L/F is nothing like C/F because the former costs you money. Even if you "only" do it three times per hour, you're killing your hourly rate.

Think about it: if you (over) limp, then fold when you don't slam the flop (never mind the times you get raised out) you are making the same mistake as the weak-tight limpers, even though you think you are doing it for a different reason.

In small stakes no limit games, limping is a terrible idea most of the time.

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When I started playing live, I played at crazy tables where all you could do was wait for a hand and punish. Eventually, I started encountering tables where sanity ruled, but te players were still or very good. This required development of different skills. There are a few prerequisites to manhandling a tight table.

1. The realization that your cards don't matter. Another way to put it is having some balls. If your opponents are only playing their cards, and only playing good ones, then you have a huge advantage if you have the ability to exploit them without the benefit of pretty starting hands. When I started out I was so uncomfortable playing post flop without a premium starting hand. It took a while for me to feel good about no having much on the flop. This just takes time. You must be comfortable with the stakes as well. You cannot tighten up when the pot gets bigger.

2. Understanding position. Once you get into beast mode, you have to be able to temper it intelligently based on position. Go nuts in LP. Be LAG in mp. Be conservator in LP. Your opponents usually won't notice but they'll be so frustrated that they can't seem to outfox you.

3. Recognition when someone decides to take a stand. Eventually, someone will get sick of you winning almost every pot. They'll start by calling more preflop. They'll fold the flop a lot. That's fine. Then they'll get braver and call a flop. A double barrel in the right spot will yield even more money. Generally, that's about the time someone or everyone will get pissed and your job is done. Be vigilant for the breaki point when the table dynamic has changed and its time to tone it down.

This is lower variance and less profitable than a loose table. It is easier and lower variance. I shan't have a favorite. I just like winning money.

Sorry, this just makes no sense. If you have a value hand, you should raise 100% of the time.

Reasons to raise:
* Fold out limpers (Yay dead money!)
* Build a pot for times you hit
* Sieze inititiative to possibly steal the pot for times you miss

There exist table conditions where limping with about 30-35% of hands with the intention of folding many of those hands to a raise (unless it is small) is the correct preflop strategy.

I know several players who I exploit heavily because they act as if they are offended by the idea of a multi-way limped pot and are excessively predictable in raising in LP after several limpers.

Maybe. Maybe. But not under the conditions posited by the original message : weak, tight, limpers who fold too much and are not deep stacked. Under those conditions, if I decide to enter a pot, I'm raising until conditions change, such as someone adjusting and playing back at me. Until then, raise!

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Actually, this is a good point -- there aren't that many games in which limping in can be profitable, and you need to have balls and good handreading skills to pull it off, because you need to know when you will be able to steal the pot, and when you will be able to extract value from a marginal hand. Most people can't do it, but if you can, and you will be able to generate an average of {% of open raises behind you/bb} EV postflop, then limping will be profitable.

It's kind of an advanced, ******edly exploitative, and also ******edly exploitable line. You don't really have to do it, and in a lot of lineups it's a bad idea to do. But it's not unprofitable all of the time.

But what happens when you will never isolate the action (except against hands that beat you), you won't win without showdown much, and you have a hand that beats your villain's postflop continuing range after they VPIP, but will not beat their range after a raise?

The pot-building argument is especially silly. In general, when you bet into an unopened pot, or raise, you're betting into a dry side pot, so you're laying yourself 1:1 to win the hand. If you will not win the hand greater than half the time, then "building a pot" costs you EV, because you're putting extra money in while behind.

In general, when PE+FE > 50%, you should put in the maximum amount of money wherein that continues to be true. If PE+FE < 50%, however, you should put in the minimum amount of money. Which means folding, if you can't make up your investment in future EV, but if you can, by all means you can call.

An ideal table for limping in a lot is a loose-passive table with a lot of multi-way limped pots where people play poorly after the flop. Raising too often lets them get away from their poor post-flop play.

Damn this is a great thread! I hope this is the strategy advice that helps take my game to the next level as I was previously just focused on ways of stacking people. Got to have multiple gears as many pros say.

I prefer a preflop raise instead of limping because it gives me a chance to win a few bets uncontested, or at least get dead money in the pot to take away on the flop. Why have 5 people see a flop when you can narrow it down and get dead money in the pot, too?

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I personally love these sorts of tables. Here's how I adjust to them:

If folks aren't calling for 5bb+x, We lower it to 4bb+x.

We need to be more loose and aggressive, but just remember that good lags open up in position. our LP range should change a lot but our EP range shouldn't change much if at all.

Always cbet except for really bad boards like T97, etc. This will print money.

The first time we get called or raised, do not assume they are playing back at us. It's more correct to assume they simply hit a hand against us.

If this happens a second time, make a note of it. If a player does this three times, he's probably playing back and we need to re adjust.

Keep in mind that if we cbet and snap fold to a raise other players will notice.

Don't triple barrel these guys with air. Again, if they are calling, they have something. Barreling scare cards is okay but do it against friendly guys, not the ones who give you an angry stare as they fold to cbets.

Be willing to check back TPGK on the turn for deception, pot control, and so we don't value own ourselves.

If these folks will fold to a 3/4th pot bet when on a draw but will call a half pot bet, we should be making half pot bets instead.

You may get a "stacking" opportunity every few hours, but scooping weak tight money opportunities happens several times a round.

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I don't like a preflop raise when the money that can be won after the flop is significantly greater than the money that can be won immediately with a raise. I also don't like raising light pf when there are short stacks who will make it awkward if they shove over top of me.

I don't hate playing a lot of muti-way pots. I may even prefer that to playing most pots heads up. Not that I can't play heads up, but I find multi-way pots to be more interesting.

Seriously folks, if we can win a preflop call or two with a cbet every orbit, we are making 15-30bbs an hour. These tables can be absurdly profitable, almost as profitable as maniac tables but with much lower risk.

If you're in a spot where you aren't likely to get more than two streets of value, you should be willing to check back TPGK on the flop because it may open up their calling ranges on the turn and river.

It's really important to get in their heads and figure out what they think a bluff looks like.

I think this is generally more true in dry flops. In draw-heavy flops, betting flop and turn can get calls from drawing hands, and light calls from made hands that think you are drawing.

Here's a great hand from this exact sort of game from yesterday.

V is a chronic limp folder nit. His PFR range is exactly AQ+, JJ+.

UTG, V raises to 15$! Folds to me on BTN with 57s. I call.

Flops: K84r V bets 15$. I call with my gutshot.

Turn: 7. V checks to me!! I check back to keep the pot smallish.
River: 2. V looks very upset and slowly counts out 25$ and sheepishly bets.

I pause for a second and call knowing with almost no doubt my pair is good. He doesn't want to show his hand. I say, c'mon, you bet! He tables AQs for nothing. I table the 57 for 'just a pair of sevens'. The table erupts!! Another Nit/TAG exclaims, "How did you call him, that's crazy!" Solid player next to me says, "no, that was poker. Just good poker." No one heard him, they still thought I was some kind of psychic poker wizard for making the call.

I know this is an anecdote, but our LSNL villains are not thinking like us, they have no post flop skills. A PSB on the flop or a double barrel and I'm WAY gone from that hand, but even still, his meta game image is so bad we may still make the play.

This is an awesome thread. Get out there and print money from these flop or fold players.

:grunch:

Based on the length of this thread I hope there's some good discussion to read.

What a dream table. Raise in LP with a wide range and take down their limps. C-bet at a high frequency and take down their scared money.

You don't need to cooler someone, or get hands at all. Winning 4bb/hand when everyone folds 3-4 times an orbit is printing money. The trick is to know when to give up facing resistance. Hand reading helps here.

If the table adjusts and starts calling wider and otherwise loosening up, you need to shift gears and tighten a bit.

Your philosophy is right as far as it goes; the problem is that at weak-tight tables, where most of your money comes from betting until your opponents fold, trying to bet 4 opponents off their hands when you flop something like third pair or a gutter is going to be a lot harder than it would be against one or two.

That goes double when most of them are short-stacked ... because they'll call two streets with their TPTK and then, oops!, they're all out of chips, and you won't be able to challenge their testicular fortitude with the 100BB river shove that you know they'll rarely call.

Finally, I don't find it awkward at all when a weak-tightie 3-bet shoves over me, short stack or no, because 98% of the time he has me crushed. After all, you're talking about a genre of players who will often flat your PFRs with hands up to and including KK "because I want to see if an Ace flops before I get too invested". Oh, a reraise? Okay, you take this one, NH sir, let's move on to the next deal.

I personally find it annoying when I get a 3bet shove by a weak-tight player who might be in "can't take it any more mode", but might not be, and I am getting something like 2.5:1 odds with a hand like JTo or A6s.

Do you have any problem with the idea that you should preflop raise light less often when there are short stacks in the 20-25bb range vs when the shortest stacks are more in the 30-35bb range?

When you flop third pair or a gutshot against these players, sometimes your goal is to take advantage of when they give you a free or cheap look at the next street of betting.

I'm not married to a romantic notion that poker is all about being able to put your opponent to the test with a big bet. Getting people to call my value bets is probably more important to me than getting people to fold to my bluffs.

Great thread. Read the entire thing and had these thoughts.

1. Trap hands go WAY down in value at a table like this. If they are only going to take a stand with good hands that hit the flop, then broadway hands and bad aces have huge reverse implied odds. You can hit TP "good" kicker and be outkicked if the nit plays all the way to river (or gets all-in before that). If you hit TP "good" kicker and they miss, they are likely folding. That's a recipe for winning small pots and losing big ones.

2. Position becomes vitally important. It's always important, but even more so when your cards don't matter. In this environment, your range in position is almost irrelevant. You aren't trying to hit something and win at showdown, you're hoping to win by raising pre-flop and cbetting.

3. Someone asked how you stack someone in this environment. Most of the time I see the nit get stacked in this type of game, it's because they either have overs or TPTK and run into a hand they never saw coming. Your wide range in late position gives you those opportunities. For example, you're on the button and three players limp, you raise with 9-2 and all three call. Flop comes K92, one of the limpers bets, your raise and he shoves. You call and he tables AK. He can't believe that you raised with 9-2 and leaves with steam coming out of his ears.

4. This game is all about looking for the best "spots." There are so many good opportunities to win money that you can afford to fold some of the marginal spots without hurting your win rate.

Hopefully these comments add to the discussion because there are so many games that go through a phase like this at some point, even if it's not for the entire session. Making these adjustments, even for just one down, should add to our win rates.

I've found that if he's going to get stacked with AK there, he's often going to get stacked if you just limp on the button with 92 instead of raising.

Meh. The whole "straddle makes teh stacks half as deep" argument doesn't matter here. These guys are thinking in terms of dollar amounts. So your $20 bet on the flop is the same to them regardless of if it's straddled or not.

Fine.

But raising pre might get him to fold K9. Which is good regardless of the flop we might have seen.

Limping trash in LP is a huge leak.

(Limping speculative hands in EP might be OK, but is a different discussion.)

Sure, if you know the flop is going to come K-9-2, then limping and raising both have roughly the same end result. But when the flop comes J-7-4 and everyone checks to you and folds to your c-bet, you win more by raising 9-2 than by limping 9-2. And most of the time in this type of game everyone is going to miss (or at least not flop strong enough to continue) and fold to your cbet.

If you limp 9-2 in late position, you are no better than the weak/tight fit-or-fold nits that you're playing against.

If you're limping trash in LP you're not really beating your opponents who are doing the same thing. In that instance, you'd be beating them by folding. The only exception would be if they will make mistakes by calling and them just folding missed flops. Then the most profitable play is to raise the trash.

If you're limping trashy spec hands on the button, the only way you can beaat your opponents is by outplaying them postflop, which OK maybe you can do, but you'll make even more if you outplay them preflop too by either folding or raising based on the specifics of the hand.

By definition if you're making money on a hand by playing it you don't make more money by folding. You make money by folding a hand when you're losing money by playing it.