you open limped? you donkey!

right, I just open limped, and I feel horrible about it

I know its unprofitable, and would never do it normally, but a special set of circumstances arose which made me think limp/limp calling here may be a good move.

early stages of a 6max tournament and there's the ultimate station at my table.. I mean he's limp calling pre flop then calling 3 streets with Q high every hand..

I was UTG with pocket 3's and everyone was 100bb deep. I considered raising, but knew that the station was going to call me down with whatever he had, so the most likely happening was that I'd brick the flop, have to continue on the flop.. knowing he's calling me with nonsense, barrel the turn, and then the river.. possibly value towning myself.

or check/fold with the possible best hand.

not the best options.

so I considered limping, knowing that if I hit my set, I barrel 3 times and probably get this guys stack.

your opinions on this thinking CC'ers?

Raise, it's easier to get his whole stack.

mm, tis true. If we raise though, are we playing just to hit a set?

how would we play when we brick.. pot control or what?

just wondering what's the best way to go about this..

Cbet and take the pot 65% of the time. If he calls the flop bet just bink your set on the turn. Easy game!

NVM my comment lols..I thought this was tournament.

However though, UTG at 6max, I think it's standard raising any pair anyway isn't not? I don't like limping pairs unless they are monsters and you expect to be raised by an aggro donkey. In general though, limping these days doesn't cut it unless your last to act, in general you are always getting raised anyway so I'd prefer being the aggressor and you can rep much more.Vs a calling station, I'm happy raising though and let him call down Queen high and keep betting. If he hits, he hits.

The way to play it!

yeah but he calls every flop bet.. so chances are I'm gonna barrel, either have another go on the turn, or check and have to play guessing games with him for a decent amount of my stack.

If you go with that 'if he hits, he hits' thing then your generally flipping for a significant portion of your stack.

repping achieves nothing here, I'd prefer to raise and barrel AK/AQ etc here, its just the fact it was a baby pair.

I always raise my pairs, I hate limping. Was just a weird spot where I thought limping could be a possibility. This table was super passive as well, so I was pretty comfortable that I wasn't going to get raised.

On further thought I prefer raising over limping, just a spot where you could vary from the standard and it wouldn't be so bad imo.

2.5bb > 7.5bb > 22.5bb > 67.5bb

Even if you pot every street your not getting his stack.
Besides if he never raises we're likely not folding the best hand that often when we check back 33.

Postflop: check/folding is far more profitable than triple barreling a calling station with an equity-less hand.

Look at it as set mining, except we get to see at 4-5 cards most the time, we get to showdown the best hand unimproved alot of the time, we will win the pot pre once in a blue moon, we get paid off better when we hit (due to villain being a huge fish). Check/folding a pair of three is not the end of the world.

Limping in this spot is totally fine EARLY in a tournament as long as there aren't really aggro players in position.

I recall many years ago I used to advocate open limping in early position with low pps when up against villains who are absolutely clueless and don't actively punish limpers (It needed to be so bad it's live or play money). I still don't think it's an appalling play but so easy to spot. If someone who isn't a 20/4 or something daft limp/calls then comes out raising preflop you sure as hell know they have more than a pair, AA/or strong TPAK hands (AJ/AQ/KQ) aren't limping pre. 33/T9s/A4s of the type of shit people tend to limp are not going to go wild unless they have 2pair+.

Anyway I've gone off on a tangent as this is clearly a position were even the most basic form of balancing is not necessary. I still think for the reasons stated raising is better. I just wanted to say that this is one of the least bad open limps you can do.

In general, open limping is bad, but there’s always exception.

If you have a calling station on your left, there’s no point in raising frequently pre unless you have a strong hand. If you have hands like low PPs like OP mentioned, it’s fine to limp.

I am 21/10 preflop (4NL) according to a tracking site, which would make some regs here indignant but it’s effective, so I stick to it. The reason I am ok with limping is because of the general passiveness of tables I get to see multiway cheap flops with low to mid PPs and SCs, which is what I want.

Against guys who’ll fold, I raise a wide range, but at 4NL there are soooo many stations that it’s fine to be passive and wait for your chance.

(Yes I realize that I’d be killed if I played like that against strong players, but I don’t play like that against strong players.)

21/10 is bad especially against passive players.

It seems like on Cake at the low stakes you get 3-4 limpers every single hand. If you have low pockets or suited connectors, I don't see anything wrong with joining the party poker and just trying to hit amazing. You get paid when you do.