how much to bet

I am pretty new at playing hold'em and I don't really know how much I should bet when I have a good hand and am playing no limit.

Not saying you are not good enuf to play no limit, but if u are starting out, then start with a limit game, or better yet, if you are playing real money, start out on small tourneys with a $1 to $5 entry fee to get your feet wet. It is always best to play tight in your circumstance and unless you are sure of the success of your cards, fold if you are in bad position or call the minimum bet or small raise. Until you get a feel for a table or the people on the table, don't get crazy and go all in cause it looks like you have the nuts. Set out teasers and collect as much information as you can with good cards. I hate to say the table will dictate what you bet, but it will be safer for you in the long run.

That and a .25 will get u a cup of bad coffee.

It would be nice to have a formula for how much to bet. There are so many variables involved, it's impossible to cover them all here. For instance, is it a ring game with set blinds? Or is it a tournament where the blinds increase incremently throughout the event? What position are you in at the table? Are your opponents playing very tight or really loose? How large is your stack? What is the strength of your hand relative to all of the above?

I strongly recommend some reading on poker fundamentals, which will address betting in a lot of different situations. My favorites are Doyle Brunson's "Super System" & "Super System II", Tom McEvoy with T.J. Cloutier on "Championship No-Limit & Pot-Limit Hold 'Em", and "How to Play Poker Like the Pros" by Phil Helmuth. But there's a lot more great poker books out there.

Of course, the greatest teacher of all is experience through repetition. Just get in there and play!!

there isnt really anyone who can tell you what to bet but id say go with your instincts, find out by raising small amounts see what the table does you might have crazy guys(gus H) or tight players (phil H) so it depends on the table so its up to you, just start studying mate!

many pros say to raise anywhere from 3-6X the BB with premium hands.......i usually play tight for a while and get a good read for the rest of the table before making any moves....

Lee Jones book Winning at Low Limit Poker is another nice read for beginning players.

there are way too many variables to discuss here, you need to definitely read some books...Also there are times you don't want to bet up a good hand, some hands you want to keep as many people in the hand as possible...hoping they will catch something and ride with you all the way to the river...and then there are other times you want to bet it way up to get people out.

This is how I looked when my quad tens got beat by a royal flush....

I'd bet around 500.

You just cut the legs out from under the multi-billion dollar poker literature industry. We're obviously trying to make this poker thing WAY too hard!!

I think one of the most important things is to bet similar amounts when you decide to raise pre-flop, you gotta keep your opponents guessing, DONT bet based on the strength of your hand I saw a guy go all-in (1000) preflop on the first hand, he won 15chips from the blinds then turned up aces - what a dunce!

Hi Clink,
I couldn't give any advice on such a broad question, you sound like your so new to the game that you shouldn't really be playing real money tables just yet. You might want to narrow the question down a little, at the moment you don't even mention if your referring to real or play money. What do you call a good hand? Are you talking about pre-flop (good hand) or after the flop (good hand) they can be completely different. Are you talking abou ring games, multi-table tourneys or sit-n-go's?
As far as what you've asked so far Hawkeye and RammerJammer have given the best advice to you but when you ask for advice on playing poker you really need to be a little more specific.
Definitely read as much material as you can, there is a whole bunch of strategies and betting techniques right here in this forum, go back over some old threads, it's all here.
Also you really want to find out what type of game your either good at or what you prefer to play as the strategies are very different for each type of game played.
I wish you lots of wins in your upcoming poker games, good luck all

Tony ( The Webmaster )