It is a good sign of this side of the business when a site has to add more space to showcase all the free bonuses that are available, and long may it continue.

Players can choose from a large selection of free bonuses totaling over $1,000 dollars in free cash, all of which can be claimed without ever needing to make a deposit.

We were a bit curious as to the difference between a ‘no deposit poker bonus’ and a ‘free poker money‘ bonus, especially as the player need not make a deposit when claiming either type of bonus.

It seems that the ‘free poker money’ bonuses are provided directly by the poker room concerned whereas the ‘no deposit’ bonuses are provided by a third party website. Other than that, they are all for free, and that is the important point!

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The last few years have seen this poker bonus model become more and more popular with poker rooms and independent third party operators.

Of course, they have always been popular with players.

Players that are not familiar with free poker cash bonuses sometimes think that there must be something dodgy about them. That they must be some time of scam. After all, why would anyone want to give away money?!

That is a fair point, and you really can’t be too careful when it comes to the internet.

Well, to begin with, these bonuses come with certain terms and conditions that restrict players from simply withdrawing the free money and walking away with it. Players who claim this type of bonus will be required to actually play poker with the money. That is what it is for after all.

So, you get the free poker cash and you play poker. And the poker room takes a small percentage of every pot in rake. The more you play, the more pots the poker room gets to rake, and the more money they make back.

Many, many players will get a small amount of free cash and blow it all in one or two hands. This is bad. Bad for the player, and bad for the poker room. But a small percentage of the players that get these bonuses will go on to play a whole lot of poker, and become loyal players at the room that gave them the money. And go on to rake a whole lot of money for that poker room.

That is the theory anyway.

Sometimes poker rooms use these bonuses to get a lot of new players. They run the bonus promotion for a while to increase their player base, and then stop for a while.

Like the ten dollars free bonus at Poker Time. They ran their free $10 bonus for a while a couple of years ago, then they stopped for about a year. Then they started up again but only on a limited basis. The finally they made the free $10 available to all new players again.

Check it out here.

1. Free Poker Money
2. Free Poker Site
3. Free Poker Bots

The new larger network is still called Everleaf so I guess you could say that the UPN was taken over by Everleaf.  The details don’t matter too much.  No players, or their bankrolls, were hurt in the making of that merger, so all is good.

The new larger network is still very small compared to the top ten poker sites, with still only a couple of hundred players at peak times.  Hopefully the increased player base and assumed cost savings will be enough to keep Everleaf Gamings doors open for another while.

In the current economic climate smaller poker rooms and networks are coming under a lot of financial pressure and the economies of scale that a larger player base can bring must be most welcome.

Everleaf Gaming sites accept American players which should be a big boost, but the software is still being reported as quite buggy by a number of dissatisfied players and, until that gets sorted out, the network will most likely not flourish.

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So what strategy do you need to take to make sure that you get past the bubble and into the money? To the final table even?

If you have been playing your best game up to now then the best advice is to simply keep playing that way.  Use a little extra caution when evaluating any big calls if you are just before the bubble. A small risk is greatly increased here as most other players will have tightened up at this stage and are probably playing as slow as they can.

They are essentially giving other players more time to make a mistake – don’t let that be you.

So what happens here if you have a premium hand, say AA, and a bigger stack than you pushes all in?  Call? Fold? Is it unthinkable to fold pocket aces? Ever?

I’m not going to say that the right move here is to fold. Or to play. The right move here is to evaluate how your whole game has been so far. How long did it take you to get this far, what was the buy in, how much do you stand to gain if you get to the cash,  how important is it to you to get there, and would you be willing to go out now happy that you had played your best game?

It could really come down to whether you feel lucky or not.

All tournament play, in fact all poker play, comes down to making the right calls.  That doesn’t mean winning all the time, but calling when the odds are in your favor. Coming up to the bubble re-evaluate your odds to factor in the extra risk inherent in this stage of the game.

Finally, if you are in the unlucky situation where you definitely will have to make a move before the tourney is into the money stage, the only real advice here is that you should be pushing, and not calling.

Pushing against a monster chip leader may not be the way to go here.  Pushing with position against an opponent with a similar sized stack to your own is preferable here as opposed to having the goods.

Having a premium starting hand but being out of position can mean that you are called by a larger stack and get outdrawn. If you have to go, and I really mean have to, then it’s Position, Opponent, and then the cards.

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This is especially true in tourneys that have very large fields.  It is a reasonable strategy, but it has one glaring flaw.

Many players will be familiar with the marginal hands that they are happy to go all-in on.  Say that you have AKoff and you are up against one other player who is all-in.  You have the guy on a low pair.  You probably already know that your odds are roughly 50/50, depending on the pair.

So you might be used to making a call here for a fifty fifty shot with two over cards.  In cash games that is ok depending on how you play and your bankroll management abilities.

But in a tourney situation you have to reassess what you stand to gain against what you potentially stand to lose.  A win here doubles you up, yes, but essentially it just keeps you in the game.

Whereas a loss here finishes your tourney life.  If you take enough of these 50/50 shots you are guaranteed to be out, sooner or later.

Obviously this is similar to saying that you should only play premium hands.  But the difference here is that even if you are not put in for all your chips, but instead are up against a short stack and only need to risk half your stack, you are still not getting good odds on this type of hand. Losing half your stack early on can cripple you just as easily as if you were in for all your chips.

And the upside of that is that you did not even double up.  Longer tourneys require that you re-evaluate your potential losses against your potential gains, and adjust accordingly.

Related posts:

1. Tournament Strategy – Stealing the blinds
2. Tournament strategy – getting into the money

It is probably a combination of things that have them looking for free poker sites.  The natural caution when it comes to putting your money online is probably the major reason for wanting to play free poker first.

And that is a good thing.

There is a lot of benefit to playing the free poker tables option in online poker rooms. For beginners, it is a great way to familiarize yourself with the poekr software of that particular room. Plus it will get you used to the betting rounds and the action of your chosen card game.

Without the pressure of worrying about making a mistake with actual real hard cash, it can be a pleasant learning experience, and is definitely recommended for players that are new to online poker.

But don’t get carried away with the free poker option. If you do well at these free tables don’t go thinking that you are a natural poker player and dive straight in to the high roller tables for real cash.

The same holds true if you do not do well at these tables, and lose all your free play chips. Don’t worry too much about that. Yes, you may be a terribly bad poker player, but losing your play chips may actually mean that you are a good player too.

Whatever happens, just realize that the only real value to be had with these tables is to learn how the software works, and get familiar with your chosen poker room before you hit the cash tables or the cash tournaments. Playing the play money tables will not teach you how to play real poker.

I can’t stress that enough. Just because you can beat the free play tables does not mean you are good enough to go to the WSOP.

No value to the chips means that no one values them. Simple. If the players don’t take the money seriously then you cannot bluff, or force someone off a draw. So just use this option to get familiar with the software, nothing more.

In fact, staying and playing for too long at the free chip tables will actually harm your game. Don’t do it.

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The bigger the field the longer this middle period will be.

By this stage many of the lesser skilled players will have been eliminated.  Of course some of them will have doubled or tripled up.

But the majority of the field now will be playing in a style similar to your own, that is, in a potentially winning strategy.

What you need to do right now is play only the premium hands that come to you.  This will be quite boring of course, but you can spend you time studying your opponents.

Bearing in mind that any decent player will be doing exactly the same, you will need to switch your play up a bit.  One approach here is to play uber tight in early position, playing super strong with only premium hands, but to loosen up completely when in later position.

When in position against a small early raise you will want to smooth call with the nuts, but come over the top with half your stack with any lesser hand.

That is a fairly simplified appraoch, and you will need to fill it out a bit by using what you have learned in your down time against your opponents when you can.  Also, don’t stick too rigidly with this as it will be soon spotted by an experienced tourney player, who will take you out by simply small raising something like pocket aces.

This is a nice strategy for stealing the blinds but getting a decent amount of chips instead of just the blinds.

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1. Tournament strategy – valuing your chips
2. Tournament strategy – getting into the money
3. Continuation Betting Theory

That is to say, you are expected to follow a pre-flop raise with a continuation bet after the flop.  Failure to do so is a glaring sign of missing the flop.

Of course you can use that to your advantage by checking when your hole cards hit the flop. Assuming that you are in position the bet will be checked round to you, and a check from you here with a strong hand will probably induce a bluff from one or more opponents after the turn.

But can you still check the flop even though you missed?

Another big factor in deciding when and or if to make a c-bet is the type of game you are playing.  Tournament c-betting can be a whole lot different to cash game continuation betting.

Before we get into the specifics of each type of game we can say in general that checking early with a strong hand and taking down an inflated pot after inducing a bluff should set you up nicely later on to be able to c-bet or not at your discretion.

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Many of these players are losing players and, one way or another, they have heard that the only way to win at online poekr is to use a bot. They most likely have also heard that they are losing to up to four of these bots at the poker tables all the time.

Now, many poker players here stories like this. Some get angry and quit the game for ever. Some get angry, but try to beat the bots. And some get angry, but then get interested, and convince themselves that if only they had a poker bot they would make a fortune at the game.

Those players that are serious about this, and have the money to spare, will pursue the poker bot angle like a business venture, or maybe like a passion, and will eventually spend many thousands of dollars on a poker bot, and the attendant software needed to run a bot successfully.

Other players, (like you maybe?) will look for the cheaper angle – free poker bots.

I am now going to give you the low down on free poker bots. It should be all that you need to know to stay away from this area of online poker.

First off, any poker bot that you get for free is not worth the price that you paid for it. Period.

If you had a working poker bot, one that made a profit playing poker while you did other things away from your pc, would YOU give it away for free?

That argument is solid. You can make excuses, offer up reasons why you are giving it away, make out like you are a benevolent millionaire or something, but ultimately if you had such a thing you would NOT give it away for free. Hell, you wouldn’t sell it either.

So why would you expect that anyone else would give it to you for free? They must have an angle, even if you can’t see what it is. What the angle is is not important; what is important is that it will not work. It will not be profitable. It can not possibly be to your benefit to use a poker bot that you got for ‘free’.

Stop and think about it for a minute, and then walk away and don’t waste your time.

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