Some people are quick to condemn online poker. They wrongly think that online poker and online casinos are a faster and more readily available means for problem gamblers to lose their money. It matters little to them, that there is a Bwin Harvard Study that shows the opposite to be true. It matters little to them that the bwin Harvard study shows that online gaming is actually easier to track and problem gamers more easily identified than in a live setting. Poker Health was quite high online because the process is automated. The study actually used the same data that an online poker site can use to prevent problem gamblers from hurting themselves to maintain poker health. This is not to say, that an online poker site has a safety net, and players can’t lose money. Players can lose a little to a lot of money but there are built in fail safes that stymie the losses. Depositing money online has its limits, thus players are restricted by how much they get on in a given time. If a session has broken down, it takes a lot more effort to get more money than it does in a live casino where ATMs and credit card advances are always a step or two nearby. The relative mental health of the two populations indicate the poker health is higher and more sustainable for online poker players than live plaeyrs The bwin Harvard study tracked 2400 new sign ups over a two year period from 2005 to 2007. The players followed were monitored to track their behaviors. The experts at Harvard were will trained to spot trends in addictive behaviors and problem gambling to evaluate poker health. After all, the branch of Harvard partnering in the study was the Harvard Medical School and the Division on Addictions. Who better to rate poker health than the Harvard Medical School? They noted that five percent of the 2400 players tracked have disconcerting tendencies to gamble more. This could be a sign of addictive behavior as it showed a willingness to place higher wages and risk more financial problems. This five percent was somewhat easily identified by the bwin Harvard study which in itself is a plus. It’s obvious online sites have far more information at their disposal than live casinos that can’t track everybody’s play. Even using comp cards falls short as not everyone uses them, and players identified as problem gamblers shun them for fear of being kicked out. Most players, the other 95%, slowed down their poker playing when losing. They risked less. Those that won sometimes played more and risked more. Course, as they won, they had more to risk. Interestingly enough, even the 5% subset reduced the amount they risked, lowering their buy-ins, but they did increase the frequency with which they played. Playing more ultimately meant they risked more in total even if each session individually was for less at stake. They did note some differences and similarities with other types of gambling. The bwin Harvard study thought that poker health would have more in common with sports gamblers health than casino players health. As the bwin Harvard study noted there are similarities in that both have skill mixed with chance in making wagers. What they discovered was that poker and casino gambling actually had slightly higher number of problem gamblers. Sports bettors were tracked at 1% problem gambling behaviors while the bwin Harvard study found casino bettors at 5% and poker players closer to that number. This revelation actually may be more attributable to poker being a casino-esque game that attracted the same type of gamblers. Sports bettors might not make the jump to poker or casino games as easily as poker and casino players would to the others. On the whole, the bwin Harvard study was upbeat. 95% of players demonstrated behaviors that were reasonable and gambled only moderately risky amounts. The 5% that didn’t were easily tracked indicate it is easy to monitor the poker health of a player and takes steps to protect problem gamblers from themselves.

As you move up through the levels in no limit hold’em then certain styles and strategies that were effective at lower levels no longer become effective higher up. One simple example is limping in with pocket pairs looking to set mine. In the low stakes levels like at $10 games for example then you may open limp with 5c-5d and there may be several limpers behind you for the simple reason that the games are more loose passive in nature. So not only do you get the chance to hit your set more frequently but your opponents are weak enough to pay you off when you do hit it.

An example could be the following, you open limp with 5-5 and three other players limp. The button raises the pot with A-K and the big blind calls. You think that if you call then the other two limpers will call giving you good implied odds. The flop comes A-5-2 and you end up with a big pot after the player with the A-K cannot lay their hand down. Now let us look at that same situation in a NL200 full ring game where you limp with the pocket fives. The players who would have limped behind you now fold but the final limper raises to steal the pot.

Now the A-K re-raises and suddenly the price to call escalates as you cannot be certain that your call will close the betting. So you fold and when the flop comes the same A-5-2 then you miss your chance to hit your set. Also the pay offs are not as great either because there are less people in the pot and better players will not always stack off with deep stacks with hands like top pair top kicker. So this is a double whammy for your strategy. Another strategy is raising from position, in weak low stakes games then this is a far more effective tactic.

In middle stakes games then there is simply no way that your opponents would let you get away with raising a very high percentage of your range. They will be watching you carefully as they would all players to their immediate left and right. Many of your opponents will be using tracking software like PokerTracker or Hold’em Manager and will have precise data on you for that part of your game. So it is clear then that certain strategies that work at some levels of play are woefully inadequate at middle stakes levels.

Your opponents at higher levels for example will have far bigger bankrolls on average. The effect of using a big bankroll is not just about riding variance. A big bankroll also allows you the leeway to call down marginally when you have very good reason to believe that your opponents are betting and c-betting and even multi-barrelling wider than usual. Strategies in poker are quite often level dependent and moving up in levels quite often involves almost learning a new way of playing.

Practice your skills at safe and high traffic poker sites such as Texas Holdem Poker See you there!