About to move up and need advice. .05 to .10

Hi all, this may be long, my apologies in advance.

I've been playing .05 NLHE on Bovada, and was originally being slowly bled by this level. If I played nit, I'd get bluffed out by players who didn't know that going all in on the river with middle pair on a board with two over cards is a bluff. But try and push them off a hand, and you crash and burn. Wait for the nuts and you just break even or lose small over time.

But my last few sessions have been getting be a good 1-3 buy-ins consistently, with not a lot of variance by using some rules that I adopted for this level that I know would get me killed at higher levels.

I'll list them out below. Can anyone tell me what changes I should make for .10 at Bovada? (that's Bovada's second micro level)

1). Limp from early position with A-8 to A-J. Fold to a raise. If your ace holds up this way, then you know you have the highest ace. An opening raise could be called by a slightly higher kicker. Limp from middle position with A-7 to A-2 for the same reason.

2). Limit c-betting. These crazy players will call with anything.

3) Limp with pocket pairs in the 22-88 range. Only call a bet if there is at least one other caller and few left to act. Fit or quit. Call a raise (but not a reraise) with 99-JJ.

4). Open raise/reraise with QQ-AA, AQ, or AK, but try not to get it all-in preflop unless it's KK or AA.

5). Open limp/limp with suited connectors and one-gappers. Only call a raise with these if there are already 3 other people in at this level without a reraise. Fold/shut down unless you hit a draw, but they will often give you good chasing odds if you do have something to work with.

6) Be fearless with TPTK or better post flop, but use bet sizing and pot control to adjust for the strength of the hand. I've had several hands where I had trips on a flush draw board and an all-in from a villain, and discovered he had unmatched pocket 10's or worse when I called.

7). Fold EVERYTHING else pre-flop, excapt KQ. Any only open raise that. You can't play LAG against a table full of maniac calling stations.

8). Beware of middle pairs. These players play anything, and will madden you with their K-2 when the K hits if you play for thin value.

Any advice for $10 NMHE would be appreciated.

Start reading and stop asking. We have a huge sticky at the top of the forum that has every answer you could possibly stand to absorb. 90% of what you ask here shows you're farther behind in poker knowledge than you think.

I recently made the jump from 5NL to 10NL on Bovada. I play FR, so if you are a 6-max player, this may not be 100% applicable.

NEVER LIMP PRE-FLOP!
All those trash hands you are limping with OOP should just be folded. This includes A9o-A2o from any position except BTN. Stop playing weak, unsuited aces. These hands, along with Kx suited, are for stealing the blinds ONLY.
Stop playing 22-77 except from the CO, BTN or when priced in from the blinds. These hands will be very hard to extract value from post-flop.
Other players will limp all the time... they are bad players who are telling you that they have a marginal hand and they want a cheap flop... take it away from them or let them donk off to each other.
Until you have a read on someone's post-flop play, you should raise or fold when it is your turn to act pre-flop. Calling is out of the question. Pressure them or GTFO.

BE POSITIONALLY AWARE!
Fold those crap hands pre-flop and raise strong hands in position. Steal all that dead money that limpers put out there. Scare the crap out of them by folding more than they expect EP and MP and raising more than they expect on the CO and BTN.

C-BET YOUR PANTS OFF!
Your range should be so much stronger than theirs that you are almost always ahead.. In general, they'll let you know when you're behind. *Note: this does not apply in 4-handed pots, or against villains that you deem "good".
This is about picking up dead money. You raised... or 3-bet... pre-flop... you must have something good, right?

DO NOT PLAY FOR STACKS ON THE FLOP WITH TPTK AGAINST DEEP STACKED VILLAINS!!!
Really, this is true for any stakes.

BET FUCKING FOLD!
You will steal enough dead money pre-flop to make a small profit, and take down plenty more with your C-bets to cover when you get called or raised. When the hand is still going on the turn, be prepared to start thinking like a goddamn poker player. These cats are NOT sophisticated and if you apply some ranges and pay attention to bet sizing, you will find it's pretty easy to play perfectly against them.
When they c/r you, they have a hand. They are trying to trap the aggro who keeps winning w/o showdown, and they don't know how to get value from a strong hand. They will shout it to you on the flop, generally, and you can safely fold bottom 2 pair or worse in those spots.

DO NOT BLUFF ON THE TURN!
Unless you have a read, they will station you down if they called the flop. Some will station with draws, and some with low pairs and some are trapping. If you don't have TPTK or a big draw on the turn, no bet.

MAKE DISCIPLINED FOLDS!
Take advantage of the fact that the HH shows you all villains' hole cards 24 hours after you end the table session. Anytime you are facing a decision that seems 50/50, just fold. Pull up the "previous hand" and make a note of the hand's starting time. Go back the next day, or 2 days later and see what Villain had when you made your "tough lay down"... I bet you'll find they were a lot stronger than you were guessing over 75% of the time.
Now as you do this, you're sense of when is a 50/50 will be completely different because what WAS 50/50 now becomes a clear fold... and you evolve.

Keep us posted on your progress. :)

Thanks MadMojo! I plan on tattooing this onto the back of my eyeballs for the next week. I personally know that my .05 strategy; which is geared toward level 1 thinkers who wouldn't know a straight if it's about to hit them, and aren't sophisticated enough to price me out of chasing; will never hold up against players with any amount of sophistication above "Bubba needs another beer!"

Truth be told, I was mostly grinding the .05 level because I was building my bankroll. I came into Bovada with $25, built it up to $250, got beaten down to $62 on levels that my BR couldn't handle ($10 DON's and 25NL), learned better, and have worked it up to $250 again through a combination of play and Bovada's promotions.

So I'll reread your reply about 10 times.

Thanks again!

Are you playing FR or 6-max?

Full ring, I've found that 6-max can't generate the implied odds for the above strategy, even at the .05 level.

On any site I've ever played, solid ABC poker will win at the NL10 level. But this doesn't mean it's best to play exactly the same way at every table / against every opponent. As a simple example, c-betting works far better against "fit or fold"-type players than against calling stations. So against two people at the same table, you may want to c-bet much more vs. one than the other.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Arjonius

As a simple example, c-betting works far better against "fit or fold"-type players than against calling stations.

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What if you're c-betting a wide value range?

FWIW, any poker player that uses the word "limp" as any type of strat for their own play needs to be stabbed in the eye with a spoon.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by jyms

FWIW, any poker player that uses the word "limp" as any type of strat for their own play needs to be stabbed in the eye with a spoon.

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don't watch me play live thx

the best advice given is always

adjust your game to the opponents around you and you'll do great.

the worst advice is always
stick to these strict blanket guidelines.

by doing so you limit your own growth and plateau early.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by .

[B

MAKE DISCIPLINED FOLDS![/B]
Take advantage of the fact that the HH shows you all villains' hole cards 24 hours after you end the table session.

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Hi this question is probably gonna show how completely out of my depth I am in this game but .......... What is HH and how do I view the hole cards 24 hours later ?? many thanks in advance .........Dom

Use the glossary here on FTR, and look things up with google when you don't know what they are, a lot of terms are just so common that we abbreviate them, in this case, HH means Hand History.

You can view your HH on Bovada by going to the lobby, and clicking on ACCOUNT. Once the ACCOUNT window pulls up, you want to select the Hand History tab.

You can review hands at any time, but the hole cards will not be shown until 24 hours after the table is closed.

Also, the HH's don't last forever. I think 6 - 7 days or so. You can always download your HH's to have them forever, but they're just text files and there is no program that I know of that allows you to interact with the HH via GUI.

Thanks for the advice MMM ........ I've been strugling a bit with some of the abreviations .. so thats a great help
I was intregued about seeing my opponents cards "24" hours later ...... I know PS replay the final table of some tournaments , with the hole cards exposed .. But do you know if it is possible to see all the cards exposed in a HH in a normal tournament on poker stars
....P.S. ... I'm still struggleing with the hand converter.. will get there in the end ...
Thanks again ... Dom

sorry to disappoint you Dom you wont see it on Pokerstars Cash Ring or Tournaments. Or any other site.

Bovada is the only site able to do it due to their unique feature of anonymous players.
And unless you are in the US (which you are not if you are playing on stars) or Canada then you can't access Bovada either. :(

Quote:

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Originally Posted by davisrei

Full ring, I've found that 6-max can't generate the implied odds for the above strategy, even at the .05 level.

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:D