Why fold when you can check

Having touched the muck, your hand is now dead. It cannot be retrieved even if you were to realise that your hand had been discarded by accident.

However, let's assume that you do want to continue in the hand after someone else has bet. In that case you may either call or raise. A call involves matching the amount already bet in order to see the next card or to see the showdown, if the last card dealt was the river card. However, if you particularly like your hand you may also raise, forcing the original bettor to match your raise if he wants to continue in the hand.

Of course, whenever you raise, the original bettor has the option to reraise , putting the onus back on you to match his bet to stay in the hand. And the point about folding if you are first to act is a good one If I simply sat and had the clock called on me, I would be forced to fold. Some years ago, the on line poker systems let you fold anytime you wanted.

I can only explain, I can't make you understand Show 6 more comments. Mikki Mikki 1. Sign up or log in Sign up using Google. Sign up using Facebook. Sign up using Email and Password.

Post as a guest Name. Email Required, but never shown. Featured on Meta. Now live: A fully responsive profile. Related 9. In a game of incomplete information, we have to use everything that is at our disposal. You double-barrel As9hKs8h. On a 2d you decide for some reason not to bluff. Should you just fold then instead of checking?

No , because there is still a minimal chance that our hand will win. I remember many occasions when I gave up on the river and checked and was surprised when pot got shipped my way. There are some rare instances when you should consider folding instead of checking. The main goal of folding instead of checking is to hide information from your opponents.

You do not want to reveal how you played your hand. In my last poker session, I focused on finding a proper spot to fold instead of checking. On the board, JsJd3c6d5d hand got miraculously checked down all the way. My options are to bet, check back, or simply fold. A conventional route would be just to check back and lose. When one opens, it has either been checked to them or they are the first person to act.

Many new players say 'raise' mistakenly in this situation, where the standard should be to say 'bet' or 'open. Players that open will subsequently be faced with either a call, raise or folds from the other players at the table. Calling is the mechanism used to call a bet. This is essentially matching the amount that has been put in by another player in the form of a bet or a raise. If nobody calls, the hand is over and the uncalled player wins the hand.

If the hand makes it to the last round of betting, called the river, and Player A bets and Player B calls, then it goes to a showdown and the best hand wins.

Raising is the action one takes when they want to increase the opening bet. After raising it up, one will have to deal with either a call, fold or re-raise from the other players in the hand. Raising is associated with either having a strong hand or trying to win the pot on the spot with a well-timed bluff.

Re-raising is exactly what it sounds like. It is the action of increasing a raise already put in by an opposing player. If there are three players in the hand and Player A opens, player B can raise that bet.