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You are here...Limit Holdem Strategy – 3 Essential Tips for Success
Texas Holdem is mostly played in No Limit format. Fixed Limit Holdem is not as popular as the Limit version of other poker games such as Stud and Draw but is still widely played.
Since Texas Holdem has become so popular the limit version of the game has gotten bigger and bigger and there are a lot more players who are now playing the game.
You do need to take a very different approach however as there are some key differences to No Limit Holdem and knowing a solid basic Limit Holdem strategy is essential to playing successfully.
As an introduction here are three basic Limit Holdem tips which will help you to become a better player and to hit the ground running and win more money, which is always the aim … right?
Limit Holdem – Maths Maths Maths
Limit format poker is a game of very specific edges. This is very much the case in No Limit Holdem as well but as there are less betting options in Limit Holdem it becomes even more of a decisive factor to use math to base decisions on.
You will need to use math to decide which play is correct and be a lot more rigid in your decision making. If the maths says no, then the cards need to go into the muck – no exceptions.
If you understand where you are in the hand, understand what outs you have and the pot odds being offered to you, then you can use all this information to ensure you make the correct call or fold.
When playing Limit Holdem this alone will give you a huge advantage as a lot of the opponents you are playing against will not understand the maths that are the basis of good solid play.
If you are on a draw such as needing one card to get a flush, or a straight then you can work out the odds of a card you need being dealt, once you known the odds of the card being dealt you can compare that to the pot odds being offered to you. If the pot is offering you better odds than the chances of your card coming, then it is correct to call as in the long term you will win the pot more often than you lose.
So there will be a lot of times that it will be correct to chase drawing hands against your opponents. You will need 4 to 1 pot odds in order to call with a flush draw and 5 to 1 for a straight draw. Similarly you must know when to throw the cards away when the pot odds are not supporting you.
Knowing when it is correct to call and to fold is vital to your success. If you aren’t drawing when you have the correct pot odds then in the long term you will be losing money. The same goes for when you are drawing and do not have the correct odds to call.
Take some time to study the subject. Here is a great explanation of the subject of Poker Math at Poker Professor which we highly recommend. We also plan to take a look at the subject here on How To Play Poker very soon so keep an eye out.
Limit Holdem Bankroll
In any type of poker game you are going to need a proper sized bankroll to handle the ups and downs of variance and to see you through the negative fluctuations we all experience from time to time.
In is inevitable that you will have bad sessions at poker, either due to a bad run of cards, or due to you playing poorly in a session. To protect against this we only sit down at a table with a small percentage of our total poker bankroll. That way you have plenty of further buy-ins left to recover from a bad session and it would take many bad sessions in a row in order to go broke and lose your total bankroll.
Making sure that you obey these strict set of rules is very important and the first rule of good strategy that you must learn. You can read more about bankroll management in our introduction article.
You should be living by these bankroll rules because if not then you will die by them.
In Limit Holdem because the betting is a lot slower the bankroll rules are not as strict and can be relaxed slightly.
The normal rule for No Limit bankroll management is to maintain 20 buy ins and only risk 5% of your total bankroll at any single table, so that would represent about 2,000 big blinds. This level of protection is required due to the volatile nature of No Limit and the potential to lose your whole buy in very quickly if it all goes wrong.
In Limit Holdem you can relax that, but you must still make sure that you have at least 600 big blinds (6 buy ins) for the limit you are playing if you are planning on playing seriously.
Bankroll Management can seem like a bit much for new players and they don’t like the fact that it prevents them from playing at higher stakes, but it really is necessary to have this much in your total bankroll to protect yourself from a bad run of cards, or a few bad sessions of playing badly. Players who don’t follow proper bankroll management will end up learning the hard way by having to find more funds to replenish their bankroll after a bad session.
Playing Tight and Aggressive
Just like most other poker games out right now one of the most proven winning strategies is to play very tight and aggressive in order to be successful at Limit Holdem.
You should be very strict (tight) about what starting hands you play and make sure you throw away all mediocre hands.
The discipline is even more important in Limit poker as the cost of calling a bet will only be small, at one bet and it is easy to fall into the line of thought of, “oh…. it’s only one bet, I’ll call and see what happens”. Over a course of a session all those incorrect calls will probably cost you 50 to 100 bets and probably a significant portion of your chip stack.
When you do play a hand then play it with aggression and meaning and be the driving force behind it.
Of course you will need to be adaptable as the best way to conquer your opponents will always be playing the opposite style that they are playing. If they are playing loose then you want to play tight and when they are tight you want to loosen up.
By doing this, you will have the small edge of having a better starting hand than your opponent when you are playing tight and they are loose. If they are tight and you loosen up you gain an edge by the few extra pots that you can steal from them with your aggression.
Usually however the majority of the players in online poker play much looser than they should do and so by using a tight aggressive strategy you will punish these players and win the majority of pots you enter.
Summary
Fixed Limit Holdem is a game of discipline and control. Treat every chip as if it was your last and make the decision properly based on your read of the hand and the maths and probabilities that present themselves. If you do this then you will already have a good base for playing good Limit Holdem strategy.
The above tips are by no means meant to be a complete strategy, they are just some introductory notes that you should understand before you start to play Limit Texas Holdem.
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