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Hi guys,
I've been reading through professional NLH and just got through this chapter on target SPRs and manipulating SPRs.
Before reading the book, and just going through the forums and reading other online guides, I've always been told to raise 4x(3.5x) + 1bb for every limper.
I just want to get everyone else's take on this, is the fixed way the way to go, or work on those SPR's???
Also to add on to this,
According to the SPR chart, with effective stack sizes of 100BB. Playing heads up against 1 player, so raising to 3BB or 4BB, or even 5BB. Yields a SPR of {13.9, 11.3, 9.0 } And if your raising with a TPTK hitting kind of hand like AK, AQ, QK, thats the worse range of SPR's you should play at.
So not only are the fixed raise sizes and SPR concepts different, they are exactly opposite when working with an effective stack around 100BB.
Do whatever you can get away with. Pick up Small Stakes No-Limit Hold'em (make sure it's the no-limit book, not the fixed-limit book by the title "Small Stakes Hold'em") and one of the first things they talk about is that target SPRs aren't the primary thing that should dictate pre-flop play.
It seems like varing your betting size would be a bad idea. They can say hey he bet 5xbb this time so he must have a big pair
littlegeorge - if that's the way they're thinking, then I encourage you to try opening some trash for 5x every now and then, hope someone nutmines against you and then steal on the flop.
spoiler alert: it won't work.
But the idea isn't to vary your bet sizing based on hand strengh anyway.
I open for anything between 2x and 6x based on position, stack sizes and how much I think they will call and what my range is - There is a merit to opening for 10x or even more in microstakes and live games at times. I think my biggest opening raise ever was to 15bb in a live 100NL game.
I think preflop bet sizing tells are way overrated. It's not something that people remember. They might see you open for 8x and think "What is he on about?" but they won't remember how much you opened for last time. How many times have you actually gone back after a hand went to showdown, checked how much they raised preflop, and then took a note on that? Right, they don't do it either. Plus even if they knew what your range was, they would probably play badly against it anyway.
Obviously it makes sense to open smaller when playing against shortstacks, especially if you're planning on isolating and stealing a bit, because otherwise they can just shovel a reasonable range and pwn you. I don't feel like explaining that... just think about it, you'll figure it out. Likewise it can be a mistake to open too small deep stacked, especially when your range is strong.
When there are limpers or one raiser and a couple of callers it can get tricky. Against bad players it can be right to make a raise that is even smaller than 2x + 1 if you want to build a pot in position and keep hands that you dominate in the pot.
and so on.
Just try to think about it logically.