Your hand is the best 5 cards you can make out of your 2 hold cards and the 5 community cards.

If your hold cards are 9-6 and the community cards are 3-4-5-7-8, your hand is a 9 high straight (5-6-7-8-9.) An opponent holding A-6 would have an 8 high straight (4-5-6-7-8,) so you would win because you have a higher straight.

The game starts with 2 hold cards kept face down and a round of betting (preflop.) Then comes 3 face up community cards (flop) followed by another round of betting, then the 4th community card (turn) and more betting, and finally the 5th community card (river) and the final round of betting. Any players still in the hand reveal their cards in betting order, called the showdown, and the best hand wins.

The trick to poker is to realize that, at any stage of the game, the player who has the best hand at that stage is more likely to have the best hand on the river. However, it’s also important to know that each new card has the potential to change who has the best hand.

For example, Player 1 has a starting hand of 6-6, and Player 2 has a starting hand of A-A. Player 2 has a much better starting hand, and if the community cards are unhelpful to either player, then Player 2 will win with the higher pair.

Let’s say the flop is 2, 4, 6, all offsuit. Now Player 1 has 6-6-6, putting them ahead of Player 2’s A-A.

Level 0 play is to just call anything and hope you win. So if Player 1 was playing at level 0, they would bet the same regardless of whether their hand was good or bad, because they don’t really know what they’re doing.

Level 1 is playing your own hand. Here, it means recognizing holding 6-6, which makes the set, is the second best hand after 3-5, which makes the straight. A level one player would play the odds and bet here.

Level 2 is playing your opponent’s hand. Let’s say your opponent bets strongly on the flop. You consider that your opponent may have gotten the straight, two pair, or a set of 5s, and you might decide to fold to avoid getting burned by the straight.

Level 3 is playing what your opponent thinks your hand is. If you think they have a straight draw or two pair, you may decide to bet strongly to give your opponent bad pot odds on calling your bet. Or if you think they’re unlikely to catch up, you bet weakly to make them think you’re on the straight draw, so they get overconfident with their A-A and make a large raise against you that you’ll eagerly call.

Level 4 is playing what your opponent wants you to think they have. Let’s say your opponent bets strongly on the flop. They clearly want you to think they hit the straight, but you know they called your raise preflop and have been playing conservatively all night. Because of this, you are very confident that if they had 3-5 preflop they would have folded it instead of calling the raise, so you believe they actually have a pocket pair or A-K, A-Q, or A-J. You call, since your set beats all of those.

Let’s say you call and the turn comes up a 3. Now you need to worry about your opponent having 5-5. Could they have hit the straight on the turn? What if they have 7-7: then on the river they could pick up a 5 or one of the remaining 7s to beat you (6 cards total.) Here, you’ll need a good read on your opponent and a good understanding of pot odds to decide whether it’s better to stay in the hand or fold. If you’ve correctly deduced that your opponent is likely to have A-A and is bluffing the straight, you will be able to confidently stay in the hand, but if you believe you are beat then you might have to fold.

Ultimately, to consistently win at poker, you need to play exactly one level above your opponent. If you’re trying to bluff (level 3) but your opponent isn’t considering your hand at all (level 0 or 1,) the bluff won’t work. If you can master levels 1-3 and switch back and forth depending on your opponents, you’ll be a solid player.