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Brag: I've been invited to a home game.

It's gonna be FR, 100bb. I'm not sure if they're buying in more than once, but I'm gonna take 400bb, 200bb being in my shoe and the other 200bb in my wallet.

They play regularly, so I want to look to maximise my return over a large number of sessions. I think this means if I play a nit heavy 3bet game, I won't be invited back again. I was caught attacking their limps at some live pub game, and they didn't seem to care, but I suspect they'd get pissed if I 3bet them light a ton, but I'm not sure, they might view it as a bit of gamble. So generally speaking, if I think a preflop situation is close at all, even slightly -EV, I'm going VP$IP. This includes playing small PP from EP1, limping behind 3 other limpers with 68s from CO, and raising or calling KJo their too.

One of them is a decent player it seems. He knows of Poker Tracker and Hold'em Mananger and table scanner, he 10 tables PokerStars and used the term value town, explained EV to me and told me how he used to go play live all the time. However, I don't think he's that advanced, probably a micro grinder. He did open limp QJs from MP, but he was high at the time, but I'd imagine any advanced grinder would have that habit ruled out even from his C game.

I'm not sure how I'm gonna handle the inevitable offering of alcohol. I don't drink much at all, and whenever I do I get tipsy very, very easily, like 1 beer, I suspect since I don't drink I'm not resistant to it, like other people. Clearly, me having a drink with them is gonna cost me bb, but they may view it as rude to decline, and may get supicious that I'm some grinder. I'm not exactly sure how I'm gonna respond to this, I could say that I used to have alcohol issues, and forced myself to quit because of, I'd have to lie about my age if I did that too, perhaps say I'm 22. I could also say I can't drink and drive on my non-full car license, but that's risky since I don't actually have a car.

And what should I look out for, being cheated wise?

[quoteI'm not sure how I'm gonna handle the inevitable offering of alcohol. I don't drink much at all, and whenever I do I get tipsy very, very easily, like 1 beer, I suspect since I don't drink I'm not resistant to it, like other people. Clearly, me having a drink with them is gonna cost me bb, but they may view it as rude to decline, and may get supicious that I'm some grinder. I'm not exactly sure how I'm gonna respond to this, I could say that I used to have alcohol issues, and forced myself to quit because of, I'd have to lie about my age if I did that too, perhaps say I'm 22. I could also say I can't drink and drive on my non-full car license, but that's risky since I don't actually have a car.[/quote]

You expressed concern that you may not be invited back if you create a nitty image...
EZ Game imo...thinking a smidge outside the box here, but if this group of guys plays on a very regular basis, it may not be a total disaster if you decided to get a bunch of beers deep...effectively buying yourself tons of action later on down the road

I think you underestimate how easily I get drunk, plus if I do that I'd probably have to drink the next time. I might be able to drive my brother's car, and that can be a solid excuse to not drink.


I've thought about it some; it doesn't matter what I actually do, it's how they percieve what I do. And they don't neccesairly care if I play better them than, they'll just percieve a nitty game as boring, and give the imperssion that I'm just their for their money, they don't wanna feel exploited. If I'm somewhat loud, talkative and fun, their not going to notice that I haven't played a hand for an hour. Quite guys always seem tighter than they actually are, and loud guys as looser. Instead of making a static plan of playing looser to not lose image, I should more base it on the situation I'm in; are they getting suspicous or whatever for me not playing anything? If that's the case, loosen up, if not I can still be a rock. When I was playing with them at the pub, I was telling them how I was raising over their limps with 72, but it was suited and they where gonna fold so it's all good, obviously much more joking and rapport like than that, but it worked. I can probably just joke around and toy with them and they won't know. They percieve raising preflop, whether over a limper or in LP, and than cbetting a lot as being out of line too, so if I play an aggressive game and hint at me bluffing them, I should be okay. As for 3betting light, I won't get many situations where I can do that profitably, if any, so chucking in once every few hours probably wouldn't matter at all, it'd probably help my image more than anything, as long as I'm not being a bully over it.

A lot of this is going to be dependent on the stakes and how serious the game is. I can see you are super worried about being perceived to be a nit, just curious how much live poker experience do you have?

If it's a low stakes game like .5/1 or 1/1 or something where people are mostly playing for fun I'm going to be playing loose pre (not absurdly loose but maybe like 25-30vpip) and just trying to play postflop as good as possible. If it's close between 3betting and flatting I tend to flat. As long as you are playing a couple hands each orbit people really aren't going to notice how many hands you are playing.

As for alcohol, again depends on how serious the game is, if you don't mind having a beer or 2 then that's going to be fine, you don't have to get blackout drunk to not be seen to be a nit.

Just sip the beer slowly. Like when you are under rolled at the two drink minimum strip club.

A lot of this is going to be dependent on the stakes and how serious the game is. I can see you are super worried about being perceived to be a nit, just curious how much live poker experience do you have?

If it's a low stakes game like .5/1 or 1/1 or something where people are mostly playing for fun I'm going to be playing loose pre (not absurdly loose but maybe like 25-30vpip) and just trying to play postflop as good as possible. If it's close between 3betting and flatting I tend to flat. As long as you are playing a couple hands each orbit people really aren't going to notice how many hands you are playing.

As for alcohol, again depends on how serious the game is, if you don't mind having a beer or 2 then that's going to be fine, you don't have to get blackout drunk to not be seen to be a nit.

I've got about 500 hours of casual tournament poker, none of cash, and the vast majority of that I was socially and poker incompetent, and it's been over a year since I've really played so eh.

It is low stakes where they're their to have fun.

A couple of hands a orbit is tough to do in a FR setting; would you be so kind to provide some borderline situations you'd VP$IP?

I don't want to drink a beer, I don't actually like alcohol much, but it's almost a taboo to not drink in my culture. I'm not gonna drink to loosen up my game or for enjoyment, rather it will be a calculative social move that will help me be reinvited to another game.

Just sip the beer slowly. Like when you are under rolled at the two drink minimum strip club. Smile

ahahahah, they actually do that? So what, free entry and get the boot when you're not drinking?


I'll play in a small tournament pub game and drink a beer, will sip at it every orbit, and observe what kind of effect that has.

Omni,
There was actually a home game like that I was invited to. Runs every Wednesday night, and it's super soft.

That being said I stopped going for multiple reasons:
Despite the fact that I absolutely crush the game, it's .25/.50, and I don't make as much as my average casino hourly.

I was worried about what they thought of me, because every time I went I won basically. I had the same line of thinking you did "these guys are there to have fun, they aren't going to want me here". However in those games the guys typically always shuffle money back and forth, on a regular basis.

In the game I played at we'd have guys raise 10xbb with 7/9o and call all ins with a gutter.

Play your A game and make money, nobody is really going to pick up on it honestly.

Just play every single hand imo.

But tbh, I usually just try to screw around and have fun when playing home games. That said, I've never had a situation to be able play with people I don't consider pretty good friends.

They play regularly, so I want to look to maximise my return over a large number of sessions. I think this means if I play a nit heavy 3bet game, I won't be invited back again. I was caught attacking their limps at some live pub game, and they didn't seem to care, but I suspect they'd get pissed if I 3bet them light a ton, but I'm not sure, they might view it as a bit of gamble. So generally speaking, if I think a preflop situation is close at all, even slightly -EV, I'm going VP$IP.

I don't think you have to take slightly -EV spots just to get them to like you and not uninvite you to the game. That said, all of those things you mentioned are probably +EV.

Also you really don't need to 3bet light since they will most likely be passive and will have tight opening ranges. If they fold most of said tight opening range that's different, but light 3betting was originally an exploitation of wide preflop raising ranges, which these guys won't have.

One of them is a decent player it seems. He knows of Poker Tracker and Hold'em Mananger and table scanner, he 10 tables PokerStars and used the term value town, explained EV to me and told me how he used to go play live all the time. However, I don't think he's that advanced, probably a micro grinder. He did open limp QJs from MP, but he was high at the time, but I'd imagine any advanced grinder would have that habit ruled out even from his C game.

In a passive somewhat deep live game, limping QJs from MP is totally fine imo.



As to being afraid to be perceived as a nit: don't be a nit. If you have a huge skill edge on them then you can definitely play pretty loose. Raising high cards and high pairs for value, limping with small PP's and suited connectors/aces as long as you are somewhat deepstacked, and getting reads on who's a pussy and will lay down hands and attacking them postflop.

find out who organizes the game and make sure to treat them well (chat them up, show only them your hands on occasion, be friendly). that's the most important thing to do.

find out who organizes the game and make sure to treat them well (chat them up, show only them your hands on occasion, be friendly). that's the most important thing to do.

You can also toss the host a few bucks of your winnings too, to cover chips,drinks,etc.
Tipping the host (especially if it's smaller stakes, like enough to cover a buyin) will generally keep him happy and keep you in the game.

In a passive somewhat deep live game, limping QJs from MP is totally fine imo.



As to being afraid to be perceived as a nit: don't be a nit. If you have a huge skill edge on them then you can definitely play pretty loose. Raising high cards and high pairs for value, limping with small PP's and suited connectors/aces as long as you are somewhat deepstacked, and getting reads on who's a pussy and will lay down hands and attacking them postflop.

Why not just raise the QJs? I see no avantage to limps it.

Unless they're playing incredibly spewy, I doubt I'd be able to make a profit from SC from OOP; that'd be fairly hard to play, no? It seems like those sorts of hands basically rely on having some FE, but I could be wrong.

You don't have much fold equity in very loose live games, you make money limping with speculative hands in the right spots in very juicy games by seeing cheap flops and then getting paid an absurdly large amount postflop when you make a strong hand.

I don't think QJs is on the high end of the speculative range, so you could argue for putting in a small raise for value preflop, but it's not really trying to generate some non-existent postflop fold equity. Like when you inevitably have your raise called in 3 places and the flop comes A95r, it's best to just check and fold, rather than start planning to 3 barrel because you can rep AK. Because A3o doesn't care and just wants to see if their pair of aces is the best hand or not.

Right, makes sense to open limp some suited connectors and stuff than, and I guess QJs would be a raise or call depending on how many J7 they call with.

find out who organizes the game and make sure to treat them well (chat them up, show only them your hands on occasion, be friendly). that's the most important thing to do.

This is gold btw, I didn't even think of think of this, cheers

You don't have much fold equity in very loose live games, you make money limping with speculative hands in the right spots in very juicy games by seeing cheap flops and then getting paid an absurdly large amount postflop when you make a strong hand.

I don't think QJs is on the high end of the speculative range, so you could argue for putting in a small raise for value preflop, but it's not really trying to generate some non-existent postflop fold equity. Like when you inevitably have your raise called in 3 places and the flop comes A95r, it's best to just check and fold, rather than start planning to 3 barrel because you can rep AK. Because A3o doesn't care and just wants to see if their pair of aces is the best hand or not.

First in mp, Lp, I would open raise QJs. Would play the flop according to board texture, and post flop player type. Which ever comes first. I seem to get into trouble when I approach a hand with fit or fold mentality. If the game is super loose the A high flop might be the perfect flop to bet at.