Gambling both in-person and online is an incredibly popular activity and many people specifically choose to partake in poker making it generally one of the most popular options in one of the most popular pastimes out there according to AmericanGambling. Considering the massive number of people playing you’re bound to run into players of all kinds of skill levels and it’s important to know all the ins and outs of the game to give yourself the highest chance of winning. Whether that be learning what beats what in poker or how to size your bets, the latter of which we’ll be covering today in our text and hopefully helping your strategy so you can improve as a player at a faster rate and earn more winnings. Let’s dive into sizing your bets and enjoy a game of poker not on Gamstop.
Why is sizing your bets properly so important?
Manipulating people in poker is one of the main aspects of the game and for many people, it’s the reason they play it so much, the social side of the game is a big draw. Manipulating them isn’t only done by having a good poker face but it can also be done with your plays and bets. If you bet more people may assume that you have an amazing hand and might fold immediately or at least be far more cautious. It’s a simple but effective method for keeping people on their toes and it’s why doing this properly is a big deal.
Experienced poker players can tell how new you are oftentimes just by monitoring your bets as new players tend to fall into some common pitfalls and/or simply make repetitive bets regardless of if they make sense or not within the context of that specific situation, which leads to them not having the edge against other players and thus their chances of winning in that party drastically go down once people realize that their experience level is simply subpar.
Don’t repeat the bet of the last person
Generally, the rule is to not repeat what the last person bet, you generally want to keep raising the bets, the amount you raise of course depends on the context and what the current situation is in regards to your hand and other players. You can generally double or triple it, sometimes even 4x if you’re feeling spicy. Of course, you can go for odd numbers like 2.7 if you want greater control over how much money is going into that round.
The reason why betting the same amount as the last guy/girl is frowned upon is that it’s simply boring, people play poker for the rush and thrill, not for people playing it as safe as physically possible and repeating the previous bet. While the option is there generally people prefer to keep raising as it causes more interesting games to happen and at the end of the day most people play not for wins but for the fun and you’ll want to at least stick to raising the bet, even if only by small amounts if you don’t want people to regret playing with you.
Betting triple is pretty safe
Most people like to use the 3x rule, meaning no matter how much the previous person raised, you’ll call 3x that amount. If they raise 5 bucks then you go 15. Of course, you can’t keep that up for long, but as the starting bets are often quite meager it’s a good way to show confidence without risking too much cash, and you can of course switch to calling double or 2.5x afterward to stay safe.
Many experienced players follow this rule as it’s become somewhat of a popular strategy and it does generally lead to more riveting games just because the amount of money in the pot goes up dramatically early on so it’s pretty difficult to remain at a small number, thus making the stakes higher and the fun factor greater.
Conclusion
While sizing your bets may seem like a scary thing initially it’s simply something that has a few popular unwritten rules and everything else will be gained with experience. You’ll learn just how much you need to raise for any given situation after you’ve been through it, there really is no better way to get good at these things than to simply play and improve. We wish you the best of luck and hope you do well.
