Raising, why does everyone say that?

After browsing around these forums for a little while now and reading a good bit, I have a question about raising. Just about every time I hear someone say something about raising before the flop, they are saying to do so to "thin the field", "get the crap out", etc, etc, etc. I just don't really understand this. Just about every book I've read doesn't really say anything about thinning the field. SUre they go into how some hands due better multiway or some are easier to play heads-up. However, they usually follow that up with your return (if you have a good hand of course) is still better then your investment, and now with more people in your return will be higher. If I have KK don't I want crap like 35o and stuff to call? Why would Iraise 6-7x the blinds to make sure I only get a good hand in? Why do I want to chase away the bad players?

Because if you have alot of ppl in the hand some donkey with 35o will suck out on you.

If you have pocket Aces and see the flop with four other players, you are less than 50% to win the hand. With the Kings you want to get players with an Ace and a bad kicker.

The most important part for raising is to make other players put money in the pot when you have a good chance to win. Therefore you are winning more money with your big hands (+ev).

well said, it doesnt take a genius to realize that you dont want a good hand (AA,KK) to get out drawn and spoiled by some random donk trying to suckout with 47 or somtin like that.
you raise preflop because you are trying to protect your hand and you want to make sure you get better odds of winning the hand.
if you play AA against 1 person, you have a great chance of making some moeny, possibly a lot of money if he hits top pair or misses a draw.
if you play AA against 5 other people, you have a chance tow in a ton of money, yet the chance to win isnt very big.
whats the point of having a big hand if you cany make money with it?!?!
its drawing hands like 78 suited in which you want to have a lot of limpers in with you, just incase you hit big and thus are able to win a huge pot with more people involved.
not raising preflop with a big hand against multiple players is just asking for trouble.

The idea is to give other players the opportunity to make a mistake. If you have AA and let the BB see a flop with 63o and he flops a straight and wins a big pot, he hasn't made any mistakes. But, if you force him to call a bet to see that flop with the weaker hand, then he's made a mistake. The same happens when you force someone to pay too much to draw to a flush. Poker, at its core, is simply about making less mistakes than your opponents. But, unlike most games, you can actually set the odds, thereby rigging the game in your favor when you have the favorite hand.

So raising is less about thinning the field than forcing errors. But, thinning the field makes your play on later streets easier, because you can theoretically narrow your opponent's range. That puts you in a better position to force mistakes.

Interested to know what books you have read. I have read several and as far as i know they basically say raise to build pot, and raise to thin field. Everyone has pretty much said the same thing here but the more people in a pot the weaker a strong preflop hand becomes.

the more people in a pot the weaker a strong preflop hand becomes.[/quote]

it doesnt become any weaker, you just have to worry about more flops.
the more limpers you have with an unraosed pot preflop, the more likelyhood of a flop connecting with one of them.
if you raise bg preflop with AA and only one person calls, the flop then comes J67, you can feel safer and assume you have the lead unless he has a set.
if you have your AA preflop in an unraised pot along with 5 limpers, that flop becomes extremly dangerous.
there is a very good chance that someone has 2 pair and another person might have a flush draw and/or a open ended straight draw.

basically, your big hand preflop is just as strong, you're just letting more weaker hands see a flop, thus taking a huge risk since the odds of one of the limpers hitting big is much higher now with a higher range of flops.

"The idea is to give other players the opportunity to make a mistake."

This is good advice.


There are three big advantages to raising with a big hand to thin the field.

The first is as already mentioned, to let the other guy make a mistake. If he overplays something (as most people have a tendency to do) it's going to cost him. Quite simply if your hand is ahead of your opponent's calling range, why not raise?

The second is to get a feel for what you're up against. If you take the flop five handed there are very few flops that will seem safe, you risk being against two pair, a set or a bigger pair on just about any flop (bigger pair only included because it's more than just AA that we're discussing as possible "thin the field" hands).
Yes, rubish hands are putting money in when they're behind if you tempt them to play, but once that flop hits how do you play it? How do you get all of your chips in (getting called all the way) and know you're still good? It's just such an ugly situation to play.
Also consider pre-flop what their implied odds are compared to yours. Rubish can fold every time they don't hit the nuts, but you've got a monster that you shouldn't dump without a fight very often.

The third advantage, as I see it, is building a pot. Limping or making a small raise pre-flop is not going to build a big pot. Raising and re-raising is going to build a pot that someone is going to be interested in enough that they'll lose a lot of chips very often.


So out of all of that: By raising you get fewer callers but more money in the middle and you have a better idea of what you're up against and you're giving your opponents a good chance to make a mistake.
Sounds good to me.

you want to make them pay to see the flop that way you will get payed off for your hand..but your looking for only 1 maybe 2 callers at most...the more players the less chance your hand will hold up.

Pokervic pretty much hit what I was trying to say. I wasn't saying that you shouldn't raise preflop, I was just wondering why everyone says to raise to thin the field. I understand that you want people to make mistakes, but if you are thinning the field to get rid of the crap hands, aren't you forcing them to make the right decision? I would like to make the standard raise and want people to call. Of course I won't win as often, but when I do the pot will be bigger, will it not?

For example, if I have AA pre-flop utg and raise to 4x BB. If I get 2 callers pokerstove says I still win about 70% of the time (if I were heads up I'd win about 85% of the time). Now sayI get a total of 4 callers, now I only win about half of the time but I'm only putting in about 20% of the pot. In the heads up example I"m putting in 50 to win 85, in the last I'm putting in 20 to win 50 (and it will be a far large pot).

Maybe I'm just missing something but it seems to me that you are raising for value and NOT to get rid of people.

ericgarner118 said:

Why would Iraise 6-7x the blinds to make sure I only get a good hand in?

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Depending on the game / players (ha, that should prefix ANY strategy)

The only time you should be raising 6-7x the blinds, is :

1) Everybody else (or you) has been raising that amount when they open.

2) You are re-raising someone who has raised 2x the blinds.

In all but the lowest stakes games, if you consistently raise more with your bigger hands, less with your smaller hands, it's a big leak / tell, and most players are going to fold, or at least easily put you on your hand.

i raise for value and i'm also hoping everyone with trash will lay it down, with something like AA, i'm really hoping for a re-raise to further clean out anyone else's aspirations of taking a peek a the flop because i've possibly just caught myself a pretty big pot as it is. i'm also feeling out the table because if someone raises me, and then another person re-raises them, then maybe i should lay my AQ to rest.

ericgarner118 said:

Pokervic pretty much hit what I was trying to say. I wasn't saying that you shouldn't raise preflop, I was just wondering why everyone says to raise to thin the field. I understand that you want people to make mistakes, but if you are thinning the field to get rid of the crap hands, aren't you forcing them to make the right decision? I would like to make the standard raise and want people to call. Of course I won't win as often, but when I do the pot will be bigger, will it not?

For example, if I have AA pre-flop utg and raise to 4x BB. If I get 2 callers pokerstove says I still win about 70% of the time (if I were heads up I'd win about 85% of the time). Now sayI get a total of 4 callers, now I only win about half of the time but I'm only putting in about 20% of the pot. In the heads up example I"m putting in 50 to win 85, in the last I'm putting in 20 to win 50 (and it will be a far large pot).

Maybe I'm just missing something but it seems to me that you are raising for value and NOT to get rid of people.

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In your example - if you raise 4xBB from UTG you probably won't get any callers (at least if they don't have a premium hand themself (AK,AQ,KK,QQ, maybe JJ) unless they are very bad players or on tilt.

When I have AA in an MTT/SNG I'm usually trying to play for stacks - preferably pf and against 1 or 2 opponents.

Try not to scare everyone away - (you lose value) but to thin the field as said.

I'll give you two pokerstove stats against random opponents....

VS 7 opponents:

Text results appended to pokerstove.txt

9,794,258 games 70.844 secs 138,251 games/sec

Board:
Dead:

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 38.713% 38.49% 00.22% 3770081 21632.71 { AcAd }
Hand 1: 08.747% 08.02% 00.73% 785379 71347.29 { random }
Hand 2: 08.752% 08.02% 00.73% 785773 71422.63 { random }
Hand 3: 08.759% 08.03% 00.73% 786744 71111.88 { random }
Hand 4: 08.760% 08.03% 00.73% 786686 71285.29 { random }
Hand 5: 08.758% 08.03% 00.73% 786360 71385.54 { random }
Hand 6: 08.762% 08.03% 00.73% 786826 71320.79 { random }
Hand 7: 08.750% 08.02% 00.73% 785889 71094.88 { random }

VS 2 opponents:

ext results appended to pokerstove.txt

47,622,332 games 40.312 secs 1,181,343 games/sec

Board:
Dead:

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 73.436% 73.21% 00.23% 34863106 109436.83 { AcAd }
Hand 1: 13.280% 12.92% 00.36% 6152158 171984.17 { random }
Hand 2: 13.284% 12.92% 00.36% 6154134 172088.67 { random }

It breaks down to this: Given everyone has the same stack (say 2K) and is all in by the river....

- you will have 16K 37.8% of the time and bust 62.2% of the time in scenario 1.
- you will have 6K 73.4% of the time and bust 26.6% of the time in scenario 2.

Hope this makes things clearer....?!

ballboy75 said:

if you play AA against 5 other people, you have a chance tow in a ton of money, yet the chance to win isnt very big.

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Agree with this.....if you can get them all to stack. Most of the people are going to miss, therefore they arent really interested in getting much more money in. I think most of the time the idea is to get yourself heads up and get the money in when you are way ahead. I think you will make more heads up than you will multiway. Most of the time when people are stacking multiway and you have missed, you are behind, sometimes way behind.

The idea for me is, no one will fight for a 3bb pot, but if you can get it to a 15-20 bb pot, they are gonna take a stab at it and possibly make a mistake. You are going to get just as many straights, flushes, sets, etc. as everyone else in the long run....what makes you money is how you play these hands.

ericgarner, what is the point of having a huge value pot if your chances of winning it are smaller?!?! seems rather foolish to me.
if you play your aces well in HU play, you can cause your opponent to wahnt to bluff you. doing nothing with AA and not raising with them is horrible in my mind, it gives people with hands like 64, 85 insentive to get in on the action, they only need to call the BB to see a flop vs 6 other people, its cheap for them to try to hit big.

Maybe my confusion is coming from the fact that I play cash games. Grafkarow, in your example the pot with multiple people if you multiply the pots by the % of chance you'll win it you get $6048 but in the smaller pot you only win $4404. I understand that in a tournament you would want to conserve your tournament life, but wouldn't (all dollars being equal) I want to take the path that gives me the most money? The pot with more people will earn me more money in the long run then the smaller pot.

I disagree with this statement, "The pot with more people will earn me more money in the long run then the smaller pot.".

I think the more likely outcome in the long run is that you may win bigger pots, but you will lose a higher percentage of pots.

The power of pocket pairs really dries up after 2 or more people get to see the flop.

ericgarner118 said:

Maybe my confusion is coming from the fact that I play cash games. Grafkarow, in your example the pot with multiple people if you multiply the pots by the % of chance you'll win it you get $6048 but in the smaller pot you only win $4404. I understand that in a tournament you would want to conserve your tournament life, but wouldn't (all dollars being equal) I want to take the path that gives me the most money? The pot with more people will earn me more money in the long run then the smaller pot.

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No. This applies to all forms of play, not just tournaments. Maybe this might make sense: Doyle Brunson says this about premium pprs "You will either win a small pot or lose a big one". Why do you think he says this? In cash games you do want the most money, from 1 or 2 opponents, not a lot. The more opps you have the greater your chance of getting sucked out on, not having your hand hold up, etc; The only time you want a lot of opps is if you had a hand that carried a 100% guarantee of winning; seeing as there is no such hand preflop, and you would have to flop a royal flush for this to be true on the flop in a multi-way pot, it is much better to thin the field. I hope this helps a bit.

i have been most successful raising preflop with a very strict formula...2X the bb in early position, 2.5X the bb in mid and 3X in late, regardless of the cards i hold...if its good enough to play, its good enough to raise

I play $2/$4 Limit in my local casino....otherwise know as "No Fold'em Hold'em. For $2, it seems that no one folds. Most flops are seen by 7-9 players at a 10 player table. It's been my experience that under these circumstance, pocket A's will win about 30% of the time. When I get them I still raise, but not to thin the field, as that is no too likely to happen, unless I happen to be at a table of decent players. But, I still raise for value. Even if the pocket A's only win 30% of the time, raising preflop is still correct. The reason pocket A's are beaten so often in this situation is because of the huge number of collective outs that exist among the wide range of hands being played by the 6-8 players who call your preflop raise. The situation only become worse if the flop is coordinated. However, in a No Limit cash game or tournament raising to thin the field is more effective and accomplishes the goal of thinning the field, since pocket A's (and other top pair hands) play much better against fewer opponents.

Im gonna start playing with you EG, ill be able to play cheaply against your AA .
In any game (as dakota mentioned) you dont want many people against your big PP's, unless you raise big and they call, thats another thing.
i have a better way to explain....
in poker, when you know you have the best hand, you want to enlargen the pot, make money when you know your ahead, that should be no different with AA preflop. if you dont raise, not only are you keeping the pot small when you have the nuts, you are also allowing others to potentially surpass your hand.
if you limp with AA, along with 6 other people, a flop comes 67J, your going to be up against a strong hand and probably multiple draws as well, this is where you start to lose a lot of money because people dont like mucking pocket A's,its against their nature, especially in online poker.
people have a hard time mucking AA even when its obvious they arent ahead.
let me make a schematic for you with arrows:

AA preflop---> raise big---->1-2 callers max----->you win a nice pot 70-85% of the time. STRIVE FOR THIS!!!!

AA preflop---> limp----> 6 other limpers-----> unless flop comes A49 with no straight/flush draws, ur in deep sh*t----> U LOSE A LOT OF MONEY!!!!

hope this makes things simple....JUST RAISE WHEN YOU HAVE AA!!!!!!

Betting with A/A is about denying people the implied odds to play their junk hands.

A/A is a big hand pre-flop, but it only a pair post-flop.
Now, against one player, your best pair is probably best, and you can win a big pot if he flops top pair or has an overpair to the flop.

If 5 people are in the pot, a one-pair hand is substantially less likely to win. When a junk hand doesn't hit they muck and you get no extra money. When they hit, you tend to lose a lot of money.

Ok, here's and example. I estimated the percentages, but it's a good enough to show the reasoning behind it.

Say you have A/A at a $1/$2 table. If you only make it $5 and get 5 callers, that's a $30 pot vs 6 opponents. You're what, 40% to win the hand? So that's like $12 in equity. But if they hit a big hand, well, it's difficult not to pay them off. And with 6 players it's likely that someone will hit a weird two pair or straight so you can lose a lot of $.

Now, lets say you make it $10 and get two callers. You're still playing for a $30 pot but now you are probably 60-something percent to win (with $18 or so in equity). Not only that, but with fewer players in the pot you (and they) do not have to worry as much about a weird hand striking gold. That means that everybody at the table will be a lot more willing to play for a bigger pot. Hopefully it'll be you with your over-pair, and them with their top pair or smaller overpair.

Raising pre-flop helps narrow the range of the hands people call with, so it's easier to play them post-flop.

The more people in the hand preflop against AA the more your percentage goes down of winning and also more likely more draws that could potentially be out there for you to avoid after the flop. Example: You have AA and limp you will likely let 34 suited, 67 off, J8 suited, QJ off hands into the pot now say the 34 is clubs and the J8 is hearts, now you have to avoid having 2 clubs or 2 hearts on the flop so they are not chasing you down also having mid range flop makes for straight possibilities. With the above example
AA vs.34c 81.39%/18.20%
AA vs.QJo 84.04%/15.66%
AA vs.76o 81.16%/18.50%
AA vs.34c vs. QJo 64.76%/18.89%/16.09%
AA vs.34c vs. 76o 68.35%/15.46%/15.72%
AA vs.76o vs. QJo 67.71%/15.57%/17.04%
AA vs.34c vs. QJo vs.76o 53.24%/17.12%/16.65%/12.81%

I guess my point in all this gibberish is would you rather flip a coin for 100 times for $100 knowing you had a 84%win percentage or a 53 % win percentage???

As I see it raising and only getting a couple callers will actually get more money into the pot then limping or min raising and getting a bunch of callers will. And it also gives you a higher win percentage. Just because more people are in the pot does not mean that the pot will be larger.

suit2please said:

As I see it raising and only getting a couple callers will actually get more money into the pot then limping or min raising and getting a bunch of callers will. And it also gives you a higher win percentage. Just because more people are in the pot does not mean that the pot will be larger.

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Very true... And as stated above more people means more suckouts. Eric if u r happy with a 50% win rate multiway for 'big pots' u really should rethink yr thinking, I think. My winrate w AA or KK is over 80%; I don't ever want to see it headed to 50, or 30%!!

by Ranger above:

"I play $2/$4 Limit in my local casino....otherwise know as "No Fold'em Hold'em. For $2, it seems that no one folds. Most flops are seen by 7-9 players at a 10 player table. It's been my experience that under these circumstance, pocket A's will win about 30% of the time."

Multiway? Give me sneaky SCs over an obvious overpair (often hard to lay down) any time...