Let's Talk Pre-Flop Play

There's not really any kind of recent thread talking about this. So um, start talking about this so I can add something to the digest. I'm going to hit some high points here and you guys can flesh out more if you want.

For open-raising ranges for completely total freaking newbies against all unknowns, I tend to suggest something like:

UTG: AQ+, 88+
UTG+1: Add AJs, KQs
MP1: Add AJo, KQo
MP2: Add ATs, QJs, JTs
HJ: Add KJs, KTs, QTs, 77-22
CO: Add T9s-65s, A2s-A9s, all other broadways
BU: Add J9s-64s, Ax, Any two suited 7+, T9o-98o
SB: Same as CO range

And I would suggest to open 4x from all positions but CO/BU, where you should open 3x instead. That's sort of being pulled out of this here ass of mine, and there are plenty of other fine strategies, but that is fairly easy to remember and can get someone started. Also, I'm referring as two cards Ten or higher as a broadway. For 6-max games, just drop the first three seats.

Late position opening ranges will tend to depend more on the remaining opponents than the early position opening ranges, and there are a whole lot of ideas that go into this. I have a really old set of blind steal posts at http://www.flopturnriver.com/pokerfo...-a-152792.html and http://www.flopturnriver.com/pokerfo...se-173291.html that are both in the BC digest.

The only thing that has really changed much is that a 4x opening raise is less fashionable as a standard opening size. There are a number of reasons for this, but in general a lot of it has to do with the 3/4/5-betting game and how larger open-raising sizes make it harder to deal with people who are 3-betting you a lot. There's a kind of old post that's still pretty good about the 3/4/5-betting game at http://www.flopturnriver.com/pokerfo...he-163171.html and I'm recommending it because it's good, not because I'm mentioned in the first sentence, I swear. The other reason a smaller opening raise size is great is because it makes your opens +EV as shit just from how often the blinds fold.

When some people limp and it's folded to you, you can raise or limp behind. I talked about this some in http://www.flopturnriver.com/pokerfo...rs-152850.html and though some of the examples might be a little off, the general ideas still hold. You want to limp behind with hands that play well multiway, isolate single limpers more when they are bad players or easy to exploit (eg: fold to c-bet a bazillion percent of the time, or limp/fold a lot etc).

Speaking of open limping, don't ever fucking do it. Okay that's not entirely true, but if you're having to ask when to open limp, you shouldn't be doing it yet. There is nothing inherently bad about open limping in poker. For example, in many games, like limit Omaha 8 or better or stud games, it's better to open limp in a lot of spots than to open raise. In aggressive no-limit hold'em games, it's generally a bad idea. That's why live it can be fine since live games tend to be more passive.

If someone limps, you raise, and they re-raise, a lot of the time they've got you smoked. At micros especially, most people do not balance their limp/raising range at all, so folding hands as strong as AQ is often going to be a no-brainer. Going into small stakes, some people are balancing that range now, or even having it completely unbalanced in terms of it being exceptionally weak (ie: rarely or never having strong hands) because people show that line so much respect. It's a natural adjustment for them to make, and a good one if they are right about the level you're thinking on.

Cold calling pre-flop in position is the nuts and so many people just do it with something like JJ-22 that it's ridiculous. I've seen it said over and over, especially in the BC, that players shouldn't call raises with suited-connectors "until they learn how to play better" or some bullshit line like that. In reality, you should be folding something like 22-55 against decent players more often. There are no hard and fast rules for this, but if you're 100bb deep at microstakes against a 3x MP open from some sort of tagg, and the blinds are unknown, I would suggest calling on the button with something at least as wide as 22-JJ and 87s-KQs or AKs, maybe dumping 22-55 or so and adding some J9s-86s type stuff. If it was a CO open instead, I have to recommend calling with all that shit plus some suited broadways and KQ and A2s-A9s kind of stuff. For fuck's sake do not 3-bet bluff with A2s-AJs in this spot, there is so much value in calling I will find you and shit in your bed or something.

Random tidbit. If there's some idiot drooler in the blinds playing tons of hands and donating left and right, open up your MP ranges like you were a seat ahead of the seat you're actually in (or more) as long as there's not someone 3-betting the shit out of you behind you. This works kind of like isolating limpers that are bad players. You make tons of money by playing pots with shitty players when you're in position.

Okay, you guys' turn.

I don't know if you left this out on purpose:

The amount your opponent has behind is extremely important to your opening standards and opening hands. Spoon suggests that cold calling preflop in position is the nuts, but he doesn't suggest that if the cold call is with 66 for 1/2 of the effective stack, you're losing money. But if you're cold calling with 66 for 1/15th of the effective stack, You're in a good position to make the mahnies.

Same goes for calling suited connectors. I've seen Supersystem suggesting that you could risk 10% of your stack with suited connectors. I've been corrected and told that 5% is about as high as you should be willing to go HU. That thresh-hold can rise as more players enter the pot (Ie Pre-flop raiser, and 2 cold callers with you on the button with 78s), you can risk a tad more than that just because of the sheer amount of money in the pot already. (7% ish? gleamed from the same area my ass happens to be)

The effective stack is the smallest stack involved when placing 2 players in a vacuum.

So if you have 100bb and your opponent has 50bb, the effective stacks are 50bb
Same Scenario with another opponent having 200bb. When you compare him and yourself the effective stack is 100bb.

The most important "opening hand chart" concept to learn is the fact that the value of a NL starting hand is how much value it extracts from your opponent. In fact: Comparing whether a hand is better or worse than another one is worse than worthless. Just because AA beats 22 80% of the time the 20% of the time you do win, if you extract maximum value from your opponent, you can completely justify the speculation. Suited connectivity extracts more value long term, but also struggles to hit as often. Large pairs are front loaded in their value, as they tend to get a lot of money early, but as the board grows more dangerous and complicated, their ability to extract value, or in fact be valuable in themselves is less and less.

there's a thread floating around here somewhere where someone did a shit ton of work with flopzilla about cold calling w suited connectors IP and basically they said unless you've got a very solid post flop game it's only worth it against the taggiest of tags

Originally Posted by JoeHaw

there's a thread floating around here somewhere where someone did a shit ton of work with flopzilla about cold calling w suited connectors IP and basically they said unless you've got a very solid post flop game it's only worth it against the taggiest of tags

What do u mean by taggiest of tags? wouldn't it be better to play back by cold calling wider ranges ip vs wider ranges given we have more fold equity postflop? obv i understand cold calling being bad if we're relying on implied odds, which isn't really what we're getting at by calling sc's ip vs tags anyway?

Originally Posted by JoeHaw

there's a thread floating around here somewhere where someone did a shit ton of work with flopzilla about cold calling w suited connectors IP and basically they said unless you've got a very solid post flop game it's only worth it against the taggiest of tags

Step 1: Call pre with SCs
Step 2: Flop equity
Step 3: Make life hell on your opponents with semibluffs and floats and shit

Standard Open Sizing

Your standard preflop open should depend on many things, not just a robotic 4x. You must take in to account your position, who's behind, their stack sizes, and your cards, obv. If you know the villain well enough to manipulate his calling range, or know he'll call you regardless of what you raise, then take that in to account as well.

If hero is on the BU with KK and there's a fish in the BB who will call a min-raise with 90% of your steal attempts, but will also call 8x with say 60% of his range, which should you do?

If hero is the CO with 98s and the blinds both have 50bb stacks, what should be the standard raise size? Should you even open here? Think about it.

Against unknowns with 100bb effective stacks, standard open sizing could be something like this: EP - 4x, MP - 3.5x, CO - 3x, BU - 2.5x, all regardless of what cards hero is holding. I don't ALWAYS follow this but it's a good starting point and it's good to think of 'why' these open raise sizes make sense.

Remember, the old 4x standard made it easier to bet pot, bet pot, shove. It's not 2003 anymore however, and the games are a lot tougher and more aggressive, which not only requires us to play even more positionally aware, but vary our rise sizes to adapt to the tagg-filled games of today. Opening less than 4x also provides more wiggle room to play post-flop.

Also, while I'm thinking about it, there's a thread from AOK and his god-awful 19-hand strategy. Not sure if that's still around, but someone should nuke that thing already.

ty spoonit. after yesterday IRC i took the openings you said. had a 2nl 2k hands session with 17$ profit this opening range combined with position and some reads on opps is great

Originally Posted by Imthenewfish

What do u mean by taggiest of tags? wouldn't it be better to play back by cold calling wider ranges ip vs wider ranges given we have more fold equity postflop? obv i understand cold calling being bad if we're relying on implied odds, which isn't really what we're getting at by calling sc's ip vs tags anyway?

ah thanks for that. yeah i think the thread was more dealing about how they aren't worth calling with for implied odds, but calling against wider opening ranges for FE makes sense to me

My addition:
there are three main advantages you can have in poker - these are skill, position, and card. AA is better than 72o, it's nice to be last to act on the flop, and it's nice to play against people who don't know what a flush is. Thing is, that people over-estimate skill advantage all the time, and over-value shit like T8s thinking that it has some innate card advantage. Think about these 3 factors every time you put money in pre. Doing this plus following one of the suggested preflop range things will result in you playing more pots with positional and card advantage.

Now for a few comments on spoon's stuff - which is gold!

I'd go with even nittier preflop ranges for absolute beginners to at least give them a good chance at 2/3 of card/positional/skill advantage. (Aokrongly 19 hands anyone?)

UTG AQs/KQs/AK/99+
UTG+1 add 88, AQo
MP1 add AJs
MP2 add KQo/77
HJ add AT+/KJs/QJs/22-66
CO add Axs, 67s-TJs, 79s-9Js
BU add Ax, JT
SB = Cutoff

re bet-sizing - i play FTP which has bet-pot button, so I'm all for opening 3.5x from EP-HJ, 3x from CO, 2.5x from BU, 3x from SB.

To adjust these ranges for 6-max I WOULD NOT just drop the first 3 positions, I think a beginner is better instead opening the FR UTG range from UTG, the MP1 range from UTG+1, the HJ range from CO and the BU range from button.

Completely agree with your comments on isolating bad players. HOwever, new players tend to a) limp behind too often, and b) iso too often when they first encounter the concept, but before they understand it. Isolating limpers should be introduced into a game gradually

Re open limping - yep, don't do it unless you could explain your reasoning to spoon and expect him to think your reasoning was solid. There. Easy. Get in IRC and give this a go. Every time you open limp. Good luck. Don't do it often at all.

Cold calling preflop in position is cool, but it's easy to do way too often and have no plan whatsoever for what/why you are doing it. Figure that out BEFORE just calling atc that are sorta suited (e.g. both red) or connected (e.g. 8J) or whatever.

Whenever I get a borderline hand like QJo in MP2 - I briefly check the blinds for droolers. If droolers=true, I check LP for habitual 3-betters. If LP_gaylords=false and blind_droolers=true I'll open my PF opening range quite a bit. You can do this in under 1 sec and it's really worth doing imo.

Originally Posted by oskar

Whenever I get a borderline hand like QJo in MP2 - I briefly check the blinds for droolers. If droolers=true, I check LP for habitual 3-betters. If LP_gaylords=false and blind_droolers=true I'll open my PF opening range quite a bit. You can do this in under 1 sec and it's really worth doing imo.

Yes. If you're someone who isn't thinking this way, start. Now.

And just cos I see it right now:

There's a 80/30 on one of my tables who pots every street of every hand until his stack is in the middle. There's a 12/10 directly to his left who's playing 2 tables. Don't be that guy.
And playing more tables wouldn't be an excuse either.