Hi everyone,

This is a pretty general question and a broad topic so I am not sure what kind of responses I am going to get but here it goes....

Over the past year I've been playing in a lot of private/online homegame tournaments on Pokerstars. The games are generally much more soft/gambly than modern internet poker on major sites, and players defend their blinds extremely wide and also just flat opens extremely wide from a variety of positions. Many of the players are regulars, and despite not being able to use HUDs (playmoney .net site) I have extensive notes on most of the players and I'd say that my success has come from 90-95% exploitative play. It really seems like a lot of GTO ish principals just do not apply. These folks are not even following basic push/fold, raise/fold chart type strategy.

So my question is.....I am correct in opening value hands larger (as I might in a loose cash game). Using 3x, and even 4x sizing in opening value hands or even my entire range?

An example in practice from the other day - I open AQss to 5x after a couple of limpers and I got it in vs. A3ss on a A105 board (Maybe extreme example) but this kind of thing his happening fairly regularly.

Am I thinking about this the right way? Please discuss.

P

Opening 5x after two people limp is not a large opening. It is standard for me (I would open to 5.5x in position after 2 limpers).

The real question is with no limpers opening to 3x to 4x.

The reason I stopped doing that in tournaments at casinos is that I tend to lose my range advantage when called. Especially difficult when caller is in position.

Though early in tourneys when everybody is deep stacked I do tend to open 3x. People still call wide at that point.

But if in your game players are calling wide vs 3x and 4x at all stages I guess it could work. I just prefer to use postflop play advantage in more hands to reduce variance.

If people are calling a lot early in the tournament, it is OK to open 3x or 4x.

I don't mind varying sizing, but I would be careful with varying based on hand strength. It is a huge tell, and so many donks follow it stereotypically at lower stakes. I will often flat call a raise with or fold AQ-AK, 99-QQ based on sizing tells.

Your Preflop sizing choice doesn’t matter as much as making sure you are playing the right % of hands in your range for the sizing you choose

I personally think (especially in live game) Ppl play a lot worse vs the 2.5x than vs the 4x
I also notice ppl playing the 4x strategy really badly.

Because the people up with the approaches from the last 15 years use smaller sizing and the people opening 4x are usually donks.

No it’s more so that I wanna use a sizing that lets me play a
Higher vpip % and people will just call a lot of dumb hands and play bad of even though it leads to a lot of multi way hands (which is fine imo)
Also I see people using the 4-5x strategy and playing way to loose with it (you’re supposed to play pretty tight using 4x

Using bigger open sizing is not a different strategy at all (maybe in some spots, it might be a tactic, but not a strategy). It just increases the variance, so in general you never need that. If you have an edge - you do not want higher variance, if you don't, you are just getting destroyed quicker with 3x and 4x RFI.

This is tournaments we are talking about. If you don't have an edge, ramping up the variance is good. As you get bigger, you approach "Kill Phil" principles.

If players are playing a lot looser, then yes, increase you preflop raise size. If you have AA and you think the players will call a 10x preflop raise, go for it. I think adjusting raise sizes depending on your opponents is a strategy to be aware of.

In your example, if you already have limpers, you should raise big and then add an extra 1BB for each limper. Eg., you have 3 limpers and it's to you on the button, raise it to at least 5BB.

I don't think that is good if some of the players are decent. If you make it 10xBB and it is obvious that is 99+/AQ and probably the higher end of it, anyone who knows what they are doing will fold all but big hands, or they can overcall multiway with a pp and try to get the max from you if they hit. There has been a reaction to raise small and always keep your sizes the same, which I don't think that is always needed. However, deception is a big part of the game, and you don't want to be close to face up, even against mostly bad players.

Nothing wrong with 10x if we are deep at the beginning of a tourney and theres a massive whale at the tbl who calls 100% of the time

Yeh, but you may want to get action from someone other than the whale. Also people can call multiway with pps and maybe decent suited cards. If they know you have 99+/AQ+ or maybe specifically QQ+ or KK+ and can maybe narrow it down further based on how play postflop, then they can play speculative hands profitably. Then they can win a huge pot from you when your overpair or TPTK is no good. If it is obvious you have a mid to high pp or big ace, then they can bluff you on boards really bad for that range.

I don't mind raising big or varying sizing, but you want to have a mixture of different types of hands in your range for that sizing.

Wat? I don’t even know where to start

If you 10x , you should do it with your entire opening range, obv in tourneys rarely are we ever deep enough and/ or have someone bad enough at the table to justify this sizing. This spot happens a lot more in deep cash where the action is centered around one whale.

Sounds like a $10/25 NL live cash game or something. In tournaments, there is a limit to what one player can lose and the dynamics are totally different for various reasons. In live cash, 10xBB opens used to be common in live $1/2, and 5xBB open can still be standard at some mid stakes games.