AA in NL400 - Villain takes confusing line

[TheWorstPlayer]

Never changing your raising amounts hides the nature of your hand - that's certainly true. But if you change your raising amounts without a strong correlation to your hand, it seems better to me. This is because occasionally you can then get away with raising a specific amount because of your hand without anyone being able to read the connection to your hand. For instance, let us say you completely randomise your raises between 3 and 8 BBs. Then you get into a hand with four very loose limpers and you are on the button with AA. You can now bet out 12BB and no one will know that you have AA and want to cut down on implied odds. However, if you always raise 4BB and now you are in the same situation, you can raise it up big, but you are now making a 'strange' raise which people will more likely be able to handle correctly. Not saying, of course, that you should always raise AA bigger. But if you completely randomise normally then you can get away with a non-random raise size occasionally which will benefit you.

[FoxwoodsFiend]

[ QUOTE ]
Party 400NL

Villain has 570. I have him covered. This is my first time playing with him. We've been together for a few hours and I haven't seen him get out of line.

He limps in MP, I raise to 15 in LP w/ A [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]A [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], he calls. Pot is 36.

Flop is 9 [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]2 [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]8 [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]

He checks, I bet 22, he raises to 74, I call. Pot is 184.

Turn is 8 [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]

He immediately checks. My default play is check it through here, but I thought I could confidently fold to a check-raise and considered JTh his most likely holding at this point.

So I bet $100. He thinks for about 15 seconds and calls. Pot is 384.

River is an offsuit 3 for a final board of 82983, with no 3-flush. He immediately pushes for his remaining 380.

I stare at my screen very confused. By the end of the turn, I was nearly certain that he had JTh, but this river bet (combined with the previous action) just screams 'MONSTER' from a tighty in that game.

Call or fold? Also, does anyone think betting the turn is really bad?

Thanks.

The Bear

[/ QUOTE ]

I personally would fold here. Checking the turn seems like a great idea, as I like to exercise pot control with an overpair and position. As for the preflop raise, you need to make it more unless this is your standard raise regardless of cards and number of limpers. With one limper, I would make it 5xBB with any raising hand.

[lapoker17]

I guess my point is that if you think your brain is capable of "completely randomizing" ANYTHING, then I probably disagree with your entire premise. Or I'm just less confident in my brain than you are in yours.

[gomberg]

It's only bad if you are leaking information. If you balance the strategy well, then it shouldn't matter. I make my raises based on whom I'm playing against, what I have, what position I'm in, and how many players are already in the pot.

some other points...
1. A lot of opponents aren't picking up on patterns (weak multi-tablers for example)
2. It's more optimal to bet bigger with better hands given no information leakage
3. You want to give your opponents the opportunity to make mistakes against you. Obviously if you always raise your strong hands strong and your weaker hands less, then the strategy won't work. But if you are against someone who calls too much preflop for big money and you have a premium hand, by all means go and make a large opening raise hoping for the call.
4. You only want to start doing this if you have some read on the psychology that your opponents are trying to use to read you.

Some of the tougher opponents I've played use a mixed betting stratgy preflop. At 5-10, some of these guys continually open raise in the range of $20-$70, and it is hard to pin them down on a range of hands cause they mix it up effectively.

I think it's a matter of personal preference and if you want to keep out of that aspect of the game, then it's fine to keep varying your preflop bet sizes to a minimum - but it's more fun to enter that 3rd dimension... Just try it out for a bit and you'll understand some of the "last time he saw me raise this much i did this, so he probably thinks I'll have this this time" type of gameplay.

I think a more important part of this is 3-betting strategy preflop. When I 3-bet, it's usually large and it's usually some type of mid-high pocket pair, AK, or a low suited connector. I've noticed that a lot of people min-reraise and it gives them a lot of control in the hand (probably because it's usually a premium hand).... gives me some interesting bluffing possibilities...

Does anyone on this board mix up their opening amount effectively? I'm not sure if this is a good strategy or not, but it has worked for me so far (although I don't do it as much as I used to at the lower limits), especially at 2-4 and below.

[lapoker17]

These arguments are not convincing me - In fact I feel that they are simply furthering the legitmacy of my entire point - Where is El Diablo?

[kagame]

let me get this straight:

gombergs takes time to post analysis that invalidates a number of the reasons you always raise the same amount and give people great implied odds to break you and commits you to play big pairs OOP in multiway pots

you for some reason think this makes your position stronger

consider the following:

A. you probably called with AA and lost because youre stubborn

B. you dont want Diablo in this thread

[The Bear]

[ QUOTE ]
let me get this straight:


A. you probably called with AA and lost because youre stubborn


[/ QUOTE ]

lapoker didn't play the hand...I did. If you really feel the need to insult someone in a thread, at least pay attention to who did what.

[kagame]

its obvious you folded because of the way youre pushing the fold line

ergo, he called when this happened to him

[lapoker17]

Um, I don't have anything to do with this hand. And the idea that any of our brains is capable of completely randomizing anything is the one I have a problem with. And I get along well with Diablo and, as advertised, would welcome his input. I play a fair amount of poker in fairly tough games and with trial and error have decided that barring extenuating circumstances - like the AA in the BB w/ lots of limpers situation - I think I gain more by not mixing my opening size than I do by doing the opposite. I also have won many pots because I was able to deduce from another players open - generally a player with whom I have a long history - what that player was holding.

So my premise is that if you never change your opening amount, you will always be less predictable (readable) than a player who does, because even if that player really really thinks he is mixing up his play, there is actually a pattern running behind it all that can be exploited.

Thank you.

[CourtesyFlush]

Instead of always raising to the same amount preflop, couldn't you just always raise the pot or a predetermined amount based on how many limpers are in? That way your opponents aren't putting you on hands at all because they are seeing that you are always raising the same amount based on how many are in the pot. Also, this way you aren't raising an abnormally large amount preflop when its folded to you, or an abnormally small amount when there are a ton of limpers in.