Playing preflop in NLHE (not a hand selection question)

[Acesover8s]

When playing PLO I generally raise preflop with 60% of the hands I'm going to play. I find it gives me more postflop action on my good hands, as I've gone off on in hundreds of posts, blah, blah, blah. . .

I'm slowly learning to break even at NLHE. I'm wondering if any (winning) players raise with most hands they play at NLHE. Is it a good strategy? How do you approach your flop play after this?

I have found after 2 sessions of playing this way that everyone is attempting to take shots at me but I rarely have enough of a hand to contend with. Not to mention I'm bluffing even more than usual, wwhich isnt very profitable.

[Utah]

I think the biggest thing is that you need to be unpredictable. The second biggest thing is that you need to read the play of the hand and the opponents who have acted and who are left to act. This could mean dramatically different ways to play AA.

If you are predictable you will get slaughtered. Tonight I played against an decent aggressive player player whose flaw was that he was way to predictable - and I knew there was a very strong possibility I would steal his entire sack. Observing this guy over 3 sessions I saw that he raised a lot UTG with junk and then stole no matter what the flop was. It was like clockwork and it was working for him. However, he played his big hands much more passively. So, he opened for $6 (.5/1.00), I raised to $25 with A,10. And he called. An Ace flopped and I knew he would lead with his whole stack - which he did. I called and took it down. Of course, I would never call a raise with A,10 against another player, much less reraise. But my read was perfect.

Not to mention I'm bluffing even more than usual, wwhich isnt very profitable.

You can bluff a ton in NL. You can win a lot in the game without ever really holding a hand if you know the opponents.

[Fistdantilus]

I've tried raising preflop with greater frequency, but didn't have much success at it. All i've found was that you end up in massive pots with mediocre hands, against people who are more than ready to GAMBLE. WOO! It's not much fun. /images/graemlins/frown.gif Against decent competition it might be worthwhile, but I definitely know that I am not playing against WPT calibur players.

Personally, my win rate jumped when i actually STOPPED preflop raising. /images/graemlins/blush.gif Why raise just to build a big pot for something stupid like TPTK, a hand that can't stand much action. Also, keeping the pot small in the early stages allows me to take stabs at the pot by raising rather than just betting. If the pot is 1/10th of your stack on the flop, a bluff-raise is easy to do... but if the pot is 1/4 or more of your stack you just have to check-fold. Punish the min-betters!

Fistdantilus