[Lexander]

I haven't played Limit since I posted this, but I have had the chance to continue my semi-regular rounds of NL SnG's.

To be honest, I have always been a serious gameplayer (board/computer/card), and the short but quick format of a 9/10/18 player tourney seems to suit me fine. Particulary since shorthanded you are forced to play more hands. I actually enjoy it more, and in the end that can be very important.

Looking back, my comment about AA was no doubt in error, and that is unfortunate because I focused too little on two fundamental ideas I am seeing.

#1) Newbies play many hands which have Negative EV even for experts.

#2) Newbies play many hands that normally have Positive EV wrong enough to remove much/all of the Pos EV.

I really should have pointed out something more like QQ against an A32 flop with all spades and 9 callers of the raise. I see a lot of people continue playing this hand far too long. I also see newbies play a lot of Q9o in early position and other such.

This suggests to me what I have already read in several places. I like Lee Jones' book, but I think that some of his weaker hands should probably be folded by a newbie early and often. And I just haven't seen a lot of value raising with 99's at Party at the .50/1 tables. Theory might suggest that this hand has PosEV in this situation, but with most players the frustration of the constant losses will negate most of the advantage.

What I am seeing a lot in my own limited experience is that at Low Limit a lot of the normally very good hands just aren't worth that much for a beginner to play. I am wondering if these writers are carrying over some of their own tendencies from some of the better games where these hands have a lot more value.

Addressing a very specific point, I have learned the general problem with A6o from my own experience. It is one of those hands where you don't benefit much from hitting the 6 and you have serious kicker problems if the A hits. You can lose a lot if you get outkicked while most of the time you will end up folding it.

But, anyhow, this was a very useful series of responses for me. I have begun to believe my problem with AA in Limit is just a slightly unusual streak of bad luck with one particular hand. As I said, my results with KK and QQ have been quiet good and I love those hands.

If it says anything about my style, somebody accused me of being a Mouse at one of the tables the other day. I was in a tourney and hadn't played any of the first 20 hands. Most of the hands where bad hands and the few good ones where marginal calls. I have adopted the general tourney strategy of rarely calling raises and generally reraising if I have the hand. Amazing how many times my AQs runs into AJo in such a situation. Then again, every so often my AQs suited runs into AK but I am getting better at sniffing that out.

- Lex

P.S. I will say this. Playing a lot of NL will do wonders for your tolerance for bad beats. I don't recommend it for everyone, but it gets easier each day.