly why they are raising or calling, but you can read this just as well online as in a live game.

As well as studying your opponents betting patterns, if you put in tester bets and re raises, you induce reactions in your opponents betting pattern, this further supplements the ideas you are forming about the strength of their hand.

To summarise I would say that there are certainly more ways to read opponents in live poker, but it would be foolish to think that just because you cannot see your opponent, you cannot read the strength of their hand either.

There always ways which you must utilise to build a picture of where your hand stands, and you can do this with online play almost as well as with live play.

It is well known in ladbrokespoker.com that (2,7) off suit is the worst starting hand, the reason that lower cards such as (2,4) aren’t considered worse is that you have better straight possibilities with this type of hand.

Despite this being the case Joe Hachem managed to win a World Series main event with (7,3) off suit and Doyle Brunson did the same thing on two separate occassions whilst holding (10,2). So do these type of seemingly weak hands really lose as often as you might think against a strong hand such as (A,K)? I decided to deal out one hundred boards with (7,2) off suit against (A,K) off suit, twice over, and averaged the two results to find out.

The Ladbrokes Poker odds calculators in these circumstances will tell you that (7,2) should win around 32.2% of the time, (A,K) should win 67.3% of the time, and the other 0.5% resulting in a tie. My results read as folows: (2,7) wins 35% of the time, (A,K) wins 64% of the time and 1% results in a tie. Although these results don’t conclusively prove or disprove anything, they do show a slightly higher trend of (2,7) winning and (A,K) losing, than you might expect, but this isn’t enough of a difference in percentages to warrant closer inspection I don’t think, we can safely say that the expected odds do work out the way they should, when it comes to real ladbrokespoker hands being played out. Ladbrokespoker.com

The key point to remember as a poker player is that (2,7) does have a chance against most hands if you have two live cards, but it certainly isn’t a hand you want to be involved in an all in showdown with if you can help it. The more you stick to the stronger hands the higher the percentage of the time that you will be victorious over your opponent.

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Fulltiltpoker.com brings you this great poker strategy guide. When it comes to Seven Card Stud there is always a temptation there for the less experienced player to chase half made hands, the whole nature of the game is that each players hand gradually reveals itself with each card dealt, and so the over optimistic player will always be lured into calling one more bet.

On the whole this is a bad idea, even if you do happen to catch the right cards to beat strong open cards that your opponent has, it still isnt logical to chase these hands in the long run, unless the price is right to do so.

Having said this, in some circumstances, it can be the right thing to do, if you need one card for a flush and you still have two cards yet to be dealt, then it is worth staying in the hand to see at least one more card to try and make the flush. www.fulltiltpoker.com

You have to take into account of course that you are very likely to win the hand if you hit the flush, where as if you are chasing a set or a big two pair, then you can fold these hands for a lot smaller bet because you often won’t win the pot even if you make your fulltilt poker.com hand. As long as an opponents cards don’t give serious concern about a bigger flush or full house causing you problems, then you can invest a little money in drawing to these type of stronger hands.

As a general rule though, if your hand isn’t strong and someone raises, there may well be a few cards in the deck that can help you to win the pot, but most of the time it isn’t worth calling raises in the hope of hitting those cards. If you are getting all your fulltilt poker.com money or chips into a pot, try and make sure you are doing it when your hand is in front.

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It can sometimes be difficult for less experienced players to hide their shock or delight when they suddenly make a very big hand, and although it is exciting when you flop a flush or a full house for instance, your first thought shouldn’t be ‘wow I have really hit the jackpot here’ because this isn’t necessarily the case. The moment those cards fall as good as you could possibly have dreamed, your work as a poker player then begins. One of your first thoughts at this point should be ‘what sort of cards could my opponents be holding that would keep them interested in this hand’ because if you have (A,Q) in a holdem game and the flop comes down (A,A,Q) there really arent many cards your opponents could be holding that would keep them interested in this hand. I would strongly advise playing your hand slowly in this situation, when it comes to your turn you would do well to look casually disinterested and check, give your opponents a chance to bluff at the pot.

There has certainly been more than one occasion which I have seen where a player makes a huge hand and ends up winning just the blinds because they don’t consider the fact that their opponents may well have nothing, and so in their excitement they just raise, and everyone else folds. If you play your hand very slowly though you immediately give your opponents a chance to improve their hand, also you don’t need to raise to protect your hand if it is as strong as our previous example for instance. If by any chance your opponent does happen to have made a playable hand then rest assured they will soon let you know when you don’t show strength and they begin to feel they are in front, that’s when you start being able to build a pot. The real golden rule I would feel, is that if you have an unbeatable hand, then make sure first and foremost, that you don’t force the other players out of the hand. If you let another card or two come off to help them improve their hand, and none of your opponents bluff at the pot then you can’t really do much about that, but always give your opponents the chance to make the first bet.

In this instance I decided to put one of the classic heads up, all in, scenarios to the test (Ad,Kc) versus (Qh,Qs) this is a situation which can significantly improve, or utterly destroy a players tournament, and accepted odds calculators show for these types of hands, results as follows. The pocket Queens hand should win against Ace King 56.99% of the time, with the Ace King winning 42.66% of the time, and the other circumstances resulting in a tie.

After taking the time to deal one hundred boards with these hands three times over, and then taking the average, with these two hole cards going head to head I found my results actually came out as (Ad,Kc) beating (Qh,Qs) 51% of the time, and (Qh,Qs) winning 49% of the time. Perhaps this is why it sometimes seems that your pocket pair doesn?t hold up against two over cards as often as it should, in theory it should win more often than it loses, but in practice this doesn?t seem to be the case.

Of course you might be able to say that it was just luck playing it’s part and things may have evened themselves out over a thousand hands, but I am not entirely convinced. I can recall two hands during the test when a Queen came out on the board and neither the Ace or King paired, I wonder if the odds claculations would chalk this down as a win for the (Q,Q). The fact was of course that the Queen came out, as well as a ten and a Jack, giving the (A,K) a straight and winning the hand, I find it difficult to believe that a simple calculation can take every variable into account. You can take these test results however you wish but they certainly show an interesting trend which I may have to re-test in my own time at a later date to see if I discover the same results.

In poker it is always important to know what your starting hand is likely to achieve against another, in Texas Holdem certain starting hands are said to win a set percentage of the time against others, and there are even odds calculators to be found which will give you these odds to help you along. There is one thing that has always concerned me though, I would think that there are quite a few variables and possibilities to take into consideration when trying to calulate such things and I?m not convinced that some simple mathematical calulations can cover all the possibilities. I think it very plausible that if you were to deal two hundred or so hands to test a scenario, and average them out as two separate hundred hands tests, to give you an accurate percentage of win to loss ratio, you may find it would come out slightly different to expectations.

With this in mind, I decided to do exactly that, with (7d,8d) against (Kc,Qs), and the results are as follows. As much as I would like to tell you that there was a significant difference between what the odds calculators tell me and what I found out, there wasn’t really, although there was a slight difference. Suited connectors such as (7d,8d) should lose to hands like (Kc,Qs) around 59.7% of the time, my test results showed that to be 56.5% which is interesting, although luck could of course swing the results slightly, in the same way that if you flipped a coin one hundred times, it’s unlikely to land on heads precisely fifty times and tails fifty times.

Despite no conclusive differences or anomalies being found, it’s important to know approximately what your odds are against any given hand, and I certainly find it enjoyable to put standard theories and accepted odds to the test, partly to absorb fully the information about different hands and odds into my memory, and partly I suppose, just to reassure myself that generally accepted odds are entirely correct.