Glad to see you back in the game monk

Yeah, it was great seeing you at the tables! I guess the one night I was on was the unlucky streak you were talking about, but you still did pretty well at the table I was on, mainly due to one big hand after some stagnation/slow bleeding early on. I kind of felt like you just weren't catching and when you did, you often ended up splitting the pot--hard to make much progress that way, although it beats losing the whole thing, of course.

By the way, if we're playing at the same tables and you notice anything you consider odd, please feel free to PM me or post (such as my various raising attempts--I remember doing a few of the LP minimum raises while we were playing as well as an occasional larger one; was also interested to note how aggressively you played AA in that game).

I think the majority of my aggro AA play came from the fact I was trying to get things moving a little bit (game seemed to drift into semi-tightness at times) and also probably partly because I was drunk.... People often seem to fold (I guess frequently incorrectly) to continuation bets on Stars too, so I suppose that was in my mind.

I think I lost about 500 in that session but made it nearly all back last night so no biggie. I didn't notice you doing anything odd, you seem to play fairly tight and straightforward. I don't think there's anything wrong with minimum raising preflop in PLO simply because it's not an especially important street. I sometimes make small preflop raises with what I'd term "top heavy" hands (that is, ones that hit on the early streets when they do hit and are folded otherwise, stuff like QQ88 or whatever), to allow a bigger bet on the streets when they're likely to be powerful if they hit (i.e. on the flop) and nullify the implied odds of some of the more draw-based hands. That said, I sometimes do it with AA or draw-type hands too, especially low ones, so...

If you're on msn or yahoo messenger I am happy to chat during games. I'm less keen on chatting about poker or strategy-based stuff at the tables as a rule for obvious reasons, but it was good to see you.

Yes, that's largely what I figured.

As to my raises: As you probably noticed, I never raised anything except in LP.

What I've really been doing is this: If I have a hand that plays well short-handed and there are maybe 2 or 3 limpers, I'll raise it big. Candidates for that are AA, decent KK, 2 pair of almost any kind, particularly if ds, also big ds cards--MAYBE also lower ds wraps, although I like those less due to lack of big cards.

My mini-raise is usually when there is a fairly large field and I just have a good hand that has a fair amount of hitting potential and stronger nut-like draws. Like any ds wrap for sure. Big pairs only if they have some extras going (KKJT or something like that, just as an example). If there are like 5 limpers or more (maybe even 4), I'll generally just limp with a crappy AA in position rather than attempting the fruitless task of thinning the field. Then I can try a bet for cheap if the board is very uncoordinated or will have seen the flop cheap to try for top set, also some deception there, I think, as most players who raise at all will probably routinely raise big on any AA in LP.

Also agree as to talking strategy at the table. I don't like to do that. But I think some after-the-fact analysis is often really nice when sitting at the same table--just to share ideas and such. Was good to see you and glad you're back in the game!