FREE POKER QUIZ!

Congratulations to bn2wn001 for winning our last Poker Quiz! (click here for details).

Welcome to 32Red’s regularly updated Poker Quiz section where we ask you all sorts of poker questions and all you have to do is answer them correctly to enter our draw for free cash prizes & tournament tickets!

Are you ready?

What’s behind No.27 in our 32 Days of Poker Xmas promotion?

A: €500 Freeroll
B: €1,000 Freeroll
C: €5,000 Freeroll

Click here for a clue!

Post your answers below and if we pick your name out of the hat and you’ve posted the correct answer, we’ll give you a free poker chip worth €32!

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A common mistake on the river

One of the problems with poker is that, when we try to adhere to this or that guideline and introduce into our armoury more ways of playing, if we fail to read situations properly our action instead becomes a mistake rather than a money earner.

One such common error is throwing in a raise on the river because we convinced ourselves we were way ahead, or making unnecessary would-be ‘value’ bets, calling big bets/raises and generally being unable to acknowledge that we are beaten.

For example if we raised in position pre-flop with a hand like AsKs and get a lone caller we run the risk of overestimating our chances on a ragged board that features an ace. Let’s say the flop comes Ac 4s 9d, our opponent checks and we make a ¾ pot bet that is called. The turn brings the 2d, we are checked to again and we bet roughly ¾ pot, with another call. The 4c appears on the river but this time, instead of checking, the opponent bets around 1/7^th of the pot. Given the way the hand has panned out thus far we figure that a possible holding could be an ace with a weaker kicker so we see this as an opportunity to extract some additional value, raising to triple the bet… After a slight pause we see a call followed by the chips heading away from us because all this time we have been up against 4d 6d. Thus the result of our attempting to earn a little extra did succeed in making a bigger pot, albeit one that we didn’t get to collect – we made our opponent some cash!

This is easily done, especially in view of how we assumed the initiative right from the beginning. A very similar mistake is when the hand follows the same path and we bet the river when checked to and call a raise with what turns out to be the worst hand.

It is an imperative to continually reassess during a hand so that we can make more realistic evaluations, ideally picking up warning signs along the way that help facilitate the decision making process. In this case our opponent check-calling considerable bets should serve as a wake-up call and alert us to the fact that we may well be holding second best despite our strong looking hand. When the board pairs, incidentally, the alarm bells should be at their loudest. At least then we can avoid falling into traps. It makes more sense to just call these bets and check out rather than expose ourselves to bad situations – remember that raising/betting with a pair on the river tends only to be called by a better hand.

Generally, a dangerous looking board and an opponent who wakes up (or checks after check-calling big bets) need treating with respect.

Good luck at the tables!

Angus Dunnington (AngusD at the 32Red tables)
32Red Poker Ambassador

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Has Black Friday affected WSOP numbers?

Has Black Friday affected WSOP numbers?

Meanwhile, with the ghost of Black Friday still haunting US-facing online poker rooms as well as the countless US players who continue to have problems with their accounts with the affected operators, the poker world is even more interested than usual in the numbers at this year’s WSOP. Perhaps surprisingly – or not, depending on who you ask – attendance records in 2011 are still being broken, with tournament, side events and cash game numbers showing healthy increases compared with last year.

For example, on Friday, June 18, an impressive 5,946 players showed up for that day’s scheduled tournaments – a record for a single day in live poker history. Moreover, Event 18, the $1,500 buy-in No-Limit Hold’em tournament, had the largest ever entry (3157) for such a single day start event, as did Event 20 for a $1,000 buy-in No-Limit Hold’em (3,175 entries), the two combining to generate the largest consecutive-days starting field sizes in poker history at 6332 entries.

And if you think poker is exclusively for the baseball cap and shades wearing younger generation, then consider Event 30, the Seniors tournament, which attracted a record 3752 entries…

Good luck at the tables!

Angus Dunnington
32Red Poker Ambassador

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Phil Hellmuth: Poker Bridesmaid

Phil Hellmuth: Poker Bridesmaid

After narrowly failing to win his first non-hold’em WSOP bracelet (to add to his collection of eleven) in Event 16 last week, Phil Hellmuth soon found himself at yet another (18th!) non-hold’em WSOP final table in Event 33, the $10,000 Seven Card Stud Hi-Low Split-8 or Better Championship.

Day 3 in fact began with the surviving 18 of the original 168 players being whittled down to the final table (and fighting for only 16 prizes). In Event 16 the Poker Brat started the heads-up phase with a 3:1 chip lead over John Juanda but lost to a worthy winner. His second bite of the WSOP cherry found him facing Eric Rodawig of Arlington, Virginia, but this time he was playing the shorter stack heads-up by roughly the same ratio, Rodawig having 3,700,000 to Hellmuth’s 1,300,000.

Despite suffering a considerable setback as the endgame began, Hellmuth nonetheless put up a good fight until the final hand that left him with only three outs to a gutshot straight on the final card, none of which materialised, thus denying the often controversial showman his twelfth WSOP bracelet and earning Rodawig his first, as well as $442,183 for his troubles.

Good luck at the tables,

Angus Dunnington
32Red Poker Ambassador

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Anonymous tables: Hand distributions

Anonymous tables: Hand distributions

As predicted, it did not take long after their introduction for Anonymous tables to become very popular at all levels. Indeed this new format, in doing away (by removing everyone’s identity) with players’ being able to use exploitative software such as data mining tools, has revolutionised online poker to return us to a more level playing field.

But this isn’t to say that certain elements of the game such as hand distribution are now completely redundant. With this in mind, those players who have hitherto not involved themselves with poker software – and are thus unlikely to have studied the implications of hand distribution – will improve their game by giving the subject some thought now, even as they sit down at Anonymous tables.

We can use hand distributions to help us decide what to do in specific situations, such as whether/how much to bet/reraise, calling bets on the river, bluffing and so on. And, remember, we must also be aware of our own hand distributions and how our opponents perceive our ranges.

Of course in order to address this part of the game as well as possible on an Anonymous table we need to very closely observe the play, getting into the habit of paying proper attention to the action regardless of whether we’re involved in a hand. Don’t switch off and watch television, for example, every time we fold, as this means missing out on information, all of which is important over time.

The more experience we have, the more we understand about what kind of hands people tend to get involved with, how these ranges (hand distribution) widen as position improves around to the button, and how different styles and personalities lead different players to favour different ranges. Armed with this combination of experience and observation we should be able to get a good enough idea of our opponents’ varying ranges to exploit them accordingly.

When we first sit down it is fair to assign players an initial ‘standard’ hand distribution that we can modify as play develops. Thus a starting point for an under-the-gun (UTG) raise in an unraised pot might be a range of, for instance, AA down to JJ, plus all AK hands and AQs. Then after someone has raised UTG with KQ and, a couple of minutes later, QJ from the same position, we can widen this particular player’s range considerably. If he is opening with QJ, then it is quite probable his range UTG is something along the lines of AA-88, AK-AT, KQ-KT, QJ-QT. While it is important to have as much info as possible in determining plausible hand distributions, we could then put this player on a range for Button raises as wide as AA-55, AK-Ax, KQ-K9, QJ-Q9, JT-J9, T9s-65s.

It shouldn’t take long to learn something useful about players’ ranges, how they act and react within their range, or even that some players give little or no thought to positional considerations when raising pre-flop. Even if accumulating all this information doesn’t succeed in helping us during a given session, the process itself is clearly going to help improve our game as we grow more used to following the action and incorporating an appreciation of hand distribution into our play.

Good luck at the tables!

Angus Dunnington (AngusD)
32Red Poker Ambassador

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Wise Guys Results (13th – 19th June)

Win at the 32Red Poker cash tables and you may qualify for even more cash rewards with our Wise Guys weekly leaderboards. Yes, we reward our biggest winners at 32Red Poker and we reward them well, with over $1,000 in prizes every week!

Congratulations to last week’s prize winners…

32Red’s Wise Guys

32Red Poker rewards loyalty, and winners – so if you’re a winning player, don’t be shy and try out our Wise Guys weekly competition. Have fun at the tables and good luck this week!

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No Limit: Stop! Thief!

No Limit:  Stop!  Thief!

Blind stealers – we don’t like them, but we want to be one.  In an ideal world, when it is our turn to be Big Blind everyone would fold so that, as well as landing a profit, we wouldn’t have to make difficult decisions out of position.  Unfortunately, in the real world, blind stealers both take our money and mess with our mojo.

Obviously we can’t just passively surrender all the time just because we are afraid of potential trouble, while calling, reraising and generally making a stand without any proper planning will succeed only in attracting unwanted attention from those players who masquerade as blind thieves but in fact are aiming to exploit our play in the BB.

The logic behind blind stealing is founded on the correct and desirable assumption that, however random the thief’s hand, the BB’s holding is also random, allowing the thief to either get away with the steal or continue the hand in position. Given the efficacy of this strategy, if we are to avoid abject passivity we must find a counter-strategy of our own, the aim being to be so (successfully) uncompromising that the thief seeks out other victims because the tussles with us are too much trouble (or he continues to play his steals poorly for our profit).

Thus it follows that playing our poor holdings is a poor idea. If we call, we are simply out of position with cards that are likely to be no better than our opponent’s. Furthermore, a (bluff-)raise will inevitably be called (and if reraised we simply must fold), leaving us trying to justify our aggression out of position. It’s much better to fold weak cards, which anyway has the ‘advantage’ of inducing the thief to blindly (ahem) continue when the situation is in our favour.

With hands like suited aces, small pairs or suited connectors we can call because already we are probably on at least an equal footing regarding hand strength, the odds justifying staying involved. We probably should avoid bluffing on a conventionally strong flop because this doesn’t tally with only a pre-flop call, while if we hit and think we’re ahead, then check-calling the standard continuation bet should do the trick, followed by check-raising in response to his follow-up bet on the turn (all of this, of course, is assuming that we have properly identified a blind stealer, as opposed to someone who is playing a strong hand).

Finally, if we have a strong hand it is a good idea to reraise and then bet any typical BB aggressor’s flop, regardless of whether or not we hit. Therefore if we reraised with AJs and the flop comes Kxx, we bet out to retain the initiative and ‘confirm’ the strength of our hand.

Remember that this is a guide aimed at getting us to approach this specific BB scenario with a concrete plan of action already prepared. Obviously some kind of flexibility is called for, too, in order to avoid being predictable and to set traps and so on.

But the main point of this article is to help address a potentially problematic part of the game – that we encounter every minute or so! – and turn it to our advantage by adopting a confident, well-prepared strategy. After all, we improve with the accumulation of set plays and ‘tactics’ that over time better equip us with a sound overall strategy and consequent positive mindset.

Good luck at the tables (especially in the Big Blind).

Angus Dunnington
32Red Poker Ambassador

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Microgaming wins awards; Phil Ivey-Full Tilt: Round 2

Microgaming wins awards

32Red Poker fans might not be too surprised to learn that Microgaming enjoyed success at the recent 2011 EGR B2B Awards.  Held at Chelsea Football Club, e-Gaming Review’s award ceremony is the established premier recognition ceremony in the industry, and rewards the top service providers and B2B operators in online gaming.

I’ve been writing for years about the initial global online poker explosion and the subsequent boom, and the game and this user-friendly format continue to be as popular as ever.  Indeed with online gaming and poker rooms now enjoying ‘everyday’ exposure in the form of various sponsorship deals such as 32Red’s with the English Premier League newcomers, Swansea, for example, then it’s just as important to achieve industry recognition now as it was in the early days.  Thus it should be reassuring to 32red players that Microgaming won the 2011 EGR B2B Poker Network of the Year award (as well as picking up an award for Innovation in Slot Provision).

Phil Ivey-Full Tilt: Round 2

Meanwhile, the Phil Ivey-Full Tilt battle escalated to a war of words following Ivey’s lawsuit about what he perceives as inaction regarding players’ account problems following the clampdown by the US Department of Justice.

Here is Tiltware’s rather combative response:

“Contrary to his sanctimonious public statements, Phil Ivey’s meritless lawsuit is about helping just one player – himself. In an effort to further enrich himself at the expense of others, Mr. Ivey appears to have timed his lawsuit to thwart pending deals with several parties that would put money back in players’ pockets. In fact, Mr. Ivey has been invited — and has declined — to take actions that could assist the company in these efforts, including paying back a large sum of money he owes the site. Tiltware doubts Mr. Ivey’s frivolous and self-serving lawsuit will ever get to court. But if it does, the company looks forward to presenting facts demonstrating that Mr. Ivey is putting his own narrow financial interests ahead of the players he professes to help.”

The pot – I mean plot – thickens…
 
 
Good luck at the tables!

Angus Dunnington
32Red Poker Ambassador

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POKER QUIZ

Congratulations to Saffron082 for winning our previous Poker Quiz (click here for details).

Welcome to 32Red’s regularly updated Poker Quiz section where we ask you all sorts of poker questions and all you have to do is answer them correctly to enter our draw for free cash prizes & tournament tickets!

Are you ready?

 

How do you win the jackpot in Diamond Royale?

A: Make a diamond flush
B: Make a diamond straight flush
C: Make a diamond royal flush

Click here for a clue!

Post your answers below and if we pick your name out of the hat and you’ve posted the correct answer, you’ll receive 32 FREE CHIPS to play at 32Red Poker!

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Diamond Royale

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The hunt is on for a Royal Flush of diamonds…

Join us every evening at 9pm (UK time) as we hunt for a precious Royal Flush of diamonds!

Be the first player to make a diamond Royal Flush and claim the Diamond Royale (DR) progressive jackpot.  Our  DR tournaments are played on the classic game of no-limit Texas Hold’em and offer 1500 starting chips with 10 minute blind levels.  Each game is guaranteed at €150 and costs a tiny €6 + €1 to enter.  While all buyins go towards the game’s prize pool, all tournament fees go towards the DR jackpot which we’ve started off at €500…

VISIT THE JACKPOT PAGE!

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