Hi y'all. Trying to transition back from nlholdem to limit.

Had a bunch of small to middle pocket pairs in my last session.
Played them all pretty bad/ passive I would say. Didn't hit a set on any and ended up folding them all.

How does the math differ in limit as opposed to nl? Are they even playable due to the smaller expected return?

Sorry if this is a subject covered a thousand times already.

Starting limit from scratch again.

Maybe the question should have been, do we have the implied odds in limit to call to a raise?

Oh goodness I'm so bad at this.

Play middle and small pairs for one bet in position (overlimp, don't open limp unless you have a bunch of calling stations to your left). Ideally get 4+ to 1 and dump it when you don't hit a set.

Also, a common mistake in limit is cold calling raises. If you want to play against a raiser in front of you then 3-bet. It only costs one more bet and you'll likely get the blinds to fold his one more.

Thank you very much.

Implied odds are severely limited in limit (pun not intended) so essentially you want to see flops cheap in position with all the speculative hands like middling suited connectors and one gappers as well as small to medium pocket pairs and small suited aces. If you have to put more than one bet in pre-flop your implied odds get eaten away big time.

Read small stakes hold'em (SSHE). This is the bible for super fishy live games. It will get you to around breakeven in most small stakes game with non-extortionate rake. I believe that when the table plays ultra loose like described in SSHE you don't even get much of a chance to deploy the more advanced part of the strategy spectrum.

Read winning in tough hold'em games (WITHG) when ready to move up to mid-stakes. What separates wheat from chaff there is 3-betting, blind steal and defense. Most great players are looser and more aggro than WITHG, though it's an open question from my perspective if the rake is still too high for high end LAGTAG play.

Frankly I didn't find hold'em poker for advanced players (hpfap) to have much value added after the info in the first two books.

The odds of flopping a set are 7.5 to 1. Sometimes you win unimproved. Implied odds. Don’t limp 44 utg

OP, thank you for bringing this up. I was about to resurrect an old thread of mine where I tried to approach this topic mathematically:

https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/1...12/?highlight=

In as few words as possible, I'm sure you've seen many posters say "You should usually raise or fold in late position after limpers" and "You should usually 3-bet or fold in late position after a raiser and at least one coldcaller". DougL has personally challenged me to come up with specific scenarios that are the difference between "usually" and "always" and I have always failed.

Conventional wisdom is that to play pocket pairs before the flop, you want aggressive villains in the hand so that if you do flop a set they will help you make the pot big. In the thread above, I tried to actually calculate how many big bets you need to expect to be able to collect postflop when you DO hit a set (and it holds up) to make up for all of the times you enter the pot and then fold the flop, or make your set and get outdrawn.

One thing in particular that I find confusing is that the same book says that you want PASSIVE postflop play to play suited connectors and suited aces, because you will FAR more often flop something you actually want to continue with and you don't want them to bet and raise you off your draw. That confuses me - you're making the same preflop investment, you're arguably putting in MORE postflop, and you're going to make up for that by winning SMALLER pots? I don't get it.

Sorry if this post was all over the place, but the point is, you are not alone if you're stumped by some of these spots.

Hope that helped.

EDIT: I think you've been asked this before but I don't remember your answer - have you been playing around in PokerStove?

I don’t think it’s so confusing. If you have a pocket pair, when you flop a set or full house you’re gonna want to be able to pump it, and you want people putting in tons of action with top pair or trips on a paired board. If you have suited connectors or aces, you want to be able to get to the river very cheaply after flopping flush or straight draws.

I think small pairs are mostly unplayable from EP except in those truly special games where flops are going off 6-9 ways for 1-2 bets.

It might help alleviate SOME of the confusion if I focus on the question of whether or not to cold-call a raise instead of jumping all over the place.

UTG and UTG+2 limp, a tight player in MP raises, folds to us in the cutoff with A2s-A9s, 43s to QJs, 53s to QTs. I'm slam-dunk 3-betting better suited aces and connectors than those, but at a passive table where it's going to be difficult to build a huge pot, I have a really hard time justifying a cold-call mathematically.

If we cold-call, most likely both blinds and the limpers are going to call, so we're looking at a probable 6-way pot. Let's say 3 villains (in addition to hero) see the turn, 2 see the river and 1 sees showdown, and since this is a passive table, let's say we're not able to get any raises in postflop. So the pot size (not including our contributions) is 5BB pre, 1.5BB on the flop, 2BB on the turn and 1BB on the river for a total of 9.5BB.

We are going to be putting in 1BB pre and then checkfolding the flop reasonably often. We are going to be chasing a draw that we have odds to chase postflop and miss reasonably often. We are going to make a hand and have it end up second best every now and then, especially when we miss our monster but back into a hand like top pair (easily dominated) or two pair (difficult to fold when beat).

It's hard to specifically quantify the math, but it "feels" like if we're at a passive table with a suited ace/connector, we're going to lose more than 9.5BB total for the times we lose if we're cold-calling pre.

If instead we're at an aggressive table with a pocket pair, we're going to be able to build bigger pots, we're going to make fewer second-best hands, we're going to be put in FAR fewer challenging situations postflop and we're going to be chasing fewer draws, so cold-calling "seems fine" mathematically.

See why I have a "mental block" when it comes to coldcalling with a SC/SA at a passive table vs. doing the same with a PP at an aggressive one? Did that help or did it just confuse things?

Well sometimes we just flop a straight or a flush or a full house and win a monster pot too. It’s important in some ways to be able to cover the board as well, imo. I think that we don’t have to always play these hands, but if the players are soft enough I’m going to want to play more pots with them and use my skill advantage to make up for the small amount of equity we might be giving up. At a tight passive table where people just fold when they miss then they can be skipped, but if players are chasing hands down to the river with no prayer, I will want to play many hands against them and give up on some weaker hands that are only good for high card strength.

with your last 2 posts you have all the answers, i just think you overthinking it imo...
Just focus on the flop.

You will never calll with 2 outs to hit a set after the flop, so u need players to be agressive to build the pot right away when u do hit but its coming rarely a set so u need to win a big pot most of the time to compensate for set mining.
Key word here, i think its frequency.
Has you win more often pots, its ok if u win a bit less.

With others draws where u can peel pretty lightly on the flop, u dont want to have to calls 2 bet cold postflop BUT u have a lots of ways to win pretty often, so u win a lot more often then a set, so its ok to win a little less compare to a set if your able to see a lot of river cheaply and win most of the time when u hit your draws.

Wow, where I initially thought I made a dumb beginner type post, this has turned into something real good. You're welcome!

No I haven't been doing any poker stove or other programs. Just got a new computer and haven't downloaded much yet.
Was playing nl but decided to jump back in at the 3/6 limit at the Flamingo in my last Vegas trip.
Will be playing at the newly opened Encore Boston where according to poker Atlas, 2 to 3 3/6 tables are running regularly.
Will be reading those books. Have to go through my library to see what I don't have.(I believe I only got the " bible" in my inventory.

"Bible" , theory of poker and super system 1,2

My library, 2 bookshelves of assorted reading material!

I'll be more than happy to contribute my experience in future to community.
Right now I'm afraid I'm very much in the question phase!

So, the original question as been adequately explained.
Basically, small pocket pairs are drawing hands in limit and should be thus treated. Basically using the same math as connectors to enter a pot.

So, I might be pushing the envelope, and I know this is also table dependent. What would be considered a small pocket pair?

22+ 88? 22+99?

Can we play 99 and TT like premiums?

( I usually play TT and sometimes 99 like premiums in nl)

roughly
22-55 small
66-99 medium
TT+ premium

In a completely readless environment, you can open raise mediums from middle positions. Open raise premiums from anywhere. Open raise possibly all from late positions.

OP, here are some more random suggestions for you:

1. For 77,88,99,TT,JJ,QQ calculate or Google the following:
a. The probability of flopping an overpair
b. The probability of flopping one overcard
c. The probability of flopping a set
d. Your hot/cold equity vs. various number of villains and ranges, i.e. 1 20% range and 2 60% ranges, or 4 70% ranges etc. Pokerstove can help with this.
e. The % of hands that have your hand crushed (higher pocket pairs) or are only a small dog against you (overcards).
2. When you do flop one overcard, calculate/estimate the probability that at least one of the villains paired it when you have 1, 2, 3 or 4 villains (this can be challenging because the villains don't necessarily have completely random hands - you can start with random hands to simplify the calculation and then adjust from there).

Random thought: With ANY hand preflop, pocket pair or otherwise, it can be useful to ask yourself the following questions:
1. What am I hoping to flop?
2. What is the probability of actually flopping it?
3. If I DO flop it, what is the (approximate) probability that either it will be the best hand at showdown or I can blow everyone else out of the pot? (Note that this depends on how many other villains see the flop, which can affect your decision to limp, raise, coldcall or reraise)
4. What am I going to do on the flop if I get a non-ideal flop? (This one can have a lot of permutations, i.e. are you in position, out of position, 1 villain, 5 villains, size of the pot preflop etc. - in this case, the best thing to try to figure out is what are you going to do if one overcard to your pair comes. If you get donked into or raised, is it ALWAYS top pair or better? Should you raise to protect your hand by trapping the majority of the villains for two bets even if you think the donker has you beat? If everyone checks around to you, does it mean nobody paired the overcard?)

The reason I'm suggesting you do all this work is because it's just not enough to ask the question, "Can I play 99 or TT like they're a preemie?". You have to understand WHY you should or shouldn't play it like a preemie.

I hope this post came across as helpful and not as me being a poker snob .

I was going to post this hand in a new thread, but since it involves a pocket pair I'll post it here:

Table is playing very loose and passive both preflop and postflop. Most pots are 6 to 8 handed. Preflop raises are rare and 3-bets are AK,QQ+. UTG raises are getting coldcalled in almost as many places as they'd have been limped along. Several times I've built a big pot pre with a big pair, flopped an overpair, gotten donked into and raised and had the villain check-call me to showdown with his flopped 2 pair or straight.

I'm in UTG+1 with 44. UTG limps, I limp, UTG+2 raises, 2 coldcallers, both blinds call, UTG calls, I call.

I prefer aggressive postflop play with small pocket pairs, but with so many pots going off 6 to 8 handed I figure there will be plenty of money in the eventual pot to justify setmining.

7 players, 14sb, flop 47Q

UTG checks. At game speed I checked, knowing that betting out would do nothing to protect my hand so I should at least HOPE someone in LP raises so I can at least face a FEW of the villains with 2 bets cold. In retrospect I think I should have bet because the PFR was to my left and might have raised me.

UTG+2 did bet, 2 callers, UTG folds and I call.

4 players, 9BB, turn T

Assuming nobody else has a set or a flush (this table is so passive that I could see baby flushes check-calling all the way to showdown, and sets being afraid of the monotone flop and doing the same), I have about 80% pot equity here, so it's time to build a pot instead of protecting my hand. I bet out and everybody calls.

4 players, 13BB, river 9

That card didn't change much. And I'm completely out of position. And if I bet and get raised I'm going to have to call. What's my thought process here?

Bet flop. AP, check/raise flop. Leading turn is good. Bet/call river.

Nice job posting ways to reason through pocket pair strategy, Dal.

On the hand:

Flop I honestly like bet out or check raise about equally. I just rarely see the flop donk into raiser hoping he'll raise work out but flopping a set I don't care how we get more money into the pot as long as we do it.

Turn yup

River bet/call. So many worse hands are calling in this enormous pot and of course never fold a set in this enormous pot.

No snob,as already stated, great post.

re: the bolded. What smaller expected return? IP, a small pair for 1 sb only needs to win a 4BB pot (on the average) to justify immediate pot odds for set mining. 4 BB is a small pot. At twice that size, you are probably getting correct implied odds to call the limp, or a raise from behind your limp.

When you get to the middle pairs, you don't need to hit a set to win. Just need to play well post flop.

But against a lot of opponents at 3/6, you raise 77-99 IP after limpers and see a flop, where if the texture hits your opponents, you may get a free card OTF which essentially gives you and extra card to hit that set. Otherwise, you fold.

Small to medium pairs are feast or famine in LHE.

In general, getting back to LHE after NL requires you to adjust back to the reality that preflop, the vast majority of decisions are raise/fold. OTF, while not the vast majority, you still should raise or fold if bet into more than half the time.

Go back and reread Ed Miller's "Small Stakes Holdem".

its pretty situational, you have to have a good feel for when the pot is going to be 5+ ways which is what you want with a hand like 22-66. depends highly on the game.

also positionally can be weird. in a good action game without much 3 betting preflop i like raising with 33 UTG because i can expect an 7 way pot for 2 bets which is perfect for a small pair. but then if it folds to me in this game in middle position and i have 33 i fold

also to really maximize on these hands you have you become good at winning with them when you dont hit a set, which requires some hand reading and situational plays, like playing paired boards aggressively, raising the turn with people behind when you know the first bettor is bluffing, etc

wow not CRing the flop is so so so bad. why would you do that

I would also get out of the mindset of trying to protect your hand, in all but very rare cases in LHE you are betting for value and you want callers. the human brain is just conditioned to place more importance on losses than wins.