PF raises early/late

[Pants_101]

I've read various ideas about pre flop raising and they seem somewhat inconsistent so I wonder what people's experience has taught them?

Principle 1 - don't build a big pot OOP. This would suggest smaller pf raises in EP and larger ones in LP

Principle 2 - Make larger raises in EP to discourage callers as all hands are harder to play OOP. Re-raise more aggresively OOP to try to end the hand immediately. This suggests the opposite...

Principle 3 - always make the same size raise so you can't be read

Principle 4 - size your raises according to the situation - value, isolation, deception etc mixing it up sometimes to confuse anyone watching.

Currently I follow principles 1 and 4, just wondered what people think. I only play 10NL by the way.

[tbone]

Your number 4 is the one I follow. I play 5/10 10/20 limit 10 max ring games and 1/2 NL. I raise in early position alot more in limit becuase you have alot more passive callers in limit then you do NL. NL is an all together diiferent animal. It depends so much on the table. IF you have a loose player behind you then I hold out for a big hand and push hard early because I know I will get at least one caller and I want heads up action against that guy. If the table is tight I change my starting hands to suited connestors and gappers and raise a small amoun to get the whole table involved as to give me pot odds to be the draw and confuse the hell of out them. That way when you make you straight or flush and push all in you got the guy behind you thinking you missed and your trying to bluff and he calls with his pocket QQ.

[zook]

At 200NL I usually raise 3.5xBB+1BB/limper in EP & MP, 4xBB+1BB/limper in LP and the blinds, and mix it up if there's a shortstack involved or a bad player I want to isolate. Sort of a mixture of all 4?

[Miffed22001]

200nl, im raising anywhere from $6 to $10 depending on what im trying to do.

Stop trying to figure out how much you should raise BECAUSE of the hand you have and try to think more about why you are raising and what that raise is trying to acheive, epspecially in respect to what you expect your opponents to have and how they will play their hand IF you raise.

[Pants_101]

Yes why am I raising, that is what I've been thinking about lately. How can I make a more profitable situation with a raise. I'm not sure how I can separate my own holding from this though, seems to me my cards, my position and the action lead to a descision to raise or not and an amount to raise.

I went back and looked at Sklansky again and his reasons for raising and raise sizing and tried to see how I could apply them.

Raising to manipulate the pot size - I do this with small to medium pairs, making a large raise. I want to be called by strong hands that will be prepared to make bets after the flop and I want the pot to be larger rather than smaller so the subsequent bets are larger and I make money on my sets. I might also take larger pots with c-bets making these pairs more profitable.

Raising for value - I thought this was straightforward, if I think I have the best hand I raise so that anyone calling is taking the worst of it. However I'm not sure about raise sizing. If I have AK in LP with a few limpers I want to raise for value, but I would like hands like AT and AJ to stay so should I make a small raise? What about AA? I don't fear any hand pf so is a smaller raise appropriate? Or is it better to try to build a bigger pot and just hope someone has a hand to call with? What about KQ or KJ in LP? Here I would make a large raise hoping to fold weak aces that are beating me and get HU with someone who is OOP and take the pot on the flop. I would do the same with a weak ace myself although this has its dangers I think. The trouble is I seem now to be advocating making bigger raises with my weaker hands and smaller raises with my stronger hands which sounds silly...

If anyone has any thoughts on this I would certainly appreciate the help!

[Miffed22001]

if we were to open for $3 in a 100nl game with any hand we are calling a reraise with, but need to build a pot with preflop, that would also prefer lots of players in the pot when it makes its hand eg pp's and Axs but make it $4 with hands we fold to a reraise (AJo/KQo) and with hands that play quite well against the blinds (KTs/A9o JTs) does this help your thinking ?

Also, raising has a primary goal, to pot build, but also you are riasing to make your opponents do something else, make a mistake. How can you make a raise that forces your opponent into making a mistake.

Also, if you think of the stars games in particular (as they are tight) if you open for any raise size, how does your opponents cold calling raise change (or not change as may be the case) if you open for 3bbs or 6bbs?

There is a lot of sort of contradictory info, but basically you are looking to be 20/20 in terms of VPIP/PFR, so which type of raising makes this easier to acheive considering how your opponents will react to you being a 20/20 sort of player?