Beginner's School

[Hedge Henderson]

Howdy, all. Long time lurker, first time poster. I have two questions but, first, some background.

I host a weekly micro-limit game composed mostly of very poor graduate and doctoral students. The games are usually hold 'em, Omaha/8, and stud, with a little five-draw thrown in when we're waiting for a full table. While we're all there to have fun, we're also pretty competitive for micro-limit. Some of the new players are regularly dropping $10.00 or more which, if you know what grad students get paid, can be a little painful. After a couple of semi-regulars dropped out, I remembered the old adage that you can shear a sheep many times but skin him only once.

As both the host of the game and, in all modesty (not!), the best player there, I took it upon myself to do something. This may be a mistake, but I decided to invite some of the least successful and least experienced players to (hopefully) teach them how to avoid being skinned.

My plan is to cover general strategy (less calls, more folds and raises, what position means, etc.). I also want to cover a bit about the individual games. Rules, game play, starting hand selection, reading the board (button games), and exposed cards (stud games). In addition, I hope to work in a bit about the differences between full and short handed games, as well as limit, pot-limit, and no limit.

Question the first: Is there anything in particular you experts out there think I should cover? Keep in mind that I merely want to keep the sheep from being skinned. I don't want to give them their own set of clippers (or worse, a sharp knife).

Question the second: I called this "meeting" without the knowledge of any of the players in positive territory, partly because I didn't want a dozen people at my house and partly because I didn't want to give any of the stronger players more ammo. Should I be worried about an angry backlash?