I'm utg (there's a straddle behind me of £5) and I limp. Problem is if it gets raised and I reraise it just looks so nutted. On the flip side if I raise and get plenty of callers I'm not loving it.

V1 (£400) - loose rec player, calls anything in the blinds, winning plenty of pots with hands like 75o. Even betting on rivers with bottom pair.

V2 (£900) - haven't played with this guy before today, seems pretty balanced. Notable hands:
- 3b! A solid reg and barrelled 2 streets with QT off, won with a pair of Qs (on the turn) vs JJ
- solid reg raises OOP pre and checks flop, V2 leads out with QT on T high flop and then c/c me on turn and river (£100 river bet) I had AT, FD and SD missed.

H (£1200)- been playing relatively tight, mostly folding garbage, been there for around 3hrs and not got involved in many pots, won the above pot with AT, a few bluffs and also got lucky against a rec player who was playing with a theory of going all in or folding (he shoved with KK and I called with AKs)

OTTH:

V2 straddles, H limps, V1 raises to £16, V2 tanks and calls, H reraises to £80, both V's tank and call

Flop (£243) J88r
V2 checks, H bets £90, V1 folds, V2 calls

Turn (£423) 4
V2 checks, H bets £260, V2 tanks, gets clock called on him and folds. Before the clock was called he asked me if I would show if he folded and I said yes if he shows his cards.

He shows KK

I know we shouldn't think results orientated but if I raise pre we probably get all the money in before cards get dealt, but is there a good time to ever limp AA? Even on an aggro table?

V1s raise pre was pretty small so put him on some suited Broadways or middling pairs, V2s tank for the 16 made me think he had a strong hand and was indifferent to raising. Overall ok with my raise pre but that could just be because they both called.

I liked the flop and when V2 called I put him on QQ or KJs, possibly 9Ts but unlikely due to preflop. If he has JJ he's doubling up.

My bet on the turn feels like a mistake, thoughts here were about putting a big enough bet in to get stacks in on any river apart from Q or J. Are we too deep to think about stacks in this position and should we just be going for value?

Also how do you guys approach questions like show if you fold? I said yes because I'd said it before and someone took that as weakness and called me all in. I know the less hands we show opponents the better so what should I be saying to questions like this?

Limp/reraise with monsters is so so underrated on so many types of tables. I have argued for this line countless times on the forums, only to get flamed for it just as many times.

Some cliffs:

-It really confuses your villains in several ways, and as an example they often put you on AK if you choose a big "bombsize" when you reraise- trying to end the hand with A high instead of seeing a flop.

-They get more emotionally attached to the pot because of more money/more dead money from callers in between, and they proceed to make larger mistakes for more amount of money.

-In some cases you can get people to put whole stacks in the middle, with hands they would simply not do that with if you had gone for the conventional regular open raise line. Because you showed weakness by limping in, the whole dynamic of a hand can change. Imagine if you limp in from early pos with AA. MP raises with lets say KJ suited, and then the nitty grinder feels "safe" to 3 bet big with 1010 on the button. Then its back on you, or you can be even more lucky that one of the players in the blinds may pick up a hand like AK that they now are gonna 4 bet/stackoff with due to the button 3 bet and what not.Depending on stacksizes,positions,dynamics and whatever, you can choose to either raise it back pre or flat the 3 bet. Either line makes for alot of +EV scenarios and a myriad of ways villain can level himself about your possible holdings- and commit more money to the pot.

I mean, just try it out a few times and see how it goes. Remember that you are not playing against 8 other 2+2 posters- you are playing against mostly losing rec players longterm with heaps of different leaks and weaknesses in their game. It really doesent matter if you think your range is "faceup". Cause to other losing players its not.

Even with the straddle I think its optimistic to think that if you get these stacks in with an unimproved AA that it will be the best hand.

As played I agree with checking the turn here. The board is too dry and there are not enough worse hands to call you. Check turn then call his river bet or bet yourself if checked to.

Your flop bet is a bit on the small side too. I would have gone 1/2 pot.

Im not a huge fan of limping AA because when you backraise everyone knows whats up. You had a dream spot here, AA vs KK in a deep stacked straddle pot, and you tipped your hand strength off very early in the hand.

Limp/re-raise is a fine strategy at some tables in early position. It looks nutted but it still gets at least one call most of the time, and if it doesn't, taking down a medium pot unopposed OOP is not such a bad result.

Don't answer. Literally don't say anything at all. It keeps you consistent so you're not giving tells by how you respond

I will say that its not the desired result here obviously when youre up against KK and he doesent reraise you again preflop. Sometimes you just run bad in terms of who gets dealt the KK: this time it seems like it was a solid player who could recognize that it was a somewhat dangerous situation being very deepstacked against a strong limp/reraise.

If the KK was in the hand of a bad losing player or a splashy fish or something, he probably gonna raise you back pre and then you get it allin pre insanely deep with AA. ( I assume this is a 1/2 game, due to the straddle being 5).

Its easy to think you couldve won more AFTER you knew he had KK. But were you really going to play for 900 in a 1/2 game with one pair? Depending on how strong he played his hand, he couldve easily have gotten you to fold AA when this deep. Id be happy with this result.

So less passive players and regs and more Lags and recs when limping aces.

Not sure how to do multiple quotes in one message (on iPhone) so will respond without..

@koss Don't you think the board was pretty dry on the flop to be betting 1/2, I didn't want to fold out all the underpairs, was contemplating betting less. I agree with your turn decision, if V held KQ suited or AK he could have bluffed a brick river and VB any good hands. I would still have leaned towards a reraise on most rivers though just because I only see one hand that beats me and maybe a few that hands that could make a loose call - AJ, KJ, QQ, KK.

@Garick thanks I'll take that approach from now on

@Petrucci Yea I thought his play with KK was pretty bad unless he had a specific read on me which I doubt. If you're going to straddle and get KK surely you'd want to raise it against a limp and an open from the loosest player at the table. From when I reraise it looks like a good play but I could easily have called and then 3 ways to a cheap flop with KK isn't ideal. And sorry forgot to say it was 1/2 250BB buy in max, apart from V2 and a 2 short stacks everyone had around 250BB

Thanks for the feedback all

I dont think there are many if any hands that call $90 on that flop that fold to $120. Betting less might get a few crying calls from underpairs and AK, but $90 likely folds out all those hands, and the calls you get would have called more.

My value betting strategy is generally divided into quarters with the following intents:

1/4 pot - I am trying to get calls from a really wide range that includes all sorts of low probability draws and weak hands.

1/2 pot - I am value betting against a "typical" range of draws and middling strength hands.

3/4 pot - I am trying to pummel draws or get a lot of money from strong hands

full pot or more - I am near nutted trying to stack your TPTK+

Thats my general strategy but I will adjust for V/situation/flop texture. Because there arent a lot of hands in their ranges that I typically would use a 1/4 pot bet to extract from, Im more likely to go 1/2 to 3/4 on this flop.

As to the 2nd question about letting him bluff with KQ or AK, he would have had to call the flop bet with those hands. Most of his hands on the river are goung to be ones he wants a cheap showdown with. Raising the river wouldnt be awful if he bet it out. Its not a play I make very often but I do sometimes think I miss value raises on the river when their range is sort of capped and mine is under repped. Most of my river raises are the nuts or bluffs.

As played I definitely agree with checking turn. You have pretty much all of the benefits (not bloating a pot vs. 98s or 87s, inducing a worse hand to bet the river, getting a medium strength hand to check/call the river) and very few drawbacks (the largest drawback being a free card to T9s). If this V is able to fold KK on the turn then your image isn't bluffy enough and you weren't getting 3 streets of value out of him. It's generally easier to check the turn and get your 2nd street on the river when it's heads up and you aren't too scared of the board overall.

I like a limp reraise at tight tables. I was playing at one table before with mostly tight passive and a few tight aggressive players in lp. All of the raises aren’t getting any action on this table. The button has the straddle on and I’m first to act with AA in the SB. I limp it here knowing I’m going to get over limps from the passives and with an aggressive later down the line a raise to attempt to take down all the money.

Lo and behold button straddle puts in a huge raise after I got 2 or 3 others to over limp after my initial limp. I go ahead and rereraise him, he jams and we get max value.

I say to hell with what the majority of 2+2 says. For low stakes, especially 1-2 just exploit your table. Nothing is ever black and white.

+1, exactly my opinion too.

V2 straddled? woke up with KK and only tank calls when prior he was 3betting a req with Q10?

you must have been giving off a huge tell for him to do this?
is there info your leaving out?

I am in the never limp AA camp
if you raised pre , even if he just called you have a range of hands.
as played you have AA, you're thinking they put you on AK is the way you look at it, they see it as what it is ; as if your afraid to open raise AK you would never 3bet that big with it as you left your big boy pants home and showed up wearing a skirt!

No info left out, I'd limped into pots a decent amount of times for it to be weak and when he was deliberating the turn bet he said 'this is why you don't play this hand like this' so pretty sure he was just trying something different/very bad. I don't think anyone puts me on AK. That's why I was asking about the reason for limp raising utg.

My coach has said to never do it.

I have done it consistently for years and it works.

You just have to know the table and the dynamics and KNOW someone will raise.

I would say I limp/RR 75 percent of the time I get AA UTG.

And I see it a ton. And I know what it is when I see it, yet people still will stack off when they can’t bear AA.

For instance:

UTG limps. LP $15 at $1/$2. UTG $52.

Flop 962 rainbow. UTG leads $100. LP $225. UTG allin for $550. LP calls.

LP: ‘I thought he had QQ.’

Yeah, 300 BBs ... QQ.

People don’t limp/RR less than AA except for very, very rare situations.




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One thing I’ve tried, (and this is if the table is more actiony than normal, but doesn’t have to be crazy) is a min raise in early opening position with AA.

It accomplishes the same thing as a “limp” but doesn’t look nearly as nutted (at least based on my experience/results) when you are able to come over the top of a raise.

Anyone ever tried this? Or have any opinion of it vs. limp?
(I know it sounds stupid to us 2+2 players, but I swear it works at my casino)

Grunch: I think your flop sizing cost you substantially. Betting 90 into 240 makes your 260 on the turn a > 1/2 PSB. If you bet flop 160 into 240 it still gets called by KK. Now the pot on the turn is 560 and I think your bet of 260 is way more likely to be called. Then easy shove on any non J river. Need to build a bigger pot for V to stay committed.

I have, especially if I have been running well, raising a lot and am generally in control of the table. Some players can't wait to raise what looks like a weak open, so when you 4!, it is really sexy.

The problem with the limp/reraise line is that it is always AA/KK, and thinking players know it. They can then outplay you or get away from the hand. I've never seen someone limp/reraise with worse. Can we exploit with a limp/rr line? Of course. Do we need to in order to get value with AA? Nope.

I'm not an advocate of the limp/rr line, and that horse has been beaten long past the point of death. But the point bolded above is really important for people on "my side" to remember.

Limp/reraise UTG is almost always AA/KK for sure, but personally I do it with other hands when I want to limp UTG / UTG+1 but there's an aggro thinking player in LP who likes to raise to iso limpers (just like I would in his position).

Yeah, coz we're aiming at KK here? Please think about this and come to your own conclusions as to why we probably don't want to get in 450bb with AA on a J88r4 board...

As for the limp/re-raise, I'm not a fan in general, but it can pay-off big time against the right players (holding the right cards). Still, I find overlimp/rr much sexier actually. At least then you can even fool a lot of thinking players as well.

Actually, a few years ago, overlimp/re-raise was pretty reliably 88-TT. It's much less common now, but still out there.

I'm right there with you as one of the few people around here who believes the l/rr has it's place as a useful play in LLS games. Like anything else it's table dependent, but in some games I use this line with a monster UTG because I truly feel it's the best way to funnel more money into the pot PF. I actually do somewhat balance this play though as in some games I'll l/rr with random hands up front at tables that are too loose-passive to an open but severely over-fold to this line.

Not to make this thread about something it's not, but to the last point you made; I got a V to stick 90bb in PF today with 99 when I l/rr AA when otherwise he would have called my open and most likely folded on what was a terrible flop for his hand. All I'm saying is that I strongly believe this play has more merit in your random 1/2-1/3 than most posters on this forum do. Don't get me wrong, it's not a line I take every session or even my default line when I get a big hand UTG, but I will use it in certain lineups.