Micro-stakes adjustments

[LuisBoaC]

A bit of a vague question: how do you play when you have little to no fold equity?
I have learnt that, in theory, we should be fighting to win certain pots not because we think we're best but because we think our opponent will fold. For example c-betting when you totally miss the flop but think your opponent's range has mostly missed too; or betting a draw in the hope that you either hit or your opponent folds.
But in the games I play - $1.50 or $3.50 SNGs on pokerstars - I often find myself at a table where, for the first 3 levels at least, there is always at least one pre-flop caller or limper (usually two or three) and most flop bets are called.
When I open someone calls. If I raise a limper someone behind will call.
So I've been tightening up, waiting for strong hands. But I still get callers and they improve to beat me. I know I should like wide callers when I have a strong hand, but when there's 2 or 3 it decreases the value of my strong hand (AA vs one opponent has less equity than AA vs 3 opponents). I recently posted a hand where I lost a big pot overvaluing my AA vs. two opponents on a wet board. The better option would have been to lose a little pot. But if you always have 2+ callers this will often happen and you'll lose lots of little pots. So your stack gets smaller and you still have no fold equity.
I often feel the easiest game is the one where I get no playable cards for the first 3 levels, but then I basically just end up playing shove/fold and wonder if I should have played more poker earlier. Plus that's boring, I might as well play the lottery.
Is there anything I could do differently? Could I limp or call a lot more hands in the early stages, playing hit or fold?
Apologies for the vagueness of this question, I've tried to make it not too ranty. And I really don't feel I'm exaggerating, 30-50% of the games I play there are 2 or 3 players who won't fold (except total, offsuit junk) before they've seen a turn, regardless of board, stacks, bet size, etc.
Thanks in advance for any help.

 

[SpanRmonka]

A bit of a vague question: how do you play when you have little to no fold equity?
I have learnt that, in theory, we should be fighting to win certain pots not because we think we're best but because we think our opponent will fold. For example c-betting when you totally miss the flop but think your opponent's range has mostly missed too; or betting a draw in the hope that you either hit or your opponent folds.
But in the games I play - $1.50 or $3.50 SNGs on Pokerstars - I often find myself at a table where, for the first 3 levels at least, there is always at least one pre-flop caller or limper (usually two or three) and most flop bets are called.
When I open someone calls. If I raise a limper someone behind will call.
So I've been tightening up, waiting for strong hands. But I still get callers and they improve to beat me. I know I should like wide callers when I have a strong hand, but when there's 2 or 3 it decreases the value of my strong hand (AA vs one opponent has less equity than AA vs 3 opponents). I recently posted a hand where I lost a big pot overvaluing my AA vs. two opponents on a wet board. The better option would have been to lose a little pot. But if you always have 2+ callers this will often happen and you'll lose lots of little pots. So your stack gets smaller and you still have no fold equity.
I often feel the easiest game is the one where I get no playable cards for the first 3 levels, but then I basically just end up playing shove/fold and wonder if I should have played more poker earlier. Plus that's boring, I might as well play the lottery.
Is there anything I could do differently? Could I limp or call a lot more hands in the early stages, playing hit or fold?
Apologies for the vagueness of this question, I've tried to make it not too ranty. And I really don't feel I'm exaggerating, 30-50% of the games I play there are 2 or 3 players who won't fold (except total, offsuit junk) before they've seen a turn, regardless of board, stacks, bet size, etc.
Thanks in advance for any help.

I think you have 2 choices. 1 is what you've been doing it seems, getting your money in with your good hands then just being sucked out on. In these cases you just have to trust that variance comes back to you! Maybe getting more of your chips in earlier with the top top hands to hopefully discourage more callers?

2 is to try to call these bets a little more in position, then never bluff C bet, get as many chips into the pot as you can when you do hit big, but be very wary when you don't.

Check out Blackrain, he has loads of great videos on playing microstakes, especially on playing calling stations, and I'm sure he will be way better than me at explaining!!

 

[akmost]

I play micros too , in the very first levels is a total chaos , so we should have a super solid open raise range , especially from early positions because we will face several flats. This means that we will play out of position for the rest of the hand. Also we can flat in position hands with strong post flop potential like suited connectors , pocket pairs and some AXs for the nut flush.

Post flop I play literally with my cards faced up , I have it , I cbet it otherwise I use the lines check/fold or check/call. I don't cbet with many opponents in the hand because in the early stages they play with any 2. If you see any type of aggression or fight back or huge overbets /check/raises in the flop without any logic most of the times they have it so just fold(They might bluff you in the check / raise scenario but this happens only if you cbet everything and the opponent is a good regular so he has noticed your strategy).
If you are 50+bbs deep try to avoid the above situations , we don't want to burn our chips/tournament life in a stupid spot versus a random clicker. Value bet with your good hands and don't think of your table image / balance they don't care about that so exploit them.

After the very first levels you will be able to play normally , open raise just one opponent in the pot etc. SNGs after a while become push/fold , this is the structure of the game and you can do nothing about that except from being well prepared. Search for some charts , 3bet resteals and always try to have in mind against who you are playing so take notes. We can do nothing about flips so don't tilt , it's part of the game. You may need to put volume.

Last but not least, personally I don't bluff a lot , OK I don't know if the cbet with my range advantage you can call it a bluff but I mean I don't try any fancy bluffs in those games(mostly in the first levels) because there is no point in it. They will still call you with the top pair no matter the board texture. I only bluff against good opponents but I have them noted and also a HUD would be extremely helpful.

GLs

 

[fundiver199]

So I've been tightening up, waiting for strong hands. But I still get callers and they improve to beat me.

This is the key statement, because thats not, what always happen. If we have the best starting hand and get 2-3 callers, we will be making a profit in the long run, even if we are losing the hand more than half the time. The only thing, we need to do, is to not make massive mistakes postflop like stacking off, when it should be obvious, someone has gotten lucky on us.

So to answer your question, very loose games will increase your winrate but also your variance. So the solution is to be mentally prepared as well as bankrolled for that and then simply buckle up for the ride. If you can tripple your stack with KK, because you get two other players to put all their chips in with inferior hands, that awesome, and its ok if one of them suck out on you as much as 50% of the time.

This is the main point. But with that being said in very loose games you probably also want to have some hands, that limp behind, when its already a limped pot. You dont always need to be the guy raising it up, when raising does not really accomplish anything other than to bloat the pot. This is especially true, when you are out of position, so maybe just take that cheap complete or the free play with good but not great hands.

 

[venycyos]

I don't win in poker in general, especially in micros, however I share the feeling, you really have to be extra careful there, they pay for everything, community pots are common, so exercise a lot of patience.

 

[BIGAUS]

I think the first thing you mention about betting hands with the intention to have your opponents fold is definitely a valuable aspect to include to your game. It's hard to be a constantly successful player if your play is predictable. I definitely try to take advantage of moments where if I bet a certain way or amount that it forces the hand of players to act and make it difficult for players to pay up to play.

 

[magister1]

First few level of micro SNGs are chaos. Embrace it! Up the variance yourself as in my opinion this is the easiest stage to grab chips and guarantee a cash. Maybe not the best time to wait around for top top hands.

 

[fundiver199]

First few level of micro SNGs are chaos. Embrace it! Up the variance yourself as in my opinion this is the easiest stage to grab chips and guarantee a cash. Maybe not the best time to wait around for top top hands.

Very true. The loosest players are the ones most likely to bust first. So especially in SnGs, where there is no late registration, you want to be involved in the early action to have a chance to win these easy chips. Once the chips have been transferred to more tight and disciplined players, its going to be much harder to win them.

 

[gambit1983]

just play ABC poker at microstakes

 

[Clease]

I'm starting at the moment at the micro SNGs and see the same problems. T try only to play with very strong hands and I'm looking for my postions. In the first positions it makes no sense playing small poket pairs or weak aces. And when I get 3 or 4 callers/limpers mostly I will make no C-Bet

 

[nuttea]

A bit of a vague question: how do you play when you have little to no fold equity?
I have learnt that, in theory, we should be fighting to win certain pots not because we think we're best but because we think our opponent will fold. For example c-betting when you totally miss the flop but think your opponent's range has mostly missed too; or betting a draw in the hope that you either hit or your opponent folds.
But in the games I play - $1.50 or $3.50 SNGs on Pokerstars - I often find myself at a table where, for the first 3 levels at least, there is always at least one pre-flop caller or limper (usually two or three) and most flop bets are called.
When I open someone calls. If I raise a limper someone behind will call.
So I've been tightening up, waiting for strong hands. But I still get callers and they improve to beat me. I know I should like wide callers when I have a strong hand, but when there's 2 or 3 it decreases the value of my strong hand (AA vs one opponent has less equity than AA vs 3 opponents). I recently posted a hand where I lost a big pot overvaluing my AA vs. two opponents on a wet board. The better option would have been to lose a little pot. But if you always have 2+ callers this will often happen and you'll lose lots of little pots. So your stack gets smaller and you still have no fold equity.
I often feel the easiest game is the one where I get no playable cards for the first 3 levels, but then I basically just end up playing shove/fold and wonder if I should have played more poker earlier. Plus that's boring, I might as well play the lottery.
Is there anything I could do differently? Could I limp or call a lot more hands in the early stages, playing hit or fold?
Apologies for the vagueness of this question, I've tried to make it not too ranty. And I really don't feel I'm exaggerating, 30-50% of the games I play there are 2 or 3 players who won't fold (except total, offsuit junk) before they've seen a turn, regardless of board, stacks, bet size, etc.
Thanks in advance for any help.

From experience, I can say that assessments of periods of luck / bad luck are extremely subjective and in fact the mathematician is not mistaken - on average, we get the same card as our opponents. There is no point in tilting, there is no point in swearing either) It is best to sincerely congratulate your opponent on the victory, even if he played like the last fool and caught his 2 outs on the all-in. Poker should be fun, otherwise I think there is no point in playing it at all