Raise ATC from CO or button?

[Fiksdal]

This is a post by me from another thread about the same subject. Think it covers a lot of it.



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My thoughts on the advantages of playing semi-loose aggressive with a positional awareness:

1. More postflop spots against fishies when you have position. This = sexy time, for obvious reasons. We, as thinking players, have an edge against our opponents post-flop. Every time we play a pot with room for manouvering postflop against these fish, especially when we have position, we have just put ourselves in a profitable situation. Also, playing a lot of hands gets you in a lot of tough spots. Getting experience with tough spots is really crucial.

2. Active image. I promise, this gets you tons of action. The fish get angry. They want to see a cheap flop all the time, and especially if you start using your BTN to raise over their limps, they get really frustrated. So this gives you the ability to felt like TPGK frequently and still be nicely ahead of the ranges that the angry fish are going to the felt against you with. "OMG THIS SUCKER RAISES ALL THE [censored] TIME AND ALWAYS BETS THE FLOP, I KNOW HE HAS NOTHING, I HAVE A PAIR AND I'M ALL-IN. Fish love convinving themselves that the big turn PSB, and the river shove, are also bluffs. I play a really active game, and you have no idea how often this has happened to me. Angry fish who I have been raising over the limps of and cbetting out, eventually stacking off with second pair when I decide to put 100bb in with tptk or whatever qualifies to valuetown him with.

3. (connects with 2) Fish usually know very little about position and why it is important. If you've been raising a lot from the BTN and CO, they usually don't understand that you will be more careful UTG. So when you raise from UTG with AA and an active image, an angry fish sitting in the BB with KTs will typically call because "this guy could have ANYTHING!! I just saw him raising with SEVEN JACK! NOT EVEN SUITED!!" Of course he deoesn't realize that that was from the button, and this time you are under the gun. Anyway, then he will usually proceed to stack off on K/T-high flops. Imagine, I'm pretty sure some of the fish have notes on me saying "raised with 74s and bluffed on the flop." Then they are in a spot against me where I shove with the best hand on the river for a big PSB, and they see that player note and decide to call, cuz "they know I'm crazy." Most of you have seen these fish on the tables, and know how studpid they are. Imagine what you can convince them to think if you try. You will see a whole new level of stupidity.

4. Straight forward fold equity. You steal blinds. A lot of people don't see the value in this, but if you do this enough and successfully, it actually helps your winrate a lot. Also cbetting is +EV just in itself usually.

5. People won't be able to setmine or play for implied odds againt you profitably. Here is an example hand.

Hero in MP (100bb)
Villain in BB (100bb)

Villain has 22.

UTG folds, Hero raises to 4bb, 3 folds, Villain...

Imagine hero is 13/9/4. His range from the MP here is actually pretty strong. Villain can very profitably call with his pair, because hero is likely to be strong and pay him off when he flops a set. Not every time of course, but fairly often given his strong range.

On the other hand, imagine if hero is 27/24/3. This is a totally different situation! Clearly the EV of villain calling is now drastically lower! Hero could have all kinds of stuff here. All the pairs, suited connectors, lots of broadway combinations, suited aces maybe, stuff like that. If villain flops a set, most of the time all he will make is the contiuniation bet! Of course some of the time hero will have AA and stack off when villain flops a set, but the strong pairs are such a tiny part of heros range. I'm guessing calling with the intention of playing back at hero on the flop has a higher EV than calling for set value. In fact I'm not sure if calling for set value is +EV at all, cuz most of the time villain misses and donates 4bb to hero. The times he hit a set, he is unlikely to win a big pot.

Think about these things. Before your next session, set PA hud to display how the players respond to cbets (fold%, call%, raise%). Then play a maximum of 4 tables (8 tabling sucks, DUCY) and try opening up your game. I think this is what a lot of you losing uNL players are missing.

[holdme]

*grunch*
youre really negative

[hanover]

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*grunch*
youre really negative

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I don't think so. The OP isn't willing to just blindly follow the accepted strategy and instead is asking well thought-out and reasonable questions looking for an explanation. Now he has some answers.

Good for the OP.

[Fiksdal]

OP got the accepted strategy wrong though. You shouldn't raise ATC from the button: Every situation is unique. If the blinds are loose calling stations, obv tighten up your range. If you have a crazy table image at the moment, slow down for a couple of orbits. The situation I'll raise ATC from the BTN is usually when blinds have low VPIPs or high folded blind to steal numbers, or when they fold a lot to cbets.

[TheSalche]

I consider myself sLAG, and I can certainly go towards TAG or LAGtard at times, but I've rarely found myself raising ATC on the button or CO, only when I had two nits (VP$IP < 10) in the blinds.

Open your range up to suited kings, any connectors, suited one gappers, etc.