What is the best approach in this situation?

Hello All,

I wrote this already and lost it. So let's try this again.

full ring live game: 1/2 blinds ($200 buy-in); 4 fish($60), 4 good( $100-$150), 2 sharks ($200) in the game. To my left: fish, fish, shark, shark.... I only had $75. Avg buy-in was $120.

Sharks are loose aggressive and raise about 30% of pots. If anyone limps and the pot gets reraised, everyone who limped calls the reraise.

Raises have been mostly from $8-13 with a couple $6 dollar raises.

I didn't see any cards other than limping with 44's UTG. I limped in MP with AK hoping to get reraised with no luck. Ended up winning a small pot with an A on the turn (didn't bet too much as it completed the flush)

Tried to limp a couple pots but got reraised.

Anyways, what would you strategy be to play in this game? If the sharks are winning pots with 34s for wheels and Q8 (raised) for flushes, what would be my best strategy? What would my reraising range be approximately?

Kind of a long post, but I would really appreciate any input as I plan to go back and win my money (but not for a while). Also, do I HAVE to buy in for $200 to be effective?

Thanks!

My strat? id need around 2000 as a starting bankroll to play this level.. if you dont have that, i suggest dropping down in limits.

if your the first to enter a pot its 'usually' a mistake to limp in unless you have a good reason for it..

raise more when the sharks are in the blinds, and 3bet them more often preflop try not to get involved as much postflop if you think they are better than you..

Play more postflop vs the fish as they will make more mistakes than you (hopefuly)..

raise and use your position
with just 75 id be looking for spots to get my money in with draws or preflop basically trying to double up.

oh and probably find a differant table, the two fish and the two sharks all have position on you, so you aint in a good seat, tought to make money against them.. when you have position on most of the OK players, which are obv tight, you want it so you have position on the fish, and preferable the sharks too..

Wizzim, thanks for all of the input. I tried to be sure to include all of the relevant information for individuals to give the best advice, but forgot one crucial point! It was a LIVE table, not online.

This changes some of your thought process. Would you mind terribly giving me some updated advice with this new crucial bit of info? (Sorry man).

Thanks!

You just described my average table.

These games are hugely proffitable, you can get way more edge in these games than you can online (online you can multi table which is more proffitable, but the point is that for a single table you can make huge money on that $1/$2 table).

Limping: Good and bad. Online you should almost never limp but in these games you should be doing a fair amount of limping. Particularly from LP which allows you to play a wide range of hands (if you're good at post-flop play, if not, don't limp). You should only be limping your weak hands from LP, this is exploitable and sharks will catch on but keep doing it until they adapt and then stop, you'll spend more time limping weak hands than not. EP also requires a lot of limping though, but with AJ type hands.
Say you're UTG, pick up AJ and raise it to $6, half of the table is going to call and you're OOP with a marginal hand with a big pot in the middle (very bad), now say you raise $15, one or two players call and your OOP against a range that's more dangerous to you (AK-AJ, 88-JJ, plus a surprising amount of suited connectors and a couple of raggy hands) and again with a big pot, which is bad for you. Instead what you should be doing here is limping, try to take a cheap flop and win a small pot with TPTK or similar, note that you don't want to protect your hand here, be willing to get outdrawn and go into check-call mode with a value bet on the river if you're ahead. If you're raised pre-flop then it's opponent specific, if they're a strong player I'll fold regardless of whether their range is premium hands only or rags 2/3 of the time (being OOP = expensive), if they're weak and their range is premiums only then I fold but if they're passive post flop or just a fish with a wide range then I'll call.

Bluffing: Do bluff but don't... the sharks you can bluff, but you wont be getting into many pots against them unless they're LAG's, in which case you're going to want position on them and to be raising them fairly light. Typically I don't bluff many regs just because I don't play hands against them, TAG regulars can be bluffed but if they raise at any point I fold any hand that isn't ahead and if they're not raising they're usually folding anyway, LAG players whether they're good or not I don't bluff so much as play a wider range more aggressively (note that your range of hands should widen but the range with which you're willing to play for stacks should not). Fish I bluff occasionally but regret it most of the time, last night I knew this guy had a pair of sixes for bottom pair, and a good TAG had complete air so I bet my flush draw quite hard and got called by the fish, spiked an 8 for second bottom pair on the river and value bet it, looked clever for the value bet but was an idiot for the bluff. Note that short stacked players can be bluffed though, strong players will know that they can't fold once they have enough chips in the middle compared to the size of their remaining stack but some fish will call a pre-flop raise of 25% of their stack and fold to a flop bet where a strong player would either fold pre-flop or shove. Learn to figure out which is which.

Value betting/Slow playing: Against strong players you want to check the best hand quite a bit to make them think that we're competing for kickers or second/third pair sometimes, a lot of play against strong players tends to be with marginal hands and you can get quite a lot of money in if you check a hand where they don't expect you to. They're not giving you many streets of value without a big hand otherwise. Be aware that this can give them free cards and you're going to have some tough decisions when a free card completes a draw and they start playing back.
Against fish, NEVER slow play, if I flop quads, I'm betting. Not big, but I'm betting, okay, maybe I check the flop with quads (maybe), but I'm betting the turn and river. ALWAYS price out draws if the hand they're drawing to beats you, fish will overpay on implied odds which may not be there. Value bet the fish like crazy, this is where your money comes from. If there's a shark and a fish in the hand with me and I hit a big hand and if I were to bet the maximum that the fish will call then the shark would know what I have, I'll bet that amount anyway because the strong player is only paying me off (if I bet smaller) for one bet sometimes and when he does put more money in then he's got the best hand. Bet for value against the fish only, if the shark makes a mistake and pays you then great but don't try and get value from him if there's a fish around too.

Premium hands: Bet big pre-flop, I still make a $15 pre-flop raise with most of my big pocket pairs and don't do this with anything else (except specific circumstances, but there's at least an 80% chance I have big pockets here). If it's raised before me then I'll make a large re-raise, if there's a lot of action before me then I'll raise big. If it's just one raiser and not much else, I'll only raise about 2.5x their raise, if there's a lot of action then I raise like 4x with AA/KK and QQ/JJ is situational. I play nothing else this way. Initially I planned to adjust when people adapted, and sharks do adapt but the value from the fish is too good to not play it this way. It does probably allow me to bluff the sharks a bit by playing other hands the same way, but as I already said, strong TAG players have a hand if they're raising and I'm not bluffing into a strong hand, LAG players I'm not setting up a multi-street bluff against because that's way too dangerous, so I really don't use this as a bluff very often.

Maybe will add more later, I've just wasted 10 minutes more than I really have so I hope some of this has been helpful.

In addition to all of the above:

Yes, buy in for the maximum if you can. Rake tends to be a big factor live and the bigger your stack then the more the pot can exceed the cap for the rake. Having a deeper stack also increases your hourly rate (i.e. double up with $100 compared to a double up with $200). More importantly it allows you to get a bit more creative post flop, the fewer chips you have then the easier you can either be commited to the pot or forced to shove or fold. This decreases any skill advantage dramatically.
The deeper you are the more you can do post-flop which is where variance gets reduced and skill plays an enhanced role.

The range of hands you should be playing varies a lot but typically shouldn't alter too much from online starting hand requirements (which I'm guessing you know, but if you don't, can be googled easily) except you're going to want to almost never fold small pocket pairs pre-flop (since players are so loose, you can play for stacks very easily), and play a very wide range from LP (button, and anywhere in LP if the players to your left aren't too aggressive) including suited connectors 45 and better and depending on your skill relative to your opponents, suited cards with 1 gap, and any ace, or suited king or suited queen. Don't call raises with anything you normally wouldn't, or at least, don't call raises significant enough to indicate strength.


Also as a side note people are honest. They're playing poker and they assume that you don't believe anything they say so they get creative by telling you the truth all of the time, if someone says he has a hand, he most likely has it.

Hey Kid,

What you wrote was amazing! Thanks a bunch. Most of it was a confirmation of my current game.

I originally play a game and realize that I am one of the best players at these small home games with max $50 buy-in. (Big shark, small pond). Going to this home game with a freeroll for $100 and then cash for $200 buy-in was new to me and ended up getting crushed. I realize after reading your post that I just suffered from being completely card dead. And the times that I thought about making a move in LP, someone had already raised, so I had to fold. I will play that game again....eventually. But I should win some more at the smaller games first.

But as for comments on your post: Here we go.

Limping: When you say only limp with your weak hands in LP, what would your limping range be? What would range be for calling a standard (2.5-3x) raise from MP with about two callers with low end of calling range being: 22+, 57s+,76s+, all broadway (and you on button)?

Also, your limping raise from EP is AJ. Is that AJs or AJo? I assume if it's AJo, they it is probably A9s or A10s? What would be the lowest pair you would limp EP with?

Bluffing: I try to also stay out of the way of the LAG's. The two I see are pretty good. I think they are more of 2/5 players, but where I live, sometimes it's hard to find a 2/5 without driving 45 min. I also think they like the guys. I know they saw me as a target when I limped in EP with AxKc, checked the two-club flop with two other limpers, limp-called the Ac on the turn (instead of check-raising with three clubs) and didn't value-bet the river. It was ugly. I just didn't know if one had a set and it was my first hand with them. Didn't have any history with them.

You said "but you wont be getting into many pots against them unless they're LAG's, in which case you're going to want position on them and to be raising them fairly light." What would your light raising range be there approximately? I know it would change based on you seeing the players play, but what would your starting 'light' range look like? (Note: One of the LAG's in particular doesn't like to show his hand....eg. gets call on the river, he says "Top pair is good". Then if you want to see his hand, you look like a jerk. But I don't know how he plays because I NEVER see his cards on the called river. Thoughts?)

Value betting/Slow playing: I like checking TP against LAG's as they usually bet the turn and river. I can usually tell based on bet-sizing (even though most don't know they are doing it) if they hit a lucky card on the river. If they don't, they slow down. Try to value-bet the fish when I can.
Defintely don't slowplay fish. Used to. Lost TONS of value. No More.

Premium hands: Pretty much exactly what I do. Question. Do you (or anybody reading) subscribe to the Ed Miller style of play? Because that's what this seems like.

Yeah, I realize that I can't sit at that table again with only $75. Kinda hoped I could double up early. But when essentially any raise starts at $5, you're calling just over 5% of your stack with a low pair or a suited connector. You do this three times, that's 15% of your stack. So you just hope for a big hand and try to double up. No room for creativity.

The range of hands are somewhat close to typical hands, but definitely get creative. I just don't like hands like K3s and stuff. But I was surprised that you suggested to call IP with 45s. Isn't that a bit low? I like at least 76s. Maybe I'm wrong.

A bit of a book. Sorry. It just started flowing. And yes, I definitely appreciated your insights. Let me know your thoughts on what I said. Anyone else is free to jump in.

Responses in bold.

Thanks Kid, that helps me a lot. Hopefully you will look at my posts if I ask anything else. I like your style of play (from what I read).

Pokerstudent