Hi,

I've been reading through the articles on the site.
(Very helpful, thank you all contributors!)

I am however slightly curious about one point in the "Stealing small pots" article.

The steal here is done with a pot-sized bet.
Why not slightly smaller, like 2/3 pot?

I understand that betting too little will invite callers getting the right odds and also reraise bluffs. But is there anything magic about a pot-sized bet compared to 2/3?

My thinking is that varying a pot-sized steal bet with a 2/3 sized steal bet will save some money overall when you do get callers or reraisers and have to lay down.

I haven't tried this in enough hands yet, but so far I feel I'm happier with pot-sized bets.
But I don't know why.
I play NL100.

Thanks again for the excellent articles!
(And I hope this is the right place to post this...)

When I have a real hand like TPTK, I bet the pot. So when I bet with nothing I have to bet the pot also. You cant change it up trying to save money when you have nothing or the good players will catch on.

For you guys watching the $1000NL project....so far Ive bet the flop with absolutley nothing 13 times. Ive won 8 of them. Thats 62% (50% is break even) and Ive made a total profit of $165 off of these 13 hands.

These are standard unraised small pots only. It doesnt count times that I raise with AK, and bet the flop unimproved which I do also of course.

In my case I usually vary my legitimate bets depending on the board - if its scary (like 2 of a suit) I bet the pot, if its totally harmless I bet 1/2 in hope of someone staying in for the ride and maybe keeping the pot down, since my only real threat is a set. (Instance 37A rainbow, I hold AK, or the same flop with 2 diamonds and I hold AdKd). So I tend to bet less on my steals if the flop is complete rags and more if it looks somewhat dangerous. Most times my steals are just continuation bets though. I rarely try a pure bluff on a dangerous board or vs too many ppl , my pure bluffs are usually on rag flops so I usually try it with 2/3 to 3/4.

Btw my first post on this forum so hi to all. The site and forum look really nice to me. It seems to me that there are players here much more competent than those posting at most poker forums I've visited. I'm a really new player, but I've been playing a lot lately and am really determited to improve my game.

Well, let's not hijack this topic, but hello and welcome!

I normally dont do it if Im far out of position. If theres only one more guy to act after me then I fire away

If the flop is Q63 and I bet pot..it doesnt matter what I have, they normally wont call without a Q. If theres a known calling station in the hand I dont do it. I would bet that Q63 flop with any hand I played......55, AJ, AT, 99...doesnt matter.