Re: Where the !*$# is Valuetown??
A few responses.
corsakh asked:
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In the third example. How often are you going to call a preflop raiser with a middle pair in a multiway Ace high flop with a 9? How often are you going to check it through on the turn on a fairly drawy board?
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My push doesn't rep a middle pair; it reps a set that filled up, or possibly a strong ace that just got safer with respect to a flush draw. I don't need him to believe me much for this to be +EV. Also, if I can put monsters under his bed, let him believe whatever the heck he wants, as long as he folds.
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Upgrade U said:
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some weird HHs
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Agreed. I was quite surprised when I looked through my biggest winners and losers to find how many "non-standard" looking hands were in there. Dan Harrington said that you make the most money when you play in a way that's different from your usual style, and he's right. Of course, it's the unusual nature of the play that makes it so effective, because your opponents never see it coming.
Also, most of my really big pots (wins and losses) had either incredibly obvious plays, incredibly bad plays [img]/images/graemlins/blush.gif[/img] , or plays where most/all the money went in preflop and on the flop. Finding hands where the most important decisions happened on the turn and river was a bit on the harder side, but these were some of the highlights from my $100NL play.
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Micro Donk asked:
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is open limping 22 good play for SSNL?
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As a general rule? No.
When table conditions require it? Absolutely.
In the hand I posted, many of the players remaining to act were highly aggressive, three-betting frequently. Given the relatively small stack sizes, my hand couldn't stand up to a three-bet and still have sufficient implied odds to hunt for a set: I'd be forced to fold my pocket pair preflop AFTER paying 4xBB. I don't like doing that. However, if I limp and an opponent makes a raise behind me, the table was loose enough that I'd often get padding in the hand from other players AND I'd still have decent implied odds to call and hunt for a set.
Notice that in this hand I DID have to pay a raise preflop, and despite that I made about 35-to-1 on my preflop wager, which is VERY safely +EV for a set hunter.
When table conditions warrant it, limping from EP is perfectly acceptable. In this case, it was the combination of short-stacked opponents, aggressive LP players, and bad post-flop players that made limping seem correct. Under more normal circumstances, I'd be open-raising this hand from any position.
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Xanta said:
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Don't like your betsize on the AA hand with the 8[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] 9[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] 5[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] flop. Especially against a drooler villain you can get him to call a pot sized bet with whatever he's calling a 2/3 pot bet with.
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For some players, your suggestion would be 100% accurate. However, I usually size my continuation bets at about 2/3rds- to 3/4ths-pot. I find this gives me similar folding equity to a pot-sized bet while offering me much better odds on my wager. Since my c-bet rate is extremely high, I made this decision consciously as an attempt to maximize value in the long run.
Of course, betting 2/3rds- to 3/4ths-pot when you've got air REQUIRES you to bet the same size when you've got the goods. In this case I've got an overpair and a backdoor nut flush draw, but I can't go mixing up my bet size based on my hand strength. Sure, it's possible that villain has a flush draw and will pay off a bigger bet, but it's more likely that he has a one-pair hand and doesn't want to pay much to see another card. It's even more likely that he's got air and is looking for an excuse to fold, whereas a small bet might get him to "look me up" with overcards, hoping to catch lucky.
I can't go betting strong with strong hands and weak with weak ones -- it's suicide if anybody at the table ever pays attention. Consider this bet size a stylistic decision rather than a card-based decision: it's all about the metagame.
One last point: AA is not the nuts, and I don't necessarily want to build a huge pot with it. I especially don't want to trap myself into this pot and get stacked by some unlikely crap like 98o or 76s. Betting small gives me more options on the turn and river, and keeps me from building a gigantic pot where I can't possibly be ahead.
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Finally, a message for orange: contact the Absolute Poker customer service, because it looks like your software is out of date. The newer version has a "check" button.
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