Hey all,

I’m looking to get back into poker, starting with small stakes (3/6, 6/12) LHE at Oaks. I’ve put in a few hours lately at 1/2 and 3/6 just to re-familiarize myself with the rules etc., and at some point down the road I want to move up to 15/30 or 30/60.

Some questions about this:

I learned to play basic limit holdem back in the mid-to-late 90s, playing online and occasionally at Oaks. I used to spend a lot of time on rec.gambling.poker (I remember Alan Bostick from there I think), and learning approaches like Abdul’s.

But I haven’t played a lot in the last 8-9 years, and I know things have changed b/c of the growing popularity of online poker. I know games got harder as players got better, but now I’m looking to play live only.

(1) So have live games changed much in recent years? My impression of the Oaks so far is that it hasn’t changed at all, at least not at the lower levels. Seems like the same crowd of extremely loose players and calling stations who were always there. Is that going to be true at 6/12 and 15/30 as well?

(2) Which leads me to: How tight/loose should I be playing at low levels? These are very loose games, usually 5-6 players to a flop, and often with one or more players who play every hand preflop, and sometimes a player who raises nearly every hand preflop.

My initial strategy has been to play very TAG; I’m guessing my VPIP is around 12-14% at most, possibly less b/c I don’t seem to be getting very good starting hands lately. This makes for very, very few pots won; I sometimes go 1 or 2 hours without winning a pot! When I do come in, I almost always come in raising (a fact that other players seem to ignore). So of course the pots are big, and so far I’m about breaking even, but am I playing too tight? It seems like there are always a couple players who play a lot of hands preflop who seem to do well.

(3) Is there a big difference between 3/6 and 6/12? Should I just forget about 3/6 and start playing 6/12 (bankroll is not an issue for me), or should I log some more hours at 3/6 just to get more comfortable? I’ve probably put in around 50 hours at 1/2 and 3/6 recently, and I'm very close to breaking even. If 6/12 is basically the same game as 3/6, I'd just as soon move up to it.

(4) So far I’ve just been playing largely on instinct/feel, i.e. I haven’t been counting bets and outs in order to calculate pot odds etc. Obviously I pay attention to pot size and drawing chances, but only in a crude way. At a game like 6/12 or 15/30, how important is it to actually count up the bets and outs and make calculations, versus approximating things?

thanks

As a starting point, read and digest SSLHE. Stick to 6/12 or 8/16 if you want a chance to make a profit.

Try to play some 500 hrs of good poker: count the pot, count your outs, be aggressive, don't play just comfortable poker, play more hands multiway in position, understand the mistakes others make at the table, post hands, comment on threads, discover your leaks, plug them.

If you don't know if 3/6 is beatable, don't count outs, play 14% pf, play by feel, and don't know if these things matter I wouldn't recommend jumping to the 30 game where anyone can easily drop 4k in a normal bad day (playing great poker).

Thanks.

I read SSHE ten or so years ago -- so is it still good strategy at a game like 6/12 or 15/30? I will read it again in any case.

I was assuming 3/6 was not really beatable b/c of the $4 drop, so I wasn't surprised to be breaking even.

I don't think Oaks deals 8/16, so I'd have to go up to 15/30 after 6/12.

Here's a very typical hand I played in 3/6 last night, would love some advice on this:

There's a very drunk, older Asian guy two seats to my left. He is pounding the scotch, slurring badly and arguing with himself. He literally plays every hand, usually raising preflop, and live straddles frequently. Amazingly, he's doing OK!

Every hand there are at least 5-6 players going to the flop.

I'm in CO w/KK. Several players limp in, I raise. Drunk guy raises from SB, limpers all call, I cap, and drunk guy calls of course. Six players at the flop.

Flop comes Axx rainbow. One of the early position limpers donks. How do I play a hand like this?

These players love to play Ax, so I'm fairly sure I'm having to draw with only 2 outs, but with 24 sb in the pot, can I really fold? It drives me crazy the way several players will play through to the river on a hand like this, and then someone will win it by pairing the second highest card on the board...

I think the strategy is pretty simple if you can do it. Posters here still think that SSHE applies to LLHE at Oaks. Study it again. Skip 3/6 and play 6/12 until you can play it well, then move to 15/30. Me, I can't do that but maybe you can. While playing post a few hands. Read and respond to other posts to see how they post a hand. What info to post like reads. Tip: never post results of the hand because it does not matter to the way it plays. I played 3/6 and mostly 6/12 at Oaks for over 5 years. never tried higher.

play the 15-30, 6-12 is just like 3-6, people don't respect your bets and will chase gutshots for 1 bet, although the 6-12 games have great action i have found them to be hard to beat even when your playing good, bottom line is the variance is higher in 6-12 and 3-6, if you have a decent bank roll play the 15-30

I hear what you're saying about variance, but strictly from an EV point of view, isn't it good to have them chasing hands when they don't have the pot odds? That means your opponent is making a mistake, which is good for you, right, if you can play it properly?

I'm also looking for thoughts on whether Abdul Jalib's pre-flop strategy is still good at a game like 6-12 at Oaks.

Back when I first came across this on the Internet (in the 90s?) I thought this was the ****. But it does have me playing very tight preflop, at least compared to the extremely loose players who seem to make up most of the clientele at Oaks low limit.

I think you'll find the lower limit games are generally loose passive, but sometimes the tables will go a bit nuts and you'll get large 3-bet and 4-bet family pots. In either case, I think the games are pretty loose at the lower limits. At 15/30 the games might start to shift towards more solid players, but 3/6 and 6/12 will probably run about the same in terms of opponent skill level.

As to your second question, I'd reread SSHE more. It's still relevant for the types of games you describe, and it will help you adjust to large multiway pots that are common in lower stakes games.

I don't think there is a big difference between 3/6 and 6/12, but it might be worth staying at 3/6 while you read and study SSHE. Just cheaper lesson fees really. Once you have the SSHE concepts down, the move to 6/12 will be smoother for you.

Other books will become applicable once you move to 15/30 and up, such as Winning In Tough Hold Em Games by Stoxtrader (other folks can correct me if that's not a relevant reference anymore). I'm certainly no authority on that since I don't play those mid-limit games.

As far as counting bets, outs, and pot odds, its always important. Approximation is fine, but why not start practicing counting the pot while you are folding all those crappy cards at 3/6? Might as well form some good habits so that they will be 2nd nature at the higher limits. Also try to start putting players on hand ranges.

LOL! I find this to be very difficult at 3-6, at least for most players. For the most part, they don't have ranges!

Many players will call with just about anything pre-flop, regardless of position. Other players refuse to raise with anything whatsoever. I routinely see players who fail to raise with hands like AK or premium pairs.

Seems like there's never more than one or two other solid players who can be pegged reliably.

Am re-reading SSHE now. I also have Lee Jones' book, which seemed to be popular back in the day.

I hear what you are saying, and I think a lot of people (myself included) have the same initial reaction to "putting people on ranges" at 3/6 or other low limits where it seems like people play any two cards, all the time, never raise, and always call to the river. "It's impossible!" we say, and talk about how we need to move up to where players respect our raises.

I'm not trying to be nit-picky, but "playing ATC" is still a range, and there are things to do against players like that. That's what a large part of SSHE is about. That's why we value bet the **** out of those players when we have a good hand.

But putting people on ranges is a skill we need to develop, even at lower limits where we think people just play anything. If you sit in the games for a few hours, watch the other players. Do they really play ATC? Do they never bet, even when they make their hand? Do they call down all the way with A-high when there is a flush on the board? I think if you watch them long enough, you'll see that even these players have things they do with certain types of hands and you can pick up reads based on their play. And if someone really plays ATC and never, ever raises or folds, then you play against them as best you can (Equilab and Pokerstove help here) and take your lumps with they go runner-runner against you. And when they don't, you stack the chips.

If you think it's hard to put people on ranges at 3/6, I can't imagine it's easier at 15/30 or 30/60 where other players are actually thinking about how they play different parts of their ranges against you. I'd bet that a thinking player at 15/30 and up is harder to read and play against than an ATC 3/6 player (but I haven't played that high).

I think Lee Jones's book is still good and relevant. I have read through it several times as well.

Personally, I just got back into poker myself about a year ago after several years away from the game, so I can relate. It sounds like you're off to a good start, and you're reading/studying/thinking about the right things, so hopefully you'll get into those higher limit games if that's where you want to play.

Read SSHE, know it inside and out. I browsed through Abdul Jalib's preflop, and it didn't look right to me.

The most important thing to understand about preflop is to learn what hands you want to play in what situations. At its most basic, certain hands play well in big, multiway pots and others play better heads-up or 3/4-way at most. Learn which play best where, then look at what the situation is (or likely will be) and play the appropriate hands in the appropriate fashion (either limping, raising, folding, etc.) to get the desired effect (big multiway, or 2-4 to the flop).

For example, most books/articles will tell you to fold 33 UTG. However, in a lot of small-stakes games it seems totally reasonable to open-limp that UTG. Same with T9s, etc.

> I'm in CO w/KK. Several players limp in, I raise. Drunk guy raises from SB, limpers all call, I cap, and drunk guy calls of course. Six players at the flop.

> Flop comes Axx rainbow. One of the early position limpers donks. How do I play a hand like this?

Hero calls 1 bet from LP unless one of the players who checked is a likely check-raiser. Hero folds turn without a set unless through some miracle Hero ends up HU *and* xx connects with some credible holdings for the limper (e.g., ATC) *and* Hero knows limper is clueless enough to try to bluff here.

from an ev standpoint what you are saying is correct, but it really comes down to whether your running good or bad, from my experience in the 15-30 there will be less situations where people are chasing gutshots or calling a raise pf with Q8os or 94s on the button, therefore you will be winning more pots "you should be winning" relative to 3-6 where multiple players are constantly chasing and trying to get lucky

personally, i have a found a hit-n-run strategy in the 15-30 game to be successful, win a couple big pots, get up, and call it a day, too many times i see players double or triple their buyin and than proceed to give it all back, the key is knowing when to leave before the blinds eat you up, the funny thing in 15-30 is people try more to steal the blinds versus in 3-6 and 6-12

Hmmm. OK, well let me apologize first -- because I am obviously the newb here, because I did come here asking for advice, and because I'm sure you've played a lot more poker than me -- but I don't understand this line of thinking.

Let's assume that I have enough discipline to maintain my strategy, e.g. that I don't go on tilt after a bad run, or play like a maniac after a good run. Then what does it matter whether I've been running hot or cold? If I can't deal with people stealing blinds, I shouldn't sit down at 15/30 in the first place, no?

The other thing is that I'm not sure the variance would be any more tolerable at 15/30. It likely would on a per-bet basis, for reasons we can agree on, but on a per-dollar basis, wouldn't it likely be higher since the dollar sizes of the bets are higher?

In other words, since Var(a*X) = (a^2)*Var(X), and 30/12 = 2.5, then my dollar-for-dollar variance at 15/30 would be 2.5^2 = 6.25 times my variance at 6/12 if players at both levels played identically. Obviously they don't play identically, but is the variance on a per-bet basis at 6/12 really more than six times greater than the variance at 15/30?

You are correct, people playing terrible is always good for your longterm winrate (it'll make it higher).

If you exclude rake, the lower limit games will therefore have a higher winrate (in BB) than the higher limits.

For the same reason, the lower limits will have slightly higher swings, so if a typical stdev per hr is 10BB for a passive 20/40 game, it may go up to say 12BB/hr for a 3/6 (I'm guessing this 3/6 number since I don't have enough data).

When we look to play in a great midstake game though, the stdev can be even higher: like the 3/6 game, it's 7 players to the flop but 2 streets will get capped and the turn raised regularly.