Texas Hold'em Guide
11 posts.
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Texas Hold'em Terms: The Six Actions at the Table
Check, bet, call, raise, fold, all in — the rules take three minutes to learn, and what actually matters is what each action does to the initiative. Which of the six hands the problem to your opponent, why you should never fold when checking is free, the live-table rules an online interface quietly handles for you (string bets, verbal declarations), and why every statistic you track is just a counter on these six buttons.
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What a 4-Bet Is in Texas Hold'em: Do You Need AA or KK to 4-Bet?
A 4-bet is a relatively rare action, and most players only ever make one holding AA, KK, QQ or AK. Those are strong hands — but once an opponent has read the pattern, that range saves him a great deal of money.
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What Fold to 3-Bet Is in Texas Hold'em: The 65% Ceiling Measures Your Opening Range, Not Your Nerve
Fold to 3-bet is how often you fold after opening and facing a re-raise, with a target of 65% or below and anything past 70% flagged as a serious leak. The reason it runs high is rarely timidity — play RushCraft's default practice ranges and it lands around 85%, and the problem happened back at the open. This post covers how the denominator works, where the 69% arithmetic behind the line comes from, how wide the continuing range has to be, what call 3-bet tells you, and why it is the slowest-converging number in the series.
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The Complete Guide to Preflop Play in Texas Hold'em: Position, Ranges, Six Spots and Seven Numbers
Preflop is the one street every hand passes through, and the only one where the spots repeat often enough to be systematised. This post takes the whole thing apart: how position prices a hand, what range charts are and are not for, which button each of the six preflop spots calls for, the three sizings you need, and the seven statistics that tell you afterwards whether you got it right. The entry point for every preflop post on the site.
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What a Cold Call Is in Texas Hold'em: The One Number With a Ceiling and No Floor, 5% or Below
A cold call is when you call a raise having put no money in yourself this round, and the target is 5% or below. It is the only statistic on the site with no lower bound — calling has never been an action worth a frequency. This post covers what it costs you (a capped range, the players it invites in behind you, a price 50% worse than the big blind's), the five conditions that decide whether this particular hand is a call, and why 50 opportunities are only enough to catch the outrageous.
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How to Play Pocket Aces After the Flop: Low Boards, Wet Boards, and When to Keep the Pot Small
Preflop, aces are the best hand there is. Once the flop lands, that stops being automatic. Three textures: how to give an opponent a reason to pay you on a dry low board, how to charge draws on wet and monotone boards, and which flops call for deliberately keeping the pot small enough to afford.
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How to Play Pocket Aces: Why You Should Not Just Shove
The first instinct with pocket aces is to move all in, and that is exactly how the most profitable hand in poker turns into one of the least profitable. Three preflop questions: why shoving costs you money, how to play aces at a table where nobody 3-bets and everybody calls, and whether to 3-bet or trap when someone opens in front of you.
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What a 3-Bet Is in Texas Hold'em: The 8-12% Target Band Averages Six Different Spots
3-bet is how often you re-raise when facing exactly one raise, with a target band of 8-12%. But that single number averages away six completely different spots — against an UTG open the value hands worth re-raising are only the top 1.7%; against a button open they are 5.3%. This post covers how the denominator works, what too low and too high each cost you, why 70% is the line on your opponent's fold-to-3-bet, and how large a sample it takes before the number counts.
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Free Texas Hold'em Preflop Range Charts: All 15 Grids, Opening and Big Blind Defence
Free 13x13 preflop range charts: opening ranges for five positions, plus the big blind's calling and 3-betting ranges against each of them — 15 grids listed in one go. Every cell is drawn from the defaults in RushCraft's preflop trainer. No signup, no email.
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What ATS Is in Texas Hold'em: Reading Your Steal Frequency, Three Positions and Three Targets
ATS is how often you raise first in from the CO, the button or the small blind when nobody has entered the pot. At six-max the blinds take about 25bb out of you every 100 hands, and stealing is the main channel for winning it back. This post covers how the denominator works, the target band for each of the three seats, what too low and too high each mean, how to respond to an opponent's ATS, and how large a sample it takes before the number counts.
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What VPIP Is in Texas Hold'em: It Only Becomes a Player Read Next to PFR
VPIP is how often you voluntarily put money in before the flop, and it measures how wide your range is; PFR measures how aggressive it is. What is actually useful is the gap between them. With reference values for every seat at a six-max table, three opponent profiles and what to do about each, and how many hands it takes before the number means anything at all.