No wasting time on introductions! We’re gonna dive straight into things this week. If you haven’t read the Basic Tournament Theory article out a couple weeks ago, I strongly suggest you do that before continuing as this article will build directly off that without much recap at all. Onwards and upwards!

So let’s give some more practical advice to play poker tournaments.

As discussed previously, the scaling payout structure and chips not having a direct cash value strongly impacts how we should play tournaments/sngs (excepting husngs) as opposed to cash games.

Namely, early game, when stacks are deep, we should be playing extremely tight. This holds true whether we’re playing 6 man sngs or a multiple thousand person 10 handed tournament.

This is mainly for the reason that we can’t win a tournament in the first hand, or even first 10, 20, or 50 hands. In the case of larger online MTTs’, it can take hundreds of hands to make it Heads Up for the victory.

But just one bad decision can end your tournament, even if you’ve been playing incredible poker for hours. The vast majority of the time, there will be someone with a bigger stack who can bust you, or with a relatively similar stack which can severely cripple you.

While later in the game we need to loosen up to account for chipping up for a deep run, the rising blinds, and changing table dynamics (6 handed vs 9 handed play, for example), early in tournaments this is not much of a factor at all, and we shouldn’t risk our tournament life by exposing ourselves to possibility of coolers (in addition to slowly losing chips by playing lots of weaker hands) or in relatively close spots where we’re flipping or slightly ahead of our opponents.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but in a cash game we should be taking 52/48 edges allin preflop (vs our opponent’s range) just about all the time.

Early in a tournament, however, we should pass in these spots to preserve our equity. There is significant (although relatively simple) math behind this, which I’ll get into either later this article or in a 3rd (and probably final) tournament theory article if it proves necessary.

I did promise some more practical advice, so I’ll do something I rarely do and provide some example ranges which I believe are quite reasonable.

> UTG – UTG+2: JJ+ AKo AQs+
> UTG+3 – CO: TT+ AQo+ AJs+
> BTN: 77+ ATo+ A9s+ KQo KJs+
> SB: 55+ AX+ KTo+ K8s+

This is approximately from effective stacks ~100bb all the way down to ~25bb, which covers early game play.

As you can see, these ranges are quite tight (and they only apply to unopened pots).

The one thing which could be added are joining in limpedes with suited connector type hands and smaller pocket pairs. Of course, as you become more solid in your postflop decision making you can definitely widen these ranges a little bit, but it really is true that tight is right in these games early and we should just be avoiding marginal spots.

When we do have one of these hands, we want to play it hard.
Stack off with your high pocket pairs preflop, and at lowstakes (probably any NPP free poker online game, and games on Stars through $3s at least) always stack off with AK (just trust me), and it’s also probably reasonable to stack of with AQ all the time as well.

When we hit tp+ postflop on all but the wettest boards, we want to be betting and raising and generally playing for stacks except against other solid players and nits. Anyway, even if you don’t follow these ranges hand-for-hand (and face it, you should be thinking for yourselves and modifying things to fit your games!), they should give you a general sense for just how tight we should be in early game spots.

Click image to check out PartyPokers bonus code offers

Play few hands, but play them fast and hard, and we should be in a generally decent position come mid and endgame, which is what’s important in MTT and SNG play.

So let’s take a short at play from ~12-~20bbs deep, which is an approximation of stacks during the standard middle game of SNGs, and is also relatively common to see in quicker-paced large field tournaments (the slower ones frequently stay deeper wire-to-wire).

Come middle game, our priorities start to shift a little bit.
We still care about survival, because all the money in tournaments comes at the end. But we need to stay on top of the rising blinds or we risk losing the value of our stack by playing too tight.

The goal here isn’t just to survive til endgame, it’s to reach endgame with a playable stack and a chance at victory, although we still do need to attempt to minimize risk. The most sensible way to do this is by widening up in unopened pots from late position.

While we should still be relatively tight from EP, our btn (button) and sb ranges should widen substantially.
A reasonable btn range is something like:

BTN: 22+ A7o+ A5s+ K9o+ K8s+ QJo QTs+

Which is significantly wider than our btn range deep. Our sb range should be substantially widened as well, but I’ll let you guys figure out exactly how to craft your ranges.

Another key difference is our opening size.
While during early game phases opening to 3x+1bb per limper is generally good sizing, in middle game we should probably be opening closer to 2.5x+1bb per limper.

The sizing effectively accomplishes the same thing (at these depths; raising to 2.5x at 100bb deep will get less folds). There’s less incentive to join limpedes here unless there are many limpers in front of you, and you generally shouldn’t be getting involved in opened pots without a relatively strong hand.

When you do, you should not be calling much; be more inclined to jam over to try and utilize the fold equity you have.

This is where I’ll cut this article. I know it’s not nearly as lengthy as some of the previous, but I really want you guys to internalize and really grasp these concepts before getting into the endgame portion, because it’s pretty dense stuff.

As always, leave a message on npp, a comment on the article or on facebook, or email me at duncelanas@hotmail.com with any questions, comments, concerns etc. I don’t bite, you’ll stay anonymous, and I’ll try to help with anything you come to me with (even if it’s a completely different poker problem unrelated to one of my articles).

I haven’t had many messages, but I think the few I have had have definitely helped people understand the content better as well as helping me learn to relay my thoughts better, so definitely feel free to contact me with anything. Until next time, I hope you play solid and run well!

- Gloves

Other articles in the free online poker From The Ground Up series by pro online poker player Gloves.

Part 1 - Patience on steroids “Common Sense Poker

Part 2 – Hand Ranges, Playable Pockets, Table Position and Limping

Part 3 - Postflop Play scenarios. Optimal play against different player styles

Part 4 – Poker math – Outs and Odds

Part 5 - Basic poker tournament theory

A big welcome to Justin (Gloves), NoPayPOKER’s newest poker writer. He is a full time online poker pro and also enjoys the free online poker games at NoPay. He has generously offered to write online poker training lessons for us in order to help any all of you (who want to be helped play better, more successful poker online. See his About Me section below for more info.

So, Gloves, over to you:

Let’s be honest. There are some players here on NPP who just enjoy pressing the allin button and having their fingers crossed while the board runs out. There are some who are here to sit in chat and make friends without playing a serious game of poker.

There are some who really don’t care about improving, about playing solidly, who just want a casual game – and while they may not be here just to gamble they think “This feels right, so I’m gonna do it! I don’t care if it’s wrong, it’s good enough for me!”. There are plenty of guys just like this – NPP is a free online poker site after all – and while I hold nothing against these people and wish them all the best, if you’re one of them, this series really won’t be for you.

However, if you are:

> A beginning player who doesn’t know where to go next to improve.
> A casual player with some interest in becoming better at poker, making more profit each month, and maybe eventually dipping into real money poker.
> Or a serious recreational player looking to plug leaks and learn to beat NPP and microstakes real money games solidly.

Then hopefully this series will motivate you to work hard and improve your game while giving you the tools to do it.

I will assume that you guys know the basic structure and rules of a NLHE game – if you don’t, I believe DM Vadnais has written an excellent series for true poker beginners which goes over the rules, hand rankings, and various odds and ends you need to know to understand the mechanics of what’s “going on” at the tables (even if you don’t understand why!).

About Me
I suppose since this is my first article, I should give a bit of background on myself. My name’s Justin; I’ve been playing poker of various formats for a few years now. I started out grinding low stakes SNGs (18 man turbos, to be exact) on stars, did some dabbling in MTTs (successful) and cash games (not so much…) before I finally found my niche in  husngs (1vs1 games). I currently am a poker pro – playing poker is my sole source of income – and I hope to continue this throughout college (yes, I’m that young) and maybe beyond.

I’m currently grinding $60 hyperturbo HUSnGs with plans to move up to $100′s soon (and maybe eventually beyond). Basically I’m the prototypical “young internet grinder” who can make a decent hourly at midstakes HU games and is excited to write about poker to an audience interested in learning and improving their games.

While I’ve written a few strategy pieces on my NPP blog (and will continue to cover more advanced concepts and musings there), I’ve never had the opportunity to really write poker articles to a larger audience – so please bear with me especially for the first few of these!

If there are any questions, comments, or suggestions, don’t hesitate to post either on the article or on my blog, to send me a NPP message, or email me at duncelanas@hotmail.com . I’ll address every comment I get to the best of my ability (and the ones I receive privately will remain that way), so fire away! I know asking questions of players better than myself helped me when I was a beginner (and even more so now that I’m more advanced), so you guys shouldn’t be afraid to ask ANYTHING! There really are no bad questions. 

With all that out of the way, let’s get on to some poker talk. 

What is the key to being a good poker player? Stop and consider this for a moment. If you’re up for the exercise, grab a pad and jot down some thoughts as to what the answer might be.

This “golden question”, if you will, may seem like the end all be all in poker. I can hear some thoughts drifting through your minds: “I bet it’s “soulreading” our opponent’s hand!”;“Is there some secret strategy which makes players successful?”;”It’s pulling off that huge bluff, isn’t it?”.

The answer is none of these. The key to becoming a solid poker player is to make reasoned, logical decisions at every opportunity. In other words, to “use common sense at all times”. I know, seems like a real copout, doesn’t it? Common sense? “Psh!” you say…”I have plenty of common sense and I’m not winning much at all!”. But common sense, you’ll come to realize, just isn’t that common when it comes to poker. 

The failing most people have in this area is how they view poker.

> Many think of poker like some sort of slot machine, something along the lines of “I’m feeling lucky! Let’s gamble!”.
> Another common misstep is the “Oh, it’s just playmoney!” view.
> In reality, poker is a skill based game where making good decisions directly correlates to long term profits.

While the result of each hand, tournament, and session is heavily influenced by luck, in the long run skill wins out and the players playing a profitable style will…well…profit!

If you just start to think of poker in this way – if all you ever take from this entire series is that poker is a skill game and playing better will lead to direct profits – I will be happy (although not satisfied, cause I hope you get a lot more out of it than that!).

When you view poker in this way, you see that “common sense” really is the key to winning at poker.

Those big bluffs you see top pros make on tv? They all have incredibly solid (and often somewhat complex) reasoning behind them. The internet pros making tens to hundreds of thousands per year? They make their money by grinding out a high volume of hands playing a style more solid than their opponents’.

Even on NoPayPoker, it stands to reason that better poker players profit more than the worse ones. This is seemingly obvious, and yet is missed by so many people.

So how do you win at poker? By structuring your game around sound fundamentals and a solid foundation of poker knowledge (hence the title, From the Ground Up). 

DM Vadnais starts off his “Building a Bankroll” series (which targets the same audience as this does) with an article about how “patience” is the most important skill a poker player could have. While I disagree with him on a great deal of things in his writing (which is part of the reason I asked to write this series), I think he was really on the mark there.

My “key”, to use “common sense”, is really just a more general way to say that (although it expands much further than just “patience”).

How does “use common sense” equate to “be patient” in a poker game?

> Well in a standard NLHE (no-limit Hold’em) hand, each player gets 2 cards facedown before any betting (excluding the posting of blinds) takes place.
> Applying the “be patient” reasoning, we wind up with something like “We should wait for hands we can play profitably and then play those because we’ll profit.
> Since relatively few hands can be played profitably, we’ll be tight preflop.”
> Applying the “use common sense” reasoning, we wind up with “Well, poker is a game where we make money from our opponents.
> If we invest money with stronger hands than them, we’ll profit against them.

Therefore, we should only play stronger hands preflop so we can profit, and as such should generally play tight.”.

Where I feel the “common sense” concept outstrips the “patience” concept is in the fact that the “common sense” line of thought is much more logical in the reasoning it lends to your decisions.

It’s the difference between “this hand is profitable so we play it” and “this hand is profitable because…so we play it”, which I feel is ultimately quite significant when trying to build a game on solid foundations.

We want to know what we’re doing at all times – but more importantly WHY we’re doing it beyond just thinking “oh, I read this in an article”.

My blog posts on poker decision making goes into this in quite some detail, although they might be well over the head of some readers of this article (that’s fine, though, this series and my writings as a whole will hopefully help take your game from its current point to the point where you can understand my blog posts with ease). 

So we’ve established that the way to win at poker is to make profitable decisions based on our knowledge of poker.

The easiest application of this is playing tight (no trash hands!) preflop.

It’s logical to think that starting out with stronger hands than our opponents preflop will lead to us having better hands postflop and making money off our opponents, and the way to start with stronger hands than our opponents preflop is to play tight and fold our trash.

This extends to many other basic poker concepts, such as value-betting “we should bet when we’re ahead of our opponents to make money”, bluffing “we should bluff when we can’t win the pot unless our opponent folds and our opponent is likely to fold”, and beyond. But those are concepts which will be explored more in depth in future articles in this series. 

So that pretty much brings my first ever article to its conclusion! Feel free to: leave a comment here, leave a comment on my blog, send me a PM, talk to me in NPP chat, or send me an email at duncelanas@hotmail.com with any questions, comments, concerns, and suggestions.

Plan right now is to have at least 1 new article per week (possibly 2 on some weeks) somewhat indefinitely, so be sure to check back often! Hope you’ve enjoyed – I know I’ve enjoyed writing this – and see you all soon in my next article! Til then, good luck at the tables! 

-Gloves

More resources:

NoPayPOKER Lesson Series List Page – All our “formal” lessons, the DM Vadnais series and Gloves lessons as they come on.

Gloves NoPay Blog for more complex poker training and theory.

In face to face poker room games it is easier to read your opponents than is the case online. In online play there is no way to see the many physical tells but don’t worry, online poker has a whole load of tells you can spot when you know what to look for and this free poker online guide is all about ‘em.

Speed of Play
In online poker games there is a time limit on making moves or else the players hand is auto moved all-in or folded. Due to this player speed of action is often a good Tell.

A lot of the time if a player makes a fast bet it is a sign of weakness, slow speed though often indicates strength because the player is busy figuring how best to play their good hand. Note how long opponents take to act and if you get to see their cards at showdown, see if you can determine what they were fast and slow with, that can help a lot next time round.

Do you give away speed tells? Ideally aim to take time for each play unless you can be a real master and mix speed no matter what type of hand you have.

Check Boxes and Auto Plays
A lot of poker rooms online have check boxes to allow players to set automated fold, raise any or call any instructions.

You can tell when a player has used a check box, because actions are immediate. If a player has checked “raise any” it indicates a strong hand. If it is “check” then it is likely weak. If it is “call any”, then the chance is good that it is a draw hand that is not completed but definitely not ready to fold.

While not 100% definite tells, over time you can draw some good conclusions from check box use especially with regular opponents.

Opponents Fold and Flop Percentage
This percentage can’t be exact but over several games you will be able to get a feel if some players fold a lot of hands or if they stick it in most pots.

A lot of folds equates normally to a good player but the player who stays in most pots is not good and can be hammered when you have a good hand.

Chat Box
Generally, if a player chatty player suddenly goes quiet he may well have got good cards.

Alternatively when a player is betting and gets antagonistic in chat it may well be a show of bluffing as the player hopes the show of “confidence” will bluff you off the table.

The chat classic is the “Tilt” player who is whining a lot. Tilted players can’t play good poker until they calm down so it’s a great time for you to push them into making errors.

Waiting for the Big Blind
You will often have the option to wait for the big blind to get to you when you join a table, or you can choose to post a matching big blind so you can get into play right away.

If a player is not patient enough to wait on the big blind to come around, it may indicate an overall lack of patience. Impatient players are loose players and loose players make mistakes.

On the other side players who wait are showing patience or maybe that they are tight fisted with their money, both are good qualities so note who waits and take care with them.

Novice Tells
Free online poker, micro and low stakes games will exhibit a lot of these.

The first is betting with a weak hand and feigning weakness with a strong hand. If you have pocket aces, don’t slow play them. A lot of novices will slow play such pockets and find themselves getting beaten on the flop, turn or river by players who make straights and trips.

Another beginners tell is when they wait one card after he has paired before betting. For example, the player gets a King on the flop and checks. The Turn shows a 2 yet the player starts betting hard. No way would he bet like that on a pair of 2′s so you can be pretty sure he paired the Kings on the flop. If you can beat it bet it.

Seeing Tells and acting on them takes practice, so start of by testing yourself and learning and play free online poker games at NoPayPOKER.com or the lowest stakes possible at PartyPoker before you start to risk real money.

In this free online poker coaching lesson learn how to play low pocket pairs. 2/2 through to 9/9 are what we define as low pocket pairs and they will, believe it or not (and you will believe by the end of this article) win you more money long term than any other pocket cards.

More than pocket A/A, pocket K/K, pocket Q/Q? How is that possible you shout! It is. They will.

And they’re good against all skill levels of players too and especially good for taking out “know it all” donks and maniacs.

Why Are Low Pockets So Good?

First lets look at some base facts and rules of pockets pairs and low pockets in particular.

1. You have about a 6% chance of being dealt a pocket pair of any type.
2. This equates to approx. every 16 or 17 hands.
3. With a pocket pair you have about a 1 in 8 chance to get a set at the flop (3 of a kind).
4. So 6% followed by 1 in 8 comes to you having a post set flop once per 133 hands.
5. At a 10 player table that equates to once every 13 small/big blind bets you deposit on.

 

Low pocket pairs are playable from all table positions however ONLY:

1. At a cost that does not exceed the big blind from Early Position.
2. Over 2x the big blind from Middle Position
3. 3x big blind from Late Position.
4. Plus, the low pocket pairs are never a pre-flop cause for raising the big blind.

Should you limp in from Early Position, or if you have called a 2x BB from Middle Position, and there has been a raise to 3x the BB, and there are five plus players left in the hand,then you should call 3x the BB bet from Early and Middle position.

Why?

When there are five plus players left there is a higher probability the flop will show 2 or 3 low cards. This is true primarily because it’s logical to assume that the 5 or more players currently in the hand each hold one or more paint cards.

Now, the one set we end up with becomes a powerful weapon. This is especially so if it is a 2-9 set. Yes, Aces down to Tens are serious weapons too, but the chance to put a big hit on the opposition lies more in the lower pocket pairs, rather than the higher pocket pairs.

That’s because a lot of players don’t fear lower cards in the flop, now do you see where we are going with this?

This example hand illustrates the point.

1. You’re seated Late Position with pocket 5c/5h.
2. There is a ‘bad’ player with Jh/7c and a ‘good’ player with Ad/Qd.
3. Our better player raises 3x the big blind and the poorer one calls, you also call, everyone else folds.
4. The flop shows Ah/Jd/5s; you have made a set of 5′s.
5. The ‘good’ player, again bets 3x the big blind.
6. The ‘bad’ player, raises by a factor of three; crazy as he’s holding the middle pair, and the ‘good’ player has betted into the flopped Ace.
7. You call and so does the good player.
8. Now it is the Turn and the card is a 7d.
9. It gives the ‘good’ player a nut flush draw (Ad/Qd/Jd/7d), and he holds the high board pair (Ad/Ah).
10. It gives the ‘bad’ player two pairs (Jacks over Sevens).
11. You have your set of 5c,5h,5s.

At this point you may be concerned that the River will bring a card to fill the flush or a J or a 7.

But do not be.

1. Left in the deck are 9 flush maker cards and 4 full house maker, 13 in all minus the last 5.
2. It’s a flush-maker but will also give you quad Fives.
3. So there are 12 cards left that can be dealt that will make you lose and 34 that will win it for you.
4. You’re about a 3 to 1 favorite to win.

The river card is one of the 34 so is no use to the others. The ‘bad’ player moves all in and you call and take a large pot.

So how was it that this pocket 5 situation was so good?

It’s because the set of Fives was hidden; as will always be the case when pocket 2/2, 3/3, 4/4, 5/5, 6/6, 7/7, 8/8, and 9/9 are turned into sets by the flop (1 in 133; although that includes sets of Tens, Jacks, Queens, Kings, and Aces).

Plus the fact that no one could have read the cards. You almost always slow-play it such that opponents, ‘bad’ or ‘good’, cannot identify the powerful set the flop created.

The power of low pockets is not very well known but is used by all pro players. After all low pocket pairs win more money at a poker table than any other two cards so why shout about it!

So add these rules to your playable pockets reference card (see Playable Pockets Tutorial or Building Bankroll part 2) now and start practicing hard and play free online poker games at NoPayPOKER.com!

In this free online poker lesson we are looking at one of the areas of poker that most players want to learn about most. Namely pocket cards, what ones to play and from which position on the table.

Fact – To win good money in lower stakes poker you don’t need to be a professional. Free, micro and lower stakes tables have a constant inflow of new players who are very bad at playing poker and lose their cash fast. They lose all their cash to players who know this fact and are there waiting to pounce, these players aren’t pros but they do have good poker skills.

Occasionally one of the bad players wins an all in when playing a terrible hand like 4,7 unsuited but this really is exceptional, to them it proves their theory that poker is luck, you know of course that it’s simply the bad thin end of probability.

Overall, statistics prove that when you play only certain pocket cards from certain table positions you win over the long term.

Pocket cards – Quick definition
The 2 cards you start the game with that only you see.

The Evidence
UCLA (the University of Chicago) mainframe computers played over 2 trillion hands of 10 handed Texas Hold Em poker games assessing all 2,652 possible combinations of two pocket cards (52 x 51 = 2,652). The results statistically defined pocket cards with both Positive Expected Value (+EV) that win in the long haul and Negative Expected Value (-EV) that lose.

That’s great you say, just play +EV cards then, ah, sorry, there is a small complication which relates to your Table Position.

Table Position is critical
Early, Middle, Late are the 3 areas on a poker table. You seat position is fundamentally important to card EV as you will see.

1) Early Positions are Small Blind, Big Blind and Under the Gun (UTG), UTG is the player on the left of the Big Blind.

2) Middle. Count left from the UTG player; Middle 1, Middle 2, Middle 3, and Middle 4.

3) Last, are the Late Table positions: Late 1, Late 2, and the Dealer Button.

For fast reference it is a good idea to code positions by 2 character codes: SB, BB, UG, M1, M2, M3, M4, L1, L2, and DB.

The thing to know is that pockets become playable or not depending on where you are sat.

Early Position. The pockets with Positive EV are:

1. AA
2. KK
3. QQ
4. AK suited
5. AQ suited
6. AK unsuited
7. Low pockets: 22 through to 99

All other pockets in Early are -EV, fold.

Middle: M1-4

Pockets with +EV are:

The same as early, plus:

1. AJ suited
2. AT suited
3. JJ
4. TT
5. AQ unsuited
6. AJ unsuited
7. AT unsuited
8. Any suited picture cards, 10,J,Q,K.

All other combinations are negative, fold them.

Late Position

Pockets with +EV are:

The same as early and middle, plus:

1. A5 suited
2. A4 suited
3. A3 suited
4. A2 suited
5. A9 suited
6. Any unsuited picture cards.

Every other possible pocket in Late position has a Negative EV.

Other considerations
With the exception of AA and KK, only play them if the cost to get to the flop is not over 3x the Big Blind bet. The Low Pockets, 22-99 have some further play rules in this regard but that is another whole article, look for that later.

To remember the playable pockets make a reference card to keep by your PC. Split it into 3 sections. Early Position, middle and late position, with the associated playable pockets.

So create your reference card now and start practicing hard on some free online poker games at NoPayPOKER.com!

This article is a cut down version of the DM Vadnais Building a Bankroll lesson 2, check that one out for expanded details on the points in this article.