NL4 FR AK against a raise from early position

Hi.

In general, do you play by the SHC? It says you to fold AK vs open raiser from UTG. Or you have reads or stats, that these opponents are loose in this position? If not, imo you have to fold AK (JJ too) as SHC advises you to do. So both hand 1 & 2 should be mucked preflop. Like in Hand 1, do you 3bet a solid regular in UTG for value? I don't think so. You are turning your hand into a bluff.

Now I would like to deal with these hands as you played them.

Hand 1: When you 3bet, you have to go all in preflop. Your EQ needed to call preflop is 30.5%.

       Equity     Win     Tie
MP2    30.88%  30.50%   0.37% { AdKh }
MP3    69.12%  68.75%   0.37% { QQ+ }

Considering he timebanks, I think he doesn't have premiums often, but he is making a tougher decision.

I don't think you can ever 3bet/fold AK preflop while playing MSS, especially with 30bb.

Hand 2:

According to theory I should have raised more here, but I decided to go for a smaller raise and keep my options open according to how the opponents would react.

If you decide to squezze, I think you have go broke preflop if someone raises. It's a equity thing, you have invested too much of your stack. Same as in hand 1. So imo there are no options opened.

Your 3bet should be 4x0.16=0.64. Since that's too much of your stack, best sizing would be all in (but the best play would be fold).

Hi.
Can you please post a link of the article where it says that I have to fold AK after a raise from UTG, because all the articles I've read so far (I haven't read them all yet) are saying that I'm raising with it always.

From basic SSS/MSS articles

MSS - How to play before the flop
http://www.pokerstrategy.com/strategy/sss/1853/1/

3betting chart

am i understanding that right? positions in that chart (3-bet) have to be used as villain point of view__example: when villain is in ep1 or ep2 and bet _regardless of our position we should raised (3bet) ...and reraised all in only with QQ+
examlpe 2: villain is in SB and bet (our position could be only BB /or/ otherwise we had limpt to that pot) we can go all in with AK

Originally posted by nemorut
am i understanding that right? positions in that chart (3-bet) have to be used as villain point of view__example: when villain is in ep1 or ep2 and bet _regardless of our position we should raised (3bet) ...and reraised all in only with QQ+
examlpe 2: villain is in SB and bet (our position could be only BB /or/ otherwise we had limpt to that pot) we can go all in with AK

Yes, you understood it right, it's about openraiser's position.

As you said in example 1, we 3bet/broke QQ+ vs EP. We don't have a standart bluffing range vs EP

In example 2 you can also 3bet/broke JJ+ and 3bet/fold 88-TT, AT-AQ, A9s

You can of course deviate from the chart, if you use stats, have reads etc.

Hmmm, I wasn't aware of this chart and it clears a lot of things up (it could have saved me a lot of money also). Besides the fact that I have more studying to do (which I know) I'm just wondering, shouldn't this information be included in the SSS and BSS Starting Hands Charts also? I mean if we play a small or big stack shouldn't we take into account the initial raiser's position? (Rhetorical question for PS's editorial team).

Originally posted by Phoenix2104
I mean if we play a small or big stack shouldn't we take into account the initial raiser's position? (Rhetorical question for PS's editorial team).

Yes but look at the bottomleft of the picture:

So you are on the Button but you do NOT look at the BU range at the chart because it says you have to look at where the raiser is positioned. So if he is raising from EP you only can reraise QQ+ from your position

The BSS chart is a bit easier ( http://www.pokerstrategy.com/strategy/bss/1535/1/#h1_3 ) & SSS is also relatively easier to follow ( http://www.pokerstrategy.com/strategy/sss/1374/1/#h1_3 )

Now about your hands, I do not understand this suspicion in hand #1. Is it not more logical that he has a troubling hand rather than KK & AA? Unless he is tricking you, if he has KK & AA he has an easy decision so he would not use his timebank for this decision. That said I just go all-in & find it out if we 3bet a solid reg

In hand 2 where you squeeze, I do not understand the ''keeping options open'' argument. You have no options as soon as you reraise preflop because you are not folding your hand ever mathwise

Therefore I tend to reraise bigger when out of position and at some point if I invest 35% of my stack preflop, I rather want to shove all-in instead

Best regards,
Gerv

Originally posted by Gerv

Originally posted by Phoenix2104
I mean if we play a small or big stack shouldn't we take into account the initial raiser's position? (Rhetorical question for PS's editorial team).

Yes but look at the bottomleft of the picture:

So you are on the Button but you do NOT look at the BU range at the chart because it says you have to look at where the raiser is positioned. So if he is raising from EP you only can reraise QQ+ from your position

The BSS chart is a bit easier ( http://www.pokerstrategy.com/strategy/bss/1535/1/#h1_3 ) & SSS is also relatively easier to follow ( http://www.pokerstrategy.com/strategy/sss/1374/1/#h1_3 )

I understand how the chart works, what I meant to say with my question, and perhaps didn't make it clear enough, is that at the BSS and SSS charts it says that with AK you re-raise no matter what the initial raiser's position is, something that according to this chart proves to be wrong.
About the hands, in hand 1 I was suspicious of the fact that he min-raised me when it was obvious that if I called I had to go all-in, which made me think that he wanted to make a less scary raise that would still none the less have the same outcome.
In hand 2 by "keeping my options open" I meant that if the initial raiser went all-in and the next caller called too, I would probably have folded (perhaps mistakenly).
But all this fear in both cases stemmed from the fact that the initial raiser's position was UTG. Now, with this chart, the problem is solved, seeing that the correct play for me would have been to fold in both cases instead of re-raising.

Originally posted by Gerv
Therefore I tend to reraise bigger when out of position and at some point if I invest 35% of my stack preflop, I rather want to shove all-in instead

Thanks for the tip, that's something that has troubled me many times in the past.