Heads up poker what is

Against aggressive players who re-raise frequently, you will need to combat this through a mixture of four-betting with marginal hands, calling with big hands to trap and calling with more speculative hands. You should also be prepared to go broke with a decent top-pair type hand, a big draw or even just a big bluff. They could be holding anything. If you raised pre-flop and were called, continuation betting is usually a must. Just be prepared to fire more than one barrel against loose opponents who will call you in the hope of hitting something on later streets.

Similarly, out of position against an aggressor you will need to employ some of these tactics by looking for exploitable traits in your opponent, such as continuation betting too much or not betting the turn enough. As you get a feel for their play, you should also be able to identify some good flops to attack with a check-raise. Turn play is often what separates average and good heads-up players from great ones. Being able to balance your strategies on this street is crucial to your overall success.

Even with stacks of big blinds it's possible to get most of your chips in the middle by raising pre-flop and betting all three streets post-flop, so the turn acts as a vital lynchpin in putting your opponent to the test. Players expect to encounter aggression pre-flop and on the flop - this is standard play - but aggression on the turn will force mediocre players and hands out of pots much of the time, particularly if you are known for following through on the river as well.

Out of position, players tend to play the turn less aggressively than they should too. While calling players down can put you in awkward situations, check-raising against aggressive players with a wide range of hands can be a very effective tool, both in individual hands and as part of an overall strategy. River play is again an area where hand reading and balancing ranges is key, but it should be noted that the bigger winners would always be those that spend the most time playing the river in position.

Since your options at this stage are simply to value bet or bluff and check-raise for value or as a bluff , you need to adjust your hand ranges throughout in order to ensure that your river betting strategy is well balanced overall. Adjust your play according to your opponent's tendencies and his probable read of you, bluffing less against a player who is likely to call you down and more against one who folds too much. If you are out of position you need to consider the same factors, but remember that this will always be a losing situation against a tough player, so try to head it off earlier.

Also, consider employing occasional river check-raises in order to force him to bet less frequently against you. Overall, bear in mind that heads-up No-limit Hold'em is a battle of not just maths and logic, but also psychology and self-discipline.

Between two strong players, aggressive and creative play will be the norm, so try to ensure that you adjust better to your opponent than he is able to adjust to you - or quit to play another day.

Click here for more info. This tool is completely free. Go to Poker Tools and scroll to the bottom. It is under free tools. It is an excellent free software to practice your preflop and postflop ranges. The big blind is first to act post-flop. It sucks to play out of position OOP. If we have a draw, we have a hard decision again. I could write a few articles just about out of position strategy when playing HU. In general, you want to stick to play straightforward.

If you are a button , then postflop is your bread and butter. You will play in position the rest of the hand. You can either decide to take the pot down by a continuation bet.

You can check to keep the pot small and seeing a free turn card. You can make a delayed continuation bet on the turn after checking back the flop. You can mix up your strategy and keep opponents guessing every time how good hand you have.

If an opponent shows weakness , you can put a lot of pressure on him , if you have a read on him. Weak players will often play very straightforward OOP and will basically tell you when they have a good hand or if they missed the board.

But remember it is worse if you choose the wrong hands to try and bluff with than play straightforward. On low stakes, you can get away with playing straightforward OOP and still make money. Firstly focus instead on the preflop game and your button post play. Once you master those, then you start learning OOP strategies. One vital thing that many low stakes players disregard is adapting to our opponent. Let me demonstrate the following case.

We are up against a maniac, who 3bets almost every hand. With our QT offsuit we are in a range advantage against him preflop.

So our QTo is good enough to defend. My preflop adjustments against such player would usually be:. The action played as follows. He makes a continuation bet on the flop I make a small raise and opponent shoves. His hand? And we won a nice bb pot, and half of the blind went away because of the rake. If we are smart, then we get a big portion of the rake back. That is called Rakeback. It is a shallow table with 50bb. Ring-game players will often be dealing with a mixture of skilled and non-skilled opponents whereas if a heads-up player decides his opponent is overly skilled he has the ability to walk away from the game and select new opposition.

Exact strategy adjustments for playing heads up will depend on the poker variant, but here are some general guidelines. Preflop ranges will typically be looser when playing heads up. Made hands on the later streets are typically worth more in heads up games.

The same hand in a tight full-ring game is barely worth anything. So, while playing only weak opponents is excellent for making money, it is looked down upon by some portion of the poker community. Top Menu. How to play. Download Now. Miscellaneous King Articles Definition of Heads-Up What does the term "heads-up" mean in poker? What is the definition of the term "heads-up"? Heads-ups poker is poker against a single opponent. It can occur at tournaments and single-table games after the elimination of every other player, or simply be a prearranged one-on-one game.

Playing heads-up poker is much different than playing even three-handed poker because each player's chance of having the winning hand skyrockets, and the range of what would be considered "playable" hands increases drastically.

For example, many players would feel uncomfortable playing a low pair against two or more opponents, but in heads-up poker a single pair is often a winning hand and as such can be played aggressively. Heads-up matches are often wildly unpredictable and stressful.