This is funny because I mostly play tournaments and I was just thinking of making a post titled “There Is No Reason to Ever Limp Early in MTTs”
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I use a strict tight pre-flop raising strategy that has gotten me to a ranking of 6000 in less than 3 months. And almost 10 mil in chips. So it works really quite well for me. I also use it during tournaments and rank daily on the leader-boards (top 1-7). Therefore I am here to defend it STRONGLY. You have to be in the right position with the right table dynamics and cards. These are all things that one must take into account before even thinking about raising pre-flop.
This is the low stakes exploitative style to play, tight and aggressive all the way. The game is simple when the opponents are bad.
Imagine a grid graph, to the left is tight (plays few hands, sees few flops), right is loose (plays lotsa hands, sees lotsa flops), bottom is passive(calls often, bets thin, rarely raises, almost never comes overtop), top is aggro (bets often, bets big, raises, re-raises, not afraid to shove).
Middle: Optimal.
Lower left: Tight and passive nit is easy to read. He almost only ever calls or raises when he has it. He folds to aggressive bets 80-90% of the time. Be aggressive. Don’t let him draw. Bluff him often. On rare occasions when he bets, fold so his nuts can’t get paid.
Lower right: Loose and passive is the classic call station that hates money so much that he will donate his chips to you. Be tight and aggressively value bet the bejeezus out of him. He has middle pair with no kicker and so long as he has a chance he stays in. If he’s suited, he will not fold until his draw busts on the river. Careful not to bluff him though because he just might stack off with 97o when he flops a 9 no matter how many broadways turn and river.
Upper right: Loose and aggressive is the maniac. He’s annoying, but he’s super easy to play against. Just put on some music, relax, files your nails, get real tight and wait until you get AK and call his jam. All of those little pots that he stole in the last 10 minutes are now yours.
Upper left: This is you, tight and aggressive super exploiter. It’s not an optimal way to play, but it does consistently beat up all of these other non-optimal weak players. It beats them better than optimal does.
When you move up to better competition, you have to loosen up, move towards the middle of the grid and play more optimally.
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I know that this thread is a year old and I’ve only been here over a month, but who are all these players who raise 2x pre every hand?
I mostly still play freerolls and 2.5ks but 90% of the flops that I see -I AM- the pre-flop raiser. The table is full of limpers. Someone betting 2x pre into me is a shock more than anything (and 2x is hardly much of a raise). And like I say, these are mostly freerolls with absolutely nothing at stake to lose which actually encourages maniac aggro play. The maniacs do come and go but there aren’t many. Instead everyone is so passive. There’s so much limping that I have to jack my opening up to 5x and 6x or sometimes more to counter the pot odds. Sometimes I just fold KJs because I can’t control the pot with 6 or 7 limpers before me, and of course with that many potential callers SOMEONE or TWO has to have a pair or an A in their pocket. It’s just not worth it.
The ugly truth is that if we rate poker skill on a 100 point scale (0 = what are the rules again?, 100 = Linus Loeliger) some 90% of Replay users are below a 50.
An average reg player who in “real $ poker community” circles would be slightly losing is automatically one of the best players on Replay.
The general lack of aggression and inability to bet without having plenty of equity makes most Replay games pretty insipid.
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My friend, just curious, you’re a genius as we all know:)-why not use your great skills n make a little money in cash games n play less fun free poker here on replay:)…Funny thing, yesterday i was playing a small cash game with a guy named Guru39 ( thought of you lol ) and he LOVED to pre-flop raise a lot like you say—after one hour friends and i felted him 7 times:).
@bill8888 funny! Yeah, that’s not me LOL
I may go back to live cash some day… for now I am just enjoying the game for its own sake 
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SilentBill, if you see this then ok rickswfla friend’s request. I’m back! Rick
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I missed you my friend-so glad your back.
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Now that you back my friend-you NEED to read and learn from younguru, he honestly is the smartest and best poker player i ever saw in my life:).
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You think being a guru he’s psychic? Or just psycho?
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lol:)—psycho:) but a nice one lol
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