Playing aggressively

[Utrmstbst]

Hey guys,

I wanted your thoughts on a way of playing hold em that I have been noticing amongst my successful opponents.

I notice a lot of guys raise pre-flop and continue to bet on the river after they have done so. That's a risky business, is it not? I do this as well, but only with the best poker hands, but sometimes even then I do not do it for fear of what the flop may show. These guys don't seem to care and as a result seem to pull off some nice wins.

If I have a decent hand I usually just limp in preflop and wait for the flop, turn, or river before making any bets raises etc. Is it okay to be limping in with good hands preflop, (AK, JJ, QQ, KK, AA) or should I be playing these hands more aggressively? I like to wait to see if my hand hits to some degree before I make a bet or continuation bet with good hands. I don't want a re-raise to all-in preflop because I might not hit the flop you know?

Any thoughts?
Thanks
Uttrmstbst

[sarbox68]

Dude... read the Beginner's Digest sticky in this thread - all of it. You're asking some really basic questions... which is very cool, and these are all addressed through the various posts in the digest.

Simply, aggression is used for a bunch of things... protecting your hand (AA/KK/QQ to force bad drawing odds for people looking for draws), value (you got what you believe to be the best hand and you're looking to build the pot so you get paid when you win...), bluff / semi-bluff (you've got less than your representing and have good odds of taking a hand down that you'd likely lose at showdown...) and a whole lot more.

Thoughtful aggression is good, and the worst thing you can do is play scared -- at a level where your bankroll or mindset are going to keep you from being aggressive. The BR thread in the Beginner's sticky talks about this too... GL!

[flomo]

what stakes?
6 max or FR?

[donnybaker]

Lots of stuff there.

Do you play full ring or 6 max? In general you don't want to be open limping, especially not at 6 max. It's ok to limp behind other weak players sometimes, especially at microstakes.

In general, when you're raising you're taking control of the hand. You raise both for value and to get folds from the other players. Your goal is to play a pot that you raised in position. In hold 'em the flop misses your opponent something like 2/3 of the time, so if you're heads up and he checks to you on the flop you bet and take it down. It doesn't matter what your cards are. However, you want to be playing good cards because on those occasions when your opponent does hit, you want to have a better hand and take down a huge pot.

Check out the digest type stickies and you'll get pointed in the right direction. There's way too much to put down here.