Whenever I see a half decent player limp up front, I immediately put him on a range like this:

88-, A2s-ATs, K9s-KJs, QTs+, JTs, T9s.

They seem like decent hands, but the whole is not equal to the sum of its parts in this case imo. Sure, at a great table, nobody is going to notice and you might turn a profit with this range. However, it only takes one aggressive player behind you to make this range unplayable in this spot. Think about your pot share and how it fluctuates based on the action. Your limp might be profitable when the hand goes off 3+ ways, but this is likely to be more than offset by how much your share shrinks when you limp and call a raise, which I think is an unprofitable spot.

Now if you decided to raise this range from 5 seats off the button:

66+, A6s+, ATo+, K9s+, KJo+, QTs+, JTs, T9s

then your opponents need a much stronger hand to 3 bet with than they needed to raise your limp. I think the hands in this range are all +ev raises unless the game is very tough with lots of preflop 3 betting. If I'm right, then I think my preflop strategy is pretty sharp. If I'm wrong, then the marginal hands are probably only losing a little bit of money.

Contrast that with a limping strategy, where if you're right, then you're probably only making a little bit of money, but if you're wrong, then you're probably losing a decent chunk of cash.

Since you're into the theory, let's say the last three seats (HJ,CO,BTN) informally collude to always raise you when you limp any range up front, as long as you aren't clearly nitting it up to lolLRR. Basically, it is the "you always get raised" thing as a pact. Maybe they also agree not to thinly 3 bet each other as they come after you, or maybe they don't.

Can you build a profitable range to play vs this three player collectives agreement? Let's say you as the "action player" get to tell them whether or not to best hand you (not 3 bet light). Would you want them to re-isolate? The BTN seems to be getting the worst of it, because if they fold he has to try to isolate you with ATC -- many of your limping ranges probably like him committing money with <random>. If you're the BTN, how often do you need the other two to raise to make you willing to join in the fun? Finally do you as the limper incorporate LRR in your strategy, or do you balance by limp/call 100%?

Some of these questions might be unanswerable. However if you were going to have a mixed limp and raise strategy, you'd need to think about this stuff. It could be this is all too complicated to actually implement (a balanced OL strat). Still, people used to think that donking was always wrong online...

HJ's ev is very good in that spot. Cutoff's is very good. Button is probably leaking. Blinds don't know what the hell to do and hero says f that I'm playing raise or fold.

Random but I'm trying to determine what I think is the most overvalued preflop hand in HE, based on how my opponents play it.

My top list right now (essentially hands I see opponents 3 betting when they shouldn't):
22
33
A2o

And for underrated hands:
KQs is my obvious #1 (why fish love cc w/ this hand but raise 22 is incomprehensible for me).

22 is flipping while KQs needs to hit a flop?

I don't know how they can think this way, but I'm glad they do

Just trying to put together a story. Honestly, finding inconsistency in their games is profitable. If you can find a bogus story that will predict their behavior, you're doing great. I used to have a great handle on mass tabling SNE nit grinders -- their strange actions just made sense. Likely all my reasoning behind those actions was 100% wrong. The story of "since this happens, I'll just do that with these hands" filled in the gaps.

FR .25/.50 online anonymous tables. UTG, a player we have not yet seen get out of line after at least 60 hands at the table, raises. UTG+1 folds. We are UTG+2 with 88. Based on our reads we believe that a coldcall is likely to get at least the BTN, SB and BB to also coldcall. We have seen SB and BTN each coldcall a 3-bet once (neither hand showed down). We are *not* confident, however, in tons of bets going in after the flop.

What do we do with 88 here?

What do you think UTG's range is and how is 88 doing?

Hard to tell on Bovada, but it seems safe to assume, at the widest case, KQso+, AJso+, 99+. If I do 3-bet and somehow manage to get him heads up I'm showing down my pocket pair so the hot-cold equity is appropriate:

Text results appended to pokerstove.txt

31,690,377 games 9.845 secs 3,218,931 games/sec

Board:
Dead:

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 41.492% 41.29% 00.20% 13084548 64466.50 { 88 }
Hand 1: 58.508% 58.31% 00.20% 18477466 64467.00 { 99+, AJs+, KQs, AJo+, KQo }

Even if we add in hands like AT+ and KJ+ (no way he's raising KTo or KTs there) we don't bump it much higher because 88 is only flipping against them.

I'm really on the fence here: folding feels too nitty, 3-betting feels too aggressive, and cold-calling feels wrong because our reads indicate we're not going to rake in a giant pot if we flop a set.

I lean toward a 3-bet here given that we've seen BTN and SB cold-call 3-bets and given that we expect passive play after the flop. SB could cold-call with a fairly wide range, so if UTG doesn't have a pocket pair and SB doesn't either maybe they don't *make* a pair and our 88 holds up.

I would fold.

why do you want to 3bet with a hand that's not even in the original raiser's range?

I find the idea of assuming UTG will fold 88 in .25/.50 game pretty hilarious

There's def people on bovaada I would fold 88 to, but I don't know who they are so u just would 3 bet everyone

My Bovada LHE database is still LOLsamplesized but there have been 136 raises from UTG with 9 people at the table. About 36 of the 136 hands were hands against which 88 has a significant hot-cold equity advantage (i.e. A8, K8, Q8, A7, A4, A2, K7, T7, 77-22). About 70 were hands 88 is flipping against i.e. AK, KQ, QJ, JT.

88 has been dealt to UTG with 9 people at the table 7 times. 4 times UTG raised, 3 times UTG limped.

Well clearly, if we're going off a table session read that villain is sane, we should dump all those raggy hands immediately (except maybe A8 of the suited variety).

So if we make a major stretch of his UTG range, we can call it:

77+, A8s+, KTs+, QTs+, JTs, ATo+, KJo+

88 has 47% equity. Probably enough to three bet, given the dead money and positional edge. But against a tight range of:

88+, ATs+, KTs+, QJs, ATo+

Our equity is just 41.6%, and our three bet is clear spew. So let's assume something in the middle, maybe something like:

77+, A9s+, KTs+, QTs+, AJo+, KQo

We are at 45.2%. It's close, but I'd probably fold this to an unknown and 3 bet if I gained knowledge that he was wide UTG, or really bad after the flop.

Is it the same kind of thought process to decide, for example, what to do with JJ or QQ in the CO facing a UTG+1 raise and a MP 3-bet? I.e.

- if both villains seem tight give them both tight ranges,
- if UTG+1 has been raising a lot and MP appears to want to isolate him, give them looser (but still realistic) ranges),
- if they're both maniacs just go ahead and 4-bet,
- if UTG+1 is a tight player but MP has been 3-betting like a monkey, give them appropriate ranges

In any of the above cases would we even consider a coldcall if we've seen BTN, SB and BB coldcall 3-bets?

Live 20/40 9 handed.

UTG: a bit Laggy pre, he's opened QJo, 9Ts from this position. Straightforward post.

HJ: extremely laggy pre. He has opened capped A8s, cold capped T7o(he said he just had a feeling). He has LRR 3 times but only showed once with AQo. Very laggy with draws but will just call down top pair no kicker or worse to aggression.

There is one good TAG to my left and then a couple Tight Passives.. I had a laggy image early in the session but have hit a cold spell with the cards lately.

UTG opens, HJ calls, folded to me in the CO. What do you do with the following hands?

ATo
9Ts
77
55
A8s
KQo

I would always cap these. I suppose if you knew that everybody behind you would call then calling JJ's makes some sense. This would give you good info if tight UTG capped or just called. QQ's are too strong to ever just call in any of these scenarios.

I'd 3 bet 77 and call the rest. If I was forced to choose hands in order of 3 betting preference: 77>55>ATo>A8s>KQo>T9s.

Of course, you were there and we weren't. With good live reads and a lot of history, I could 3 bet down to KQo, but I'd always call T9s.

I'd rather three bet ATo than 55 fwiw

Also confused by the love of people with 3 betting small pocket pairs. Are guessing games post flop super fun?

Yes, but I think the ev of 3 betting ATo or 55 is very close and perhaps I got those backwards. Sure, ATo is easier to play because we either hit something sweet or have a profitable draw to top pair or have a monster broadway + overcard draw. However, just because a hand is easy to play, that doesn't make the ev of ATo higher than 55 in this spot. I'm sure that 32s is very easy to play in this spot, but I'd never 3 bet it because it's likely very -ev.

If the game was no limit, then I'd change my rankings to this:

A8s>ATo>KQo>T9s>77>55

So your post flop mistakes don't lower your EV of a hand?

Do your opponents never bluff? Folding the best hand is correct if your opponent doesn't bluff enough. Bluffcatching is profitable if your opponent bluffs enough. You're right though that I'm going to make mistakes by either folding a profitable bluffcatcher or calling an unprofitable bluffcatcher, but those same problems exist with ATo. It's not like you hit top pair and win every time.