I'm going to take a moment before my morning sessions and make poker (and the math involved) really easy. In poker, we're usually concerned with finding two numbers and then comparing them. The first number is a risk-to-reward ratio, and the second number is our chance of winning. Different scenarios will have us calculating these two numbers in different ways. I'm going to give a few basic scenarios, let people reply, and then come back with some more questions.

1. A lone Villain bets into you on the river and if you call you'll have a 25% chance to win. Should you call?

---Depends on whether or not your getting better than 3-1 to call. Villan has to bet 49.99% of current pot for this call to be profitable.

2. On the river you're out of position against a lone Villain. If you bet pot and Villain calls, you'll have a 25% chance to win. Should you bet pot?

---If that's the only way you can win, yes. When you bet pot and your opponent calls and you win, you win 3 pots, when you lose, you lose one pot. So (100*.75)-(300*.25) = 75 - 75 which = zero. So if your villan folds even 1% of the time you make money over time. This is odd, I expected a different number here... my math is probably off.

3. You have a 12-out draw on the flop and a lone Villain shoves the flop. Should you call?

---Yes, because you have just about 50% equity, and all the money in the pot already is juice when you consider his shove to be 1-1 to your call after it all works out.