Andy Bloch

The semi-bluff is one of the most powerful weapons in any poker player’s arsenal. If there’s a decent chance you can steal a pot by semi-bluffing, you should usually take it.

For many poker players, there's nothing prettier than peeking at their hole cards and seeing paint. A-K. K-Q. Q-J. They're all big hands and, often times, very playable ones, especially in position. Sometimes though, your masterpiece of a starting hand can lead to a very ugly result.

In my last tip, I talked about the necessity of loosening up your pre-flop game, especially in the late stages of a poker tournament.

Knowing what to do and when to do it is what separates those who just play in tournaments from those who make final tables. This is especially true in No-Limit Hold‘em, where the first decisions you’re faced with are what hands you should play and when you should play them.

In my last tip, I discussed the basic principles of implied odds. As you’ll recall, your implied odds are the total amount you can win in a given pot, divided by the number of poker chips you’re putting into the pot.

Most people have a pretty good understanding of pot odds - whether the amount of chips in the pot justifies making a call - but they fail to realize that making this calculation only solves part of the poker equation

In the World Series of Poker HORSE tournaments, the antes are usually about 25% of the initial bet so if the limits are 100/200, the ante is going to be 25 per player with a 25 bring-in. That means there are a lot of chips in the pot that are worth fighting for

If you want to win a HORSE tournament, you have to be good at all five games. You don't have to be the best poker player at any one game, but you can't be the worst. If you're really bad at one of the games, it's going to hurt you.

There are a variety of factors that will effect any decision in a hand of poker, but if I was the one who raised pre-flop, I'll put out a continuation bet on the flop a large proportion of the time.

Earlier this year, I cashed in the $2,000 Omaha Hi/Lo event at the World Series of Poker. I enjoyed the tournament; it was great to spend some time playing a game other than hold 'em.

In No-Limit Hold'em Poker, it can be difficult to know what the right play is on the river when you're out of position with a marginal hand. In my experience, if you think your hand is good enough to call with, you should consider betting the river if you don't think your opponent will try to bluff.

I'm writing from Tunica, MS, where I've played in several World Series of Poker Circuit events at the Grand Hotel and Casino. A couple of days ago, I played in a $2,000 No-Limit Hold 'em tournament, and I saw some of my opponents make some pretty odd plays. For this tip, I decided to highlight a couple of these strange decisions and describe why you should avoid making similar plays.

I get asked a lot of poker strategy questions, from beginner to advanced. Some are easy, but some involve the kind of math I can't always do off the top of my head. When that happens, I rely on one of a number of free tools to calculate the probability of winning the hand.