SSHE starting hands question
 

So jason_t mentioned to me yesterday that I should be raising ATs from early position in a 2/4 game. I reread my SSHE on this and it recommends that play for games with 6+ players in on the flop most hands. I rarely find games where THAT many people are playing each hand. Am I not understanding something?

Re: SSHE starting hands question
 

The time I like to raise a hand like ATs utg or even KJs, is when I believe many people are gonna call me with worse hands. I like the idea of buiding a large mutiway pot with these hands. If I believe my raise will only get called by 1 or 2 players or I'll get 3 bet and be against 1 or 2 players, then I would rather limp with these hands as I would rather play these hands 6 or 7 handed for one small bet OOP than 2 or 3 handed for 2-3 small bets OOP. On rare occasions when I think an UTG raise will win the blinds, then I will raise in that situation also.
There are many 2-4 games where it would be correct to raise with ATs utg, and there are many where It would be correct to call.
In general, if you have no read on the table, I think it would be better to call UTG than raise, but thats just my opinion, as I have no hard data to back up any of my logic in this post.

Re: SSHE starting hands question
 

A lot of(most?) 2+2ers will tell you to raise in a 'tight' game with a few hands in EP that SSH says not to (I'm thinking mainly AJo, ATs, KQs, 99). I have asked a couple times about why the deviation from SSH but never received a reply that was better than something along the lines of "because its more profitable". At which point I ask why SSH doesn't have us raising those hand and they then don't reply. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] But I have came up with a couple thoughts that might atleast have something to do with it...

1) The online games used to be looser. Apparently 2/4 today played more like 1/2 or .5/1 a year to two years ago. Perhaps back then the games were loose enough where the game was playing more like a loose SSH game than a tight one.

2) Raising more hands UTG might be be a good plan for very tight/aggressive games. Last week I was playing two tables of Absolute 5/10 for about two hours and during the session EVERY time I limped in EP I was raised and EVERY time I raised in EP I took the blinds.

Re: SSHE starting hands question
 

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Last week I was playing two tables of Absolute 5/10 for about two hours and during the session EVERY time I limped in EP I was raised and EVERY time I raised in EP I took the blinds.

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Once you play in these types of games, you will stop open limping 22-55 and suited A-trash from UTG1.

It's so fun to limp 33, all fold to CO who raises, then the rest fold, you call.

Flop

AJ7, you check fold, repeat.

Re: SSHE starting hands question
 

[ QUOTE ]
jason_t mentioned to me yesterday that I should be raising ATs from early position in a 2/4 game. I reread my SSHE on this and it recommends

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p.68 Big Suited Broadway ...ATs:

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These are very strong hands...They play well against many or a few opponents. They shine in both passive and aggressive games.





If the pot is unraised, you should usually raise with any of these hands.

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Re: SSHE starting hands question
 

The issue in this case would be your position... I don't think anybody on here would argue against raising ATs from LP or MP.

Also the chart in SSH for tight games says to limp ATs in EP.

Re: SSHE starting hands question
 

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Last week I was playing two tables of Absolute 5/10 for about two hours and during the session EVERY time I limped in EP I was raised and EVERY time I raised in EP I took the blinds.

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Dear god man. TABLE SELECTION.

Re: SSHE starting hands question
 

SSH was written with the B&M game in mind. Typically, even today, small stakes B&M games are a whole lot looser and generally crazier than online ones. This is part of the reason they recommend not raising with ATs from EP, I believe...you are going to be coldcalled too much, and while ATs is a good hand in a multiway pot, it is not a good hand to play for 2+ bets in a multiway pot.

Since the online games are generally much tighter than their B&M counterparts, many players have realized that it's now profitable to raise a wider range of hands from EP, even UTG, because they will not be coldcalled in multiple places--if I'm playing a hand with ATs, I want it to be either shorthanded or for one bet preflop. And, because the online games are generally more aggressive than the B&M games that Ed et al had in mind when writing the book, you cannot often limp ATs from EP because the pot is very likely to be raised behind you. So you get into a raise/fold kind of picture on most online SS tables.

Also, keep in mind that SSH is not meant to be the be all end all of LHE play. The authors point out in the book that not all of the advice they give is good for every situation, and that as you grow more experienced in your play and learn to recognize & take advantage of slight +EV situations, you will start to stray from a good deal of what SSH teaches. The book lays the foundation for the correct way of thinking for a small stakes, limit hold'em player--it is up to all of us to take things to the next level.

What you should be raising from EP should be directly correlated to how tightly the table is playing and how well you feel you stack up against your opponents in the postflop game. If the table is playing so tightly that nobody will enter a raised pot with anything less than a truly premium hand (AA-JJ, AK), then you should be raising quite a few hands from every position (and check/folding a lot of flops when you get 3-bet).

Re: SSHE starting hands question
 

I actually sat down because they looked like good tables for the site. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Re: SSHE starting hands question
 

Also to add to this is that it says right in the book that the starting hand charts were made suboptimal to make them easier to memorize. A lot of the situations for early and middle position were treated the same, even though this shouldn't be the case, simply for the case of ease of memorization.

After you've been playing for a while you tend to stray quite a bit from the chart.