pre flop raise amount

[basementproject]

Agree with the article 100%. Seems to reiterate alot of things said in this thread.

[drunk.hole]

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These posts are really good for sure, but recently I read this article from Phil Gordon and liked it's ideas alot on disguising while still varying your bet size preflop, I think it applies well to either tourney or cash play so go ahead and read it and tell me your opinion on it...

http://www.fulltiltpoker.com/pro-tip...on&tip=120

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Cool article thanks.Even though I think Phil Gordon is kind of a douche, it was well written and makes alot of sense.

[thrasher789]

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These posts are really good for sure, but recently I read this article from Phil Gordon and liked it's ideas alot on disguising while still varying your bet size preflop, I think it applies well to either tourney or cash play so go ahead and read it and tell me your opinion on it...

http://www.fulltiltpoker.com/pro-tip...on&tip=120

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Cool article thanks.Even though I think Phil Gordon is kind of a douche, it was well written and makes alot of sense.

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my feelings exactly, I defaintly felt like I had to share it even though Phil isn't my favorite player of all time

[MrX5000]

[ QUOTE ]
These posts are really good for sure, but recently I read this article from Phil Gordon and liked it's ideas alot on disguising while still varying your bet size preflop, I think it applies well to either tourney or cash play so go ahead and read it and tell me your opinion on it...

http://www.fulltiltpoker.com/pro-tip...on&tip=120

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I agree with Phil 100% for 2 reasons:

1) The strategy hides the strength of your hand
2) It gives you one less thing to think about when you're making a decision on how to play the hand. It allows you to concentrate on something else. All you need to know is where you're sitting and simply make a decision to play or not based on your cards.

[2p2J]

I like to vary my raises by position and not hand ranking. It's good to vary you raise depending on what hand you have also sometimes ex: you have 89s or 109s in MP and raise 4xBB instead of your usual limp or 3xbb raise. I think these are things that might throw an opponent off. The Phil Gordon article is well written and has some good advice that everyone should read.

[pzhon]

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Isnt it better to raise the same ammount everyhnad so that you can disguise your big hands? I mean if you raise 75cents 90% of the time and raise 1.50 when you have a big hand it makes it kinda obvious

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That would, but that is not the only way to raise different amounts with different hands.

When you limp some of the time, and raise some of the time, you are already giving up some information, but the benefits are supposed to be worth it. The same is true for varying your raise size intelligently based on the hand you hold.

Harrington On Hold'em covers a strategy for raising different amounts with different hands which gives away very little usable information. It suggests raising to 3 BB some of the time when you have AA, and to 5 BB some of the time when you have AA, and the same with JJ, but with different probabilities. This means your opponents may know that you are more likely to have JJ than AA when you raise to 5 BB, but you might have AA, and so it is hard for them to act on that information. PNL also describes benefits of raising different amounts with different hands, although PNL mainly assumes that your opponents are bad and won't catch on, which describes the vast majority of players in all but the toughest games.

You don't have to very your raise size based on your hand to be a winning player. You don't have to make any bluff raises to be a winning player. However, it is a tool which an expert can use to good effect, both in cash games and tournaments.

[basementproject]

Probably important to note that, at micro stakes, the above strategies will probably be useless, as no players down there are going to be paying attention to betting patterns, and they'll probably call everything anyway. No use stressing over bet size @ 5NL.

[2p2J]

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That would, but that is not the only way to raise different amounts with different hands.

When you limp some of the time, and raise some of the time, you are already giving up some information, but the benefits are supposed to be worth it. The same is true for varying your raise size intelligently based on the hand you hold.

Harrington On Hold'em covers a strategy for raising different amounts with different hands which gives away very little usable information. It suggests raising to 3 BB some of the time when you have AA, and to 5 BB some of the time when you have AA, and the same with JJ, but with different probabilities. This means your opponents may know that you are more likely to have JJ than AA when you raise to 5 BB, but you might have AA, and so it is hard for them to act on that information. PNL also describes benefits of raising different amounts with different hands, although PNL mainly assumes that your opponents are bad and won't catch on, which describes the vast majority of players in all but the toughest games.

You don't have to very your raise size based on your hand to be a winning player. You don't have to make any bluff raises to be a winning player. However, it is a tool which an expert can use to good effect, both in cash games and tournaments.

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TY for the information. Great post.