Hey,

Can anyone explain to how counting odds work, and does it actualy improve your poker game?

there is a well known "cheat" for counting your odds after the flop.

lets say you have

and the flop comes.



pretty good flop for you. You have 4 hearts to the nuts and 2 over cards. Count the number of cards that you think help you.

Any heart (9 of them)

and likely any J (3 of them)

or any A (3 remaining)

that is 15 cards in the deck. Take this number and multiply it by 4 which comes to 60. that is the percentage of time that your draw will fill on the turn...this is usually right within 1%...so in this case, 60% of the time a heart, an ace, or a j will fall on the turn.

if it DOESN't come on the turn, take the same # of outs, but now multiply by 2, and again you have your percentage of it falling on the river..in this case, it's now 30%

Following this math while watching WPT/WSOp when they show a players chance of winning, you'll find you'll almost always be within 1-2% of what they're saying on the screen...just be sure not to give yourself too many outs by counting the same cards twice which is a common mistake. Some may also want to take the :10h out of the equation because it could possibly fill someone up.

Well that's hand odds....the probability of making a certain hand.

Pot odds tell you whether or not it's worth chasing that hand.

Usually, when counting your hand odds, you only really want to count outs towards one particular hand, preferably the nut hand or close to it. So in the example above you would have 9 outs for a nut flush. This is especially important when using hand odds and pot odds together.

So 9x4 = 32% or 2 to 1 chance of making a flush. That means every 3 times you play this hand, you'll hit it once.

Therefore your pot odds have to be 2 to 1 or better to make this hand worth chasing. So if the call is £10, you need at least £30 in the pot to be able to make it.

However it gets further complicated as all this assumes nothing will happen on the turn!!! If you're all-in, then fine. If you think there will be further betting on the turn, you have to factor that in. It also means you can't really times your outs by 4....you have to imagine there's only one card to come, times your outs by 2, and use that for your calculation. Then after you've seen what happens on the turn, do the same again for the river.

This is very basic and rough, but it will get you started and plenty of people here will be able to go into much more depth.

And yes, it improves your game!!! Massively!!! It means you know when to chase a hand or when not to, it means you know your chances of making a certain hand, and if you only call when you've got the pot odds it means you will generally end up in profit!!

Originally Posted by mookie

Take this number and multiply it by 4 which comes to 60. that is the percentage of time that your draw will fill on the turn

No, this is a common mistake. The 60% is your odds of hitting your card and the turn AND RIVER combined.

The ONLY time you want to use the outs x 4 forumula on the flop is if you or all your opponents are all-in. Otherwise, you are paying to see one card and need to use the one card formula (outs x 2).

Bascially, you want your odds of hitting your hand to be higher than the portion of the pot your are paying. In the above example, if you think your 15 outs are good, you have about a 30% chance of hitting your card (32%, I think), so you would be willing to pay up to that percentage of the pot to call.

For example, lets say you have the hand above and the current pot is 100. You have right about 3-1 (32 out of 100) odds to hit your hand on the next card. If your opponent bets 50 or less you should deffinately call because he is giving you the proper odds. If he bets more than that, then pot odds do NOT justify the call (that's when you get into implied odds).

Originally Posted by Girevik

No, this is a commone mistake. The 60% is your odds of hitting your card and theturn AND RIVER combined.

that is incorrect. It's 4x then 2x.


trust me.

Originally Posted by mookie

that is incorrect. It's 4x then 2x.


trust me.

Wanna bet? 4x is ONLY correct if you do not face the possibility of a turn bet.

well, not according to my talk with Linda Johnston on the exact topic..but ok.
I'll stick with how I've been doing it for 4 1/2 years.