Create Pressure With Your Opening Bet

            If you're the first to enter the pot in a No-Limit Hold’Em game, never call. If you aren't prepared to raise, quit. By raising, you put pressure on the blinds and the other players at the table, making them think about just how strong their hands really are. Chances are that by raising, you'll force average hands to fold before you even see the flop, limiting the number of players you have to beat through the rest of the hand. You shouldn't allow the strength of your hand affect the size of your raise, however think about your position. In choosing the size of your raise, give the big blind a tough decision between calling and folding if the rest of the table folds around to him. You want to make your opponents' decisions as difficult as possible. When raising from an early position, you’re advertising a very strong hand. Since you’re willing to take a risk, you don’t mind a call from the big blind, thanks to your hand strength. The real reason for a small raise is that you have so many players acting after you, any of whom might re-raise. When raising in a late position you’re telling the table that you can easily beat the few remaining hands. This gives you a lot more freedom to raise with marginal hands, but your raise must be bigger or the big blind can call too easily. One of the most common mistakes in No-Limit Hold’Em is coming in for a raise that's too big. If you're representing a big hand by raising from early position, it stands to reason that you'll only get played with by huge hands. The only exception would be if you know your opponents aren't paying attention and you’re sure that you can manipulate them.

            Loose games are a lot more common these days. If you find yourself in one of these games and you can't steal the blinds with a normal raise, tighten up your requirements slightly and make larger raises. Since your opponents are playing too loose, take advantage of it by building bigger pots when you think you're going to get the best of it.  The last exception is when you're short-stacked, and making your typical raise means putting over a quarter of your stack in the pot, you might as well move all in instead. It will force tough decision on your opponents and eliminates one of your tough calling decisions.

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