When I'm in a limp fest game it can get quite akward when there are 5 limps and you have a decent, but not great hand like KQ, KJ, AJ, A10., etc.

I heard Bart Hanson say something once like after one limp raise your normal range from that position, but after more limps basically raise your UTG range.

Does that mean, then, we are limping along with these hands that don't do so well multiway?

It seems like flopping top pair with KJ, even on a dry board, doesn't hold many times.

But just folding pre, in position to most limpers, also seems way too tight.

Thoughts?

If your concern with these hands is that they don’t do well multi-way, raising doesn’t solve this problem since everyone will call. Those types of hands to me are raise or fold. Yes, I’d rather fold than limp.

No way in the world I am folding AJo /KQo over a bunch of limpers, maybe to a large raise which looks strong.

It depends on how they will respond. Hands like AJo and KQo do really really bad multiway. If people are going to call even a ridiculously large raise, then you should just fold them. That means you can just wait for a better hand and the table will likely call your large raise size when you have a premium.

If the table will mostly fold and you can get heads up then go for a raise to knock some people out.

They don't play well multiway, but I am find with playing them against junk hands they limp or limp/call with.

Unless I'm mistaken, I believe what Bart said is that he ignores the first limp and opens the same range, but for each additional limper, he basically shifts his opening range to one position earlier. So, if there were two limpers when action gets to us in in the CO, we'd use our LJ opening range.

If you're a player who knows exactly what hands can be opened from every position, perhaps Bart's advice is good. If you're a player who likes to punish the limpers and open the same range, I'd just open bigger. Over-limping with strong hands sucks. You're basically playing Bingo.

Like, if I'm playing 1/3, and the usual open is $15, and there are 5 limpers to me, I'm probably opening $30-$35. We're risking $30-$35 to win $19.

I mean, if we're playing 9 handed, and there are 5 limps in front of you, we're in the CO. I'm not folding or over-limping with KQs or bigger suited aces. If the blinds and limpers want to call with sub-par hands, hoping to out-flop us and play the rest of the hand from OOP, I'm cool with that.

For every four or five hands that go super-multi-way and we have to fold IP post-flop, torching 10bb's, there will be one hand where we win >100bb's.

Remember that the limpers have already declared their hands were only worth 1bb when they limped. Unless someone is planning to back-raise, they shouldn't want to call a 10bb raise, when they'll have to play the rest of the hand from OOP.

You can raise really huge. Then you tend to isolate versus the better hands or the bigger fish. If they are playing marginal hands, then it is better to build the pot with a good hand. You are usually going to have to fold the flop multiway, but so what. Clearly, you also have an advantage in a multiway pot. Clearly it is better to limp behind AJo then fold. It may be better to raise, but you will often have the limper dominated when you make either pair.

Sure I would rather have pps or suited aces multiway, preferably, like AQs, AJs, 88-TT, which also have high card value. Of course even better to have JJ+/AK. However, it isn't optimal to just play a small percentage of your hands.

Imo, the wider Vs are willing to call (based on a variety of factors including number of limpers, the particulars of the limper, etc), the larger your preflop bet size should be to capitalize on this error. Youre basically looking for exactly 1 caller. In turn, your bet size (as well as position of course) should be the 2 biggest factors in setting your range.

For an extreme and unrealistic example, If a guy at the table would call a raise with 100% of his range no matter the size, id be ship or fold, which would make my range quite tight especially if i were UTG.

I believe HOC (likely considered outdated nowadays) also way tightened up his raising range after lottsa limpers, to something quite tight like TT+/AKo/AQs+. Obviously Harrington was a nit, but so am I, and lately I've been far less enthusiastic about attempting to "attack" lottsa limpers with these dicey hands, especially against those who passively limp dominating hands (or idiots like me who are overlimping monsters). Putting in a huge raise (especially on a shortish stack) in these conditions just to go after a few bbs doesn't seem like good risk / reward to me (i.e. the times we steal some small pots, by blowing out dominated hands at that, might not make up for the times we own ourselves against dominating hands).

I also don't understand the fold or raise mentality either. If we're in LP and are semi-competent postflop, it is hardly a mistake to overlimp almost ~ATC (and these hands are better than ~ATC). So I just join the limp party and my skillz and positional advantage should do just fine in a high SPR pot.

GcluelessoverlimpingnoobG

You're range should stay the same for the most part, but with more limpers, you just adjust your bet sizing. If people are still limp/calling big raises, then you would just have to adjust to that game type and tighten up your range. I would never limp with hands that don't play multiway just because I don't wanna raise with them. I would just fold them.

What type of limpfest? If you have a game where people play tight and will treat AJs in early position as a "pull" hand (to encourage action from dominated hands like KJ) then Bart may be correct.
In those cases, I might limp along and play cautiously with one pair postflop. I.e. if you bet J72r and are called, probably check the turn.
On the other hand, if it's a limpfest bc people play any two cards then you can raise more and bet top pair for value 2-3 streets. Since AQ is generally raised by most players, AJ/KQ is the line where raising seems unambiguously good against limpers

GG, I just want to point out here that this mentality that you advance in the last paragraph doesn’t square with your previously stated aversion to playing deep. If you make the stacks 3 times deeper and you raise to 3 big blinds instead of limping, you mathematically have exactly the same skill and positional advantage. But I believe you don’t do this, right?

Yeah, that contradiction may be somewhat correct. I could attempt to argue that there are differences playing in an SPR 20 pot with $200 stacks vs playing in a 20 SPR pot with $1000 stacks at the same blind level (I do think they play different). And even pure nutmining we're probably still better off keeping the pot smaller due to uncapped potential ceiling (i.e. no need to juice if someone may still get in stacks postflop versus nuts). But it may be that I just don't have quite the same amount of confidence in my decision making playing for $$$$ vs $. Overall, I'm happy keeping the $ amount small preflop with marginal hands and playing postflop in position for moderate $$.

Gclueless$vs$$$$noobG