Lol ur scared of getting action with aces ^_^

My point is that if one of the biggest benefits to playing suited connectors is that we get more action when we actually have a premium, I'm not exactly sure how big a metagame +EV result that is *if* we're playing in games where a raise in EP for lol 5% of stacks with AA sees us in a 5way pot OOP.

Gbutthat'showIlookatthingsG

I like to call with suited connectors in position heads up, and then float the flop if I Flop any equity (assuming v over cbets), and then take the pot away if shown weakness on the turn or Riv

That is so NOT the biggest benefit. The biggest benefit is making overall profit with them.

Also, there is just no way your games are as weird as you act like. On one hand you say everyone is a nit and on the other hand you say you get 4-5 callers when you raise.

I dont know how its possible for you play as nitty as you say and then still get 4-5 callers when you raise. If that's the case, then raise open raise 10x. Keep increasing your raise sizes until you get 1-2 callers on avg.

Now we are talking some poker. People think you cant play suited connectors unless its multiway. This isn't limit poker.

PP >>>>> SCs, SCs overrated for the most part, especially the weaker ones and from EP. Databases will show how much more profitable PP are than SCs.

this is the "balance" in a balanced range

theoretically speaking we are supposed to have some bluffs or semi-bluffs in our range pre flop. that is the "mixed" in mixed strategy

why do you guys need to win every hand? showing down the nut low when called on the river is your graduation from nit-boring poker

i raise all suited connectors from EP and 3 bet them some of the time (depending on table dynamics). I only fold them when there are aggressive 3bettors at the table, which essentially don't exist at 1/2 and 2/5. Also if I've been playing too many hands I will stop but most of the time the players are not skilled enough to take advantage of my wide range, or they call too infrequently and I just shut down post flop

don't forget that raise/fold is a good option, in fact we should be raise/folding a lot more than people actually think is profitable

in all honesty i think some of the more skilled players here would improve their win rate by raising SCs in EP some of the time, yes you will definitely lose money on those hands but you get to practice your hand reading skills and you make yourself a much more dangerous player

the goal is to lose a small amount with them while increasing your win rate with big hands

+1...although my goal is not to lose a small amount. Its to win raising with them. You're never going to win as much as you will with premiums but winning overall raising SCs and other less than great hands can be done.

+1
UTG and UTG+1 I raise Suited Connectors

AQ AJ KQ which a lot of you like to play get folded in the blink on an eye
up front they are by far the biggest $$$$$$ burners in the games I play in

you get so many callers at low stakes that raising it should be a profit, when they start playing to tight and too well i will muck pre flop but until that happens i am going to be raising AA and 67s with exactly the same frequency and guess what, you get dealt AA more often than 67s

also note that 67s plays better from EP than LP since we can be called in multiple spots more often. 67s has better equity 3 way than HU, so it's actually a muck in later positions than UTG+1, which is exactly where it's a standard raise

Bolded is 100% wrong. That is absolutely not what a mixed strategy means.

Also, I personally think suited connectors are potentially a great example of how multiple opponents' mistakes can force you to have to deviate from an otherwise solid strategy to win. In the games I play in most often, when I raise preflop, there will often be multiple people at the table willing to call me with not just any suited ace, but also suited kings and suited queens. When people's calling ranges with suited cards are that wide, all of a sudden it's not such a good thing to make a small flush and get action.

It would be different if when I raised with a suited connector, people would (correctly) fold garbage suited hands like Q2s that could still overflush me. Then my flushes would go up in value when I made them, because I'd be coolered less often.

Basically these days, I'm of the opinion that if your plan for a hand doesn't include sometimes stealing the pot, you can't play suited connectors for a profit.

and yet this is proven to be the only way to win at poker...it's exactly zero sum, stealing equity is the only way to win in a vacuum, obviously people make a lot of mistakes at the table and don't play optimally and that ev will funnel to you but stealing pots is exactly the only way to win mathematically

if you can beat the average with a suited connector, that is, lose but still lose less than everyone else then it's the same as a win

if poker players in general average -0.2 bb playing a suited connector on the button and you lose only 0.1 it's a win, there is nothing wrong with taking small -ev shots for big money in any gambling, the flexibility of having a bankroll by giving up some equity is definitely worth the shot for me, i wouldn't want to play 1/2 or 2/5 forever

the most important part of suited connectors is their implied odds, the deeper the stacks get the more often you should open, also the size of the BB's stack is important, try and do it when he is deep, he's the most important person you are raising

KT, it seems to me you consistently make these mathematically / theoretical claims and yet don't back them up (and many of them can easily be disproved with a simple counter-example).

I don't think there's any simple proof that the claim "the only way to win at poker is to be able to steal some pots" is false, but it's pretty obvious to me that (thankfully) at the majority of tables that it simply is. I'm pretty convinced you could utilize a 0% bluffs / steal attempts method and yet still win in most games thanks to our opponents mistakes (not saying you would crush it by any means, but to say that you wouldn't be able to win is farfetched).

GimoG

live full ring - think of them as specialty hands. make money with big pairs, ak, playing broadways aggressively -- especially suited, and mining sets - all before suited connectors below T9s.

Actually there is a simple proof: if your bets always get called, then just value bet when u have the best hand. And when u have a bad hand just fold.

FYI mixed strategy refers to playing one hand differently in the same spot. For example, sometimes betting AJ on A83. And sometimes checking the same AJ in that spot.

Again, blatantly false. If the average player earns -.2bb with a suited connector on the button, and you fold that same suited connector, thereby earning 0bb, you're doing better than losing anything.

This post is absurd start to finish. In equity terms 76s is a losing hand against typical calling ranges whether you're heads up, 3 handed or 6 handed. It just doesn't win at showdown very much, which is why it's not a good hand against a crowd.

Correct, although that last sentence might be a bit strong. I'm making much the same points here:

Suited connectors are basically bad hands which back into strong hands at a slightly better clip than other bad hands, which makes them a decent choice for launching bluffs against tightish ranges. The idea that they are super sick multiway hands where you get to own people by making sick straights and flushes is just way wrong.

I guess the best way to describe what 76s is is that it's exactly the same as 76o except that you sometimes get to flop a 7 high flush or draw to a 7 high flush draw. In a loose game you really don't want to be doing that, you're going to get regularly owned by the guy with Q2s, like Vernon said. Small pairs have an issue with being oversetted but at least a set is a crushing hand when it's not the case that you're oversetted. A flush draw isn't that great a hand even when you're not drawing dead vs a larger flush draw.

My basic rules are that I want to play them in multi-pots, in loose games, heads up against players whose range I can narrow down and who I know will stack off with an overpair.

Furthermore, I don't go to war if I hit top pair, but will prefer pot control in such situations, preferring to play for five card draws or easily let go.

I'm in complete agreement with that. I'd just point out that "a decent choice for launching bluffs" means that if you want to play them, you have to have already chosen an opponent you want to bluff, i.e. your plan for the hand includes sometimes stealing the pot. It sounds like we don't disagree on this point.

well, not really

if you play a GTO style you will make money off peoples mistakes, if you play an exploitable style, you can win off GTO as long as you are willing to take more risks, you can also mix the two depending on game conditions

most of your money at low stakes is made off peoples mistakes, they will be raising with something like KTo instead of 67s, they will fold too often or whatever silly mistakes people make

so i'd raise suited connectors whenever the table is deep enough at low stakes, that's just my advice, at higher stakes you need some frequency of folding but who knows what that is, you have to have some pure bluffs in your range, everyone knows that

so at low stakes you probably should always play these suited connectors in EP, always call with them in LP, and try n steal every single pot you think you can, because the math says you need x% amount of bluffs per value hand, right?

as far as the question is concerned, the better people play the harder it is not to lose A LOT playing suited connectors

89s is significantly better than 67s because people are generally always flatting with those hands behind you and negative implied odds is a *****, if you don't want to play for stacks then i guess just fold

there is a bankroll rule for variance vs profit, so if you actually sat down and made a raising chart you could figure out it's variance, the bigger your bankroll is the more you should play SCs

just simple math really, it can certainly be computed by brute force but that would take too long, but some of those suited connector hands are better than others but one thing i know is never fold 9Ts UTG. just start with that hand and never ever fold it under the gun

Feel like KT is hitting big tokes in between each line of these posts. Mad respect.

Using SCs to have balanced ranges is probably the most important info to be gleaned from this thread.

If we're only raising with the top 8-10% from EP and shift towards opening the top 20% from LP, then we become exploitable by not including 76s/87s/98s and other 20-30% hands in our range. Good players will find it too easy to play against us.

Can we still be profitable not playing middle SCs at all? Of course we can, because there are still plenty of below-average and bad players on our table that can't exploit our tight range.

With that said, while opening 87s from the MP1 might be a -EV hand in a vacuum, that doesn't tell the whole story. Opening and taking 87s to showdown from MP1 may lose you money on those hands when you're playing 87s, but what might it generate for you when playing AJs from the same position and you're now getting action from A7-A9o behind you that you may not have gotten otherwise?

Playing middle SCs may be a loss on their own in a vacuum but opening more hands should expand our value range when opponents play back at us wider. People don't want to fold, so they're going to play more marginal hands when they get tired of us opening more often. We invest a small loss now for a larger win in the future. Having an agro preflop range is hugely profitable for when we're actually getting a run of strong value hands and connecting to the board. That's the time we really make our bread. Just make sure you're losing small with EV-neutral hands and winning big with the ones that matter.