Because I realize I'm good a large majority of the time, but I really don't see any room for raising as I'm sure I'll fold out anything we beat. I think BTN would fold a single pair facing a raise from me like 100% of the time. BB did NOT play this like flopped trips FH/Quads, so a raise gets a fold out of there almost always as well. It wasn't a sigh call, but more of a sigh... I have no option but to call since I can't get any more value.

Couldn't have said it better myself. This is exactly what my friend and I were discussing.

Keep in mind for people doubting my theories, I have over 5000 logged hours winning at over 10bb per hour live.

Since you're so amazing and already solved it why did you make this thread?

Because I wanted other people's opinions on the matter. For the record, I'm not discounting the power of suited connectors all together. I'm just saying that over 5000 of live play. There has to be perfect conditions so we can play suited connectors profitably. You need to be at least 150-200 bb deep, you need to have position and playing against players who are calling stations. I think they have more value playing heads up using them to apply pressure with equity against nitty players. I like 3betting them sometimes against TAG players or fit or fold type players. Even if the conditions are correct to play suited connectors I would advise people to use caution playing anything below J10/109 suited.

Obviously regarding the 1/3 and 2/5 stakes.

To play SCs you need perfect conditions 150+bb deep + position + calling station opponents? If that were true good tournament players would just dump suited connectors after the early levels. They don't.

And why would you want calling station opponents with prime bluffing hands?

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Thoughts:

A) SC play well multiway.
B) SC flop well and can continue more than other hands.
C) SC do not suffer card removal effects as often.
D) SC play well heads-up.
E) SC benefit other hands that you will play.
F) SC have great implied odds.
G) SC are easy to fold.
H) Learning to play SC well makes you a better poker player.
I) EV is also a product of player skill. Quit thinking in finite terms.
J) SC are good hands to use as bluffs.
K) SC tilt people.
L) SC are confusing hands to play against.

Imo getting on the right track.

Suited connectors are marginally profitable, given you are good postflop. Obviously slightly more profitable the further we go down from MP to the BB, not including the really bad ones like 54s/65s from MP. If you won as much with SCs anywhere near the winrate of 99-AA, you'd be winning 20-30bb/100 at live poker. Which isn't possible. Most of your profit comes from hands like AJs+, AQo+, 77+. I'm a six-max online specialist and have been analyzing a lot of different things in PT4, but I have zero reason to believe that the same applies to live poker if you actually data-mined a large sample size. If you took away a winning reg's winnings from QQ-AA, he would either be a big loser or maybe a slight loser/breakeven if he's a crusher. So yeah, in the grand scheme of pure profitability, SCs are pretty down low there even if you believe you're crushing.

The main takeaway imo is that you need SCs in your range in order to get paid off your good hands. If you folded everything but the above hands, people will pay you off a lot less often and will more likely think you have the nuts when you get involved in a pot (regardless they'll still pay you off at a good frequency because lol live poker). If they see you splashing around with suited connectors, they're more likely to think you're loose and are more capable of making moves, which is especially important in bigger pots when you are nutted/when you're deep.

Yeah, I guess board coverage is nice in terms of GTO/balance, and just to make yourself sound smart. But even the regs who actually do understand that concept, they sure as hell aren't going to try to spew/exploit nits on low boards where nits show aggression just because they understand the nit's range is capped to 33% combo of sets and overpairs. So the idea that a reg exploiting a nit for his inability to have two pairs/sets on a board is just absolutely ridiculous. Do you guys seriously think 95% of the regs in a poker room think, "Wow, this guy only plays 1 hand per hour or every other hour. He's involved in this pot now and is betting huge into a 3-7 way pot, but I know his range is extremely capped to one pair. Maybe I should take advantage of that and spew off my whole stack, and try to get him off his big overpair INSTEAD of folding." Seriously?

If he does, more power to him because that takes a lot of balls and degen to actually not only think it, but pull the trigger.

Now, if the reg is exploiting him by folding all his non-nutted hands vs that nit's c-bet and/or turn barrel, that is a different story but nobody mentioned that.

Everything you wrote is dead on except this. Even of we limp in with SC in late position. They give us alot of equity to bluff with. Don't necessary have to RFI to build up fold equity.

Also suited SC, can play well I as a flat to EP, and MP opens. As they flop well allowing us opportunities to use our position with less risk.

So yes, I believe any computer would definitely be using fold equity in any equation.

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Good post and I agree with most of it save some comments in the last three paragraphs. I'm curious--does your database analysis show SCs in EP 6-max are more -EV to play than folding? Because our goal OOP isn't so much to make money as it is to lose less. As I'm sure you know we make almost all our money in position.

As for the rest...I'm not talking about board coverage to sound smart. I actually try to figure out villains' board coverage in a given spot so I can exploit them. Folding to a nit's double barrels is really obvious which is why I didn't mention it, but yeah, if somebody only raises big pairs and big cards it's pretty easy to get out of the way on KQ9 (for example).

Playing the way OP suggests turns one's hands almost face-up to a smart, attentive player. And plenty of people on this forum think nobody notices such things but some do. It might only be 5% of regs or even fewer who notice these things but such players will make nits' lives hell.

I commonly exploit nits in the manner you're saying doesn't happen. I figure out who the nits are and when their ranges are weak because of board texture or otherwise capped I then barrel the hell out of them. And they fold way too often. And I've seen other good players make the same exploits. Such players are fairly rare, but the thing is if you have one in your game and they play with you a lot they will absolutely crush you if you fork your range the way OP suggests.

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People analyze EV in much too narrow of way, sometimes. I love face-up players.

of course weak nit fishes are easy to exploit, theyre just fishes with a different mindset.

im a huge nit but i never fold when i suspect someone is bluffing too much vs me with 100bbs stacks.

SCs are a quite a bit more valuable in 9 or 10 handed full ring live game which is way more passive preflop, than they are in a 6 max online game.

Yeah I don't disagree here, but bottom line is I'm confident most of every player's profits come from A10s+, AQo+, and 66+.

I didn't direct the comment at you when I said some regs try to act all smart bringing up board coverage.

Folding yields 0 EV when folding from EP. I think you are confusing it with blind defence, where our goal is to lose less money with as many hands as possible that aren't premiums. Thus, although we "lose" with certain hands, we are actually losing less than other players are, which boosts our winrate.

Hmm...I might be confused, but I'm pretty sure I've seen charts from database analysis showing winning players typically lose money UTG (in FR at least). Obviously we lose the most in the blinds, but I thought we tend to lose money UTG as well, hence the goal is more losing less than winning more. And if we lose money UTG by playing hands then folding can't be neutral EV or we should just fold everything UTG. No?

So you're saying it's +EV to fold SCs compared to playing them OOP? And is this applicable to online or live FR or both? What are you typically opening live EP, MP, LP?

SCs are one of my favorite hand types (after maybe AXs). Dumping them in EP feels too nitty. Dumping them from every position as OP says feels insanely nitty. Maybe I'm wrong.

You're probably more right than wrong. If it's 100bb cap and a reasonable preflop raise rarely gets folds, and you just end up seeing flops with 3-4 people with a low SPR, you're not making money raising low suited connectors.

There is probably still value in overlimping those kinds of hands on the button. Maybe even co/hj if the players to your left are weak/tight and passive, or you can see they're going to fold or whatever.

The value in suited connectors comes from playability on turns and rivers. Not from flopping big. If you're playing suited connectors solely trying to hit two pair or flop a monster draw you are probably making a mistake.

For instance, if you flop 3 to a straight flush, 15 turn cards give you 8/9 out draws. This doesn't sound like much. But consider if you decide to fire a turn barrel as a bluff. If you bet 2/3 pot it needs to work 40% of the time. However if you have an 8 out draw your bluff now only needs to work around 20% of the time. This is powerful, but also less relevant when the turn bet puts you all-in -- you don't threaten a massive river barrel and you lose the implied odds. Also obviously it's much easier to bluff heads up than multiway.

that´s exactly the point. as he said, folding everything is 0 EV outside of the blinds. if you think the goal is to lose less UTG, just fold every hand. 0 ev is obviously better than negative ev. playing no hands is just wrong from every position, so you got a fundamental misunderstanding.

as minatorr said, you are confusing this spot with blind defence, where we are -100bb/100 if we´d fold our entire range and are aiming to lose less.

So, i see a lot of people here saying the forums are nitty, i feel pretty confident I play one of the widest ranges on the forum (my somewhat limited tracking had me at about 32% VPIP and i rarely limp), and i can somewhat advocate against SCs.

what SCs are for

so the easiest way to view SCs is as a bluffing hand. you "bluffed" preflop, and you are hoping to get a board that lets you bluff postflop. The goal is to iso, and hit a draw so you can play them like a big hand with semi bluffs. SCs also help balance your range so Vs can put you on trips on most paired boards, but balance is near worthless at 1/3 especially.


limping or calling multiway with suited connectors

SCs are very overrated multiway, the hands have so much more reverse implied odds than people seem to think. Suited aces just kill SCs with flush over flush amd trips over trips. 98- all can lose straight over straight. These things happen rarely, but they stack you. Of course it happens HU as well, but very good non nut hands lose a lot more multiway than HU.

The other problem playing SCs like this is that if SCs are a bluffing hand, well you sorta lost your opportunity to play them like aces after you called pre.

raising SCs when limped to you in LP

This is profitible, and I would say that good players in general play far too tight and passive in these types of pots, but I dont necessarily recommend raising for everyone. Nearly no one goes broke playing too tight pre.

EP most likely the move is to just fold, but its skill dependent and table dependent.

better than SCs?

suited aces are far better than SCs in almost all situations, so long as you dont overplay TPNK. But the one i like more is suited one gappers. I actually prefer one gappers over SC. Lets compare 53s to 54s:

hitting the bottom end of a straight is 467 instead of 678. no one plays 58, tons of people play T9. 53s is facing 3 cards that let 1 card straights beat him, and 7 that let 1 card straights chop with him. 54s is facing 11 that beat him and 3 that chop. Since 54 hits 1 more straight than 53. Really my only point is that the extra straight that 54 gets isnt super valuable, since the 53 non nut straight is effectively the nuts and so the extra 54 straight is not exciting.

hitting two pair: 53x is going to make plenty of dryish boards, 54x is going to be much wetter and set up for way more straights and straight draws for your opponent.

balance: Unknown thinking Villans will likely put you on potential SCs, they will not put you on suited one gappers, I think that your straights will be much more disguised and will pay you off way more often. I also think that semi bluffing is more successful against thinking regs with 1 gappers. 98xr board, if you check raise a C bet they likey know you could have JT or 76. T8xr, i dont think you get put on J9 or 97 nearly as often, so youll get much more credit for a made hand.

You do hit less often, and end up with gutshot draws more often, but I think it plays a bit better multiway because of the considerably lower reverse implied odds, and probably plays a bit better HU as well.

Very good post.

Quality post as usual Tomark.

What you've written is in line with how I play SCs. One thing I'm wondering though, from what positions do you raise hands like 97? I often raise SCs and 1-gaps from any position--wondering if it's too loose.

And if you're at an overly loose passive table where raising tends to get 4-5 calls, do you still raise SCs and if so from what positions?

I love SCs and AXs when I can get the pot HU (3-way is okay too), but when it's 6-way I can't play them as aggressively as I like and often end up check/folding.

And how do you average 32% VPIP and still win? I consider myself a LAG but that seems really high. I average maybe 27%. I'm opening about 50% OTB and 14% UTG. Not sure where I should be opening up more (if at all).

I havent played high volume online since BF...I have a very large d-base. Me and all my on line pals show a profit from UTG in FR games

If you lose money from UTG, I´d suggest to fold all your hands but AA and open shove it.
I guarantee it´s +ev, which is, after all, better than losing money from UTG

AFAIK winning players win in all positions except the blinds. I mean, if you play a tight range like 88+, AQ+, you show a profit, because the hand value is so big, it overcomes the positional disadvantage.

Small sample, I may be lower. I think I tracked maybe 200-300 hands or so. 27% might be, but I will say I was tracking my hands because I felt I was playing too wide and thought it would tighten me up, and to some degree it did, so I think i was actually playing wider before. I think the main thing is I raise near 100% range limped to me from btn and CO at most tables if I expect a fish to be the only caller. Also this is at 1/3 where I am pretty sure i was the best player at the casino at that stake. I tightened up a decent amount (probably ~25%) at 2/5 and was still getting killed, im playing a reasonably normal range now, probably 15% or something, havent checked.

As far as EP, I didnt really have a set range exactly. Basically if i was card dead im sometimes raising 52s from UTG, but if ive played 5 or 6 hands in a row ill fold 98s from MP. As a LAG bluffing seems like one of those buttons where if you press it enough times, eventually you gotta stack someone to put the fear back in everyone, so I basically am more inclined to play a consistent percentage of hands than a consistent range of hands since the only thing that slows me down is table image getting bad. I also played a ton of offsuit and just general crap a decent amount even from EP when everyone sucked.

As far as the overly loose tables, this was basically my 3 step thought process for any hand:

1) set bet size to whatever i think it would take to get HU based on the ction (for my entire range)
2) decide whether to raise based on quality of opponents and the bet size
3) if i cant raise, decide whether to limp

So a larger bet size required would tighten my range, but my poor opposition may counteract it somewhat. I super rarely limped, but I think the largest my typical raise size ever got at a table was $30 (lots of drunks), and I was limping more than raising.

yes, I believe thats his point. Many winnng players play too loose from UTG to a point of losing money, so the idea of folding SCs from UTG is likely good.