NLHE preflop variable raise sizing vs. 4xbb + 1bb/limper

[PantsOnFire]

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Who can point me to convincing arguments in favor of fairly fixed preflop raise sizes where those arguments make more sense than the arguments for variable preflop raise sizing in NLHETAP and PNLHE Vol 1?

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This is not really a fair question. A "standard" preflop raise size is a viable and good strategy. Your arguement of whether it's the best strategy can only be answered by the old standby, "it depends".

As you know, the effective stacks sizes are a major consideration. But if the effective stack size is very deep, then building a certain size pf pot is not really that important. Defining your opponents hands is more important. So in this deep stack scenario, you may revert to a standard raise size if it defines your opponent's hands adequately.

What I am saying is you may find yourself both in the situation where a standard pf raise is best for the current conditions or another situation where variable pf raises are going to earn you more.

As a final note, the term "standard pf raise" doesn't necessarily mean exactly 3xBB or 3xBB+1xBB per limper every single time. It could mean 4xBB in early position, 3xBB in middle/late position, YxBB for certain players in the blinds, 4xBB+1xBB per limper in early/mid, 2xBB+1xBB per limper in late pos, 5xBB+1xBB per limper out of the blinds, etc. In this case, you would have a "standard" pf raise for each situation.

[Albert Moulton]

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Who can point me to convincing arguments in favor of fairly fixed preflop raise sizes where those arguments make more sense than the arguments for variable preflop raise sizing in NLHETAP and PNLHE Vol 1?

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This is not really a fair question. A "standard" preflop raise size is a viable and good strategy. Your arguement of whether it's the best strategy can only be answered by the old standby, "it depends".

As you know, the effective stacks sizes are a major consideration. But if the effective stack size is very deep, then building a certain size pf pot is not really that important. Defining your opponents hands is more important. So in this deep stack scenario, you may revert to a standard raise size if it defines your opponent's hands adequately.

What I am saying is you may find yourself both in the situation where a standard pf raise is best for the current conditions or another situation where variable pf raises are going to earn you more.

As a final note, the term "standard pf raise" doesn't necessarily mean exactly 3xBB or 3xBB+1xBB per limper every single time. It could mean 4xBB in early position, 3xBB in middle/late position, YxBB for certain players in the blinds, 4xBB+1xBB per limper in early/mid, 2xBB+1xBB per limper in late pos, 5xBB+1xBB per limper out of the blinds, etc. In this case, you would have a "standard" pf raise for each situation.

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Yes, varying raise size in some standard fashion based on position independent of hand strength is advocated here Varying Your Opening Bet Size by Bob Ciaffone:


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A player has two main goals when raising preflop. One is to get more money into the pot because he has a good hand. The other is to capture the blind money by having everyone fold. The latter goal is far more important in tournament play than in a money game, because capturing those big tournament blinds often results in a sizable increase in your stack. So, it should be obvious that you need to alter your play for tournaments by raising a greater amount. Even so, I do not stick to the pot-size raise in either setting.


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The quality of my hand seldom enters into my decision of how much to raise. In fact, with rare exceptions, whether I have pocket aces or pocket fives, the amount will be the same. One of the biggest no-limit hold'em mistakes is to raise a smaller amount (looking to get action) with your strong hands or, as some rookies do, use a formula that the bigger your hand, the bigger your bet size. Don't determine your wager amount by the strength of your hand.


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But that makes less sense to me than the decription of variable raising in NLHETAP that includes position and hand strength as two of many factors in determining pf raise size. Specifically, NLHETAP that goes directly against much of Ciaffone's argument when it says on page 111,

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Lots of no limit teachers give rather peculiar advice. They recommend that you always make the same size raises, no matter what hand you hold. Whether you have

K [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]K [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]

or

8 [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]7 [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]

raise the same amount every time.

They may tell you to alter your raise size based on your position. Or to alter it based on the number of limpers. But never to alter it based on what's in your hand.

Their rationale is that you betray information about the quality of holding by raising different amounts. So, to keep your opponents guessing, always raise the same amount.

This advice strikes us like cutting off your leg to cure your athlete's foot. Sure, you don't want to give away extra information through your raise sizes. And sure, some players do manage to do just that. But ... you can raise preflop for a variety of reasons, and some of those reasons prefer differently-sized raises. If you artificially limit your options to avoid giving away information, you soften up your entire preflop strategy.

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Well Sklansky/Miller are at odds with Ciaffone here, it seems. And Sklansky/Miller's reasoning makes more sense to me in what I've read. But thinking more like Ciaffone's and/or the formulaic 4xbb+1/limper seem to dominate most of the NL strat forums.

Why?

And who is more right?

[Albert Moulton]

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I'm not the first person to dismiss the advice given in that book . Daniel Negreanu is another player who disagreed with that advice . I read an article by him in a local newspaper, since we grew up in the same town , which mentions how varying your raises should be more about your opponent's tendencies than your actual hole cards . If I find that article which was written in the Toronto Sun , then I will post it here .

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This may be similar: http://www.canada.com/windsorstar/ne...6-c37f98b63956

By the way, Leafs Suck... [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

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Daniel Negreanu, Windsor Star
Published: Saturday, September 15, 2007

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In No Limit Hold'em, a standard raise is exactly three times the amount of the big blind. So, if the blinds are $10-$20, a player's normal raise will make it $60.

This is a solid pre-flop raising strategy, but you should also consider adjusting the amount based on several key factors.

The most important consideration is the type of opponents you're up against -- especially the player whose big blind you're raising.

...

You should also factor in the type of game you're in.

...

Another major factor that can't be overlooked is the presence of antes.

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The last key factor is position.

...


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Noteably and conspicuously absent from Negreanu's list considerations for adjusting preflop raise size is the nature of your hole cards.

[AFCBeer]

Varying your raise siazes based purely on your hole cards is giving infomation away about your hands. However, the way I read PNL and NLHTAP, the authors are not suggesting raising an amount soley on your hole cards.

What I take them to mean is that you adjust your raise size depending on your hole cards AND position, effective stack sizes, opponent tendencies, your table image and possibly other variables too.

For example, on a loose table with deep stacks and with QQ in mid position you might want to raise 7xBB. However, on a tight table you might want to raise 3xBB from the cut off. But on that same tight table if the blinds are loose you might choose a different size again. You might also make large raises with speculative hands against players who call too much preflop but fold too much post flop.

These are just examples. I'm not interested in discussing whether these are the correct sized raises given the stated parameters - I simply made it up as I went along. The point I am attempting to make is that even a regular cannot get a read on your hand from your raise sizes using this strategy.

Me personally I just use 4xbb + 1bb/limper. Multi-tabling I don't have enough infomation on the table to make the correct adjustments. Frankly I know I am not good enough to choose the correct raise size to manipulate the pot to my liking. However, I believe it can be done and I think employing such a strategy will enable you to maximise more effectively against different opponents.

[PantsOnFire]

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Well Sklansky/Miller are at odds with Ciaffone here, it seems. And Sklansky/Miller's reasoning makes more sense to me in what I've read. But thinking more like Ciaffone's and/or the formulaic 4xbb+1/limper seem to dominate most of the NL strat forums.

Why?

And who is more right?

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I am fairly sure your question will be too difficult to answer.

Say that using a standard raise methodolgy has an effectiveness of E. Now say that varying this strategy will cause a difference in effectiveness which is Ed.

A player who varies his pf raise size might now have a range of effectiveness from E-Ed to E+Ed. So I feel a player who does actually vary his pf raise sizes has a chance of being more effective than a standard pf raiser. On the other hand, he may make some mistakes with his strategy and drop lower than E.

FWIW, I follow both standard methodolgy and also a varying pf raise methodology depending on the factor of the game I am playing in.

I realize I didn't actually answer or address your question adequately but that's the best I can analyze this problem.

[Matt Flynn]

you used fixed preflop raise sizes when the information varied raise sizes would give away costs you more than the advantage gained by using a different bet size.

in loose live games like the 10-20's at the Commerce this weekend, the fields were routinely calling open $110 raises. you have a huge range to work with, the callers are reasonably indifferent to raise size, you're only getting 30 hands an hour so it's very hard to tell when you're mixing it up, and live reading skills can outweigh the disadvantage of giving up information.

some mid and high stakes online pros nearly puked when they read about mixing raise sizes in PNL1. they live in a rarefied environment. in online games you have much less information (no live tells, easier to bluff, etc) and the value of position increases. so playing out of position creates a very big problem against a tough opponent, especially given the 100bb stack sizes and tendency to raise to 3-3.5bb with 2-3 seeing the flop. giving up information in a low-information environment where position advantage is magnified and SPRs suck for one-pair hands costs a lot more. out of position against good positional players there is an intense desire to disguise ranges as much as possible.

they are quite right about the general case. some are overestimating the information leak or ignoring obvious exploits like making it 6bb with suited connectors if opponents fold as much as they say. but in the truly tough games they do need to use nonexploitative strategies like fixed raise sizes OUT OF POSITION. of course everyone's gotten there by trial and error and make those whomping raises on the button. there ya go. information leak costs a lot less when you have position and a broader starting range, so the cost of varying the raise size drops enough that everyone is happy raising. as you approach the button, raise with a broader range of hands, and improve your likely postflop position, the cost of giving away some information by varying preflop raise size drops.

of course if you shortstack or play against short stacks, the cost is much lower, so again you have incentive to vary your raise sizes.

we barely got into planning hands, and planning around commitment is only one part of it. we'd have done better from a criticism standpoint by releasing the first two simultaneously a la Harrington, but we were already way late to market with PNL1.

[Albert Moulton]

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you used fixed preflop raise sizes when the information varied raise sizes would give away costs you more than the advantage gained by using a different bet size.

in loose live games like the 10-20's at the Commerce this weekend, the fields were routinely calling open $110 raises. you have a huge range to work with, the callers are reasonably indifferent to raise size, you're only getting 30 hands an hour so it's very hard to tell when you're mixing it up, and live reading skills can outweigh the disadvantage of giving up information.

some mid and high stakes online pros nearly puked when they read about mixing raise sizes in PNL1. they live in a rarefied environment. in online games you have much less information (no live tells, easier to bluff, etc) and the value of position increases. so playing out of position creates a very big problem against a tough opponent, especially given the 100bb stack sizes and tendency to raise to 3-3.5bb with 2-3 seeing the flop. giving up information in a low-information environment where position advantage is magnified and SPRs suck for one-pair hands costs a lot more. out of position against good positional players there is an intense desire to disguise ranges as much as possible.

they are quite right about the general case. some are overestimating the information leak or ignoring obvious exploits like making it 6bb with suited connectors if opponents fold as much as they say. but in the truly tough games they do need to use nonexploitative strategies like fixed raise sizes OUT OF POSITION. of course everyone's gotten there by trial and error and make those whomping raises on the button. there ya go. information leak costs a lot less when you have position and a broader starting range, so the cost of varying the raise size drops enough that everyone is happy raising. as you approach the button, raise with a broader range of hands, and improve your likely postflop position, the cost of giving away some information by varying preflop raise size drops.

of course if you shortstack or play against short stacks, the cost is much lower, so again you have incentive to vary your raise sizes.

we barely got into planning hands, and planning around commitment is only one part of it. we'd have done better from a criticism standpoint by releasing the first two simultaneously a la Harrington, but we were already way late to market with PNL1.

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Thank you. This helps a lot.

I really look forward to reading volume 2.

Albert

[poker_n00b]

Out of the blue:

If there existed a game theoretic solution for no limit holdem with 100BB stack (i.e. the non-exploitative play as Matt says), would the preflop raise size be:

a) always the same
b) variable
c) unknown

[riverspecialist]

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Out of the blue:

If there existed a game theoretic solution for no limit holdem with 100BB stack (i.e. the non-exploitative play as Matt says), would the preflop raise size be:

a) always the same
b) variable
c) unknown

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b) variable

its been said but ill say it again for consensus. We do a standard raise when multitablign just to save time. If you just want to increase your bb/100 you could just play 1 table and come up with things to do with your time. the first and most reasonable would be varying preflop raises. next might be more specific note taking on every hand. sharper game selection, timing tells, etc. Why dont we do this? because we would rather have half(very conservative) as good of a bb/100 but be playing 3+ tables.

If your playing live and/or short i think this is much more useful. That said i am mostly a standard raise guy, but when i can (and always in live play) i do a variable raise now.

[milespro]

If I vary my raises based soley on hand strength how would my opponent even know this?

For instance:

I hold AA in LP at an aggressive table, I raise 6xbb

Same table later on I hold AA in LP again and raise 4xbb

Seems like my opponent would be far more less likely to put me on AA then say if I had raised the same amount both times. Now apply this to every hand in your VPIP range.

Second scenario, you hold AA in LP and raise 6xbb.

same table later on in EP you have AA and raise 6xbb.

Would this be considered a variance in your bet sizing based on your position?

Seems like its not the bet size that is dictating the information about your hand but moreso the other factors that we want to include as a reason for changing our pfr sizes in the first place. At least from a villians perception.