You don't like free dead money?

I don't want to win 4bb's when I have the opportunity to stack someone or make 70-80bb's off some reg who doesn't like folding top pair to me in limped pots.

Lets put some numbers on it. Any fishy routine player limping AT AXs JT etc in mid to late position isnt folding for the raise i suggest from SB. And my raise size would reflect how many callers i want. Preferably one, two max callers. So now we have 2 scenarios, one where we limp and its anyones pot on the flop (and a tiny pot at that) and another where the pot is built slightly, we have initiative, and are in control of how the pot will continue most likely.

Anytime we are pretty sure we have the best hand (and mid PP dont count since that must make set to really counter our initiative) , and we can take over initiative, is a spot to raise "something". I dont see how anyone can make a case for limping other than if they are the type player that just wants to avoid OOP altogether. But this certainly cannot be optimum.

Why not just shove all 4 and collect all that dead money for free? Or do at least 11-13x

level?

Getting LRR is a legitimate concern. I think many of those who advocate jam, jam, jam dont play much live poker. the people you are playing against arent robots and do adjust. That said, if you are an unknown or this is a new strategy for you, you should jam until someone plays back at you...then jam some more until they play back at the re-jam then...slow down. This whole process can take as long as a year or as little as an hour (no joke).

fyp

So you think 1 in 15-20 times you will get a magical setup where A) You dominate their hand B) the magical flop comes out where you can "stack someone" C) they actually call all bets of a sufficient size to get it all in (no scare cards freezing your action on later streets being a component of this as well) D) your hand holds up

Or would you rather just win 4-5BBs a large % time, have an awesome table image (think anti-quiet boring hypernit who likes limped pots) and then stack them sometimes as well when they resist with the same hands you are trying to magically stack? Well , issa not very gud at the math so i dont knoww!!!

lol. with some players this is true. but even the nittiest regs play back sooner or later. an older lady 4 bet me w/ 9To yesterday!

Hiyah! Those damn internet old ladies...

I agree that live regs have evolved considerably, and that "varying your play" has actually become relevant in live poker. However, imo pre-flop exploitation is tough to execute in live games because its full-ring and the stacks are generally deep. I'd go as far as to say that if you don't have position (the seats to the left of the table captain are obv tough to get these days) or a short-stack, pre-flop exploitation is basically spew. Thoughts?

Also, I think working off default pre-flop lines tailored to your image/skill set has some merit. Out of curiosity, what are your defaults (if you have them) for the scenario's posed by OP? I was actually pretty surprised how small you raised from the blinds vs several limpers in the 2 hands with Limon thread, but I imagine you had good/interesting logic (maybe your image is such that you don't need to overpay or something, idk). Thanks.

Can someone explain to me the merits/purpose of "pot sweetners"?

It's one of the few concepts that cross over from limit nicely, but I am in a hurry, so I will allow someone else to expand on this.

instead of asking how to play specific hands, why not look at how you play against specific players given their tendencies to do certain things with certain types of hands. against bad players stick to ABC poker and modify somewhat to maximize against their leaks that they aren't aware of. against better players who recognize that you are decent, vary your lines from what they would expect and plan to win big pots that way since too many OK-to-decent players see you do certain things and expect you to be this or that type of player and therefore expect you to play certain hands in certain ways all of the time. if you are able to adjust from hand to hand, player to player, you can turn good players into fish because they, especially live players, are slow at adjusting. instead of asking "how should I play this hand in this position" etc etc, try to become someone who is constantly thinking, constantly evolving, from hand to hand, player to player.

So it can come 872 and the guy who limp/called TT can stack off to your 2 pair and then be like, "Omg, he raised before the flop... I put him on AK!"

Also because you have one of the most likely hands to crush a flop (not just "hit" a flop), which is necessary in most cases to win a big pot against several players. Therefore, you are raising with the best of it in a sense, provided you don't thin the field too much.

Note: I'm sure this is written 10x better in a book somewhere, but hopefully this helps.

As an example, in my last session this guy limped and called with KK against my sweetener raise with 7-6s. Flop came 4-5-8. guess what happened :-). Hint - someone got busted.

Needless to say this was a good game.