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The Theory behind Poker Playing

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The basic theory of poker was introduced by David Sklansky and it goes like this: you gain every time you play your cards like you know your opponent's cards and you also gain every time your opponent plays his cards in a different way than he would play them if he knew your cards.

The most common strategy to induce your opponent into playing his cards differently than he would if they could see your cards is bluffing and slow-playing. Both slow-playing and bluffing are ways of deceiving t other players. By bluffing a player deceives his opponents to think he has a strong hand and induces them to fold superior hands. Slow-playing is in a way the opposite of bluffing: a slow-player bets weakly with a strong hand while a bluffer bets strongly with a weak hand. If the players know each other they can predict each other's moves so one shouldn’t be too consistent when playing poker. If a player never slow-plays, opponents will probably swoop at the first sing of weakness. At the same time if a player never bluffs his opponents will not call his bets if they don't have very strong hands.

The seating arrangement of the players is very important from a strategic point of view. In most cases players who have to act first need stronger hands to bet than players in later positions. A player in a late position has the advantage of seeing the other players’ actions and thus he knows more about their hands than his opponents know about his.

Another important factor to consider in online poker strategy is the relationship between odds of winning and pot odds. Pot odds means the ratio of the pot to the minimum amount of bet required to stay in the play. Ideally the winning odds are better than pot odds.

- by Kianna Smith