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1. What Does 1/2 No Limit Poker Mean
2. How Many People Win At 1 2 No Limit Poker
3. How To Play $1 $2 No Limit Poker

Texas hold'em is easily the most popular poker game played in card rooms in the United States. Hold'em comes in four betting structures: limit, no-limit, pot-limit and spread-limit. No-limit hold'em (NLHE) is the rising star of poker games. A few years ago the game could not be found in a live poker room, but the popularity of televised poker. Actual apps to make money. Details about game and stakes for the 1/2 - No Limit Holdem cash game in Las Vegas, NV. Attention Poker Rooms: Get your Real-Time Live Action on PokerAtlas! Ideally, in poker you want to bet an amount that maximizes how much you can win and minimizes how much you can lose. When you structure your no-limit bet so that the pot is offering even money on a call, but the odds against your opponent completing his hand are 2-to-1, you’ll win in the long run. And that’s what poker is all about. With this in mind, here are what I think my top five lessons would be for a new player trying to beat the $2-$5 no-limit hold’em games in Las Vegas. Don’t limp into pots ever.

NL Hold’em Starting Hand Charts

One aspect of the game of No-Limit Hold’em that causes beginning players much grief is deciding which hands to play and which hands to dump. NL Hold’em is much more difficult than Limit Hold’em because the value of a hand depends on so many factors other than just the cards in your hand. Despite this difficulty, our coaches believe that following some general guidelines and adjusting from these is a better solution than having no guidelines at all. Given that well over half of your profitability in NL Hold’em is based on hand selection alone, we have developed these charts to help you better determine whether to play or fold.

There are no perfect No-Limit starting hand charts. That is because there are many factors that affect your decision, and charts cannot account for all of them. Some of these include:

1. The size of your opponent's stacks.
2. How loose or tight, passive or aggressive, your opponents are.
3. Where these opponents are located at the table – for example, does an aggressive player still have to act after you?
4. Your image at the table – for example, how tight or tricky you are perceived.

That being said, these charts will serve you well in most typical low-stakes No-Limit cash games, such as games with blinds of $1/$2, and home games. These games typically have several loose players at the table, and good opportunities for winning big pots with suited connectors and pocket pairs. With practice, you will be able to be a consistently winning player with these charts as a starting point. As you improve, you'll find yourself making adjustments to these charts based on the factors listed above, and more.

AGAIN: These charts are a good starting point for beginners. Specifically, Chart #1 recommends a significant amount of limping. This is great in loose, passive games but less often seen in tougher games. You’ll find other training material on Advanced Poker Training that may recommend a more aggressive approach for more experienced players.

Note: It would be a serious mistake to apply these hand charts before reading the Frequent Asked Questions first.

CHART #1 ‐ LOOSE, PASSIVE GAME (OFTEN 4-5 LIMPERS PER HAND)
NO ONE HAS RAISED YET

• Raise Always
• Call from Early Position, otherwise raise
• Call always
• Call from Middle or Late Position if the conditions are right (see Frequently Asked Questions)

CHART #2 ‐ TIGHTER GAME (FEWER LIMPERS) OR MORE AGGRESSIVE GAME
NO ONE HAS RAISED YET

• Raise Always
• Call from Early Position, otherwise raise
• Call (or Raise) from Middle or Late Position if the conditions are right (see Frequently Asked Questions)

CHART #3 ‐ THERE HAS BEEN A SINGLE RAISE
(3‐5 TIMES THE BIG BLIND) BEFORE YOU

• Re‐Raise Always
• Call from Early Position, otherwise re‐raise
• Call always
• Call from Middle or Late Position if the conditions are right (see Frequently Asked Questions)

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

For the hands in yellow, what do you mean when you say to play these hands if the conditions are right? The hands in yellow are speculative hands. They should always be folded from Early Position. From other positions, they can be profitable given the right conditions. Some of the questions to ask yourself:

1. Are there other players who have called so far (the more, the better)?
2. Are the players who have called playing poorly after the flop? Will they pay me off if I hit something?
3. Is there an aggressive player still to act behind me (you might get raised and have to fold)?
4. If there has been a raise and no other callers, what chance do I have of using my position after the flop to win the hand even if I don't improve (Chart #3 only)?

Why does Chart #2 say to sometimes raise with the hands in yellow, but Chart #1 does not? We have different goals in mind. Using Chart #1, we want to call to encourage additional players to enter the pot. These hands will be immensely profitable when our loose, passive opponents enter the hand, and get trapped when we flop a set, or make a well-disguised straight. When using Chart #2, however, we want to size up the opponents still to act. If they are tight, we can raise. Sometimes, we'll pick up the blinds. Other times, our pre-flop aggression will allow us to take down the pot on the flop.

What's the difference between AKs and AKo? AKs means an Ace and King of the same suit. AKo means an Ace and King of different suits.

What are early, middle, and late position? Early Position is generally the first 2 (in a nine player game) or 3 (in a ten player game) positions after the blinds. Late Position is the “cutoff” position (to the right of the dealer), and dealer button positions. Middle Position is everything in between.

How much should I raise? As a general rule, raise 3 to 4 times the big blind, plus 1 extra big blind for every player who has called before you. So if there are 2 callers already, raise between 5 and 6 times the big blind.

What if someone raises after I call? Whether you call the raise depends on how much money the raiser has for you to win, how many other players are involved, and what type of hand you have. As a general rule, if you have a pocket pair, lean towards calling. If there are a lot of other players (and therefore a big pot), lean towards calling. In general, fold suited connectors from early position. Fold hands like KQ that don't play well against a raiser.

How do I play from the blinds? From the small blind, play the same hands you would play from late position, plus a few more. But don't call with junk hands like T5o, just because it is “cheap”. From the big blind, if there is a raise to you, play like you would if you had already called from early position.

The chart says to fold KQo to a raise. Really? Yes, this hand performs very poorly against typical raising hands. Against AK, AQ, AA, KK, QQ, you are a big underdog. Other typical raising hands like JJ, TT, 99, AJs, are slightly ahead of you as well. The only time you might call or re-raise is from late position, if the opener was in middle or late position, indicating they might have a wider range of hands.

I was told to fold AJo from Early Position, why do you say to call with it? Folding AJo is not a bad idea in many games. We included it because, at low stakes tables (even tight or aggressive ones), the players are often playing badly enough after the flop that it can be profitable. We used data from millions of hands of low-limit poker to analyze this. The same could be said for KQo, ATs, and KJs – you can make a small profit in the long run at most low-stakes games, but folding would be perfectly acceptable from early position.

Can I use these charts in a NL Hold'em tournament? The charts would be best applicable to the early stages of a NL tournament, when everyone has a deep stack. In the middle and later stages, they should not be used.

Read all our instructional articles

Preflop raising decisions can be very complex. What stakes are we playing? Is it a live game or online? How strong is our hand? Which limpers will call? Will we be in position postflop?

Sometimes our decision is obvious: 'I have aces, so I'm going to raise for value here.' Sometimes it's subjective: 'I think I can force the limper to fold here.' But we should also consider what a mathematical analysis of preflop raising can teach us. When is a raise our most profitable action for the moment? When might it be the most profitable action for the hand?

Las Vegas $1/$2 NLH Stats

In order to calculate the expected value for our preflop actions accurately, we need to know certain key frequencies that are typical for our game.

Figure 1 below contains some of the most useful stats for these EV calculations for both online NL100 and $1/$2 NL live games in Las Vegas, most of them published here for the first time. (Check out Donkey Poker Volume 2: Postflop, Section 7.5 to see how these stats were generated.)

Here I define 'EP/MP' as the first four seats after the big blind on a nine-seat table. Since the vast majority of Vegas $1/$2 players are position-dumb, we can combine the results from these seats into a single stat in order to make the stat more reliable. The hijack and cutoff stats are similar to the EP/MP stats. Betonline sportsbook review.

VPIP and PFR are the primary stats useful to determine an opponent's playing style. '35/6' means that the average Vegas player voluntarily invests in 35 percent of his dealt hands, while raising only 6 percent of them. This player would be considered a 'loose-passive' player in an online game, but he is average in a Vegas $1/$2 game.

Calling a Preflop Raise (CPFR) is a statistic that applies only when a player calls a raise after having already invested in the pot, which applies to limp-callers as well as to the blinds. This is not the same thing as Cold Calling Preflop (CCPF).

Compared to an online game, a Vegas preflop raise is fraught with more risk. Not only is our average raise size larger, our Vegas opponents are more likely to call it. Although their calling range is weaker, we often face multiple callers, which is rare online. Consequently, it is extremely important to have a solid idea of how these stats influence the profitability of our preflop action.

What Does 1/2 No Limit Poker Mean

A Simple Example: A Big Blind Hero vs. a Single EP/MP Limper

Let's consider a situation which is relatively easy to calculate. Suppose an average player limps from one of the EP/MP positions. It folds around to Hero in the big blind who can check his option or raise.

Figure 1 indicates that that Mr. Average has a range of 35 percent, but he normally raises with 6.1 percent of this range. So we can assign his limping range as [6.1–35]. The specific card combos within his range depend on the ranking system we use. Although there is no single ranking system that is always correct, I will use the Flopzilla NLHE ranking in this column, since it is easy for anyone to access.

Suppose Hero has and decides to check. We can estimate Hero's 'Momentary Expected Value' (MEV) as..

MEV_Check = Pot₀ × EWC = $5 × 0.474 = $2.37

..where Pot₀ = $5 and EWC (Showdown Equity When Called) is 47.4 percent for Hero's pocket deuces when facing Villain's range. I call this his 'momentary' EV since it applies only at the moment he checks.

Suppose Hero decides to raise to $10 with the same . Figure 1 shows that an average villain will call a preflop raise after limping in EP/MP about 56 percent of the time (Row 8). This would be a Flopzilla range of [6.1–22.7]. Bluey and bingo costume.

Hero's Fold Equity is FE = (1 - 0.564) = 0.436. His showdown Equity-When-Called is EWC = 0.454. Notice that even though the villain has folded nearly half of his range, Hero's EWC is only slightly worse than when he checks. This suggests that the villain's actual limping and calling ranges are not critical in establishing Hero's MEV.

How Many People Win At 1 2 No Limit Poker

After deciding to raise, we can calculate Hero's MEV as..

MEV_Raise-$8 = (FE × Pot₀) + ((1-FE) × (EWC × Pot₁ - Raise)) = $2.27 + $0.28 = $2.55

The first term is just the average amount earned when the villain folds. The second term is the amount earned when the villain calls. ' Pot₁' is the size of the pot after he calls, minus the rake. 'Raise' is the size of our raise ($8 in this case). Since three-betting is so rare in Vegas $1/$2, and limp-three-betting is even rarer, we can ignore it for this calculation. Again, we consider this our momentary EV since it only applies at the end of the preflop action.

So Hero's raise appears to be more profitable (by $0.18) than checking. It gains nearly all of its profitability from fold equity and a just little from showdown equity. This is generally the case for heads-up battles.

However, there is a serious issue with these estimates. MEV uses showdown equity, which essentially assumes that the hand will be checked down postflop. This rarely happens in a real game, which makes its usefulness imperfect. We haven't considered such factors as skill and position, which can increase or decrease our expected profit in the hand. Hero's inferior position in this scenario suggests that his actual 'Hand EV' (HEV) will be lower than his calculated MEV. Even Hero's superior skill will not likely overcome his inferior position.

Since Hero's inferior postflop position makes it difficult to realize the full MEV of either action, it's difficult to say which action would have the higher HEV. Hero's best decision could depend on whether the villain appears more or less likely than the average villain to fold to Hero's raise. We might also consider that if both actions result in a similar HEV, the check does so with less risk.

Figure 2 shows the results of these calculations applied to some of the hands listed in the Donkey Poker starting hands chart. The solid symbols represent Hero's MEV when raising to $10, which is positive for each of these combos. 'JTs-' denotes 'suited connectors JTs and smaller.' Meanwhile the '+' symbols represent the difference in MEV between raising and checking.

When MEV is positive, raising is more profitable than checking, which is true for a range including approximately 22+, A2+, KT+, and QJ (i.e., any pocket pair, any ace-x hand, any two Broadway cards). This represents 27.6 percent of all starting hands.

Since we are out of position in the scenario, our HEV is probably lower than these values, so checking is probably preferable when the Delta MEV is close to zero.

Button Hero vs. One Limper

The previous scenario is rare in Vegas $1/$2 games, but it serves to illustrate the principals used for our analytical EV calculations. A more common and useful example is when the Hero is on the button with and facing a single EP/MP limper. In this case Hero can fold, limp, or raise, where folding has an EV_fold = 0.

This calculation has additional complexity because we have the blinds behind us, which means we must consider their propensity to check behind or complete and their propensity to call a raise. (We will ignore their negligible three-betting frequency here.)

Suppose Hero limps and the two blinds raise 4.8 percent and 3.4 percent of the time, respectively. If the small blind completes with [4.8-50] and the big blind has a range of [3.4-100], we will have a four-way pot about 92 percent of the time.

Let's suppose the other 8 percent of the time Hero limp-folds after one of the blinds raises. (This is plausible for those hands with which Hero would actually limp.) We can also assume that the EP/MP limper has a range of [6.1-35.7]. All of these values are based on the actual Vegas stats listed in Figure 1.

We then have..

MEV_Limp = 0.92 × (Pot₀ × EWC-Limp) - (0.08 × Limp) = 0.92 × ($8 × 0.222 - $2) - (0.08 × $2) = -$0.38

In other words, limping on the button with is not immediately profitable.

How To Play $1 $2 No Limit Poker

Suppose we raise to $10 with on the button. Using the above frequencies, everyone will fold 23.1 percent of the time. A single villain will call 47.0 percent of the time, two villains will call 25.7 percent of the time, and everyone will call 4.2 percent of the time.

It turns out our EWC is nearly the same no matter which villain calls, so we can treat each villain as interchangeable. Thus, Hero's MEV is approximately..

MEV_Raise = (0.231 × Pot₀) + (0.47 × (EWC₁ × Pot₁ - Raise)) + (0.257 × (EWC₂ × Pot₂ - Raise)) + (0.042 × (EWC₃ × Pot₃ - Raise)) = $0.63

..where the various values depend on how many players called our raise. We can see that raising with our pocket deuces is much more immediately profitable than limping with them. Furthermore, our Hand EV should be better than this since we have superior position and skill and since we can leverage our profit when we flop a set.

Note that when the blinds are tight and/or passive, they are less likely to call our raise and less likely to three-bet. (Pre-loading tells are very important here.) In these situations, raising a single limper from the button is even more +MEV. And our HEV is even more enhanced since we are less likely to face multiple villains in a raised pot. (It's generally easier to outplay a single villain than three of them.)

Figure 3 depicts the MEV results for various hand types. The symbols represent the MEV for raising to $10 in a Vegas $1/$2 game. Each series represents a descending hand grouping. For example, 'T9s-' denotes 'suited connectors T9s and smaller.'

Bottom line: in low-stakes cash games such as the $1/$2 NL games in Vegas, raising is nearly always more profitable than limping (except for 63s, 53s, 65o and 54o). In fact, 33 percent of all starting combos are immediately profitable. And some of the negative-MEV combos are probably profitable for the hand due to our superior position.

Since most Vegas $1/$2 players are position-dumb, they generally limp and call with a similar frequency from the hijack and cutoff positions. So our very wide button raising range is valid for any single-limper situation when we are on the button.

Button Hero vs. Multiple Limpers

The previous single-limper scenario occurs only a small fraction of the time in Vegas $1/$2 games. We can readily extend this to multiple-limper scenarios, which are much more common. This calculation is even more complex and we are less likely to fold everyone out with a $10 button raise. This time I will spare you the gory math and show you the results below in Figure 4.

Here the top four curves represent the MEV for raising to $10 facing one, two, three, and four limpers. The smooth line represents the average MEV of limping. These curves show that our 'immediately profitable' raising range is 33.6 percent when facing a single limper, and that our range decreases to 13.4 percent when facing four limpers.

We can make several conclusions here:

• The more limpers we face, the tighter our raising range should be from the button.
• When facing one or two limpers, we should generally either raise or fold, since once raising becomes unprofitable, limping is even more unprofitable.
• When facing three or more limpers, limping is generally more profitable than raising once raising becomes unprofitable. So we now have both raising and limping ranges.
• When both raising and limping have MEVs near zero, limping may be preferable since we risk less for the same reward.
• Our slightly negative-MEV combos may still have slightly positive-EV for the hand. Our superior skill and position, coupled with our ability to leverage our big flops should increase our profit for the hand. This is combo-dependent since some combos are more likely to flop big. (22 is stronger than 54o.)
• Another way to state this is that some -MEV combos may have sufficient implied odds play. For instance, we can play a -$0.50 MEV combo if we believe our implied EV for the hand is worth more than this.

The Effect of Raise Size

A typical rule of thumb for these Vegas $1/$2 games is to raise to about 4x BB plus one additional BB for each limper. Thus we would raise to $10, $12, $14, or $16 as the number of limpers increases. The previous analysis kept the raise size constant to see the influence of the number of limpers.

A key question we would like answered is how the villains will respond to reasonable variations in raise size. Unfortunately, that data does not exist for these Vegas games. My general feeling, however, is that most Vegas $1/$2 players are not very sensitive to our raise size as long as we keep it within the table norm. So, to a first approximation, we can assume that the Figure 1 stats do not change very much when we increase our raise size incrementally.

Figure 5 shows what happens to MEV_Raise as we increase the size of our raise when facing four limpers. We can see that that our raising range decreases slightly as we increase our raise size. This effect is fairly small and may be counterbalanced by a decreased likelihood that a villain will call a larger raise.

Here the symbols represent the MEV for raising to $10, $12, $14 or $16 in a Vegas $1/$2 game. These combos are sorted in order of MEV_Raise.

The important thing to notice in this graph is that we have a much larger MEV when we raise our best hands by the maximum amount that will not result in a villain adjustment. If we have aces and the villains will call a $16 bet as often as a $10 bet, we should bet $16.

On the other hand, we should consider betting smaller with our borderline raising hands. Of course, this sets up the possibility that we could be telegraphing our hand strength. But most Vegas $1/$2 players are not paying much attention to our bet size unless the size is unusual for the table. Here we can make adjustments based on our knowledge of the players at our table.

Hero is in the Cutoff

Putting the Hero in the cutoff makes the analysis even more complex. Making some reasonable approximations, I can make a few generalizations:

• All players, including the button, are very unlikely to three-bet, so we should generally ignore this possibility when deciding to raise. (If our particular button opponent likes to three-bet, we should consider changing seats.)
• The button is less likely to cold call our cutoff raise than an EP/MP player is to call after a limp.
• Being in the cutoff facing three limpers is similar to being on the button facing four limpers. This is equivalent to the button replacing the fourth limper.
• The average button will call our cutoff raise about 22 percent of the time. We will then not have a postflop position advantage on every villain. This means that our average HEV will not be as enhanced from the cutoff as it would be from the button, and thus our cutoff raising range should be somewhat tighter that it would be from the button with one additional limper.
• If we have a tell that suggests that the button intends to fold, we can play the cutoff exactly as we would normally play the button.

Conclusions

We can't yet decide on a specific hand range for each scenario since we have not yet determined just how valuable our superior position and skill is. Nevertheless, it is clear that the more limpers we face, the tighter our raising raise should be.

Also, our raising range should be much wider than the typical Vegas player. We can also play from the cutoff facing X limpers with a similar range as from the button when facing X+1 limpers.

And of course, we should always adjust our ranges depending on the tendencies of the specific villains we face and based on specific tells we observe.

Steve Selbrede has been playing poker for 20 years and writing about it since 2012. He is the author of five books, The Statistics of Poker, Beat the Donks, Donkey Poker Volume 1: Preflop, Donkey Poker Volume 2: Postflop, and Donkey Poker Volume 3: Hand Reading.

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