Improve your poker game drastically: follow this simple tip.
 

I heard this tip while watching Poker on tv the other night and since putting it into practice I have done better and been making nice bank at every kind of Hold'Em game: cash games, heads-up SnG, single-table SnG, tournys. I'm playing at Full-Tilt btw if anyone wants to play with me :)

Pre-flop, NEVER call (or "limp in").

Either your hand is good enough to raise with, or you should be folding it. This applies to the small blind as well.

Exceptions are of course if you are the Big Blind and don't have much of anything, you can still take your free check. Or, if someone else raised and you would have raised around that amount, you may call. If you were going to go for a bigger raise, you should still re-raise.

Try it for yourselves, especially at online poker where donkeys catch stuff on the river they have no right catching all the time, raise or fold. You will see a LOT less flops but come out more profitable for it :)

good tip. I will try it out.

Interesting, at the very least I would say playing with that mentality would help correct those that play too loose. While I like that idea and can see some merit, I think there is a time and place for the slow play smooth call. If I have bullets on the button and everyone folds but the blinds, I'm probably going to try to get some value out of them by slow playing them with a pre flop call.

How about this tip... see my signature :thumbsup

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I like to limp in with small pairs 55 66 77 88 in early/mid postion to try and see a cheap flop in the hopes of catching a set. I'll limp in on the cut off or button with suited connectors if the pot hasn't been raised yet. Sometimes I'll even raise the suited connectors if I'm on the button and it's been nothing but limpers. Limping in isn't always a bad play.. It's hard to read when you do hit a big hand and alot of players will bleed off chips with their top pair or 2 pair, mean while you're sitting on a monster :)

I used to do the same, but esp. online people kept hitting two pair or sets or even flushes etc... to kill my Aces or Cowboys more often than not. Since I have been aggressively raising them, I still usually end up with at least one caller - if not, I steal the blinds; sucks but better than losing to people who suck out.

To make it harder to read me, I just mix up my raises. Sometimes with pocket 3s I'll raise 5-6x the blind and then with AA or KK I'll only do 3 times, etc...when you end up in showdowns and people see what you actually had, they then can't read your pre-flop raise well at all.

One thing I never do is limp in with hands like AA KK QQ JJ 1010 AK AQ Always raise these hands from any postion to try and get the fluff out and get heads up with someone. If you're holding JJ or 1010 and someone comes over top and re raises you, (if it's not a huge all in) I just call again in the hopes of seeing my set. If it comes out A9Q and he starts betting let it go and find a better spot.

Oh yeah I always mix up my raises/calls. Allways a good idea to keep the others players guessing.:upsidedow

Man I love poker.

Well I'm entering the $240 + $16 Sunday Brawl knockout tourny at FT right now. Starts in 26 mins for anyone else who wants in.

Already 1,004 registrants and counting, this should be fun heh. I only need to beat 14 knockouts to claim first place on their leaderboard :)

Nicely done. Do you do design work?

I know just enough Photoshop and ImageReady to get by. I'm better at coding PHP and javascript.

Best poker advice I can give....

see the movie Rounders.