Regardless of whether you play free poker games for fun or seriously for money you always get a buzz when you get a good starting hand such as a pair of kings. How can you make best use of this stroke of luck though? If you go All-In hoping to win big there is a big danger that the other players will fold.

This can happen a lot and is very frustrating, however, there are ways to cash-in on such opportunities and in this article I am going to tell you what you need to know.

Sadly there is no magic bullet, very simply it is about experience; knowing about things such as playable pockets, implied and pot odds and how to play in such a way that the others think you’re bluffing and not fold.

At the start of a hand, in most cases having a pair is good news and you will definitely get chances to win based on the cards that follow on the flop, turn and river.

Lets look at an example: You get a nice pair to start: Ks, Kd. A great pair that should give you strong winning opportunities.

Your options at this point are to either go all-in or wait for the flop.

If you wait you must keep in mind that if an Ace opens on the flop then your winning chances will be greatly reduced.

If an Ace does fall then going on and betting more could be a waste and you would be advised to fold as if someone else is bets then it’s likely they have an Ace in their hand and will be able to beat you. Alternatively they could be bluffing or are playing crazy. Your experience helps here, once you learn to observe other players you can get a feel for if they are bluffing, playing crazy or if they really might have a better hand meaning it’s best to fold.

You might think that it would have been better to have gone all-in but you need to remember that in that case too the person having an Ace might have gone ahead and bet and you would have lost more money. Having folded you are just down a bit but very much not out.

Now lets look at your Ks,Kd again but where the flop cards are 6s,6h, Qh. Now you know that if anyone has a 6, you will be beaten.

But do not lose hope, a 6 is a lower value card and there is a good chance that a player holding a 6 might have already folded. So in this case you should raise the stakes and see how the others react. If someone goes all-in then, unless you’ve flagged them as a crazy player, there is a good chance they have a 6 so your best option is to fold and minimize damage.

Don’t be disheartened by the examples, they’re not meant to imply that you can’t play to win or have to reply on pure luck. Not at all! What I am trying to get across is that poker is a game that involves a lot of probability (also known as luck) to which is added psychology, and into this is mixed what cards open up as the hand progresses which in turn affects the power of your hand.

That’s how poker works and sometimes even the best cards will be rendered powerless by events, so keep this fact in kind and when you get a great hand that turns bad just accept it as part of the game and aim to lose as little as possible.

As long as you playing solid good poker then probability will come out on your side in the longer term and as you have minimised your losses during the bad patches you will have money to bet when probability smiles on you.

The best way to learn better poker online is in quality but low risk games,learning by your mistakes is very much the way of things in poker so it is a good idea to keep those mistakes cheap! Micro stakes and free poker games are the way to go in the early stages and be sure to read up on lots of free poker lessons too in order to learn about things like pot odds and playable pockets.

For best results practice and play free poker on free poker online site NoPayPOKER.com at first and when, only when, you are confident, move up to low stakes cash games.