Raising

[Aisthesis]

This is actually a kind of continuation of my "cracking AA" thread, an additional aspect that to my mind has a lot to do with that one.

Basic idea is this: Why not raise (max?) consistently with position on pretty much ALL of the hands that do well against AAKKds?

What you'd be doing with that is just exaggerating your positional advantage on a very wide variety of strong hands.

First point: You leave out a lot of big pairs. Naked JJ-KK are really bad if you get re-raised pot, as you normally can't call, so you just knocked yourself off of a hand with which it would have been nice to see a flop.

What I'd also exclude here are even ds wrappy hands where the hole is on top. I think the hole becomes relevant in multi-way pots, as it will often/usually be anyway.

One group of hands that I'd also add in as really good for LP raises: Big card hands, at least ss. On these, if they include an A, I intend to fold to a re-raise. But honestly, I feel like they're doing me a bit of a favor if I get re-raised, since now I know that my A was no good anyway.

Anyhow, whether or not it's actually desirable to raise all of the hands we've been talking about (which does NOT include JJ-KK), one thing can be said: You can still proceed if you do get re-raised.

Also, on the AA hands for an LP raise: While AA72 with no flush is still better than 2:1 vs. AAKKds, that's mainly because it splits more often than not. Actual wins are only around 11%, with a little over 50% splits, as I recall. That's really not the kind of situation that you're looking for--i.e., a worse AA playing against a better AA where you're hoping more for a split with lots of chips in there. On all of the other hands, the splits are virtually non-existent.

So, I think it's probably better to just limp junky AA in LP and reserve the raise for at least ss, possibly ss with moderately coordinated side cards, like AA96s or better. I think that probably puts you about in the top third of AA hands.

[Ojingo]

[Aisthesis]

[Felonius_Monk]

[Ojingo]

[Aisthesis]

[Aisthesis]

[Ojingo]

[Aisthesis]

[Felonius_Monk]

I don't know how much you play, I think I'm about 50 hrs or less most months, but as I play about tables that's probably 3-400 table hours every month, and for the last few years my winnings have been quite variable month-on-month. I've had one losing month (Jan 2006) and a couple of incomplete losing months (Dec2004 and Feb 2006) when I only played 2 weeks or whatever, a couple of not much better than break even months. Could be you september bad streak is just a bit of variance so I wouldn't be too concerned about looking for leaks in your game; losing makes me play more tentatively as well (I think we're similar players albeit I'm maybe a tiny bit more aggressive), and I really think you still put far too much stock in preflop decisions (look back at the posts you've started here in the last 6 months and the % of them that are about preflop play if you don't believe me) and dedicating a higher-than-necessary proportion of your admirable analytical powers to analysing this relatively small part of your game is potentially a bigger leak than changing your LP PFR by a few % either way. Food for thought anyhow, and I certainly don't mean to discourage you from doing so!

I'm also not at all aversed to people buying in short (not mega-short but half stacks or something) as in general they don't play it that well and give you a lot more options against them.

I think in general erring on the side of aggression on most streets in PLO is no bad thing - btw, I also think if your KKJ9 was ss you could probably have taken a flop against AA for the re-raise but it's marginal as you said. As Ojingo very rightly said, raising can be a powerful tool as you'll win a LOT of pots uncontested from LP by CBing when an ace hits; even good players with 2 pair will think twice about continuing here, and if you DO have a single ace in your hand, even if you get called by someone on a draw you could well be ahead (and if not, have lots of outs) with position.

So certainly, in LP, and especially with a minimal number of limpers (IMO a huge % of the equity from raising in LP comes from maximising your positional advantage to steal pots when only 2 or 3 players take the flop) I'd go with the more aggressive option and raise if you're ambivalent about how to play a certain hand. It's also good for your image; most PLO players see a regular PFRer as a bit of a LAG (this, I think, is a common holdem-derived misconception) which might help you get action post-flop in situations when you might want it, and also (because people will believe that you're raising a potentially wide variety of hands) won't mean observant players automatically fold to flop re-raises, which can help get you paid off in set-over-set situations and the like. I've always subscribed to the rather unscientific view that good things happen when you raise!

[Felonius_Monk]

[Aisthesis]