1. No Limit Texas Holdem Strategy
2. Aol Texas Holdem No Limit
3. Aol Texas Hold'em No Limit

A good primer for how to play limit hold'em especially if you are a no limit player curious how to adjust.Check out my Full Contact Poker Podcast at http://w. Hold'em comes in four betting structures: limit, no-limit, pot-limit and spread-limit. No-limit hold'em (NLHE) is the rising star of poker games. A few years ago the game could not be found in a live poker room, but the popularity of televised poker has increased interest in this structure. In some rooms it rivals limit hold'em in popularity and is about even in popularity at online poker venues.

Playing before the flop is your first opportunity to voluntarily put money in the pot. Don’t just toss in the first single bet to be a part of the action. Make good decisions by following the advice given in this lesson and stick to our recommended starting hand requirements until you gain more experience. There is no shame in folding and waiting for a better hand to play. On the contrary, the shame is in falling prey to the donkey’s mantra of “any two will do!”

Before we mention starting hand requirements, let’s talk about the mindset that captures successful limit play. That mindset is the ability to be patient and selective about the hands you play. Patience is a critical element to winning hold’em play. Good players exercise the patience to wait for hands that they know have positive expectation and then play them aggressively. In a nutshell this strategy describes the selective, aggressive mantra that has been espoused by Krieger, Sklansky, Malmuth, Caro, and every other credible limit hold’em pundit of the last several decades.

Tight is Right

No Limit Hold'em is the most popular variant of poker in the world, though Pot Limit Omaha has made some strides over the past 4-5 years. The online No Limit Hold'em games have gotten much, much. The Rules of the Game are the same as in No-Limit Hold’em, but the hand ranking is slightly different. It’s played with ante’s instead of blinds, of which each player has to post one before the flop and the BTN.

The tight-aggressive approach is the backbone of a successful limit player’s strategy. The reason this approach is so successful is simple—the vast majority of the poker playing public are long term losers who do not have the discipline or knowledge to beat the game. Let your opponents make the mistake of playing too many hands while you become more selective. It will pay dividends. If you only play hands that figure to be the best against opponents who play too many mediocre hands, it just makes sense that you will win money. This critical skill is the foundation upon which other skills need to be added to make you a formidable limit hold’em player.

The most common mistake made by limit hold’em players is that they play too many hands. Look, no one enters a casino or logs on to an online game with the intention of folding hand after hand. But when you look at the entire universe of possible two-card starting hand combinations you might be dealt, the vast majority of them are junk, which means the correct play is to fold most of them. If there’s one tip that will raise your game significantly, it’s this: be selective with the hands you choose to play, and then be aggressive with the hands you do play.

Starting Hand Selection

What hands should you play if you’re going to be patient and selective? Well, that depends in large measure upon your position relative to the dealer button. The best starting hands are playable from any position, but other hands have very different characteristics.

We have created a starting hand chart that can be used as a guide. This chart will load as a PDF document (link opens in a new window), which you can view on screen or print off for easy reference.

Understand that our attempt to categorize starting hands by their strength and positional considerations is a loose guide. There are many factors that may encourage you to tighten or loosen your play from these guidelines. As in all poker decisions the phrase, “It depends” comes to mind. That is to say our starting hand chart is a guide, not a set of intractable rules.

In fact, you may want to look at a starting hand chart this way:

1. If you’re a beginner or a consistently money-losing player, treat this guide as the gospel.
2. If you’re an experienced player, you can treat these recommendations as a guide.
3. If you’re a skillful, winning player, please consider these recommendations a point of demarcation for your own creative, winning play.

But before you decide to deviate from these guidelines, have a reason for taking action that’s at variance from our recommendations.

We haven’t included every possible starting hand on our chart. Unplayable hands, also known as ‘junk’ don’t need any further explanation. I’m sure you will recognize them. In fact, the majority of the hands you’ll be dealt will fall into this category. Let your weak undisciplined opponents play 7-2 because it was suited—you throw them in the muck where they belong.

No Limit Texas Holdem Strategy

Type of Games

It’s important to be aware that different games play differently. The texture of the game—whether it’s tight and aggressive, tight and passive, loose and aggressive, loose and passive, or a mixture of these, will dictate what hands you should play. For example, if you’re playing in a loose and passive game, you can limp in from early position with small pocket pairs. If you’re playing in an aggressive game these hands are better off mucked from early position.

There is an old adage in poker relating to how tight or loose the game in which you’re in is being played. The adage advises to play tighter than the table. While this is obviously an over simplification it is generally true. While tight is certainly right, all you need do is play tighter poker than the table. The reason this will work is that through prudent hand selection coupled with your position you will be playing fewer (and generally better) hands than your opponents. However, expect loose games to tighten and tight games to become looser, and be ahead of that curve to ensure you’re in the most profitable zone at all times.

Calling vs. Raising

A lot of limit hold’em players will limp in pre-flop rather than raise. If you’re in a passive game and have a hand like J-Ts then you might want to limp because you’re looking to get as many people into the pot with you as possible in anticipation of flopping a big hand like a straight or flush—and making money from a large number of opponents. If you have a pair or high cards that can win without improving, such as A-K, you’re much better off raising and narrowing the field down to heads-up than you are by simply calling and inviting a number of players to enter the pot after you, one of whom might get lucky and steal the pot away from you.

If you call and are then raised, you’re going to call one more bet and see the flop. If it’s raised and re-raised, some players will do the same thing, regardless of the strength of their hand. Imagine entering the pot with the speculative hand of for a single bet from middle position. Now the player to your left raises, another player re-raises and yet another player makes it four bets, which is normally the cap in fixed limit. Weaker players will normally call as they have already invested a bet and the hand does have lots of potential. Stronger players would recognize the futility of throwing away three extra bets when it is apparent that they are way behind the competition. These distinctions will become clearer and clearer as your experience grows.

Cold Calling Raises

If the pot has been raised before it’s your turn, you must tighten up significantly and adjust for the position of the raise. Inexperienced limit hold’em players will frequently cold-call raises with mediocre and potentially dominated hands, such as A-J and K-J. These are costly errors. Be selective and avoid cold-calling raises with hands that have a slim chance to catch the cards they need to enable you to win the pot. Most good players, if they don’t have a very good hand, will simply throw their hand away and wait for a better opportunity. Remember that it takes a much better hand to call a raise than it does to make the initial raise yourself.

Always observe the pre-flop betting action in a limit hold’em game, because it provides valuable information about the strength of your opponent’s holdings. If there’s a bet and a raise and someone cold-calls, my first thought is “here’s a guy with A-Q who is terrified of a big pair and even more terrified of A-K”. He thinks A-Q is a pretty good hand and says to himself… “I’ll call and see what happens with it.” Of course it’s important that you assign a range of hands to your opponents, not just a specific hand. But most players will re-raise before the flop when they hold a premium hand and cold-calling a raise or cold-calling a re-raise is usually a sign of a hand that’s not in first place.

Conclusion

The question or whether to hold’em or fold’em is the first and most important decision you will make. If you’re new to limit hold’em then study our starting hand chart and follow the guidelines given in this lesson. Starting hand selection may differ slightly from pundit to pundit but these are a solid outline for a beginner to embrace. As your experience and knowledge of the game increases your starting requirements will vary based upon how tight or loose your table is, knowledge of the tendencies of players yet to act behind you, any betting that has occurred in front of you, and your current table image.

If you only play hands that figure to be the best against opponents who play too many mediocre hands, it just makes sense that you will win the money. Playing tight requires patience which many or even most recreational players just don’t exhibit. They are in the game to play, not sit to there and fold hand after hand and sit on the sidelines. This is the reason that most poker players are long term losers—they play too many hands. Sure they can get lucky playing junk on occasion and that is what keeps them coming back but their lack of patience and discipline is their financial undoing. If you truly seek success you must have the discipline to be patient.

By Tom 'TIME' Leonard

Tom has been writing about poker since 1994 and has played across the USA for over 40 years, playing every game in almost every card room in Atlantic City, California and Las Vegas.

General No Limit Holdem Advice

Play No Limit Texas Holdem at a loose table for more profits, raise with any high pocket pair and avoid slow playing most hands.

Poker Tips for Small Pocket Pairs

Small pocket pairs 2-8 can be played under certain situations. Look for a set on board, bluff a short-stacked player or go heads up with the button.

No Limit Play after the Flop

After the flop, it is time to fold missed pocket pairs, chase drawing hands with correct pot odds, slow play a monster and bluff off a rainbow board.

Best Internet Casinos

In a very real way, No Limit Texas Holdem is better than limit and pot limit versions. If you don't believe this, just go to any poker room online and compare the games among themselves. If you have been playing at the limit tables for a while, you will be surprised by the dramatic change in atmosphere when you switch to No Limit. Here anyone can go all-in without warning. This makes the game more exciting, riveting and rewarding.

Aol Texas Holdem No Limit

Yes, No Limit Texas Holdem is actually more profitable than the limit versions. Because raises are limited only by your stock of chips, you can squeeze the most profits from your monster hands, unlike in limit games where there is a betting cap. Moreover bluffing is more useful in No Limit Holdem. In limit tables, it's hard to threaten the big blind with only four times their bet. But in No Limit, you can raise to an amount equal to their chip stack and steal the pot right there.

The option to bet bigger has its advantages and disadvantages. You can lose more if you make bad decisions (officially called 'mistakes') such as calling a $1,000 bet while chasing a gutshot on the river. But you can also get paid off big on an A-8 that makes a two pair on the flop. You can have a stack 2-6 times more than the other players in one hand, and in the next it is decimated when one of them goes all-in and win. Or you can buy in with a paltry $160 and walk away with $3,300 thanks to a decent two pair.

In No Limit, you have to be more aggressive than in Limit. It will pay off more often than not. However aggressive does not mean being loose. In No Limit, you will want to raise often so make sure you have a hand that is worth raising. Generally (not always), even when you are on the button, you must play no worse than a Jack and Ten. But it is a fact that you can win more with less in No Limit.

On the whole, the freedom to bet as much as you can afford makes No Limit Texas Holdem truly a very exciting and fulfilling poker game. Best of all, it pays. Big.

Learn to play No Limit Texas Holdem with these lessons and strategies:

Lesson 1 - Basic Rules of No Limit Texas Holdem Lesson 2 - Starting Hands No Limit Texas Holdem Lesson 3 - Short-Handed and Full No Limit Tables Lesson 4 - General No Limit Holdem Advice Lesson 5 - Tips for Playing Small Pocket Pairs Lesson 6 - No Limit Texas Holdem after the Flop Lesson 7 - Poker Hand Evaluation On the Turn and River Lesson 8 - Betting Tells: Call, Fold, Raise or Check Lesson 9 - Various No Limit Poker Concepts and Strategies Lesson 10 - No Limit Texas Holdem Tournament Strategy Lesson 11 - Stack Size, Betting and Bluffing Lesson 12 - Types of Hands and Pay Off Lesson 13 - More No Limit Texas Holdem Tips

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Aol Texas Hold'em No Limit

No Limit Texas Holdem Stack Size and Betting

Chip stack sizes are a factor in poker. Short-stacked players can easily go all-in and big-stacked players police the table to keep you honest

Short-Handed and Full Tables in No Limit Texas Holdem

Short-handed tables are poker games with six or less active players. Play aggressively with more hands, bluff more and raise/re-raise a lot.