How Useful Is Mathematics at A Poker Table?

Poker is a game of strategy mixed with luck. You can apply all the strategies you can think of but in the end, the cards are either on your side or not.

That being said, there is something to be said for the amount of chess players that make moves into professional poker and the amount of analytical brain types that are attracted to the game. Maybe the luck element is to keep things interesting, rather than a defining characteristic of the game. After all, if it were purely strategy, it would be like math homework, with a predictable outcome every time: boredom.

But is there more to it? Is being good at math a big part of winning at poker? We explore the idea here. Read on to find out how you can use math skills to your advantage at the poker table.

IMAGE: https://unsplash.com/photos/_pRe982WvBQ (Unsplash)

What skills are needed for poker?

Poker is definitely a game that will attract the analytical mind. Depending on whether you’re playing in a room on GGPoker Canada or a physical one, you’ll need to keep tabs on different things, but the cards don’t change. There isn’t much room for interpretation. You are analyzing the deck, trying to guess odds and hands, analyzing your opponent, trying to read body language and detect tells, and you will need decision making skills too.

Pot odds

For a simple start, we can explain pot odds. Beginners can use math to determine pot odds to help their game. It is the simplest bit of math on the table, but it is a very useful thing to keep in your back pocket. It informs the first decision you will make at the game: whether you are likely to win or not.

From determining the pot odds, you can figure out the odds of you winning, then decide whether to call or raise.

First, you’ll want to determine the card odds, and compare them with the pot odds. So, let’s say you have an ace-eight in hearts and the flop has a 2 of hearts, seven of spaces and jack of hearts, there is $80 in the pot and your opponent bets $20.

First, the card odds say that there are five cards we know in this hand, leaving us with 47 cards that we don’t know in the deck. From those 47 there are nine cards that will make the flush, leaving 38 that won’t, giving us the sum of 38:9 or around 4:1. That’s how likely we are to hit a heart on the next card.

Then the pot odds put the size of the pot against the size of the bet. There is $100 in the pot and we have to call $20, which means the pot odds work out to 100:20 or 5:1.

From there you should call, since you are likely to win more money than you are losing, because the pot odds are higher than the card odds. Stick to that rule and you are on your way to winning.

There are a lot of ways you can use math to gain an advantage in poker. More beginner level math includes implied odds and Sklansky dollars. Middle tier math includes expected value, poker equity, fold equity and reverse implied odds, and if you really want to impress players you can look up G-bucks, equity and drawing hands and hand combinations.

So, to sum up, mathematics is very important to poker. The mastery of the math of the game will go a long way to helping you win, where even the most basic math means goes a long way.