Are we limping aces? Kings? AKs?

If we aren’t, we’re going to lack a lot of the strongest hands on a lot of boards. And if we do Have things like two pair edges, it means we also limped a bunch of stuff that makes one pair with a marginal kicker. If people are playing well against your limps by raising them with appropriate hands, then the only thing we can do is try to eliminate weak hands from our range as fast as possible non a lot of boards.

99 is like a top 5% hand full ring.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Of course we are. Why wouldn't we? Of course we're going to protect our limping range. Like when we limp 4bet we don't only have bluffs.

I really have no clue what this means. A ton of my raising range makes one pair with a marginal kicker.

What are the appropriate hands to raise over my limps?

I thought we were capped to only weak hands.

Yeah, I guess I simply do not understand where the line is drawn. At least in live poker, we all do things to appear weak or strong by the way we sit, stand, handle chips, etc. Sometimes we push chips slow or fast to tell the other player a confusing message. We talk to our opponent to see if his voice cracks, or he swallows real hard, or refuses to look at you. We ask the all in guy if he wants a call. I've always thought all that was fair game.

Although Jamie Gold did take it to new levels of annoying and time wasting and IIRC, WSOP did change the rules a bit to limit his sorts of antics.

Don't do this. It is super shady.

Announcing a raise and then taking a few moments to decide the amount is normal. If you can pick up information along the way is just part of the game. I see it frequently.

I assume that you're being discreet about it though.

Apparently I am discreet because no one has ever commented about it until I mentioned it here.

I wear a baseball cap when playing poker and tilt my head so that eye contact is not possible. The other players have no idea what I'm looking at, which is their hands, mouth, and throat.

Good players never tell me anything by this, but occasionally I get a read. As in this hand, V1 indicated he was going to fold. He was a tricky player so I did consider he might be bluff-telling.

Yeah your post is all over the place.

Why are we limping AA? To limp-reraise? If they’re aggressively 3 betting, why don’t we want a situation where we can 4 bet and get more money into the pot?

So instead you want to cap how much money we can make with AA because 99 can somehow be profitable to limp in with but not raise because reasons.

Save your open limping strategies for loose passive games.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

My open limping strategies don't just revolve around pocket aces, a hand we are only dealt once every 221 hands (aka on avg we will be dealt 663 hands for every one time we get AA in EP), and a hand that we should not be open limping anywhere close to 100% of the time.

Unless everyone limps behind, you, as the EP limper controls how big the pot will be preflop (with all holdings, not just the AA you get dealt once every 20+ hours).

OP, it is angle shooting. You did an action in hope of getting a reaction before you had to make a decision (how much should I raise). Guessing by this HH, the people you play with consider you a contributor to the game. Therefore, they decided to not "tap the glass." If you were a big winner, they would be more likely to complain.

Note that includes your friend, the floor and the dealers. More players, more job security.

The thing is that it really doesn't do you any good. Unless you catch their immediate reaction, even weak players know how to put on a poker face after a couple of seconds. So I'd stop doing this and get rid of the hat that is trying to hide your eyes.

This is the one spot where I agree w/ GG and will limp/raise AA/KK/AK/QQ, but only because I will do it wider, too. Again, not every big hand (which as stated are rare anyway), but they don't know what I'm limp/calling with and what I'm limp/raising with. Agree if you don't mix it up it's not very helpful.

You seem angry. I'll not argue the point about angle shooting because I think you and others are right. I come here to learn and I learned something about myself that I don't particularly like, but I think I need to accept it and adjust.

The rest of your post is just angry crap.

I just checked my log and in this room, at 2/5, in 11 sessions and 67 hours of play, I'm making $63.88/hour so far this year. Granted that isn't a long term average, but if you want, I can go back into prior years and give you the numbers which will show a lower but wining hourly rate.

Overall, I'm not a big money maker at 2/5. I've got lots to learn and I've got no room to brag about my great skills and results.

I'll be sure and let Mike Caro know that his book of poker tells "really doesn't do any good." Yeah, instant reactions is exactly what I'm looking for but sometimes delayed reactions as well. Some people wilt under pressure.

As to judging me based on this one hand, or even all the hands I post here, I only post PAHWM that I played poorly or at least are questionable in my mind. I am here to learn and improve, not have my ego stroked.

Agreed. I would limp UTG in this particular game with any hand worthy of opening. I had been there 2 hours and played 5, maybe 6 hands. I sure don't want to open UTG with AA and have everyone fold to the seemingly tightest player at the table.

No one was chopping blinds and only twice, IIRC, did it ever get to a pre-flop SB vs BB contest. A raise was pretty much guaranteed and 3B happened about 25% of the time.

In other games with other players, I'm often the most aggressive and would open UTG with 25s on rare occasion. It just depends on the players at the table, not some one size fits all tactic one reads on the internet.

My table image had to be super tight. I was playing well less than 2 hands per dealer. It's going to be very transparent if all of a sudden I'm Mr. Aggro from UTG.

I swear this isn't meant as an attack, but that sounds like your issue isn't your limping range, it's that your 3 bet range is too tight. And even if just your opens get folded around, open a little lighter.

I disagree with limping KK+. It just seems like this weird exploit to get around scaring everyone out, until everyone limps. And all of a sudden, you are 4+ handed on a 10-9-7r board, and have no idea where you stand when someone milks you for 3 streets of value.

[QUOTE=Nippleman;56962592] that sounds like your issue isn't your limping range, it's that your 3 bet range is too tight. [quote]

fair point. In games with aggro players, I am too tight. It's something I'm working on. Today I played and the table was totally passive. Over the course of 4 hours, I 3B about 12 - 15 times. One guy 3B once. That was all the 3B. It's a much easier game for me when I'm the aggro of the table.

I'm sure I don't have a perfect accounting of that day's action, but I remember 2 chopped blinds and just a few all limped hands. It wasn't a table that I would worry about limps all around.

I have had to fold AA and KK before because I didn't get the raise I was looking for when an aggro table suddenly went passive. I'm not one of those people who think I deserve to win the hand because I started with AA.

I get AA and I assume I'm going to win the blinds or lose the hand

[QUOTE=DEKE01;56963137][QUOTE=Nippleman;56962592] that sounds like your issue isn't your limping range, it's that your 3 bet range is too tight. I like to think of it as getting the money in at the one point in the hand that you know with 100% certainty you have the best hand. It doesn't mean you auto win, just that you got it in perfectly.

Maybe it's just me. Even at tables I would classify as aggro, someone limps with a premium, and no one calls. Everyone gives the guy a weird look, even when they lose. I've seen Aces cracked often, but far more so when the board pairs to dat BB special.

Kudos to you for acknowledging that your announce and wait strategy is angle shooting (reasons already stated.).

Before you get all bent out of shape about your being a winning player, consider this: If almost universally players here consider it to be an angle, and all of us have spent considerable amount of time at the table; what is the likelihood that no-one you have ever met in the rest of the poker world considers it an angle?

Assuming we aren't some aberration of the poker world, clearly many you play with probably feel similarly... so why don't they say so to you? There are likely different reasons for different groups, but Venice's point was not an attack on your skills. Its a reasonable assumption that players want you in the game and have been willing to tolerate your angle shooting in order to keep you in the game. You can answer for yourself better than the rest of us why that might be.

This is Level 2 social thinking

It hasn't been universal here so your premise is questionable.

I asked at the table yesterday of people I play with a lot, all regs. One guy, I think, believed it was a angle but wouldn't come out and say so. I even went so far as to say I'm doing it specifically to get a read. Six out of the seven players said it was just a part of the game and no one had ever heard of a verbal string bet. Two dealers and the floor said no problem. But I am a loser in that game so your theory is potentially applicable there.

It isn't something I do with great frequency. The table where I last did it was the hand of this thread. To the best of my memory, they were all new players to me. If anyone was going to cal me out, it would have been someone there.

I think the reason no one has ever complained is because it's subtle. I'm putting on a show as if I'm really counting my chips. I'm sure you're going to say no one is going to fall for my hollywood crap, but I've been playing poker for 25 years in all sorts of venues, and no one has ever even hinted that it is a problem. That's why I asked here for opinions because I was incredulous. I've been called out for a lot of things, some tilt inducing intentional *******ry, some were things I had no idea I was doing that was offensive.

LOL at the players' not mentioning it being because they want him in the game. It doesn't matter if it's true or not -- if nobody's saying anything it's because most players just don't speak up about things like that unless it's flat out cheating or really slowing down the game. If I thought he was doing either one, I'd mention it whether he was the biggest loser or the biggest winner at the table. If not, I wouldn't mention it regardless.

I can't believe the conversation dropped to this level.

my apologies to the forum. I did not realize that reference to a certain opening was banned.

You did nothing wrong. I totally agree with your limping in this situation. If your stacks were deeper then you could consider raising and calling a 4-bet but agree you need 15-20 times your bet to make this profitable when playing OOP against multiple players. You want weaker hands to be calling.

I agree with your check raise on the flop provided you have high confidence the button will raise and not check behind. Players generally do not check raise enough. This is a great opportunity to do so. I would have bet half the pot. This could easily represent an overpair and does not give away how strong your hand is. This can set up some future check raise bluffs with two overcards in the future.

Betting half to two-thirds pot will deny anyone pot odds from drawing to even an open ended straight draw having only 8 outs needing 5 to one to call correctly. The fop was a rainbow so no combo draws on the flop. Most likely someone will call you with a pair and a gut shot.

On the turn I would have led out with a half-pot bet hoping to get called by a weaker hand, but even if they shove all in after me I am probably pot committed given you are often ahead of their two pair hands and combination draws. And even when your behind you still have ten outs to hit your full house. Also note when they shove with a strong combination draw they never have as many outs to the flush as they think they do. Two of their flush cards pair the board so you in essence have blockers to their flush draw leaving them with only 7 outs and not 9.

Your one mistake was raising too much on the turn which will generally prevent worse hands from calling and you end up winning less money as the worse hands fold but you loose when someone did make the straight.

I wouldn't be too worried about 56 in this situation. They really shouldn't be calling your re-raise with the bottom straight draw. They hit the only card they could hit to make the nuts. If they hit the top end of their straight it could be beat by a better straight and the big blind has called the original bet. The big bling could still call or raise and may have a better draw to the higher straight. In this situation the button should have folded. Obviously he did not but that doesn't make your play a bad one.

You can exploit his weak play in the future. You cannot be that scared to get it in with top set every time the turn completes a straight or flush. His shove on the turn was equally bad. You could have the bigger straight and your never folding a set. so better for him to just call the turn and wait for a blank over card on river then call when you shove the river.

Not sure if you were referring to my post, but I was referring to BlueSpade84's. I can't believe he/she is saying the other players aren't calling you out because you are a losing player in the game. That's ridiculous and an assumption based on zero fact (based on nothing, really). And it's completely unnecessary. That's the low level that bothers me.

No, you're good. Thank you for your valuable input throughout this thread.

I was referring to my own post where I said something the software masked. I was trying to say I was being a jerk but used a banned phrase.

As to Bluespade, his first post in this thread was way off base and I responded with "Thank you internet" and I should have done the same thing again, staying focused on discussion that improves my poker skills, knowledge, and results.

Whoops... i think that you misread my comment Javanewt, and its quite possible I was unclear.

I am NOT saying that Deke is a losing player and that is why they want him in the game.

What I AM saying is that if most of the players here consider taking a long pause to evaluate the rest of the table between announcing raise, and actually making a bet an angle shoot. It is likely that players Deke plays with have thought the same thing.

Since they haven't mentioned it to Deke, there are two possibilities.
1) They don't consider it an angle shoot, and we are just blowing this out of proportion.

2) They consider it an angle shoot and don't want to say it to him for some reason.

In the case of the 2nd reason, I don't know why that is. I only said that Deke would be better able to determine that than I will, since I don't know him, or his player pool. There might be many reasons for this. Deke might be a chill dude they love to chat with and don't want to upset him, they might be scared of confrontation, or any other number of reasons.