Poker strategies have been created to help us, the players, make the best of each played game and to take home the big pots of the game.

This chapter is dedicated to general poker strategies. You will get the chance to take a look at other strategies in the next few pages.

The first thing you should know is the fundamental theorem of poker. It was introduced by David Sklansky and it states that you gain when you play your hand like you would play it if you could see the cards your opponents are holding. The fundamental theory of poker also states that you also gain when your opponent plays his hands differently from how he would play them if he could see your cards.

The arch enemy of the fundamental theory of poker is Morton's theorem. Morton's theorem states that in multiway pots the expectations one payer has may be maximized by an opponent making a correct decision.

An example of Morton's theorem is when one player holds the best hand and two other players are on draws. The player with the best hand can make more money when another player folds to a bet even if the player who folded made the right choice to do so and he would have been wrong to call the bet.

You must remember that the fundamental theorem of poker is usually applied when two players are after the same pot and Morton's theorem is best applied in multiway situations.

Now let's talk about poker odds. Pot odds means the ratio of the size of the pot to the cost of a contemplated call. Let's take an example: If one player must call 100$ to stay and the pot contains 1000$ that respective player has 10 to 1 pot odds for the call.

If the pot odds are low for a call it is best to fold and if the pot odds for a call are high then calling is the right decision.

Here is a way of calculating pot odds:

• First of all you count the number of outs you have. Out cards are those cards that will improve your hand. Let's say you are holding a K and a Q and on the board you have J, 10, 7. the cards that will definitely improve your hand are any of the 4 aces and any of the 4 nines so those are your out cards. You calculate the percentage of hitting an out on the next card by multiplying the number of outs you have then add 1. in our example you have 8 outs so 8*2= 16 and 16+1 = 17 so you have a 17% chance of hitting on the turn.
• Next up you multiply the chance you have of hitting a draw by the pot plus bet and you get the maximum bet you can call.

Let's see how it's done:

• The bet is 10$ and the pot is 90$. By adding 10$ to 90$ you get pot+bet=100$.
• In this example you have 6 outs meaning you have 6 cards that will help you therefore you have a 13%chance of hitting an out on the next card. If the pot is 90$ and you must call 10$ it is best if you call since you have more than 10% chances of hitting an out (10$/100$).
• This changes if the bet to you is 20$ it is best to fold because you would need a 18.2% chance of hitting (20$/110$).