-Do a lot of betting and be very aggressive. If you're going to stay in a pot, you should either be in the lead or have a reason for calling (namely when playing against aggressive, bluff-happy players; when slowplaying/trapping/inducing a bluff; when you think there's a good chance your hand is good but want to keep the pot small because you don't really know where you're at; or based on the expressed and implied odds of a draw). You should generally bet at least 2/3 of the pot on a flush draw or straight draw board to give opponents bad odds to chase. Slow-playing should be used sparingly and mostly against bad players who you want to give a chance to catch up and who won't find it suspicous when you suddenly come alive betting/raising.
-Be as unpredictable as possible. Make sure you do at least some slowplaying and big bluffing (just how much depends on personal taste and effectiveness, but remember, too much slowplaying becomes predictable and ends up giving opponents many cheap or free chances to suck out). Do a lot of check-raising, both on (semi)bluffs and with the goods. Always be looking to put plays on people and play differently or creatively (make sure you don't develop FPS though). Limp big hands PF when opening a pot at least once in a while. Sometimes just smooth call raises PF with AA and KK. Sometimes raise small and medium pairs PF, sometimes just limp with them.
A big part of unpredictability actually comes from consistency (i.e. betting the same way whether you're bluffing, semibluffing, have a semi-strong hand, or have the nuts). If you're consistently betting in the same fashion with a wide range of hands, your opponents are going to have lots of trouble getting reads from your betting size and pattern.
-Adjust your play based on the other players at the table. For example, against a tight table, you should tend to play more LAGG. Against a maniac, big preflop reraises-bet big on flop if called and semi-tight trapping/calling station style works best. Against fish, make sure you give them truly terrible odds to chase, play more hands against them since you can outplay them, and don't be afraid to overbet or transparently slowplay or check-raise a big hand. etc.
-Never forget that pot odds can be applied to almost every situation and go hand-in-hand with the reads you make. For example, if you estimate that a person will fold in a given situation more then half of the time to a pot sized bet than you can make that bet profitably every time. As another example, if someone makes a 1/2 pot sized bet on the river and you think he would be bluffing in this spot more than 1/3 of the time, then you call. This assumes you can more or less correctly estimate these percentages over the long run (the only way to tell this really is in your results). If you can't, well you need to sharpen up your game, but if you are getting burned a lot on either your bluff attempts or calldowns, you should cut down on your bluffs/lean towards folding more often.
-NL is a game that allows you to make a lot of mistakes in small pots but will burn you if you can't keep your big mistakes to a minimum. Thus, when you play a big pot (or make a big bet) you want to have either a hand you're fairly certain is good, a big draw, or a strong read that the other guy will fold. You can afford to make lots of small bluffs and semibluffs, but you should save your big bluffs for situations where you've got a good indication the other guy will get out of dodge (i.e. a scare card hit that was unlikely to have helped his hand). Until you get good at reading when people will fold, you should avoid making many big bluffs.
[The above I think is pretty generally accepted as solid NL play. Below is another element of profit maximized NLHE in my opinion and how I play.]
-Strive to earn a reckless, action image. Every time you flop a hand that you're pretty sure has at least 10 outs in a raised pot (and you're fairly confident you're not up against a set), try to move all-in--specifically by betting 3/4 or so of the pot into the PF raiser then pushing over the top if he raises. As a sidenote, if someone sees this play, the next time you're in a raised pot with them on a draw happy board and do the same thing, better believe they're calling with their QQ-AA. Set up pure bluffs on trash, and show the 24o when you're not called. Show your big bluffs. Gamble with short stacks even though you're not getting quite the right price on your money. Ideally, you want the image of an action player who likes to gamble, a tricky, unpredictable player who at any time could be holding absolutely nothing or the nuts.
Wow, I think this is by far my longest post ever on FTR. Am I really stoned and is most of this shit obvious or am I on to something?
