Betting

[ladyhacker]

The blinds are 20/40, there are 3 callers. The flop comes and the first person to act bets 50... Is this legal? Do they have to bet the 40 or raise to 80. I don't understand this first step. Is it a bet of 50 and then a raise would have to be 100 or what?

[HalfSugar]

If you are first to act, you can always bet anything equal to or greater than the value of the big blind so in this case, a bet of 50 is fine.

If a player has acted before you, in order to raise you need to increase the bet by the value of the last raise. Examples:

Player 1 bets 50. Player 2 needs to put in 100 or more to raise.

or

Player 1 bets 50. Player 2 then raises to 120. Player 3 has to make it 190 or more because the previous raise was 70 (120 - 50) and so to raise, he has to put in at least 120 + 70 chips.

(All of the above applies to NO LIMIT poker by the way)

In limit poker, bets and raises are fixed so in a game where the blinds are 20/40, pre-flop and on the flop the betting and raising has to be 40 and on the turn and river it has to be 80. No other options exist.