Narciso Baldo, Author at Texas Holdem Questions

Is Mobile Poker a Good Thing?

Posted on February 19, 2020February 19, 2020 by Narciso Baldo

Mobile Poker is Here

With the advances made in technology, poker enthusiasts are now able to play mobile poker. Who’d have thought when the poker boom happened, we would one day have the ability to play poker on our phones? At face value, it’s great isn’t it? You can get bonuses, play practically anywhere and earn on the move. If you’re a winning player already, you may think this will increase your earning potential, particularly if there are more recreational players on their mobile phones playing poker against you.

There are some disadvantages to playing mobile poker too though.

Small Screen

Most mobiles are not that big. If you’re playing mobile poker, chances are you on an iPhone or Android which is a lot smaller than a PC screen or even a tablet. This is not great for visibility or your eyesight. You are more likely to make errors or mis-click the buttons playing on a small screen.

Distractions

The most obvious problem with playing on your phone is the distractions you are likely to encounter. You’re more than likely playing in an environment with noise, TV on, people around. This means you are not as likely to give the game enough concentration. Poker is a mental game and it’s challenging enough without distractions. If you add noise, conversations and TV to the mix, it is only likely to hurt your hourly win rate.

Difficulties with Multi-Tabling

If you are at your best playing 2-4 tables, then you will want to take this to mobile poker. This is difficult to say the least, while some sites allow you to multi table and your table will pop up when it’s your action, there is no denying that the visibility you have on a PC or laptop far outweighs the capacity to multi table effectively on a mobile. Depending on the games you play, one table may be your optimum anyway but if playing 1 table harms your win rate than maybe mobile poker isn’t for you.

Burn Out

Believe it or not, you can play too much poker. If you’re playing poker on your PC or laptop and then playing lots on your phone too, you might just be playing too much. This is negative several reasons including personal wellness and your ability to earn. It’s usually a good idea to track how much you are playing. Burn out is a real issue for poker players even the best ones. Many players just want to earn and will play far too long because they think the game is good or they have an edge. Having ability to mobile poker certainly increases the likelihood of burn out and fatigue

Conclusion

Mobile poker is convenient and can be a useful tool, particularly for a beginner wanting to learn. Check out pokerappguide if you want to know the best poker app sites around. For the serious player hoping to maximise earnings and play their best, it’s probably not as appropriate but still profitable.

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Strip Poker

Posted on February 16, 2020February 13, 2020 by Narciso Baldo

Introduction to Strip Poker

You have probably watched strip poker scenes on TV before. Strip Poker is the default party game. It involves losing players to remove items of clothing. It is usually played between 3 and 6 players but can also be played heads up (although a little weird!). Historically it has been played with men and women. It was likely founded in the late 19^th century but earliest attestations date to early 20^th century circa 1920 when it was played in New Orleans, USA and predominantly played in brothels, for obvious reasons. It has gained popularity in movies and TV shows, including popular sitcom Friends.

Which Game of Poker?

It is usually played to 5 card draw but can be played with Texas Holdem too. The main difference between the two is that Texas Holdem Strip Poker is usually the betting of clothes whereas 5 card draw relies on either the worst performing player in the hand removing an item of clothing or all but the winner of the hand removes an item. The Texas Holdem variant also means if you fold before the flop, you do not have to remove clothing. This essentially means a tight pre flop strategy keeps you clothed for longer!

Clothes

It is usually a good idea to have everyone have the same number of items of clothing. This sometimes means you will have to put a hat on or gloves to make the game fair. There is no point turning up to a strip poker game in shorts and a tank top and your opponents wearing 10 items of clothing.

The Spirit of Strip Poker

Strip poker is not really meant to be played seriously. It designed to increase the sexual tension and embarrassment between adults playing the game. It is usually played whilst drinking, at a party and between friends, with no money at stake. If you are at party and invited to play strip poker, don’t put on your sunglasses and get out your notepad to take notes, it’s all about the fun. A word of caution though, if you are particularly uptight or self-conscious about your body, best to bow out and watch the game with a beer than play yourself. It is not a game for the faint hearted.

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Sit N Go Poker – The Pros & Cons

Posted on February 14, 2020February 14, 2020 by Narciso Baldo

Sit N Go Introduction

A Sit N Go is a tournament with a predefined number of entrants, usually 9 or 18 but can be up to 180. Like a regular tournament, the top positions occupy the best cashes. It combines tournament strategy, survival, hand selection and the ability to play short stack well. Let’s look at reasons for and against playing Sit N Go poker.

Pro – Convenience

Being able to play a tournament in an hour is far more convenient than playing one lasting 8. You have plans to go cinema tonight? Don’t worry you can still play a SNG. They rarely last more than 75 minutes and turbo SNGs are available too which take even less time.

Pro – Multi-Tabling is Simple

You can increase your ROI easier with SNGs playing a few tables. If you are a competent player and looking at your ROI and hourly rate, you will quickly see you need to be playing several tables. Due to the relatively simple and predictable nature of a SNG, it is far simpler to multi table a sit n go than any other poker.

Pro – Improves Discipline

You will notice after playing many SNGs, that a defined strategy and hand selection will become imperative, particularly early on. This will improve your discipline before the flop and allow you to hone a strategy that works for you.

computer screens — Photo by Josh Sorenson

Con – Earnings Restrictions

We all play poker to make money, but unless you are playing many tables or playing decent stakes. It’s questionable how much money you can make. If you are ambitious and want to earn lots of money, SNGs may not be for you as you need a lot of volume to see tangible earnings.

Con – Technical Restrictions

You’ll see Sit N Gos develop into short stack poker mode quite quickly. That’s great if you are happy to play short stack poker, but if you are looking to develop as a poker player and learn to play post flop poker well than Sit N Go poker isn’t your bag.

Con – Boring

This may be a contentious “con” but I find sit n go poker quite boring. The predefined nature, the same opponents, the same pay-outs. Where cash games and tournaments are dynamic and engaging, sit n go poker is more rigid and predictable.

I hope you enjoyed this article. Our poker training video membership has a video on spin n go poker if you are interested, just email us at info@texasholdemquestions.com to find out how to view it or click the button below and take advantage of 25% discount.

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Is PKC Poker and Chinese Poker Apps Safe?

Posted on February 13, 2020February 12, 2020 by Narciso Baldo

Introduction to PKC and Poker Apps

PKC is the abbreviation for Poker King Club – an Asian mobile poker site that offers Texas Holdem to predominantly Asian but also international poker enthusiasts.

What Do They Offer?

Chinese poker apps may sound like the Chinese poker game but it is the main poker games they offer. The games themselves appear very lucrative and fishy with many a poker expert labeling NL600 playing NL25. This is partly due to the Asian community playing, no HUDs and playing on a mobile phone. At face value this seems great but on close inspection there are a few reasons to avoid these sites and apps.

Problem Registering Accounts

Registering an account with these sites are often problematic and rarely direct. Many stories circulate online about people posing as agents to get money on the site for you, to vanish off with your money. Be very careful if you choose to play on these sites and can’t register direct.

Problems with Bots

Whilst bots are mostly used for rakeback purposes and rarely visible on most sites. They are known to be prevalent on the Chinese poker apps. Not only is this illegal but it brings the game and sites into question. The safe poker sites have departments dedicated to fraud detection and can pick up on the use of bots and ban accounts. This security seems to be a concept lost on the Chinese poker apps and PKC.

Problems with Collusion

Another cause for concern with security is the stories circulating of rampant collusion. Where big money is, the cheaters will look to go and these sites appear fishy and draw the criminals to them. With poor security, this makes detecting and preventing collusion much more difficult.

Problems with Money?

Most of these sites deal in crypto currency like Bitcoin. Any App that wants to use anything else other than proper currency is suspect to me. In an industry that is already tarnished with a bad brush due to scams in the past, this does no site or app any favors.

Final Warning

You are free to make your own decision when choosing to play poker but please do your due diligence. There are plenty of review sites dedicated to helping you find the safest and best sites to play poker on. Whilst an app may seem profitable at first glance, think twice before depositing.

Please remember to gamble responsibly.

I want improve my poker game in 2020

Is The Over-Bet Underused in Poker?

Posted on February 11, 2020February 10, 2020 by Narciso Baldo

The Over-Bet

Depending on the situation, an over bet is either an awful play or a genius one. There is not much in between, from a 3^rd party perspective. This is because an over bet will force your opponent out of the pot (either lost value or a great bluff) or you’ve been called (lost far more than necessary or got extra value).The truth is, there are scenarios where an over bet is the most profitable bet to make and also the worst bet to make. Deciding when to pull off a successful over-bet takes experience, intuition and thorough of understanding your opponent.

The Bluff Over-Bet

In order to pull off success bluff, sometimes you have to bet a lot. With the right opponent (conservative) and deep stacks, an over bet bluff can be a great weapon to use. Whilst this same player may call 60-80% of the pot, they will often fold to an over- bet shove or 2x pot size bet. They know they are not getting a good price on their money and will look for a more sensible hand to invest in. The over bet bluff is usually best to try on the river when there are no more cards to come.

You need a few things to be on your side for an over- bet bluff to be successful:

Opponent who has demonstrated ability to fold
Deep stacks
You’ve not shown down an over bet bluff already

The Value Over-Bet

This value bet is not utilised enough really. I am guilty myself and don’t use this move often enough. I think many people think they will waste value and prefer to get something than nothing so they will typically just put in a decent value bet. It’s a great move to pull off against fishy players who can’t fold a medium strength hand or advanced players who are prone to making a hero call or levelling themselves.

Fishy opponent who is likely to call an over bet just as much a standard
You have shown an over bet bluff
Competent player who can level themselves
Deep stacks

embarrassed by over-bet — Photo By Wallace Chuck
*Don’t be embarrassed to try the over-bet*

Caution

Like most poker moves, this is not one to be constantly used against the same players. In fact, against a decent player, you can probably only get away with 2-3 successful over bet bluffs or value over bets before they’ve clocked which you use it for. The trick is to master both. I recommend attempting both in the future when your instinct tells you it will work. Once you have dipped your toe in you will soon incorporating both bets into your game in the future.

I hope you found this article useful and consider the over-bet more in the future.

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Poker Cheat Sheet for 2020

Posted on February 9, 2020February 18, 2020 by Narciso Baldo

What is a Poker Cheat Sheet?

A poker cheat sheet is a guide to help you learn the absolute basic fundamentals to play solid poker in order to beat micro and low stake games. Like any endeavor, it takes time, experience and regular evaluation to become a master. The idea behind a cheat sheet is that you can refer to it easily to help you make better decisions than you would otherwise.

Hand Rankings

If you are new to poker, you will need to understand the proper hand rankings. The list below should help you understand the respective hand rankings.

Calculating Outs as Odds

To make better decisions, you will want to know the chances of improving your hand and reconciling that with the amount your opponent is betting. The table below should help you see, at a glance, the approximate percentage of you making your hand for the most common scenarios you will find yourself in. After a while, calculating your outs and converting them to odds will become intuitive. In the meantime, feel free to refer to this table.

Draw Type	Number of Outs	Turn & River (2 Cards)	River (One Card)
Flush & 2 Overcards	15	54%	33%
Flush & 1 Overcard	14	51%	30%
Open End Straight & 1 Overcard	11	42%	24%
Flush	9	35%	19%
Open End Straight	8	32%	17%
Set to Full House or Quads	7	28%	15%
2 Overcards	6	24%	13%
Gutshot Straight	4	17%	9%
Backdoor Flush or Straight	1	4%	2%

Hand Selection – Open Raising

Choosing which hands to play is very important. It’s the first key decision of any poker hand. If you are starting out in poker. The most important thing is to play a selective hand range based on the position you are in. As you lack the post flop skills to profitably make marginal pre flop calls, you will need to be careful about the hands you play. The table below is a guide to hands you can open raise with, if you are first to enter the pot i.e. nobody has raised in front of you. Please note that the table assumes you are opening the hand ranges in the earlier positions too e.g. You open KJ suited in early position therefore you are opening it in mid position too.

Early Position	Middle Position	Late Position	Small Blind
All pocket pairs from 5s to Aces	KJ/KQ/KT/QJ	Any Ace	NA
AT-AK Suited	Suited Aces	All Suited Kings	NA
KQ Suited	Pocket 2s to 4s	All Connectors	NA
KJ Suited	Suited Connectors above a 6 e.g. 7h 8h	All Gapped Connectors e.g. Q9	NA
	QJ Suited/KT Suited/QT Suited/JT Suited	Any suited cards with at worst 3 gap between e.g. Jd8d	NA

Please note I have not assigned a hand range to open raise from the small blind with. I firmly believe this is the worst spot to open raise in Texas Holdem from and don’t think it would be wise to advise a wide open raise range from here. Instead, play very careful from there. Look to minimize how much you lose and let the strong hands do their “talking” so to speak.

Hand Selection – Calling Raises

As you won’t have the pre-flop aggression in the hand when calling a raise, it is important you are calling raises with hands that are at least as equal in value to the likely range your opponent is raising with and preferably with position on them. There is no cheat to knowing what hands you should call player A’s raise with. Instead, think about the type of player raising and act accordingly. In other words, if it is a loose player opening, you can widen the hands you call with as he is opening wider than a tight player. If it is a tight player opening, you should be looking to play less hands or hands that can break him and his premium hands e.g. low pairs.
As a very basic guide consider calling raises with the hands below.

Any Pocket Pair
A Q off suit
A J suited
A Q suited
A T suited
K Q suited

Hand Selection – Re Raising AKA 3 Bet

Starting out, I recommend 3 betting with AK suited, Pocket Queens, Kings and Aces. As you develop and gain experience you will certainly be re raising with other hands but this cheat sheet is purely for the new player playing micro/low stakes poker.

Post Flop Poker

You will quickly learn that playing the flop, turn and river is complex. As you are playing a selective hand range to begin with, you will not be facing as many difficult situations as a more experience player. Check out some tips to follow below.

Miss the flop, get out of the way
Be wary of straight and flushes if betting gets large
Bet 50% or more of the pot when you bet
Don’t attempt crazy bluff bets when you are multi way
Don’t slowplay your hands, people will call you down at micro stakes so less need for deception
Bet your top pair or better hands#
Don’t get too attached to Ace King if you miss!

Conclusions

This cheat sheet is aimed at the new player coming to poker in 2020 who has no experience but wants to learn quickly. Understanding hand rankings, what hands to play and the basic odds are the most simple and fundamental skills to be a competent player, capable of winning at micro stakes. There is so much more strategy and complexity to Texas Holdem that can take years to master but we hope this cheat sheet will help you at the start of your poker journey.

I hope you enjoyed this article. Feel free to contact us if you are interested in finding out how we can help you improve your game and bankroll in 2020. You can also download our poker cheat sheet below.

How to Play Ace King?

Posted on February 5, 2020February 5, 2020 by Narciso Baldo

Introduction to Ace King

Known as “Big Slick”, Ace King is one of the strongest hands in Texas Holdem. This is a hand that many a player are unsure how to play, with most players prone to overplaying it. Whilst Ace King is unquestionably a premium starting hand, the context of the situation will determine its relative strength.

Maths

First of all, looking at the maths, you are far more likely to be dealt Ace King then any pocket aces or pocket kings as there are more combination of this hand than aces or kings. Ace King suited is clearly better than an off suit ace king and represents with suited usually achieving 5-7% better equity than its off suit counterparts. It’s also worth pointing out at that if your opponent has pocket aces or kings than you are a big underdog (unsurprisingly) with approximately 6% chance against aces and 30% against kings.

Context is Everything

The situation should guide the way you play A-K. If stacks are shallow, its an amazing hand and you want to get your chips in with it. Tournament players will rarely fold A-K late in a tournament as stack sizes are rarely deep enough to warrant a fold. They understand that they are only doing badly against aces or kings and will happily take a coin flip if necessary. Whilst this is a reasonable proposition when stacks are shallow or you are facing aggressive opponents, it’s not always the best mentality, particularly if you consider yourself the best player at the table. If you are in an expensive and slow structured tournament, ace king’s value for committing you’re your stack before the should drop significantly as you are likely to be up against kings or aces when strong players commit their tournament life. Obviously, this is player dependent but the reality is, strong tournament players are not committing their entire stacks very lightly early in deep stack events (there are exceptions).
If it’s early in a tournament or you are facing a tight player opening from early position, consider a more prudent approach to playing. Most beginner players see A-K and want to re raise regardless of the situation. This is a foolish way to play, not only are you disregarding position, stack sizes, opponent and the value of deception, you are also giving away information to your opponents “I always re raise with ace king”. Flat calling raises with A-K, particularly in heads up pots can be no bad thing. In situations when your opponent is dominated before the flop and would otherwise fold, you can often extract a lot of value.

Conclusion

Ultimately your ability and confidence in playing post flop poker will guide how you intend to play A-K. A strong and experienced player can vary his style and adopt flat calls and 3 bets as he sees fit, whereas a novice should be more inclined to play straightforward poker, particularly at low stakes. If you have less than 75 BBs in a tournament and your opponent isn’t a nit, you can often safely commit your stack, providing you are getting the last bet in. If it’s more than 75b BBs and the player is tight or there are multiple raises, throw it away and move on to the next hand.

I hope you found this article on Ace King useful. If you are keen to learn more about how it can be played in tournaments or cash games, feel free to email us at info@texasholdemquestions.com.

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What is Small Ball Poker?

Posted on February 1, 2020February 15, 2020 by Narciso Baldo

Introduction to Small Ball Poker

A poker strategy that has exploded in popularity in the last few years, small ball is an overarching poker mentality used successfully by professionals, yet often misunderstood and poorly used by novices. There are several components to playing small ball; hand selection, bet sizing, position and table image.

Hand Selection

Small ball poker dictates playing a lot of poker with a variety of hands. If you want to attack many unwanted pots, you need to widen your opening range. This varies player to player, but most professionals accept that suited connectors, suited aces and the paint cards have the most play-ability and equity to warrant including in opening raise ranges.

Bet Sizing

Small ball poker is what you expect, small bets. Professionals understand that a smaller, probing type bet accomplishes the same thing as a bigger bet and for less risk. This means many cheap bluffs. The underlying concept is that the player is consistent though. It’s no use sizing your bets differently based on hand strength, otherwise your opponents will correctly read your hand. It doesn’t take long to figure this out. Consistent bet sizing is critical to small ball poker. It means you can accomplish cheap bluffs but also extract value.

Position

As always, position is important. Small ball experts will play as many pots in position as they can. They understand there are an abundance of chips to be picked up in pots that people aren’t interested in contesting. As such, they will be opening an incredibly high amount of pots in position when it folds to them and also be calling raises in position if multi way and cheap. The reason being they can risk few chips to gain many. They understand the implied odds, that they can play the 3h 4h for a small raise when stack sizes are 100 bb + because they are risking 2.5 big blinds to bust a weak player who is prone to overplaying their pocket Aces on a 3s 3h Kd type flop.

Table Image

The beauty of small ball is the image you project to your opponents. By playing many pots you are giving the illusion you are a bit wild and almost certainly a bluffer. After all, you are playing many pots and often betting and winning without showdown. On close inspection though, the small ball expert is not betting crazily and big amounts. They are often 40-50% of the pot and carefully wagered, often heads up pots or when the time is right. In short, the table image a small ball player projects is perfect! An opponent may notice after hours of lost pots, take a stand and then bust out when they finally realise that the small baller is only playing big pots with monster hands.

Warning

Small ball requires a player to be expert before and after the flop, experienced and attentive. Don’t try this style of poker if you are not confident playing many different scenarios. It’s also worth pointing out this is not the ideal strategy for most cash games and is mostly utilised in tournaments to build a stack without much risk.

This article has touched on just a few parts involved in small ball poker. If you are interested in knowing more or want mentoring in small ball, email us at info@texasholdemquestions.com.

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Table Image – Does It Matter?

Posted on January 28, 2020February 5, 2020 by Narciso Baldo

How are you perceived at the poker table? Do you know or care? You should, because your image will be a factor when playing poker. Whether it’s trying to get a bluff through or getting paid off, your table image will be taking into account by your opponents. Everyone has an image they are projecting at the poker table, whether they know it or not. Within an hour or so of playing, a strong and experienced player will already have tagged the majority of the table, almost entirely based on how they have played and appeared.

Loosey Goose Image

These are ten a penny online at the casino. The player involved in every pot, playing too many hands. Often bluffing and paying off bets all over the place. The loose player image is a good one to have as it means you are likely to get paid. A strong player will often do their best to get this image without actually playing crazy. This can be achieved by playing many small pots and attacking many pots with small bets, but not actually investing a lot of chips or money.

Tight Nitty Image

This is the player folding, hand after hand, round after round and patiently waiting for the premium hands to come along. How these players think they will get paid is beyond me, but in low stakes online and great games live, they do! The benefit of having a nitty image is if you have the ability to change gears, you can pull off many bluffs (against the right opponents). The reason is simple, if you have folded for 2 hours and now 3 bet, your opponents will give you credit – and rightly so.

Fishy/Donkey Image

This is just a bad player, it is similar to a loose image, however, a loose player can still be a strong player. Where a loose player is involved in lots of pots and trying bluff, a fish/donkey is just playing bad poker. This image is not desirable as it a strong player will target you all day long. It is not in your interest to get into personal battles or be known as the worst player at the table.

Professional

On the face of it, having the image of a professional seems great. People respect you and how you play. The reality is though, this isn’t the most desirable image as people will try to stay out of pots with you. Getting paid can be difficult and people often want to impress you and will potentially fold big hands or try bluffs on you. If you’re on your A game and pick up on this, it’s fine, but the fact is, you won’t always be and you can be in a pickle sizing your opponent up.

camera, image — Photo by Markus Spiske @markusspiske

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Table Image Tips

Change up your style, don’t be predictable and be confined to one image. It’s important to be difficult to read and cause confusion for your opponents. Soon as they know how you play; you’ve lost the battle. It’s best to be aware of your current image and shift to another and exploit your existing image. This takes a lot of practice but it is essentially what the best players are regularly doing. They know you saw them pull off a bluff 5 minutes ago and have gone into lock-down for 10 minutes. You need to do likewise to be a big winner at poker.

I hope you found this article useful. Feel free to email us if you are interested in knowing more about table image and how to use it to your advantage.

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The Value Bet – Reasons Why People Miss Out

Posted on January 24, 2020February 5, 2020 by Narciso Baldo

An art that is difficult to master, the value bet in poker is perhaps the most important skill to develop in order to become a long-term winner. It combines the complexity of hand reading, understanding of opponent and maximising value.

Common Mistakes

One of the most prevalent errors an inexperienced or unconfident player will make is check back hands on the river that warrant betting for value. They will often check back hands for reasons listed below.

Fear of Being Check-Raised
The river check raise is such an uncommon play and rarely ever done on a bluff that it is not to be feared, to the extent most players afraid. It takes incredible patience for an opponent to make their hand on the river and still check raise for value. Whilst it’s true, a strong player certainly has the discipline and skill to employ this, the typical online player will often just bet their nut hand on the river (even if their opponent has bet all the way through), purely because they are worried you will check back.

Lacking Conviction
Many players who miss out on value are doing so because they lack conviction in their own ability to know their hand is best and assign a range to their opponent. This is because they don’t have the confidence in their own game or lack experience. Perhaps they have suffered too many bad beats or read some hands poorly and it has affected them. Perhaps they are on tilt. Whatever the reason, they lack the conviction to put in the value bet they rightly should.

Wanting a Cheap Showdown
Some players just want to show their hand down. They don’t recognise that they are missing out on lots of value in the long run and are happy to check back on the river and show the winning hand. This is extremely detrimental to their long-term ROI and profitability as they are costing themselves money. I contend that many of these types of players even know they are checking back the better hand but do so anyway. Don’t be one of these players.

How Much to Bet?
This is the key question you should be asking every time you are considering a value bet on the river. One needs to think what is the most amount of money or chips I can obtain from my opponent. This is a complex question as it involves you assuming the perfect and maximum amount your opponent will call, given their likely hand range. A pot sized bet gives poor pot odds; thus, a strong, experienced player may be less inclined to call with a weak hand. On the contrary, a weak and inexperienced may be happy to call a huge over bet. Correctly judging the amount within a few seconds may seem impossible, but it is it not. It is intuitive and developed off the back of many hands of playing.

Money — Photo by Dmitry Demidko @wildbook

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Conclusion
The importance of appropriate value betting can’t be stressed enough. This article has discussed the reasons why people miss out on value and to avoid it. In future articles, we will be exploring the different types of value bet and how they can used based on opponent and relative hand strength.

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