[Guruman]

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I like continuation bets when an overcard that I don't have shows up.

Ex: I raise preflop with AQo, get one caller, and the board comes 7J5. In these cases 1/3 of the pot seems to work well. Fire the bet and take down the pot. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

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Why would this change if you hit your A or Q? And 1/3 of the pot? This may apply to small stakes games, but playing like this will get you killed at higher stakes NL.

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A quick defense of this play:

1)According to Harrington on Hold 'Em (p277) a bet must meet three requirements to be considered a continuation bet:
"a)The player making the bet was the betting leader before the flop
b)after the flop no other bets have been made
c)the player making the bet missed the flop"

Therefore if I hit an A or Q on the board my bet would not be a continuation bet, it would be a protection/value bet by definition.

Also from HOHE (p 278-279) "For a continuation bet to be a profitable move, the amount of the bet has to be carefully chosen in comparison to the pot. In essence, you are hopint to buy the pot right now. if you overpay you'll loose too much money when your opponent calls with a hand better than yours. If you underpay you'll be offering your opponent correct pot odds to stick around with a drawing hand."

If I bet 1/3 of the pot, my opponent will need a full eleven outs to make a call profitable for him. Harrington states that he likes to bet around half of the pot on a continuation bet. My opponents typically will call an all-in if they wouldn't have folded to somewhere between 1/3 and 1/2 of the pot, so I keep it around there.