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[Chrissio]

I’m playing in a 10 player NL Holdem cash game where the typical buy in is $60 with 25c/25c blinds. One week I made a pile of money but on subsequent weeks I’ve been losing it. The table plays like no other cash game I’ve ever seen. I’m a reasonably competent player and don’t feel uncomfortable about playing the flop/turn/ river. I was wondering if you could give me some advice on starting hands vs position for the type of game I’m going to describe and where I should have each type player seated.

Pre-flop the betting seams to be pretty aggressive from the initial bettor but then about half the table calls! A typical raise in this game is 6-20x BB and you can expect sometimes the entire table to call a bet preflop just to see what happens on the flop. Post flop the betting tends to get pretty aggressive. When I play a nice hand like AKs if I raise to 4xBB and I can expect almost the entire table to call. If I raise to 12xBB I’ll still get 4+ callers. If I raise to 25xBB I may get 1 caller but then I’m seriously overplaying my hand and potenetially in a big pot with a guy that I can’t shake off with a decent flop bet when I miss the A or K. It’s almost impossible to drive people out of a pot preflop. I’ve been playing fairly tight. I play low suited connectors in good position, play big suited connectors in any position and always play pocket pairs looking for a set on the flop. The problem is that with hands like TT I can raise and will get 5 callers and when the board comes JQ4, chances are one of these fools is holding Q8o and I’m drawing to 2 outs. It seems that the only way to make money is with QQ, KK or AA and even then with 5 callers AA gets busted and besides I can’t wait all night for AA!

Essentially we normally end up with big preflop pots with multiple players where pocket pairs are uselss unless you flop a set and draws are often shut out pretty aggressively.

Every pot is raised to ~10BB so when I’m on the button with a nice drawing hand like 78s, I’m forced to drop it and end up playing few hands. If I try and kill a pot from the SB or BB with a big bet chances are several people will call and I’m left with a big pot to fight for with aggressive post flop players, out of position.

Basically these guys are all good tournament players and will happily go all in preflop or on the flop with a ‘monster’ like AQo. I find it frustrating as I end up getting driven out the pot unless I have at least top pair A kicker or better.

So here are my questions:

What type of starting hands should you play in early, middle and late position in a game where preflop bets are big with multiple callers and post flop action is definately on the aggressive side and very often multi-way? Should I play tight or loose. Aggressive or ultra aggressive?