Poker novice - Slowplay

First of all the term slowplay means to not bet like you have a crap hand, when you have a monster hand. The idea is to lure your opponent into thinking they have you beat, in order to secure a larger pot later, rather than scaring them away and making no extra money after the flop.

Slowplaying definitely has it's place, but is used far too much in lower limits, and is actually quite damaging, here are a couple of classic example. I would advise against slowplaying except against the right opponents, like very aggressive betters who always cbet and then call after that too usually.

Scenrio 1.

Last night I finally got AA as my hole cards. I rarely bet very small or very big preflop, so in this case I bet 4BB. The flop comes out AQQ with a possible flush draw, which couldn't be better for me. That draw doesn't matter at all, I have flush beaten. I also have 3 Queens beaten, two aces, basically it would be a freak of great proportions to lose this hand. One guy bets 1BB. What do you do?

In this case I called. Next card comes up nothing, he bets 1BB again, I call. Last card completes the flush draw if he had it, so I bet 10BB, hoping he raises me after hitting a flush, he calls. I was lucky to even get that call, he had 3 Queens.

So lets reverse that a little. He originally bets 1BB. If I raise that 5BB right there, what does he do? He had 3 queens already, so he probably puts me on an Ace or maybe the flush draw, so he has me beat so far in his mind, he'd call if not raise. Next card comes up nothing, he would probably start betting bigger or at least call any decent sized bet I make. If I'm lucky he goes all in with his 3 queens, I make over 100BB in this case. As it was I made about 16BB, and was lucky to get him calling after the flush had completed.

Scenario 2.

I played with KK as my hole cards, and yes I always get great hole cards :) I hit a 3rd king on the flop and bet medium sized to pretend like I have a pair of kings or maybe the flush draw. The flush completes next card (neither of my cards is that suit), and I bet bigger to see what he has. He calls. Basically I'm beaten by a flush already, and lose the hand (though no more money fortunately). It's purely guesswork whether he would have called a big bet on the flop hoping for a flush, but by giving him a smaller bet, he was always going to call and then make more money as the flush hit.

Scenario 3.

And just to show the opposite of slowplays. I played a hand KT of hearts. The flop came up 3 hearts, I'm only beaten by someone playing Ax of hearts. The other player bet 5BB, I raised to 20BB, he called. He checked, I bet 40BB, he called. He checked again, I went all in with another 30BB, he called. He was chasing a straight, which wouldn't have beaten the flush anyway. In this case slowplaying wouldn't have made much, because he was after a lucky card and might have happily checked/called a low amount to get it, but it didn't eventuate. As it was he chased a large amount to get it and I win all the more money.

Basically I would advise slowplaying very rarely to catch out your opponents when they least expect it. It is a weapon, but betting is usually a far more effective weapon for winning pots or making really big money.