Thinking Like a Poker Player

It is often said that the best poker strategy is to play tight and aggressive, to not play too many hands but to play them like they were the nuts when you do play. Whilst this is basically true in shorthanded games it may to a good agressive player thet is loose that will win. To be the all round player there are four thinking skills that must be mastered.

1) Mental arithmetic is essential for poker. You need to know for example that if you have a pocket pair your chances of drawing to a three of a kind, quads or two pair is 1 in 8 and that the chances of a flush draw are 1 in 3 at the flop.

You need to have a good understanding of outs. These are the number of cards not in your hand or on the board that would improve your hand to a winner. To express outs as a percentage if you prefer them, a good rule of thumb is to double the number of outs and add one. ( it works because there are around 50 cards in a deck that you do not know the identity of at any one time, so doubling the number of outs gives the equivalent of the number of outs there would be if there were 100 in the deck i.e. per 100 ).

Once you have added up your outs you must calculate your pot odds. Pot odds are the odds of your return on a bet. If for example there was $50 in the pot and you would need to bet $10 to see the River card your odds are 1 in 5. Compare this to your outs. If you have 12 outs and there are 48 cards neither on the board or in your hand your odds of drawing your hand are 1 in 4. We can now see that the bet would be a good risk because your rate of return is higher than your odds of drawing your hand.

2) Discipline and determination separates the fish from the real players. The winners of poker play few hands and expect to win when they  do play. The losers play hoping to get lucky and are just as happy playing any of the casino games, Different games require different amounts of discipline. Even between different types of poker you will need to use different amounts of discipline to prevail. In Limit and No-Limit poker for instance what will work in on will not in another. To win at Limit Poker you must play extra tight pre-flop and play fewer hands than in No-Limit.

The difference between No Limit and Limit Poker is that at Limit Poker the player must pay attention to not losing his stack bit by bit to the blinds and low bets but in No-Limit players are more concerned with not blowing their stack on a single hand.

Discipline is about taking a clinical view of when to play or go home. A player should know when they are On Tilt and when they should stay for a few more hands rather than quitting while they are ahead.

You should keep a log of your games played, stats, winnings, losses winnings per game, per hour played and the like. Find which games you are best at and figure out why, play to your strengths.

Do not get hung up on your mistakes, figure out what you did wrong realise what you should have done and move on, do not dwell on it. Your mind will seek out what ever you focus on so make sure you focus on how to play properly not on your mistakes.

3) Psychological Skills

Psychology is vitally important in Poker. To win at poker you must be able to get inside the head of you opponents. You must be able to put yourself in their position and give them the impression that you have a great hand by fastplaying or a weak hand by slowplaying.

Ask yourself:

• What do they have?

• What do they think I have?

• What do they think I think they have?

You must become a master at thinking along these lines and adept at making your opponents think what you would like them to think. Psychology is much more important in No-Limit Poker than Limit Poker where math skills are more important.

4) Appreciating Risk Versus Reward

Pot Odds, Implied Odds expecting a return are all a part of this. Poker players will take a bet with a low probability of winning if the return on the bet is high enough.

Economists consider people to be risk averse, neutral or loving depending on what they would do with a 50 50 bet. Risk averse people would not bet and risk lovers would. Since poker players demand an advantage they are thus naturally slightly risk averse however they are not afraid to bet and bet big when they have determined that the odds are in their favour.