Newbie lost!!!!! HELP!

Hi

i have just joined and i am kind of lost here where should i start?

I see many different poker styles and do not even know if i should just pop in one and start playing or what???

Start out playing low limits and read some strategy, use the articles on this site and buy a book. Use whatever style suits you best, if your a beginner then you should probably start out playing tight and maybe you shoud play limit. Thats how i started out. gl!

Welcome to the forum and hope you enjoy it here - plenty of friendly types to answer any question you have.

http://www.cardschat.com/poker-strategy.php answers a lot of questions and limit poker is a good place as you wont lose to big (if you do happen to lose )

Start slow and play top hands AA, KK, QQ etc but if you discover a style that you prefer and it serves you well than god luck with it.

Read lots and play lots as well - but my number one i always tell people is - enjoy it

Good luck and have fun

If I were you- this would be my approach.

- Consider your initial investment as a training Budget. Eg an amount that you are prepared to lose. Choose an amount that you are willing to spend on training. eg £10.

- Play Freeroll tourneyments on whatever site you choose.

- Play the cheapest possible Ring games or sit and goes if you play them and try not to spend more than 1/10 of your training budget in one go.

.....Then - go "train" And last as long as you can with this budget. Play at least 20 freerolls and cash regularly in the freerolls before you plan to reload any extra money.

The reason I suggest this is that if you just read books you will not understand it unless you have experienced some of these things mentioned in the book. Once you have finished your training read lots and lots of books.

Some general tips for training

A) Everytime there is a set of cards in the middle try and work out what the best possible hand is that someone else can have.
B) Try and work out out which players on the table play lots of hands and which ones play few hands. This will tell you a lot about the players. If they play few hands then they are more likely to have a good hand when they do play. Write there names down and after 20 hands categorise them. use this information when you choose to play your hands

In terms of play the golden rule is to try and maximise the pot when winning and minimise when losing. hence you could use this as a very very generic rule of thumb. Everytime you have two pairs or better then try and make the pot bigger and if you have less then two pair try to keep the pot smaller. This is not fool proof and you will learn some important lesson from this - eg - when not to make the pot bigger - but thats good training.

Try this for starting hands strategy. I am not saying its perfect but a guide.

In any Position Raise with AA, KK ,QQ, JJ, 10-10, A-Ks, A-K, A-Qs. ( the s stands for suited cards )
Raise with the above hands + 9-9, 8-8, A-Q, A-J, K-Qs, K-Q if in the middle of table and no previous raisers
Raise with all the above hands + 7-7, A-x, and high suited connectors like Q-Js and J-10s if one of the last to act with no previous raisers