Hand Odds & Pot Odds

[jimjamjay]

Hi all,  am new to this forum and am looking for some advice.......

Have read the article on the blonde website and that cleared up %'s pre flop and of improving on Turn or River so that is the hand odds - how do you then calculate the pot odds quickly during a hand ?

Know its a basic question for you guys so please bear with me

Also what are the recommendations on books to read for NL ?  I have read a couple but they did not really hit the mark.

[TightEnd]

Books, there are a number of threads on this if you have the time to look back

the usual suspects...Harrington Vols 1 and 2 for tournaments, Super System 2, Sklansky


Pot odds.....a quick bit of mental arithmetic to do at the table that I find helpful to give "Ballpark" figures

The Rule of Four/Two

With two cards to come after the flop multiply your number of outs by four.
With one to come after the turn multiply your number of outs by two

If you have a four to a flush after the flop you have nine outs. 9 X 4= 36% chance of hitting your flush. After the turn 9x2=18%

You can compare said odds with the amount you are being asked to put into a pot compared to the total to see if youo have "pot odds"

Of course you then have to consider Implied Odds (I'll leave explaining that to somone else, the cricket's starting!)) and the fact that some of your "outs" may not be clean outs

I find the rule of four/two especially useful on line when you don't have that much time to make a decision

[RED-DOG]

The Rule of Four/Two


This rule has been very helpfull to me

Every time I get it wrong, Mrs Red hits me with a lump of Four/Two, it really focuses the mind

[TightEnd]

 

Good morning Red Dog

[jimjamjay]

4x2 it is then - thanks guys 

[RED-DOG]

Morning TE

Do you (or anyone else) know of any decent multis, say $50 + starting in the AM, or failing that, $100 + STT's with a good clock

I can't seem to find anything

[TightEnd]

The morning is dead for decent Multis

STTs....try Stars or the Cryptos...you might wait a while but they fill up all day long

[RED-DOG]

Thanks, Stars very slow at this time of the morning and I can only find 10 hand levels on Crypto

[Sheriff Fatman]

Also what are the recommendations on books to read for NL ?  I have read a couple but they did not really hit the mark.

A good entry level book for No Limit Hold'em is "No Limit Hold'em" by Tom McEvoy and Brad Daugherty, which is aimed at new players to the game.

Follow that up with Harrington on Holdem Vols 1 & 2, which are actually aimed at NL tournaments but are also the best sources of info on NLHE in general, in my view.

Doyle Brunsons NLHE section in Super System (which is pretty much copied again in Super System 2) is generally considered to be a classic but its more suited to very deep stacked games rather than the fixed buy-in games which predominate nowadays.  Worth a read, but not at the top of the list in my view.

I'd also recommend Ciaffone/Reuben's "Pot and No Limit Poker" at some point which covers general concepts for big bet poker.

Sklansky is supposed to be bringing out a NLHE book this year (all his earlier work is pretty much focused on limit poker).  It should be good, based on his previous work, but we'll have to wait and see.

Sheriff

[snoopy1239]

If you are speedy enough, card player has a very accessible poker odds calculator for Texas and Omaha.

[ifm]

I think there was a slight misread there jim.
Firstly just to say you can get pretty much exact HAND odds for the river by multiplying your outs by 2.2
i.e if you have 10 outs your odds are 22% to hit the river

Pot odds are used when you have to decide whether it's worth calling a bet or raise.
If say you are drawing to a 3 outer on the river and it's 5k to call with 20k in the pot you are getting good pot odds (4 to 1)to call the bet even though your hand odds are terrible it's pretty much unpassable due to the size of the pot (and implied odds should you hit).
Obviously if it would put you allin it ain't such a good call

I had one the other day where i raised utg to steal the blinds (i never usually steal) with KJ off, it's folded to a player who goes allin, it's folded back to me and i have the decision of whether to call another 7k to win a 17k pot, not the best pot odds but seeing as i had chips back i call and bust aces with 2 pairs on the flop
The point is i wouldn't have called the reraise without pot odds.
Hope this helps,
Ian

[jimjamjay]

All posts very useful thanks 

[Ironside]

in cash game always take the pot odds if they are in your favour

in tourny always look at the +/- of your stack by taking the pot odds are you going to hurt your stack to such an extent that it will be nearly impossible to recover weigh that up by how much of an advantage will you have if you win the pot

example your 50/50 to win the pot there is 300k in the pot and it will cost you 200k to see the remaining cards
the average stack is 1million

if you have 3million its an easy call
if you have 500k it's debatable
if you have 200k its proberly a correct call but you would prefably be going into coin flips as the raiser

[Maroon]

Good thread.