Bryce's Pre-Flop Bible

[The Bryce]

This is another "article" origionally from a friend's site (in case you're wondering about the crazy tone). Origionally I thought this would be a kind of sucky thing to post, but then I realized this is just another really simple idea with really complex applications, which is fine by me.


This will be more like a blog entry than an article. I’m bored and I thought I’d write something about poker. I’m sure that you, dear reader, can take comfort knowing that your poker career is my afterthought.

(Snarky!)

So what I want to talk about is limit hold’em pre-flop. I’m not going to give you an up-to-date list or chart of what hand goes where with what action etc, because I think that would be stupid. I’m going to lay out some things that are rattling around in my brain until I feel I’ve explained them to my satisfaction. At that point you may power up your own brain and learn whatever you like, at your discretion.

I think I’m actually going to be able to be pretty concise with this.

There are only two ways that you can make money playing hold’em. Way one is to have all of your opponents fold after you bet or raise. Way two is having the best hand at showdown. Shocking stuff, obviously, but you might be also interested to know that you don’t make a dime for putting money in with the best hand pre-flop.

Heresy! Take him to the stake!

(I cast Issac’s greater missile storm, all angry peasants are obliterated.)

Unconventional thinking, sure, but something which is obviously true (incidentally, it’s not my fault if this sounds weird, I blame the conventions). Unless you’re playing Wednesdays on WSEX, no one has every walked up and handed you a massive refund for having your aces cracked after you correctly capped a four way pot pre-flop. Getting money in with the best hand pre-flop can often be a pretty good idea, but in the end you either have the best hand at showdown, everyone else folds, or you lose your chips. That’s it.

So what does this mean to you, the conservatively handsome reader? Quite a bit, actually. Picture, in your head, a big hill made of all the possible hole-cards, with all the really scummy stuff at the bottom and your premiums at the top. Where, in your mind, do the ace-rag hands go? Somewhere just below the crest? There are some situations where this is the case, and many where it is not. What separates these situations? What you expect to occur in post-flop play dictates these situations.

Post-flop dictates pre-flop.

That was so important that it deserved its own line. When you make a decision on street one you should be thinking just as hard about streets two through four (and you should also be thinking about how you will impact the streaming set of data called the meta-game, but for brevity’s sake, I’m not going to talk about that). You should be considering how your play on this street will affect your expectation for the entire hand. One more time: there are no shiny consolation trophies for putting money in with the best hand on just one street.

Think of pre-flop as the dirty handshake in a nut-kicking contest. Having a world class-dirty handshake is nice, but it’s not worth a damn if doesn’t get your foot between this particular opponent’s legs right freaking now.

So pay attention to what your opponents are doing!

A few examples and then I’m done.

Let’s say you’re against a tight and somewhat weak player who opens from one of the last two positions and you are in the SB. A hand like A4o should go in the muck. A hand like QJo should probably be three-bet. The showdown value of the ace is worth very little, if anything. If the weak player forces a showdown you will likely lose with either an unimproved ace or a pair of fours. As the attacking player, you will win in this situation when you either, one, make a hand, or two, your opponent misses the flop and folds. You will be putting money in with more live outs with the QJ hand when your opponent does make a pair and you miss, and you will make more money on average with pairs of Js and Qs post-flop than As and 4s.

In another example you are in the small blind with a small pocket pair or small ace against a player in the big who plays very aggressively post-flop and almost never folds his blind. You should often open-complete, leading any flop if he checks his option. If you raise pre-flop and become the attacking player you will have little recourse if he chooses to take a shot at a dry looking flop. If the opponent has quite loose peeling standards you will often have to bet two streets to find out whether or not he would like to give up, and you will have entered a reverse implied situation on one of the big streets in a small pot. Very rarely will you be able to bet a small pair or unimproved ace for value on the fourth street. So once again, should you choose to become the attacking player out of position, you will win the hand by either forcing your opponent to fold, or by making a better hand.

By open completing in this example one of two things will usually happen. He will check and you can bet the flop under the conditions of the out of position attacking player, but in a pot small enough that it will be much harder for him to peel or bluff. You can also call a raise pre-flop and then become the defending player, collecting bets post-flop by either calling his continuation bets on two streets, or attacking the flops you like at your discretion.

Last example. You open with AK from two or three positions off the button, and a solid player three-bets out of the blinds. You should call. If you cap and bet when checked to post flop, one of two things will likely happen: your opponent will fold, or peel and fold with a hand you had dominated, or your opponent will check-raise you with a better hand on the flop (which you will usually have outs to pass), as well as some semi-bluffs. If you call your opponent will usually bet twice with his entire range. You will see the most streets for the least amount of money against the hands which you are drawing against, and will win the most from the hands which are drawing against you.

So can you see why? Concise explanation indeed.

The better you get at answering the question: “What will my opponent do if…” the better you become at poker, and this skill counts for each street even street one. I hope you have founds this helpful. Some last minute ramblings:

You can often make just as much money overall by check-raising or raising the flops you like in multi-way pots as you could by jamming pre-flop. Do you really want to isolate that guy with jack high? Trying to beat some opponents unimproved is stupid. Yes, you really can open-limp on the button. If you complete a poor hand in the small-blind, will the open limper bet with anything when the flop’s checked to him? Beating some opponents unimproved will pay the rent. If you open raise with this hand from an early position, how well does it perform under a three bet? Figure out where you want to be relative to the raiser. Will the player in the small blind bet the flop if you check your option? People usually don’t walk into the same trap twice unless you give them incentive. I talked way too much about ace-rag in this article, which is now, in fact, over.

-Bryce Paradis

* Ammendum: I don't really talk about it much in the origional, but your most important decision pre-flop is how often you will win the blinds. Other things like how often you will be 3 bet with what sort of hands, how often players will call two bets with position on you, etc, are obviously important as well.

[BigPoppa]

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Think of pre-flop as the dirty handshake in a nut-kicking contest.

[/ QUOTE ]

NH

[Paxosmotic]

[ QUOTE ]
Let’s say you’re against a tight and somewhat weak player who opens from one of the last two positions and you are in the SB. A hand like A4o should go in the muck. A hand like QJo should probably be three-bet. The showdown value of the ace is worth very little, if anything.

Last example. You open with AK from two or three positions off the button, and a solid player three-bets out of the blinds. You should call. If you cap and bet when checked to post flop, one of two things will likely happen: your opponent will fold, or peel and fold with a hand you had dominated, or your opponent will check-raise you with a better hand on the flop (which you will usually have outs to pass), as well as some semi-bluffs. If you call your opponent will usually bet twice with his entire range. You will see the most streets for the least amount of money against the hands which you are drawing against, and will win the most from the hands which are drawing against you.[/i]

[/ QUOTE ]
A4o is a stronger hand than QJo heads up and simply must be three bet if we're re-raising with queen high.

AK must be capped under all circumstances. We're not "playing it safe" hoping to explode on a favorable flop. That's not tight-aggressive poker. Get money into the pot as early and as frequently as possible.

[Toonces]

My hunch is to disagree with this article. The thing that this article flies in the face of is the concept of pot equity. Of course, each of these decisions you make may confuse your opponent, but at what cost? Each time you don't raise with a 60-40 edge on your opponent, your are giving up 0.2 SB in pot equity. Will you force enough mistakes on later streets to make it up? I doubt that the tricky play will usually make up the money that the straightforward play doesn't make. Too many people are too bad that giving them the extra info won't help them. Anyway, you never know what they think is tricky. If I cap with AK, they may very well assume I would only do that with AA or KK and play accordingly.

[bozlax]

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I think I’m actually going to be able to be pretty concise with this.

[/ QUOTE ]

Had you been, I might've actually read it all.

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(Snarky!)

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As it was I read until I got to the part where you recommend folding A4o to a steal but 3-betting QJo, since ace-high doesn't have showdown strength against a steal and QJo has more live outs (did I paraphrase that correctly?), and decided that I'd already lost 3 minutes of my life and wasn't about to spend 5 more on what was clearly a lot of cutesy eyewash about getting kicked in the nuts that masked some seriously flawed suggestions about preflop Hold 'Em play.

[cpk]

[ QUOTE ]
As it was I read until I got to the part where you recommend folding A4o to a steal but 3-betting QJo, since ace-high doesn't have showdown strength against a steal and QJo has more live outs (did I paraphrase that correctly?), and decided that I'd already lost 3 minutes of my life and wasn't about to spend 5 more on what was clearly a lot of cutesy eyewash about getting kicked in the nuts that masked some seriously flawed suggestions about preflop Hold 'Em play.

[/ QUOTE ]

NH, sir.

Against a weak-tight player who knows how to steal, you don't expect to show anything down at all, but it's also nice to have some showdown value UI, and any moron knows that A-high > Q-high. I mean, come on.

[James.]

if that's your bible i suggest you convert to a different religion.

[belloc]

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Yes, you really can open-limp on the button.

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No, you can't. Not if you like money.

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* Ammendum: I don't really talk about it much in the origional

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I'm having a great deal of trouble taking this "article" seriously. I really hope the small stakes players are reading this and taking it to heart.

[The Bryce]

Hoo hoo hoo! The responses from small-stakes are interesting. I've never posted here, I think, so it's occured to me that I might not have any credibility, which is fine. I should introduce myself: my name's Bryce, I've played full time for about a year now, and my staple games are PP 20/40 and 30/60, though I have a long history of propping smaller stakes.

I origionally wrote this article for a friend's website and when I decided to post it on 2+2 I remembered to drop it in small stakes, where it would probably be needed most. The feedback is not, exactly, surprising, but this isn't some dirty trick, I promise you! The contents of this "article" are quite common sense! There was a fellow in MHUSH who had an objection, and I'm going to cross-post the objection and the example I replied with to provide some clarity here:

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
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Way two is having the best hand at showdown. Shocking stuff, obviously, but you might be also interested to know that you don’t make a dime for putting money in with the best hand pre-flop.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is stupid. You make money by increasing the size of the pots you win.

[/ QUOTE ]

Here's an example from NL that might clear this up for you: a good player limps UTG, a few people limp behind, and you raise with AA in the blinds or something (if my example is off forgive me, I basically have never played a hand of NL, the terms of the example are arbitrary). UTG re-raises and the limpers fold. You think UTG has some other big PP, and you think he'll push on the flop if you just call, but might fold if you push now. Should you push pre-flop with your edge or just call?

The point of the article is that we're not out to win streets, we're out to do whatever's going to make us the most money on average over the course of the entire hand.

[/ QUOTE ]

Now, I want to point out that this is an advanced article mostly aimed towards the sort of games I play (where most hands are HU). In these smaller pots it's usually impossible for the defending player to realize most of their equity and things like implied odds take a big role. Knowing things like how often your opponent will release for one bet on the flop when he misses are critical.

Now, it usually IS the best idea to get the most money in pre-flop with the best hand, and at lower stakes, especially ring games, where pots are more likely to be multi-way this is even more true (since hot / cold equity and actual equity begin to merge as the pots become larger). There should be quite a bit here for newer players to learn from and store away for later. I'm kind of hoping that by expanding on my thoughts a bit here it will be a bit more approachable for people who find it confusing. I'll probably check back on this thread once and a while the next few days, and if anyone has any specific questions I'll probably be happy to answer.

[BenA]

I think the NL example is irrelevant because the differences in the two games pre-flop can be rather severe. Sure, you might easily 'slowplay' your Aces preflop in NL because you set up a situation for jeopardizing someone's entire chipstack later on. But in limit, where bets have to be put in one at a time, you're not trying to 'win' preflop, you are trying to push your equity at the point you are ahead. Its much harder to set up earth shattering later-streets plays against typical small stakes opponents, which is why your post (as you yourself admitted) probably works better for higher stakes and a higher percentage of HU pots.

You did bring up some good unique, read-dependent situations which are well justified, but generally I disagree with using "you either win by getting everyone to fold or by having the best hand at showdown" to justify some rather random plays. That statement, while being 100% true in each and every individual hand, is not important when considering equity, which essentially measures the THEORETICAL ammount of money you expect to win from a pot. Your Bible seems to be talking about using pre-flop to win more money off of ONE opponent on later streets.

Your AK example, for instance, is super-simplified. You fail to take into account the value gained in terms of fold-equity (later on), control of the hand, and position by capping. What you are essentially saying is that you are setting up a position-oriented bluff-inducement situation so you can see the most streets for less money. Fair enough, against CERTAIN opponents (solid player is not specific enough). But you've now given up many other strategic advantages so you can call with yours outs cheaply? I certainly don't advocate always capping with AK, but I also don't think its just a drawing hand. In most situations, if I can have position and control, I'm not as afraid of a flop c/r as you seem to suggest I should be.

You yourself suggested that everything is situation oriented. Then why the specific examples with direct advice? Sure, we shouldn't all be Sklanskyites, playing 'hand groups,' but A4 heads up against QJo most definitely has value in terms of pure mathematical equity.