Tournament Strategies
After receiving pocket cards, you are immediately faced with a choice: play your cards and either raise or call the blinds, or fold.
Practice Matters
Now you have to figure out how much to bet.
Now you have to figure out how much to bet. In general, on dry boards, where there are few draws, you should bet around 1/2 pot and when the board is wet, with lots of draws, you should bet around 3/4 pot. You do this because your opponents will be more likely to fold on dry boards because there is less to connect with. They will connect more often on wet boards, so you want to bet a bit more to discourage them from continuing with a weak made hand. You continuation-bet between 1/2 and 3/4 pot because this will build the pot when you connect with the flop while not risking too much when you miss.
Some players habitually make a “probe bet”
Some players habitually make a “probe bet” of around 1/3 pot to find out where they are at when they’ve missed the board or flopped a weak made hand. Bets for information have little place in no-limit holdem, especially at a high level because opponents rarely give you accurate information. I size all my post-flop bets similarly to conceal information about my hand. As stacks get shorter, you can continuation-bet slightly fewer chips, between 2/5 and 2/3 pot because you can get your whole stack in easily with these small bets while risking less with your bluffs.