Beginner
24 posts.
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The Big Blind (BB) in Poker: Chips Already In, a Seat Built Around Defence
The big blind posts a full big blind before the deal, acts last preflop and gets the best pot odds at the table when facing an open, but is out of position after the flop almost every time. This post covers what makes the big blind special, why your defending range should follow whoever opened, the default defence frequencies against all five positions, and the most common mistakes.
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The Button (BTN) in Poker: The Most Profitable Seat
The button always makes the last decision after the flop and opens 46.9% of hands, the widest first-in range at the table and the seat that wins the most over the long run. This post covers what makes the button special, why you can open nearly half your hands there, the steal target to aim for, and three ways of playing that waste this advantage.
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The Cutoff (CO) in Poker: A Positional Edge, but Watch for Attacks From the Button
The CO is the seat before the button. Only the button and the two blinds are left behind you, the opening range is 29.1%, and stealing starts here. This post covers what the cutoff is like, how the opening range expands into suited hands, why the button is the player to watch most closely, and the common mistakes.
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Middle Position (MP) in Poker: A Little Better Than UTG, but Still Choose Your Hands Carefully
MP is the seat after UTG, also called the HJ (Hijack) at 6-max, with four players still behind you and an opening range of 18.9%. This post covers what middle position is like, which hands it adds to the UTG range, which seats count as middle position at a 9-handed table, and the most common mistakes.
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The Small Blind (SB) in Poker: The Hardest Seat to Play, So Raise or Fold
The small blind has already posted half a big blind and has only the big blind left behind it preflop, yet after the flop it is at a positional disadvantage against anyone. This post covers what makes the small blind special, why its rule is raise or fold, what to do when someone else has opened, and the most common mistakes.
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Under the Gun (UTG) in Poker: First to Decide Preflop, the Highest Bar at the Table
UTG is the first seat to act preflop, with five players still to speak behind you, and its opening range is just 11.2%. This post covers what the seat is like, which hands to open, why KJo and small pairs get folded, and the three mistakes beginners make most often here.
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Why Good Players Love the Button: In Position vs Out of Position (IP/OOP)
IP means in position and OOP means out of position — it is about who speaks first between you and your opponent. This post covers why acting later means seeing one more piece of information, how to tell in a second whether you are IP or OOP, the three most common match-ups, and why the button is the most profitable seat at the table.
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Why Beginners Lose at Poker: No Sense of Position and Range
The most common beginner leak is not misplaying one particular hand, it is wanting to see every hand from every seat. Using one hand of A6o, this post shows why a bad seat calls for a stronger hand, then brings in ranges: the opening ranges of the five positions differ by a factor of four, and a range chart is the best place for a beginner to start.
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Texas Hold'em Basics: Position Names at 6-Max and 9-Handed Tables
What do UTG, MP, CO, BTN, SB and BB mean? An overview of the seat names at six-max and nine-handed tables. Why is the order of action different before and after the flop? And what do early, middle, late position and the blinds actually mean?
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Texas Hold'em: Online vs Live, What Actually Differs
Same game, same rules, but online and live play feel nothing alike. Is it the social side, weaker opponents, or the tells you can only see in person? Six differences, one table, and the part that never changes.
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Cash Games, Tournaments and Time-Limited Tournaments: What Changes in Taiwan
If you already play cash and MTTs, the format you will meet in Taiwan is the one you probably have not played: a tournament that ends when the clock does. What the clock changes, and what it does not.
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Is Texas Hold'em Legal in Taiwan? No Statute Describes the Game
Tournaments are fine, cash games are not, time-limited tournaments are a grey area — that summary is wrong on the rulings. Courts decide on three facts, not on the name of the format.
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How to Use RushCraft: What Every Screen Answers
You have downloaded it — now what. A walk through every screen in RushCraft: the question each one answers, where to open it, and what to do once you have read it.
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Is Texas Hold'em Gambling? Start With How You Play It
Luck and variance are not the same thing as pure chance. A 60% favourite still loses five all-ins in a row; it takes thousands before the maths shows.
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Why Texas Hold'em Is Fun, and Why Taiwan Plays It Now
Three minutes of rules, easy to start, anybody has a chance. What makes Texas Hold'em fun is that five minutes of study can beat ten years of it.
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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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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 is the map for every preflop post on the site: the three questions to answer before you press a button, position and ranges, which button each of the six spots calls for, the three sizings you need and the seven numbers to check yourself against, with every stop linking to its own post.
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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 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.
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How to Work Out Pot Odds in Texas Hold'em: Skip the Equity, Just Ask How Often You Have to Win
You are on a flush draw and your opponent bets half the pot — call or fold? Pot ÷ bet + 2 gives you how often you need to win, and comparing that with how often your draw hits settles it. Includes a threshold table for the common bet sizes and hit frequencies for six common draws.
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Texas Hold'em Position Guide: Seat Order, IP/OOP, and How to Choose Your Hands
A complete introduction to position in Texas Hold'em. Three posts explain how the seats are ordered, what separates being in position from being out of position, and how position decides which hands you should play; then six short posts introduce each seat in turn: UTG, MP, CO, BTN, SB and BB.
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Texas Hold'em Hand Rankings in Full: All Ten Hands, and the Five Showdowns That Cost You Money
From the royal flush down to high card — the order, the odds and real examples. The second half is the part that matters: flush against flush, how kickers are compared, whether the ace is high or low in a straight, and what to do when the board itself is the best hand. Those five are where beginners actually lose.
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Downloading Your Natural8 Hand History: Six Steps in PokerCraft
Open PokerCraft from the Natural8 desktop client, pick a game type, set a time range, select every hand and save the file. Six steps and six screenshots, and everything you have played ends up in one file.
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What Texas Hold'em Is: Hand Rankings, Four Streets, and Why the Blinds Exist
Using Big Two — the card game everyone in Taiwan grew up on — as the point of comparison: how Texas Hold'em ranks hands, how its four rounds of dealing and betting work, and what the small and big blind are there for in the first place.