Free rules for poker 35: If you're doing a lot of folding, won't this look odd to the other players?

You might sometimes get the feeling that all this folding you're doing looks
pretty obvious to the other players. You can almost feel their watchful eyes
on you – and hear them thinking: «Boy, he sure plays tight. He must be
waiting for the perfect hand to come along».
If you took a survey, though, you would find this is not what most low-
level opponents are thinking at all. Here is what they are really thinking
when you are doing a lot of folding:

1. Nothing.
2. You're a player who must be getting pretty lousy cards.
3. Great “you're out of the way“ let the action commence without
you.
4. They really don't care (or even notice). Frankly, there are enough
other opponents in the game to worry about, and the fewer
opponents, the better.
5. You must be a fairly «tight» player may be a «rock».

Notice that the thing you were most worried about came in last –
which it probably would in a real survey.

Free rules for poker 34: In the best players there is a streak of simple common sense.

If we put things in these terms, the game seems pretty simple.
Strategies are somewhat different than this at higher, more sophisticated
levels of play, of course, but for most players this common sense aspect is
something to keep in mind. It is possible for a player to get lost in
convoluted scheming and overlook this simple truth – that a good portion of
the game is simply common sense. And this trait is also present in the great
players. In fact, the vast majority of plays in the game of poker are not
fancy, sophisticated plays, but obvious ones. But these have to be done right
too.

Free rules for poker 33: Don't go on the offense against a large field of players with a weak hand.

Here's a poker secret: When you don't have good cards, someone else
usually does. Don't go into the aggressive/offense mode in a situation where
you're weak and they are a mystery. Remember, the good cards have to be
somewhere.