Call or 3bet from the blinds?

I think one of the things I'm struggling with in microstakes cash games is how to defend the blinds properly.
If we assume villain is a decent TAG with a steal percentage of 40% from the button, how should I defend against his steal from the button? What hands do I call with, and which do I 3bet with from the SB and the BB respectively? If I'm in the SB, do I 3bet, call or fold with
Big suited kings? (KTs, KJs, KQs)
Middle pairs? (77-TT)
Low suited aces? (A2s-A5s)
Big aces? (AJs+, AQo+)
Suited connectors? (87s, 98s, T9s, JTs, QJs)
What do I do with the same types of hands in the BB?

+1 to this question, very interesting to read some good advice. Always got some problems at blinds, haven't exactly plan what i will do with which hand

Well, I will tell you how I play those cards. AJs and AQs I always go all in when I play on table with small stakes. Win it or lose it. Those are very good cards and when they are suited, it is worth to try. Other cards that you wrote, I only call and follow the situation.

I would probably 3 bet hands like 10s, AQ-AJ suited, call with strong tens and suited connectors, and also call with the weaker pairs, depending on the bet size I would call or fold the weak suited aces. It seems like I always get outkicked when I attempt to play a hand like A3.

40% is a little low in my opinion so i problably just call and only 3bet with premium hands

The way you have your starting rage I suspect you got some hands as limping hands and some very tight raising hands. That's is absolutely wrong, wrong .. and more way wrong.

I can play any two cards against you and always raise when you limp and get out when you raise. You will never be able to win. Keep in mind that I can sometime flop too and you'll be in deep trouble. Especially if your raising hands are a narrow rage you have no chance to win big even on your monsters.
First of all I will destroy all your suited connectors from 87s, 98s, T9s and JTs. Also all your pocket pairs of 22, 33, 44, 55, 66, 77 will be out of action. On top of that your A2s, A3s, A4s, A5s, A6s, A7s, A8s and A9s will be under tremendous overwhelming pressure preflop when I will force you to play speculative hands for a solid big raise. The AQo is a no play in NL cash.
So, what's left for you to play your ABC strategy? TT+, AK and AQs
How can you make money seeing flops with 3.7% of your hands. You'll miss the flop 1/2 of that and see the river with another 1/2 of the 1/2 left. So, 1% of your premium hands you get to the river IF you get action in the first place from the get go when you come in for a raise. But since I know what hands you like to raise vs. limps you'll not even get action on your supreme hands.

So, where your winning are coming from? - They're no coming because there's not gonna be any

. I play in Vegas for a very long time and there's no one that can beat me even during in a couple hour session. Forget about in the long run. I am a specialist on taking on the tourists. I actually focus on ABC players, novice, respectable tourists, soccer dads, family dads with wives and sucker dudes on vacation. They all have no chance but to donate for my living expenses bills.

I would advise not to teach the correct hand! You need to see a flop and play only at the flop! A typical situation when you have A8 and the flop shows K46 What to do when the opponent puts? Play hope for ACE? Proper study of opponents + to carefully look at the aggression in the game.

Good advice not to use 3-bet without a pair on hand!

I'm so sorry, but your post makes zero sense. I'm talking about a scenario when you have a decision in the blinds to either fold, call or 3bet a button raise, there is no limping involved.

Also trashtalking about my strategy is not really going to help me or anyone else in this forum, is it? And if you want to brag about how good of a player you are, maybe Brags, Beats and Challenges is the place for you to post.

But don't come here if you don't have anything helpful or constructive to share.

AJs and TT are some interesting hands to talk about. TT is more often a call than a 3bet for me, and I feel like I've started to play more passively by just calling a lot with AJs from the blinds. AJs holds a lot of value, but you can't continue against a 4bet most of the time. Same with TT. So I tend to call and play more postflop with these hands, even though I do 3bet them from time to time, depending on the opponent.

Definitely agree with you on the weaker suited aces. I used to get into trouble playing those OOP, but learned pretty quickly that weak suited aces are worse than they look.

This is interesting topic. I'm quite sure calling wide is what the books teach, and not 3betting. However, 2NL and 5NL 3betting was like printing money. There might be a cap between nano stakes and 25NL where the optimal style changes, at least now in 10NL first time I'm trying to build calling ranges because 3bet style seems to be not that productive anymore. Calling is so damn hard OOP that it’s giving me shivers, then again 3betting light and then called semi light is pukesome result wise.


About TT, I’m starting to think TT is better hand to 3bet. No idea why this feeling is popping up, protect our equity?

BB vs BU:

Polished poker, John, says (well not really say, I add stuff not necessary as intended):
1. that you can reasonable flat if you have 60% equity. 3betting TT+, AQ+ most of the time. You can 3bet the hands you don’t feel you are confident enough post flop
2. Then we polarize the range somehow adding hands and doing stuff until we defend 50% of time, or something like that. I’m totally not sure, but the logic might go that the added bad hands are 100% 3bets, so 3betting hands like Kx,Axo,Qx,66-

Boker in the box says, (well not really say, I add stuff not necessary as intended)
1. Defend 1:1, so if villain opens 40%, defend 40%, practically giving us 47% equity vs opening range
2. 3bet range about top 17% of total defense range. You only defend by 3betting the hands you are ready to go AI!!!!, you add little less 3bet bluff hands which are the worst hands in your range (ie. hands like Q7s, K8o etc). Value 3bet AI range with about 46% equity.
3. Rest you call with 45% equity

So Villain is typical nit tag, opening range BU 29% {22+, A2s+, KTs+, QTs+, J9s+, T9s, 98s, 87s, 76s, A2o+, KTo+, QTo+, JTo}, His AI range {QQ+}

Boker in the box:
Our value 3bet range {KK+}, 3bet bluff 16 combos, but really this makes no sense =) so I give up, I tried over two hours to understand what was wanted. There are surely some very simple rules to follow.

Harrington on online cash gemes says (on 100NL oh those were the days):
3bet over 55% equity + 50% bluffs

So his 3bet range against example 30% nit tag would be:
Value 3bet: {99+, ATs+, ATo+}, bluff { A5s-A2s, J9s, T9s, 98s, 87s}

However this range is quite much different than presented in other sources.

Oh well, I think nobody knows what to 3bet This is partypoker pro Josef Rantamaki 3bet range BB vs BU 17%.
For value: {TT+, A9s+, KJs+, ATo+, KJo+} 130 combos
For bluff: {22, K4s-K2s, Q6s-Q2s, J7s-J6s, T7s, 96s+, 85s+, 75s+, 64s+, 53s+, 43s} 102 combos

This looks like harrington range? Oh wait that is actually John range, so value range is 60% EQ vs opening range.

So this is what I was able to do in 4 hours, please make corrections.

Against our nit tag with 30% BU open and QQ AI range:
We defend 70% of time, so about 21%, this range is about{ 22+, A2s+, KTs+, QTs+, J9s+, T9s, 98s, A7o+, KJo+, QJo} that has about 45eq% min EQ per hand against opening range. Range equity vs 30% range 53eq%.

We can defend by 3betting for value 60eq% range: { 99+, AJs+, AQo+} 71 combos, bluff 3bet {KTs, QTs, KJo, QJo} 32 combos.

However, I was not able to unbalance this range to counter only AI with QQ by villain, my guess is that we should a) not 3bet for value with full range b) we should bluff more with bad hands

Actually the trick might be here: Given our range, villain needs to defend wide enough that our value range stays positive. If he starts nitting up and only calls the hands he has great equity edge against us, we auto profit. (speculation).

The kind of hands you suggest as "bluff 3bets" are hands that I would just call. They have pretty alright postflop playability, and I feel like they are the sort of hands that you can also float with, to punish those players that open and then cbet the flop way too often. Then again if we want to have any 3bet bluffs in our range (we are talking about microstakes after all, so maybe not so much), the hands you suggested, along with some low suited aces and suited connectors are the hands I would be 3betting some of the time.

Well isn't this the idea after all, to play a well balanced game so villain will have a harder time exploiting us. But we are talking microstakes here, so a game plan that revolves around mostly getting aggressive with value hands is going to be fine, in most cases as close as we can get to optimal. I'd also like to add that from the blinds you often play OOP, and bluffing OOP can get costly if you don't know what you are doing (that's why I try to stay away from it :P), and in worst cases tilt-inducing if it doesn't go as planned.

Those hands are the worst hands in our total range, thus in bluff range, they all are blockers too. You can copy paste the suggested range to Equilab to see that yourself. Suited Ax are too good to bluff and when called mostly dominated by tight players calling range. In practice though I probably would 3bet low Axs hands, but it seems this is actually wrong by the book.

"We defend 70% of time, so about 21%, this range is about{ 22+, A2s+, KTs+, QTs+, J9s+, T9s, 98s, A7o+, KJo+, QJo}"

Bluffing tight players when they open BU in nanos is super profitable, but yeah there is no point of 3betting bluffs vs loose opponents. Instead better use merged range?

Typically our opponents range should suggest our range whether we tighten or widen.

If people fold more to 3bets. Common sense suggests we 3bet more.
Example if someone 3bets QQ+ ... if someone folds a lot more we could begin to 3bet JJ TT... just widen your range depending how comfortable postflop and hand reading.

I think beginners get too caught up with exploiting and trying to play same hands with someone with more experience. Keep to your level and slowly expand but only open up wider when you feel you can outplay them.

No point 3betting KJo and you dont know when your dominated or when your infront. Start with what you know which is AK most likely and go to AQo etc.

When i see 100% to fold to 3bet i will play ATC but it all changes and you learn with experience

Edit:
Poker in a box pre guide (modern play) for example gives against BB vs BU 40% range the following for 2NL - 25NL play.
Value range { TT+, AQs+, AKo}
Bluff range { QTs, K9o, QTo, JTo}
And 33% of calls, including all Kxs

You are missing the point, we know we are mostly dominated when we bluff raise KJo and get called.

Edit: Office hours fly when thinking about poker lol.

Depwnds on player you are playing against

Kjo isnt a typical bluff hand in the blinds. Its a value hand most times.

Ooo snappy replies

I love these guides. You got anymore?

You should get if free by registering to news letter. It's very hard to use though because the consepts are so much different than how nano player are thinking and they are not theoretically justified by explaining and are constructed against similar optimal ranges. But an eye opener for me at least, not that I have learned to use the ideas in practice

The whole concept of calling makes me shiver, just when I learn not to call, I'm then again supposed to call a range that feels like a fish play, rolf

http://pokerinabox.com/

http://www.deucescracked.com/forums/34-Small-Stakes-Shorthanded-NL/topics/155911-3betting-KQ-KJ-oop-v-CO-B

"Why would we want to 3bet KJ type hands oop vs CO open?" Here I assume CO has about similar range than our tight BU.

"Since most opponents will be happy to call with AQ, KQs, KJs, QJs - we block a lot of combos of those, also we block their value range of JJ+, AK if we 3bet AQ-ATo / KQ-KJo. Also many opponents will call with 88-JJ so 3 betting KQ is good in a way we can easy outflop them and our hand is easier to play - we can barrel on J high boards and they will face over cards most of the time to their pair.

"I would 3 bet those against people that fold a lot to 3 bets - since I don't like calling those OOP, or not fold to 3 bets at all - then my range of high cards crushes their range of small PP / SC and all kinds of crap and my cbet earns lots of $$"

"I agree, KQ/KJ is just too strong too fold but too weak to play profitable oop.
When 3betting we gain when they call too much and we gain when they are forced to fold because of their wide stealing range.
3betting those hands in the blinds is +Ev imo"

These guides are good to know because i want to see what people are following and then i can exploit

Yes i do nano style but i also flick a switch and do a whole nit style. Depends on how the fields playing

Unfortunately this is something you can not exploit , no one can at least pre

Yeh hospital hours fly on here 2

Theres always more than one way to skin a fish... just follow different rules. You sound defeated sir and thats awful.

Hey if u got spare time and havnt already on youtube lookup the evolution of poker

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Aww you miss the point. The ranges are game optimal, they are designed to be unexploitable. Any deviation from your side makes me to exploit you.

Do you mean this one:

Yup that one

What if i have a 21/17 vpip.... and for that day i decide to play 5% of hands.... but not the top 5% but manipulate stats to say 5... but i choose specifically beteeen 10-15... sounds crazy right sure.. but just as crazy as saying sticking to those ranges will exploit all. You make poker sound like chess.... but poker isnt chess and people are irrational ... wipe that range with ur bum n flush it down the toilet cuz it aint workin for u

My guess is that by playing too few hands you would lose in blind costs the profit you would do against having unexpected range, and when the 3betting starts you can’t help but play against the range I’m presenting mostly.

Think that not too much, I believe only top level HU specialists (NL2000) can play game optimally, and that is only the pre phase. After pre play there is 3 streets to work your magic. And playing game optimally is quite stupid when exploitable play is so much more profitable.

But we should not forget that we should know what game optimal way is so we can pinpoint the mistakes of the villain and develop our own game in every step to better and better, also hopefully answering questions like what hands to 3bet or not against good opponent.

Btw it always happens in chess that someone starts opening only to forget the next move, or completely missing the point of that opening. I don’t think that is too far away from poker. Then again GM might play the whole game by the book, from the first move to the last. Again this sounds like something very good poker player would do.

Edit: If you want to see what it means to play game optimally, EvanerTV does that in twitch.

I think i see grandmasterz and poker players who do well... create their own books but understand others ... ill check it out sometime

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