2. Continuation bets or c-betting

Like 3-betting, there are several reasons why you want to be c-betting. Remember, c-betting is where you are a raiser or 3-better preflop and you're "continuing" your aggression postflop.

Simply, it gives you another chance to take down the pot. Just like raising or 3-betting did, now play has moved on to post flop. If you c-bet, one of three things can again happens. First, he calls and you guys play a turn. Two, he raises and you're playing out a potentially dangerous/confusing situation. Or three, he folds and you take it down. Again, I like those odds a lot of the time.

Secondly, it gives you an easy decision on how to play the pot. If you're raised off the bat after a c-bet, you get a lot of information on his hand and typically you can throw it away. If he calls, you can deduce a lot of the time he has a medium strength hand or a draw. If he check/raises, you may understand he's trying to be tricky and it gives you information on how to potentially c-bet him in the future.

There are several factors or variables you must think about before c-betting. Lets take a look at them:

A. The value of your hand

The best way to get value out of a good hand is to simply bet it out, correct? So with a made hand on the flop, betting it out and getting value out of it seems self-explanatory. But what about not-made hands?

For draws, often-times putting out a bet is more +EV for your hand and therefore can give you more value out of just taking it down there instead of trying to hit your draw. This is for several reasons. First, your odds of taking down the pot with a c-bet and your opponent folding may be greater than your odds of hitting the draw, if it happens to be weak. Two, if the board is pretty dangerous to begin with and you hit you may not be getting action anyways. Or three, if he has a better draw than you, trying to c-bet and making him pay for his draw may get him to fold and therefore if the draw hits and you both have a made-hand but his is better, you lose more value seeing the rest of the board.

With absolutely nothing, c-betting gives you another chance to try to take it down. If you get raised or called and you give up the pot later, it's no big deal. But it's a great feeling having nothing and getting another shot to win a pot.

B. How much credit will you be given for a good hand?

This is a very common mistake among people who are c-betting. When you are doing this, you need to think of basically, how often is this going to work? In short, is this a situation where your opponent is going to give you credit for a good hand?

What situations will you get credit on?

The most common is if you are raising in early position or maybe even middle position. The point is that people are less likely to give you credit for a hand if you are in a more steal-worthy position (late position, button, etc.). If people suspect you may be trying to steal, your c-bets will be working less. It's still worth it to c-bet most of the time, but if people are playing back at you a lot it may be more worth it to check some flops. If you're raising in early position though, your range is typically tighter or at least people will believe so, allowing your c-bets to work more often.

C. How much merit does your hand hand if you are check/raised or raised?

This is another thing to think about. Lets say you are in position post flop and they check to you, you c-bet, and they raise you. You need to think about this when making a c-bet. Keep tabs on players that are doing this tricky play, especially when you are c-betting with fairly weak hands.

If you have a good hand and you are check/raised, you're going to be excited, right? When about if you have a weak hand? A draw? Absolutely nothing?

You don't want to get yourself into situations where you could possibly have the best hand but you'd have to fold because you might be behind.

This is why having player notes on how people are playing you is so important. If someone has a habit of check/raising you or raising you (if you are first to act and you c-bet and someone in position raises your c-bet), you can avoid c-betting them without a made hand or at least something you're not afraid to be raised with.

How much do I c-bet?

This is a very questionable and arguable topic as far as c-betters will say. Generally, your c-bets should be fairly strong..lets look at it a little more closely, though.

Example - You raise with KJos on the button and the small blind calls, the bb folds. You miss the flop but want to represent some kind of made hand so you look to bet into his check.

The pot is your $1.00, plus his $1.00 call, plus the bb so its $2.25 altogether.

You c-bet $1.25. Him calling is merely $1.25 to see a turn of a pot which will be $4.75. Are you giving him odds to his draws? To outdraw you? To call with a LOT of hands? Yes. Even if he has a better hand than you, you can still get him to fold.

Lets say you have KJos in this example and he has AT. Flop comes 638. If you c-bet to $1.25 I can guarantee he's calling a vast majority of the time. But lets say you make your c-bet a little stronger, and make it around 2/3 or 3/4 the pot. Lets say you bet around $1.75. His odd's decrease, his perception on your hand strength changes (to your favor), and his desire to continue with the pot increase. You'll take down the pot much more often.

A typical c-bet should be around, like I said, 2/3 or 3/4 the pot. Anything less is just begging people to call. What you don't want to do, however, is vary your c-bets based on your hand strength. You shouldn't be betting nearly full pot with no hand to "force them out" but only betting around 1/2 pot with a made hand to "get action". To your surprise, even morons pick up on this after awhile.

Again, more c-betting tendencies and maybe a little on how to play c-bets in another article. Lets move on to a quick section on player notes!

3.Player notes, and how to use them for your advantage

This is something that I've personally endorsed to everyone I've ever coached. I don't see a lot of people doing this and I honestly think its one of the easiest and most important things you could do playing cash tables, especially 6-max.

Every time you 3-bet someone, or someone 3-bets you, you should be typing stuff into their player notes box. That's why almost every poker site has this!

When I 3-bet someone, I type in something like the following:

"3-bet him: 1x"

then underneath, what the situation was

"AQ, he folded." or "KK, he called then folded to c-bet on a T35"

If I'm 3-bet, I'll type in something like this:

"3-bet me:1x
77, tight player.
JJ, i called and check/folded on a AK6 flop"

How does this benefit me in terms of 3-betting?

Like I've mentioned, 3-betting is all about adjustments. Your ranges on 3-betting or calling/raising a 3-better depends on your perception on their aggressiveness AND previous experiences.

If someone's 3-betting you a lot, you may adjust to their playing style and play back at THEM more, or call them more often.

If you're 3-betting someone a lot, you will learn to slow down perhaps a little bit if they eventually start playing back at YOU. However, until they do, and until you note it as such, you can continue doing it to the players at the table you know it will work on.

By documenting how people are playing you and how you are playing them, deciding hand ranges, deciding whether to 3-bet or not, deciding whether or not to call or raise a 3-bet becomes extremely easy.

How does this work with c-bets though?

Like the above examples, I will note what happened postflop if its a normal just raise/call preflop and postflop betting situation. If they are folding to c-bets often, that means they are calling more preflop with weak hands and I can raise into them more often. Also, it means I can c-bet them more often.

If they are check/raising my c-bets or raising them outright, I can be more careful not to c-bet without a decent hand.

Get how it can benefit your play? If you're multitabling and can't narrow people's ranges or how people are playing you, this benefits you even more because you can multitable while really being able to figure out a lot of people's playing styles without having to sit and memorize their every play every hand.

_____________________________

This has been a pretty long article and I'm sure a lot of you just skimmed to the end or skipped over it. I want to stress to you though, if you really want to improve at poker, you really need to read these kind of articles. They can benefit your play so much. A few minutes reading over this information will be beneficial to your play for years to come. Really getting a lot of detail and info on specific concepts is what really will help your playing style and improve your poker game. Please don't cheat yourself by not allowing yourself to improve.

Much of this info comes from my own experiences as a coach and player. Some of the concepts and basis of other parts come, though not directly, from articles on twoplustwo.com and various poker strategy videos from PokerXFactor and StoxPoker.Com. For more information, check out the Micro NLHE forum on twoplustwo.com forums, go to the "***The Best of uNL - Strategy posts***" thread at the top of the page and read through some of the 3-bet, c-bet, and other concept articles there as well.

Thank you for reading, the next article will deal with a little bit more on c-betting and 3-betting along with playing with position, what kind of opening ranges and how much to make raises based on limpers or if you're first to open.