Inverse Positional Raising Trend?

I think it's something that was more widely noticed at least a year ago from what I know of. Obviously the theory being that your UTG raises get so much respect that raising a tight range doesn't get you much action for your big hands so raising a wider range maximises yoru EV via folds and also gets you more action for big hands as they will be more disguised.

That being said I don't think it's sensible to totally inverse your range as you still have more positional advantage when your closer to the blinds. On a tight table though it makes sense to open up your UTG range to 22+ AJs+ for example rather than the nitty AK QQ+ range.

Originally posted by cgoldie
I think it's something that was more widely noticed at least a year ago from what I know of. Obviously the theory being that your UTG raises get so much respect that raising a tight range doesn't get you much action for your big hands so raising a wider range maximises yoru EV via folds and also gets you more action for big hands as they will be more disguised.

That being said I don't think it's sensible to totally inverse your range as you still have more positional advantage when your closer to the blinds. On a tight table though it makes sense to open up your UTG range to 22+ AJs+ for example rather than the nitty AK QQ+ range.

I wasn't playing a year ago so I wouldn't know, but since I switched to FullTilt I noticed a lot more people doing it. Maybe they're just playing exactly as they were a year ago. I get the benefits, they probably get away with a lot of steals vs inattentive players.

Yeah it's a sensible thing to do for very tight FR games, but there's probably also a lot of people doing it incorrectly and raising too wide early when there's people 3 betting light in the game.

Cool idea i never thought of it ^.^

so is this what the weird sh25 regs on party are doing by opening 25% from pretty much every position?

anyway once people figure what you are doing (shouldn't even take too long) i don't see how this could be a good idea ever, it seems more reasonable to believe that they don't know very well what they are doing

Well i don't think this is really useful at cash game tables. Even if your range looks really strong at FR UTG doesn't change the fact that you still get to play OOP with weak hands. Its not like ppl won't setmine and still call some speculative hands when they're IP thinking they can outplay you(which they can once you start opening a wider range)

In MTT's where still blinds is way more significant then opening UTG gets more viable since you won't get flatted that often and stealing the blinds is more important.

Originally posted by Tomaloc
so is this what the weird sh25 regs on party are doing by opening 25% from pretty much every position?

anyway once people figure what you are doing (shouldn't even take too long) i don't see how this could be a good idea ever, it seems more reasonable to believe that they don't know very well what they are doing

Nah the ones I've seen are definitely positionally aware. It will be like

EP: 33% PFR
MP: 16% PFR
LP: 12% PFR
Blinds: 5% PFR

Which is really poor because as well as what MatejM47 said about people setmining and playing speculative hands, it just opens them up to get 3bet light OOP and pretty much nothing to do about it except revert to normal opening patterns, as well as if they buy their own scheme of their UTG raise representing strength they probably won't even realize that they are being 3bet light and see it as a value 3bet vs tight perceived UTG raise.

raising almost any two ep and only nuts from late position sounds great

Originally posted by vmarqui
raising almost any two ep and only nuts from late position sounds great

yup, sounds like a great idea to put yourself in OOP spots with marginal hands every time.

Quite possibly the worst idea on strategy I have ever seen on this site.

I think it's a good post; it's good to discuss all angles of the game.

Mardy, I'm not advocating it as a strategy to implement, just wanted to see if other people had noticed these kinds of players too.

There is of course some logic behind playing in such a way because inattentive players will be like "UTG raise, must be strong" so there will be some benefits, but when I see this in people's PFR stats its a dream come true for me as I'm already a wee bit of a 3bet monkey and this just makes it even easier.

I definitely a bad strategy overall to totally inverse your range as it wouldn't make sense. However if you are on tight tables and everyone folds to UTG it makes sense to open your range with non standard UTG hands.

If the majority still fold it's fine, if a few start 3 betting light your opening range still consists of enough hands you can 4 bet for value and 4 bet bluff if necessary. If you get cold callers every so often when they have a standard 3bet range you know there going to have a weak capped range and still play your hands effectively OOP.

Recently having gone on a mega tilt roll I decided to get back to basics and only follow the guide (Pokerstrategy) give for starting hands and position to call fold or raise..
Sometimes it's hard to fold QQ after more than 2 players have raised or re raised in front of you but that's the advice, human nature sometimes over rides this but % wise it is the right advice..
I have followed this positional guide and find that playing in Rush games on fulltilt has made the decisions to fold raise or call so easy and the speed at which your getting dealt new cards means that patience pays off, you don't hang around to see the outcome of your decision to fold and move on to another hand if any of the cards your dealt fit into any of the criteria given and you follow it religiously your heading it the right direction...Me? I have found that keeping it stupid and simple is getting me in the money 70% of the time and final table approx 30% of the time...Once you have established what is a tight image, in the later stage of the game you can mix it up...
Using the same strategy in any type of game is paying off for sure...
I have a message on my screensaver that simply says IF YOU START WITH CRAP YOU FINISH WITH CRAP
Pot odds implied etc important stuff but most of that becomes secondary when your in the game with the percentages in your favor...When your all in KK gets busted by AA it's actually easy to accept... pokerstrategy say to throw AK away pre flop if more than 2 players get into a potential all in situation in front of you, in the 8 times this week that I have faced that decision and followed it I would have won 1 and lost seven!!!!!
We know that the fish out there will call an all in with a rag ace or something like a k 5 suited against our KK and they hit a straight with the 5 or a flush but as the saying goes 'even a broken clock is right twice a day'..it's the rest of the time that counts...
Mal

and everyone folds to UTG

SO much depends on your opponents.

I recently was at a table where I had a reasonably tight image due to being card dead for quite a while.

After a few open raise got a chorus of folds, I started raising a lot more from MP and EP, but I did NOT stop stealing from CO onwards.

If you look at the PokerStrategy.com open-raising ranges in Equilab, and decide that you will loosen up in EP and tighten up in LP, what hands would you drop from LP? Most people already tighten up vs opponents who defend widely, and loosen up vs tight blinds.

I don't think that you could safely adopt this "inverse position" strategy without knowing a good deal about all of the opponents at the table.

Also, you would need to drop it after a few hands, because it would be glaringly obvious after only a few orbits