So most of you have probably heard the rule: If it's strong enough to call, it's strong enough to raise. Even though I understand that you want the initiative by 3betting, I haven't fully understood this rule. Does this apply to every situation, when you have to choose between calling, 3betting and folding preflop?
I don't like this rule, except for opening the pot. If everybody folded to you, you should be raising or folding most of the time (I can see some heads up or tournament spots when it is ok to open limp though). In postflop play or when facing an open raise or 3bet, many hands are too weak to raise, but are playable and when given good price to call, you should definitely call. It will of course depend on positions a lot. When facing an open raise from UTG and you are on UTG+1, your range will be rather narrow so you will not have as many calling hands as on the button in that spot. But still, you should have some calling hands on UTG+1, like maybe 88, 99, TT, KQs, AJs - those hands would be too weak to 3bet with so many people to act behind, but are playable hands with a lot of implied odds if the board comes favourable. On later positions you can even add more calling hands, like lower pairs, weaker suited broadway cards, weak suited aces etc.
Postflop, this is even worse if you treat it as fixed rule, because you often face situations, in which you have some showdown value with second pair or top pair weak kicker - in those cases you want to control the pot and raising is not the best play. Lets say you have 9T on K97 rainbow board in position. This is good spot to control the pot and try to go to showdown (with intention of folding to big bets). You have a lot of other hands to
bluff in this spot and there is no need to turn your hand with showdown value into a bluff (there are better bluffs in this range like QJ, QT, JT, 8T etc.)
For example: A TAG in UTG+2 opens to 3bb, and it folds around to me in the BB, holding KJs. I would call in this situation, getting somewhat good pot odds, and the ability to flop something decent. So the rule tells me that I should also be able to 3bet in this spot, but I'd never do that, given he has a semi-strong range, and I'm OOP. I'd rather just call and see a flop, and play from there.
Exactly, you have great price to call, no need to be 3betting here as you would have to fold on any 4bet. I personally like to defend BB and I will call with very wide range like even 97s and all suited aces, even A9-A6, which I wouldn't call with on the button in that spot.
How do you handle these situations, and what tips do you have for when to cold call and when to 3bet?
There are charts with poker ranges for certain spots, which could be treated as a starting point. Of course this will greatly change based on table dynamics. When I started learning poker I haven't been studying such resources, because I was like "ah, it depends on the game anyway", but without solid fundamentals it was chaos
. You can also run some simulations after spots you played and you are uncertain of.
There is a
book about preflop play that I like as starting point. There are more such resources often based on hands history of poker pros.