Limp/calling with aces

[BusterFlush]

Limping with Aces in MTT is best when:
1. The table is aggressive and a LP player is garaunteed to raise.
2. Have you limped with other hands during the event and folded to a raise? If you raise every single hand then limp in this one time, any non-donkey's radar is on.
3. Limping is gambling. The bigger your stack, the less you should gamble with AA.

[betgo]

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agreed, that's a similar level that I play at, and whenever I see a limp push I immediately put them on a medium pocket pair with a slight possibility of ak and a slight possibility of high pair. But it's like 90% medium pair.

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When I said any buyin, I meant high buyin, but also in ordinary tournaments. In the Stars $5 rebuy between the rebuy period and the bubble(forget the rebuy period), the play is pretty maniacal, so you should get plenty of action just raising or limpraising. Against real loose fish, there is no point getting tricky.

[morphball]

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Limping with Aces in MTT is best when:
1. The table is aggressive and a LP player is garaunteed to raise.
2. Have you limped with other hands during the event and folded to a raise? If you raise every single hand then limp in this one time, any non-donkey's radar is on.
3. Limping is gambling. The bigger your stack, the less you should gamble with AA.

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I agree. I only limp with aces in the following circumstances:

1. I am in early position;

2. The table is aggressive;

3. The table has reason to believe that when I limp early, I am not that strong.

In other words, I only limp with AA when I am 90% or more sure the table will raise me before the flop! If you limp and 5 people follow, how sure are you about your aces now?

Also, I have read some comments about limping with them at the final tables so that you can deceive your opponents. This doesn't seem right to me at all. You only get aces 1 out of 220 times. If you want to add in the other premiums hands, KK/QQ/AK, you'll see that you do not get those so often either. I think only 1 out of 40 or hands. So being cute doesn't seem to pay because you may not get another good hand again, and you can be pretty sure you won't see AA again at all. So I see little value in this avenue of trickery.

Bottom line - you only limp with AA when you are sure that you will be raised before the flop, period, that is IMHO.

[Spee]

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I know the books and the consensus on this forum indicate that when you limp with aces, you should reraise when raised.

I have had some success with limp calling and I have seen other people use this play. It creates great deception and works at any buyin level. The raiser is sure you have a marginal or speculative hand and is almost certain to make a continuation bet.

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IMHO, this is very much a position and opponent oriented decision. Most of the comments to follow are for full table. IMHO, the fewer players at the table, the more deception may be required to keep players in the hand long enough to get them to pay you off.

I totally disagree with those advocating limping with Aces UTG (or UTG+1). The last thing in the world you want with Aces is 4 or 5 people overcalling with hands like JTs, KQs, middle pairs, and the like). I would much rather raise a bit to drive out hands like little pairs, to instead face only one or two dominated hands like AQ or JJ to pay me off the whole way.

Rather than limp with Aces, IMHO, most players would be better off simply playing them (and other big pairs) slightly differently each time. Against better players, I will almost always raise with these hands, but do it differently, perhaps raising 2xBB one time, then 3x or 4xBB another. This is of particular importance if the table has just seen me play something like KQs or 99 or something similar the same way in a recent hand.

Same thing goes with the flop. If the flop suits me, and depending on position and opponents, I might bet out with the Aces, or check raise, or check call.

The goal with pocket Aces is to try and extract maximum penalty from anyone who wants to play against them. The only reason to come off the stall and give your hand away is when the pot is big enough to warrant it, or you are sure to be ahead and get a caller.

While I couldn't guarantee this to be true against the top higher limit MTT players because I don't have the experience, IMHO, most lower limit MTT'ers have a short term memory that is about 3-5 hands long.

Therefore, I try to remember how the last 3-5 hands have been played, against whom, and how the hand played out. If I can add some deception to a strong hand like AA by playing it somewhat similar to a recent hand that I think the opponent can remember, then that is often enough to do the trick.

[Dave D]

I totally disagree that this wont work at the lower levels (20-30 buy in tourneys). I think its more like the conditions weren't right for it. What I mean is that I'm rarely in a situation where I have aces and there arent already a few limpers. But given how wild some tourneys are early on, you can definatly get people to call a push early on. It's all about making sure that it's going to be HU, which is rare, not about getting calls of all ins.

[MikeSmith]

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I know the books and the consensus on this forum indicate that when you limp with aces, you should reraise when raised.

I have had some success with limp calling and I have seen other people use this play. It creates great deception and works at any buyin level. The raiser is sure you have a marginal or speculative hand and is almost certain to make a continuation bet.

To make this play, you need aces, not kings or whatever. You need to have only one opponent. Also, the money need to be reasonably deep. It can be real deep or just deep enough so that villain will have trouble calling a limpraise. You prefer that villain raised from late position, so he probably doesn't have a big hand. If you think villain has JJ-KK or AK, go ahead and limpraise. You also prefer that the opponent is in the blinds so you have position. Normally you would try this against an opponent in the blinds if you limped from mid to late position, so the player in the blinds doesn't need a big hand to raise. The flat call should thoroughly convince him you have a marginal hand. You want an aggressive opponent. You want to do this when you think your opponent will read the limpraise correctly.

I see people play aces in ways that make it fairly obvious that they have aces. This approach makes it almost impossible that your opponent will consider you might have aces.

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Really good advice, but if im out of position on flop i might throw out a probe bet on flop unless the guy is aggressive, i would hate for it to go check check on flop. The probe bet looks exactly what it is and might even encourage a reraise if he hit the flop at all.