Limping or Raising Preflop (Limit) |
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Posted Sun Mar 05, 2006 11:21 am GMT by wEbMaStEr
Recently i've been "experimenting" with some $3/$6 limit tables. I say experiment cos i suck at limit and have next to no experienceat it.
So far i've been fairly consistently losing.
One of the main reasons i can see for this is getting married to hands like AK or AQ because "ach it's only another bet or 2"
Anyways, my Q: Is it better to limp in with a hand like AK in limit and then see what happens or should you always raise preflop?
I swear, i don't think i've won a hand where i have raised preflop with AK or AQ
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Posted Sun Mar 05, 2006 12:42 pm GMT by suitedaces84
Raise. But the real key is to flop top pair--this is what seperates the sharks from the fish.
Reverse implied odds are a good reason to not raise preflop with weaker but still better than average holdings. In a lot of these situations the additional reverse implied odds will cost you more than the small amount you'll gain by pushing your equity edge. But AK and AQ have too much of an edge to not raise.
Posted Sun Mar 05, 2006 12:43 pm GMT by snoogins47
Big money Big money No limpy no limpy no limpy STOP!
Posted Sun Mar 05, 2006 12:51 pm GMT by Geno
You will quickly appreciate that at limit tables, high suited connectors will pay you off less than high pocket pairs but you will make a stack more money from them. I think I'd rather look down at AKs every hand than AA if the table is full of fish because they will chase their hands down and own your hand time after time. Hell, even a flopped set is usually no good at low limit!
Posted Sun Mar 05, 2006 5:02 pm GMT by Dave B
Raise and sometimes 3 bet if possible.
How to play them after the flop when you miss is harder. I usually bet at least one, sometimes check the flop and bet the turn, sometimes bet the flop.
If a blind bets w/ a rag board, I will usually reraise. Why? I am really just trying to buy a free card and stop them from believing that they can buy the pot if any low cards come on the flop.
Just make sure to really mix up your game when playing A high after the flop. People will expoit you if you dont.
Posted Sun Mar 05, 2006 8:26 pm GMT by xDiamond_CutteRx
Most of the time you're raising pre-flop in Limit, you're raising for value to build a pot, not protect your hand or shut out other players (especially in loose games). It's all about long odds, maximizing EV, and playing pot equity.
So yes, you should almost always raise with AK or AQ, especially if no one has entered the pot, and sometimes reraise with AK in position (I will reraise with AKs about 80% of the time when I'm in good position, am pretty sure I will buy the button, and when the original raiser is not a strong player).
There was a similar thread about this in hand analysis where I wrote about raising out of the blinds.
In any case, have a look at Small Stakes Hold'em. That's the best limit primer out there today.
Posted Mon Mar 06, 2006 3:51 am GMT by Moon_Child
RAISEEE!
If you flop TPTK or top pair and second best kicker then bet out or if someone bets out first, re-raises...
lay it down if u don't hit... eassy fold, no need to chase anything.
Posted Mon Mar 06, 2006 4:19 am GMT by xDiamond_CutteRx
| Moon_Child wrote: | RAISEEE!
If you flop TPTK or top pair and second best kicker then bet out or if someone bets out first, re-raises...
lay it down if u don't hit... eassy fold, no need to chase anything. |
Don't make folding automatic though, especially if it's already a big pot and you only have to call one bet. With a hand like KJs, you often flop at least one or two overcards and a backdoor flush draw, which is usually enough of a hand to take one off for one small bet, especially when you're getting something like 10-1 or even better.
Posted Mon Mar 06, 2006 4:43 pm GMT by Phil14312
| Moon_Child wrote: | RAISEEE!
If you flop TPTK or top pair and second best kicker then bet out or if someone bets out first, re-raises...
lay it down if u don't hit... eassy fold, no need to chase anything. |
I think one of the big things that better limit players try to do in middle-limit games is bet out into the preflop raiser when a small, raggedy flop hits. Folding everytime with AK or AQ is probably leaving a big chunk of money on the table.
Posted Mon Mar 06, 2006 10:27 pm GMT by snoogins47
I don't understand why 'chasing' is so inherently bad. As if, the best players always have the best hand and never have to catch up. 'Chasing' is like, half the game. The trick is to know when it's worth doing, and when it's not.
Diamond is right though, if you're folding AK on the flop every time you don't flop an A or a K, you're probably playing some pretty bad poker.
Posted Mon Mar 06, 2006 11:49 pm GMT by Dave B
Chasing is bad.
Chasing w/ pot odds and a strong nut draw is OK.
In limit, you cant "make up" for bad calls by really getting paid off. What happens more often than not, is that you chase w/ AK w/ flop of 984. You hit an Ace and raise-because that is the only way you get paid off. But wait, he had A9 or 98 suited because only morons play K9 or worse.
Limit Chasing:
Miss-lose medium amount
Hit-either win medium amount or lose big amount
Posted Tue Mar 07, 2006 3:04 am GMT by Moon_Child
i'm not saying if u miss the flop entirely you would fold, sometimes it is okay to chase, especially that extra 1 bet to see a backdoor or if even u have a 4 to the flush... but most of the time, i just lay it down... but this just goes for AK AQ... for me, i love to see lots of flops with many hands.
Posted Tue Mar 07, 2006 4:32 am GMT by tame_deuces
In exceptionally tight and aggressive limit games, unimproved AK or AQ can actually win the pot on the river quite often though, esp in pots which are down to HU on the flop and in blind battles. I think it all depends on the game, the flop and the amount of players in it and who they are.
I'll admit that in my typical 0.5/1 games an unimproved AK is often not worth hanging on to if it missed the flop badly though.
Posted Tue Mar 07, 2006 4:48 am GMT by snoogins47
Well it's a bit of the confusion of the term, I think. I've gotten absolutely lambasted by people for hitting a gutshot draw to the nuts on a rainbow board, when I'm getting eight million to one and have two overcards and a backdoor flush draw. To them, "chasing" seems to be getting involved with a hand that isn't the best at the time. That's usually how I use 'chasing' too: peeling off a card or two, to try to improve to a winning hand, regardless of the situation.
In that sense, chasing obviously isn't always bad. If you use it in the sense of 'trying to go up-hill without the proper odds,' then obviously chasing sucks.
I think I'm realizing that poker is a game that is full of assloads of confusion, that could be avoided if things like the terms, the rules, etc. were standardized.
Dave does make a very good point though, and it's something everybody should take to heart. Even when it may seem you're 'getting the odds,' it's often wrong to 'chase' anyway, because of the dangers of improving to a hand that doesn't win. It happens a lot in general, but Dave's example of drawing to overcards including an Ace happens all the damned time. In fact, against reasonable players, be they very good, or even pretty bad, you tend to have to discount Ace outs that would make you one pair, a lot more than with other cards. If you're in a situation where there's no chance you'll ever show down the AK unimproved, something like KQ is significantly better than AK, AQ, etc.
For instance, a similar example: board is 872 rainbow, your opponent has a range of A8, A7, K8-K7suited, 98, 87, or a set... AKo only wins less than 11% of the time, whereas QJo is over 17%. That's a pretty massive difference, despite the hand being significantly 'worse.' That's also IGNORING the fact that, like Dave said, you're going to spew bets when you hit top pair and somebody made two pair. That just makes it worse for the Aces.
A somewhat related line of thinking can be applied to show why Top pair with no kicker sucks, at times being significantly worse than middle/bottom pair + overcard.
Top pair, bottom kicker beats almost the same amount of hands as second pair with an overcard kicker. But when you're behind, you've got a significantly better chance of improving with the second one.
Moon_Child: I hope I didn't come off as necessarily attacking what you were saying... I didn't intend that, and while I can't speak for the others, I don't think they intended that either. I would be willing to bet you have some understanding of when you should keep going with AK when you miss, when to draw to overcards when your odds are big, etc. The problem though, is that if somebody didn't know this, and followed your advice to the letter: "Raise with AK/AQ, and fold every time you don't flop top pair or better" they would often be making mistakes, and I think that's why people, myself included, felt the need to comment. (Admittedly, my comment was a bit more generalized than that hehe)
Anyway to address Webby's initial question, (I put a bunch of spaces here so that people scrolling through might ignore the rest and read this)
The simplest way to think about it, is this: WHENEVER we have an equity edge in poker, and do not raise, we are giving something up. There are times where it may be worth it to give this up, if by giving this up, we will make more money later in the hand. Though there are probably other factors as well, two of the ways we primarily 'make it up' later are:
1)Deception. If we fail to push our edge now, our hand will be disguised, and our opponents will play differently.
2)Pot manipulation: we may want to keep the pot small so people's calls later are worse, or we may want to keep people involved so they can catch up, etc.
But, in smaller games where many opponents aren't paying much attention to what the other players do, and tend to make the same mistakes regardless of the pot size, it's hard to fit these two criteria enough to make passing up our preflop edge worthwhile. Keep on raisin'.
It's sort of an opposite situation from small pairs preflop: in looser games, I'll limp with small pairs in situations where I may well raise in bigger games, mostly in multiway pots in position. Usually, raising in bigger multiway pots (with a lot of hands, really) doesn't cost us a whole lot of money in immediate expectation. However, when the flop comes 5 x x it's harder for perceptive players to put me on 55 if I raise after 2 limpers, than if I limped after 2 limpers... and more importantly, the pot will be much bigger, and cause people to get involved with hands that they may not have gotten as involved with in a smaller pot. It's not a big deal against the 'legitimate' drawing hands: flush draws, OESDs, etc. aren't going to go away anyway. But when the pot is twice as big, people are going to be a lot more likely to draw to their trips/twopair, their overcards, etc, and it won't do them any good.
In a loose, lower limit game though, many of these people are going to be sticking around with those same hands regardless of the pot size, and I'll just go ahead and make the immediately more profitable play (limping) versus the one that costs a little now (raising) because it's less likely that I'll benefit much on later streets.
Posted Tue Mar 07, 2006 10:05 am GMT by golddog
After all this, don't forget the value of position and deception.
Limping with AK in late position (occasionally!) can be valuable. Nobody's going to put you on it, so they sometimes will think you hit a raggedy flop and fold to your bet/raise.
I like to do this at a loose table where there's already been a pre-flop raise, letting others do my work for me initially. Maybe 'limping' is the wrong term, since it's not just one bet I'm calling. But you get the idea.
You did hit one of the problems with limit on the head, though--the "only one more bet" syndrome. That's the small margin that makes money for good limit players, getting that one bet from others while not giving it away.
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