Poker rooms charge players rake which is generally about 5% and this is removed from every pot at the end of the hand. So if the pot is $10 the rake taken by the room will be $0.50. There is yet a limit to the quantity of rake taken and this is usually a maximum of $3.
This does mean that lower limit players appear to be hit stronger by rake. At the poorer limits like NL5, NL10, NL25, Tables(5) they appear to be more exploited and taken more frequently. My guess is this is because the amount of real money being played at the lower limits is considerably lower than at the higher limits.
Becoming a successful player at the poor limits makes it a little more challenging because of the percentage of the rake. Although this is correct the competition at the lower levels is much easier which doesn’t exactly correlate with the quality of the players.
One way to measurements the size of the rake taken by the room is the ‘rakeThrough ratio’. This ratio tells you how much of the rake the room removes from the pots. The standard is 100% which means that the poker room will take 100% of the rake. Although this is certainly generous the reality is that most rooms in fact rake less than 90% so they are still making money.
A quicker method to assess the size of rake taken by a room is to use a special online program to calculate the rake. The rake program used by most of the poker sites can be found with a quick online search and once downloaded will calculate the rake for any player on the site. So for example if you entered a rake of $3 you would have $0.30 returned to you.
So knowing how much money is returned to the players and how much money the poker room is making from playing at the low limits, the stakes could be raised to $1/2 or even $5/10 where the percentage of the rake is more meaningful.
Omaha is another game where the amount of rake taken by the room is lower than in Texas Hold’em and thus another reason to play at lower limits. Because the amount of the rake is lower in Omaha the pots also tend to be flatter.
Texas Hold’em
The Texas Hold’em afapoker room is quite large and as a result the amount of money needed to tile up the blinds is large. Because of the large amount of money needed to clear the poker bonus the massive size of the Texas Hold’em poker room is not a seating problem although it is a problem if you are trying to learn to play Texas Hold’em.
The game of poker requires a large amount of skill and therefore the more the number of players the less experienced everyone is going to be. At the lower limits like NL5, NL10, and NL25 you will find a few amateurs. At the high limits like NL25, NL50, and NL100 there is a little more player so you can still be separated into two groups.
Double or Nothing
The most popular game in the poker room is the Texas holdem. In Texas hold’em all the players have a choice. In pot limit there is no option to slow play so unless you think you have a really good hand you always slow your play. The only exception to slow play would be in heads up or short-handed play where you would raise or reraise in order to increase the size of the pot.Disadvantages of Slow Playing.
The biggest disadvantage of slow playing is that usually you will not get any action from the opponents once you do decide to slow play. Whether you have QQ, KK or AA there is a good chance that you wont get any action for a quite some time.
The Only Way to Get Cards
If you really want to see the flop in texas holdem you canibaee something called the turn or the river. This idea is especially strong if you did a continuation bet on the flop as you may well get some betting action from the opponents. Disadvantages of Slow Playing.
With no cards available on the flop you are in trouble if you slow play a hand. The next problem is that you wont know what cards your opponent has. You could guess and assume but you never really know.armed with only your hand and the flop, what are your odds on getting the cards you need?
The River Bet
You can use this Texas holdem betting strategy in a different way than you would with a river bet. You can again use your estimate of what cards your opponent probably has in order to make your bet. You can again make your bet a little smaller than the flop but your estimate of the cards may be off. Either way you are in no danger of getting it wrong.