Hey guys! So finally I have reached this level of 1K posts :PPP Hurray!

First of all I would like to thank all the 2+2 community for being helpful ,for answering all the difficult and easy questions and being friendly and supportive. This forum is awesome :P

I hope I won’t get torn apart for this post ,of course feel free to comment ,just don’t be to harsh... Pleeeease :P

Let us begin.
A little bit of info-background for this post...

People who start to play SNG’s seem to follow the one and only fundamental rule – tight early, loose later.
This is so called role-model of SNG game and that formula works well. As total beginners like to overvalue such hands as KJ, Ax and stuff they are told to be patient and learn to play nuts only(AK JJ+) and limping pps for set mine. I have begun with it too and I think it is cool for beginners as it shows that hands like KQ from UTG is trash.

So when the problem of overvaluing these hands is solved, everything seems cool, though it isn’t .

Lately on the forum I have noticed that many people seem to underestimate the value of these non-premium hands in late position early in SNG. And the idea of this post is that playing non-premium hands from LP aggressively is +EV.

First 3 levels of blinds, and last 3 positons (HJ,Co,BTN).

Hand groups which I gonna talk about.

1. 22-99
2. QJ,KJ,JT etc. (Face cards hands and some gapped connectors)
3. A2-AQ

And 3 basic situations which illustrate the idea well.

1. No limpers
2. 1 limper
3. 2+ limpers

Those who say that these hands are not worth playing are just lazy ,b/c it is much easier to fold ,rather than raise and play em postflop. In fact these hands are hyper easy to play. U will be amazed how many times will u just take the pot down pre even with limper(s).

Postflop play doesn’t include much of a thinking – c-bet if the flop is good and shutdown if called and unimproved ,unless there is a cool situation for a 2nd barrel or check.

So, let us go deeper into exact situations

No limpers

HJ – Many people will advocate limping most of the pps for set value, I can understand limping with 22-55 as they are really not very strong, but open limping PPs 66+ is suicidal.

1st You won’t get paid for your set unless there is a monster hand which raises pre.
2nd You won’t be able to take the pot down with c-bet, as you are not the preflop aggressor.
So, you will c/f most flops, and when u hit your set it is unlikely that somebody is going to pay you a lot.

Definetly raise them for value. I will talk about postflop play later on.
Same with 2nd group hands- raise them QJ,KJ,KQ are all super hands to make a raise in LP.

3rd group- Ax are not very good hands to play them early even in LP,so I suppose u can raise something like A9-AT+,of course u can adjust this range for own preferences.

CO – 22-44+ ,A9+,J and any face card, T and a face card (it is cooler though if they are suited)

BTN – Now this depends on your style, u can raise reaaaly wide if u know your opponents and you are easily playing postflop and not stacking off with wicked TP. Just experiment and adjust your ranges.

1 limper

There are a lot of factors that influence your play – position of limper his stats, trends, style. Let us think what usually limpers limp – small pockets, some sexy cards like QJs,Ax, and random trash.

By raising pre u will fold out trash usually, maybe some wicker sexy holdings and get calls from other hands. Some will say, well we don’t wanna play a big pot postflop early with KJ. Wrong!

C-bet is your power, small pockets see flop and c/f to a bet, so do other hands which do not hit, if u hit your K u will get a lot of value from Kx trashy hands, it is not that u will stack off, no, u will play a not very big pot.
So raising PPs ,Face cards, stronger A after one limper is cooley.

2+ limpers

Especially at level 3 (25/50) u should tighten your range ,no QJ raise or A9,it is possible but you have to be really carefull and know your opponents well. Though now u have several other options – limp with Axs, with KJs,QTs,JT... U can now limp 22-77-88.

Postflop:
1. You hit
2. You miss

You hit

Usually u will have to bet for value, though sometimes check is more appropriate.

For example.
Level 2.
HJ limps for 30
Hero (CO) 1500 : AT and u raise it to 120

It is folded to BB who calls.
HJ calls too.

Flop: A J 3(370)
BB: checks.
HJ : checks
Hero: checks,
though u can have the best hand here but the there are not that many hands that u beat A7-A9 at best. If u c-bet and get c/raised u will pretty much have to fold. By c u will keep the pot rather small and also will be able to take value from Kx ,Ax(lower) maybe some pps.

You miss

C-bet flops like Axx, Kxx. Do not c-bet on drawy or well coordinated flops.

For example.
Level 3.
Hero is BTN with 66.
It is folded to hero who raises to 150

BB calls.

Flop: K73 (325)

BB checks, now it is an easy c-bet as we will force many hands out of the pot and take it down,checking here is not valuable as there are virtually no hands we can take value from and catching bluffs with 3rd pair is not very cool.

Hero bets 165
BB calls

Turn (655): A
BB: checks

Generally if called you should shutdown and c turn behind and hope to get the c on the river,but as the A is a very cool card to 2nd barrel u can bet 300 and take the pot down.

Well this is what I wanted to say,u should play more agressive in LP ,but if u thought that this post is useless or whatever just look at the pics below

First. Congrats on 1k. Nice post!!! Excellent for beginners like myself.

Congrats on your 1K post man. Wish you future success in pokers and lots of maneyyyys (as long as you share).
I like that you addressed this specific topic. A lot of players follow the general rule of tight early loose late way too strictly and are probably losing extra value on LP in early stages. Well put!

Thanks men. yeah,mooonies is what i need :P

Congrats, more pics plz k thnx.

Congrats on the 1k!
Well, there is one particular reason for it, that I didn't identify in your post; the reason being, that since your equity later in a STT mainly comes from being able to shove a bigger stack and thereby to induce other players to make -EV folds, early on in a STT the EV you gain by increasing your stack with a given number of the chips is lesser than the EV you sacrifice by losing the same amount of chips.

From that assumption follows, that even though raising wider in LP at level 1 and level 2 might be +cEV, it can very easily be -$EV.

So the tight early/wild late doctrine is not as much a strategy for newbies to survive, as it is an expression of the temporal dynamics within a STT.

If you look at the very strong/winning STT players, you will see that a majority of them they are tight as #### early on. These are the players that 18 - 30 table with 10%+ ROI. If opening up in LP (more than conventional 2+2 STTf wisdom says) was a way of improving your EV, wouldn't these players have embraced the idea more?

Well,I understand that the chips we lose are much more valuable than those we gain,but do u really play as tight in EP as in LP?

Well done on the 1k post Gobao.

I don't want to criticise because it's obvious you have put a lot of effort into this post, and I do like the general topic, I just think a lot of your thoughts are too far off correct. I won't do a Kamel and rip every bit apart, but I think there are some key aspects that are wrong. Things like having to be the preflop aggressor for a bet in position on the flop to work, and limping PP's 66+ from late position being suicidal etc.

Anyways, congrats, and hope this provokes some discussion which is what this forums supposed to be all about.

Ty. I would like to hear your thoughts,can u expand them a little bit ?

I just think in general you are advocating raising hands preflop that are so marginal that we almost always end up turning them into bluffs when we c/bet the flop - these hands can't stand any heat from re-raises or flats etc the vast majority of the time, all for the sake of adding a very small amount of equity to your stack. When you do get looked up with your marginal hand that can't stand the heat you end up losing far more equity than you were standing to gain. Also they have the tendency to make very good second best hands which are all too easy to valuetown yourself with.

Many of the hands you advocate playing, play much better over multiple streets, but as we usually aren't deep enough in SNGs to utilise multiple street lines without risking spewing a ton of valuable equity, it is all too easy to get very spewy.

Like I said before, I like the topic, and I definitely agree people are generally way way too nitty, but I think some of your hand examples just push the idea a little too far.

Hm ... Agreed,I am thinking about this right kno,though it is hard to draw the line...

Congrats, nice post, I disagree and agree with some of it, but I think that the general idea of it is good: people seem to be way too nitty in the early stages from LP.
There are donks at every level, but as you move up, there are fewer of them, yet these are the guys who will allow you to double up early so that you won't be forced to go into push/fold move so soon.

So I think that loosening up in LP early on can definitly be +EV, provided you target the right players and you don't stack off with TP.

Thanks for the comments guys. Anyone else?

Congrats and nice post! Esp. like the bottom part of the post.. ;-)

Congrats on the 1K post, but like as others have said in the first 2-levels you will just lose too much equity by building pots with marginal hands.

However if you have a number of regular bad players behind which you have good exploitable reads on then your theory is reasonable. However in low-buyin STT this is never the case.