Hi everyone,

I got into poker 3 months back and have mostly been playing "fit or fold" poker. I'm trying to improve my game and started studying range betting.
I have two questions when it comes to range advantage and flop textures:

1. At low and med stakes where I play, people raise with almost anything: suited connectors, any two broadway cards, any A-x from any position.
How can I possibly use range advantage in such a situation?
For example, I understand that a flop with high cards connects with the preflop aggressor than the caller. But if someone were to call raises with almost anything outside their range, how could I use range advantage to my benefit?


2. I understand constructing ranges is fairly easier in heads-up scenarios, in multiway pots as the preflop aggressor should I go back to "fit or fold" since range construction is much more complicated?

Apologizes if this has been asked before or is very rudimentary, if the latter I would appreciate some resources online where I can study and find the answers.

I'm in a similar situation at my games. Most of my opponents don't seem to be following any recommended ranges. And raise from any position with random cards. So it makes defining their possible range very tough.

They will call 3 bets with hands like K9 off 69 off etc OOP.

Same for me :|

Those sound like GREAT games, assuming you can make the proper adjustments. If players are over calling when you range cbet flops after you raise pre, then stop doing it (or more accurately do it much less often). Players like you describe are not beaten by dance theoreticalplay. You beat them by playing better starting hands, having an overall equity edge, extracting maximal value when you hit flops, and minimizing your losses when you do not. Also be aware of entitlement tilt; it is frustrating to lose AKs to A3o that should have folded to your PF raise. That does not mean that you will never see an A3X flop that will cost you a fairly large amount of money. Just remember that you WANT that A3o calling, and that you will have large edges on future hands to exploit.

Well said. I agree tighten up and start punishing them when you have top starting hands pre and when you smack flops don't be afraid to over play premium hands. Fish will call with a wide range and look you up with trash.

The other posts in this thread are all pretty decent advice for winning in loose passive lowstakes games against weak players, but I don't think they really answered your question so I'll give something a bit more direct.

If you want to think about range advantage vs weaker players, think about what their "extra" hands are and how they connect with the board. For example, is the player in the big blind the type to call too much trashy Axo, or are they the type to call any two suited, offsuit connectors, etc? If they like Ax too much, on A hi flops you can cbet less and bet turns and rivers larger to apply pressure against a range heavy in weak top pair combos. If they like suited cards and offsuit connectors, most of the combos they add to their range brick on A and K hi boards so it can make sense to play high frequency small bets, but they might have some additional strong hands on middling connected boards so you'll have to be more careful there.

If someone is playing way too wide...well, most hands miss in no limit so it will likely be profitable to cbet often. But a main driver of value against this playertype is just having higher quality top pair type hands and getting paid more than you should when you have KQ and they have K7 on some K hi board. You don't have to reinvent the wheel; money in poker comes from your value hands.

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Regarding multiway play, range construction isn't more complicated per se, but generally speaking you should be more selective when betting anyway. Your bluffs have to make it through multiple players, and your valuebet threshold needs to be higher because each player behind can have some good hands and can fold more of their range against your bet. But if there are situations where you obviously have range and nut advantage, and if you're playing against weak passive opponents who are likely to be cally and not bluffraise you, you can still bet a fair amount in multiway spots.

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I like this. To expand, i feel the primary thing op mentioned is the lag factor, which outweighs the fish factor. One fish added among bunch of lags doesnt change my strategy much. One lag added among a fishy table changes things significantly(the closer lag is to my direct left the more significant this effect). My preflop range is much stronger at a lag table. At fishy tables im quite loose. Passivity allows you to get to the river more often, as do small bets. Free showdowns vs fish is a significant source of ev and the same goes for both loose passive fish and tight passive nitty types.

Lags and tags make you pay to see showdown much more frequently on every street and they tend to bet bigger too. This equates to a significant portion of unrealized(you fold a lot more) showdown ev which causes the profitability of the bottom half of your opening range to drop significantly. Thus a significant portion of my opening range at a fish table is instant fold at tag lag table.