when we say lower limit games, what level is that and is it referring true of just the reg segment of the population too or just the overall population?

As someone who started at the micros and has been grinding is way up, I can say that Adam's last post is spot on. At the micros (and even low to small stakes), it's all about getting value from your strong hands and getting out when you get raised. Once I came to this realization, the game got a lot easier to beat at the micros. Unfortunately most of us adopt an "advanced" mindset in which we believe we have to play balanced and defensive poker when in fact the simple advice espoused by Adam will do the trick at the micros. Easy game.

Value-Betting vs Weak Opposition




To recap, we have been talking about the fundamental principles required to beat lower limits. Poker can be complex and we can find ourselves going in to situations with many conflicting principles in our head. So long as we understand which principles to give the most weight, this need not be a problem. And the most important principles for lower limit games are extracting value, and being able to hero-fold when villain takes a line synonymous with great strength. Today we’ll talk about value-betting.


Understanding Streets of Value

We should already have some sort of internal compass which helps us to understand whether a hand is worth three streets or two streets of value. I.e 2pair plus is probably worth 3 streets, a good top pair worth two, and most second pairs are worth one.

However, the units used here i.e “streets of value” are extremely non-specific and misleading. It’s like me trying to sell you “bags of flour” without telling you how big the bags are. You might be getting a good deal or you might be getting completely screwed over.

There is nothing overly wrong with thinking in streets of value, apart from it can potentially blind us to finding the best play. Even my weak top-pair might be worth three streets of value if I size my bets carefully. In fact, my bottom pair is worth 3 streets if I min-bet three times. The first step in becoming proficient at value-betting against weak opposition is opening our mind to the possibilities in terms of sizing.


Common Spots

To illustrate. We’ve probably been in that scenario with weak top pair hand where we have value-bet both flop and turn OOP against a suspected recreational opponent. We get to the river and consider shoving, but already our “streets-of-value” radar is going off. Our hand should be worth two streets. Surely shoving is an overplay. I guess that means we have to check right? Of course not, think about underbetting.

Another spot; we have top set against a recreational player. We know our hand is worth three streets of value. We fire the flop, and the turn card is co-ordinated, putting a whole bunch of draws out there. So bet turn, bet river? Probably not. Just over-bet ship the turn if the stack-to-pot ratio is reasonable (or even sometimes when it seems unreasonable since it will be a huge overbet). Remember that our opponent is probably going to be calling too wide with his draws and we want to invest as much of the money as possible while his draws are still live. Ultimately the same amount of money will go in the middle, but we make a lot more money in the long-term by not using a consistent bet sizing on each street.


Sizing in General

It doesn’t take a large amount of DB analysis to demonstrate that for whatever reason, larger value-bets make more money in lower limit games. We do not need to bluff and value bet for the same sizing. Our bluffs can be smallish while our value-bets are on the large side. If you find yourself betting less than about 75% pot with any strong value hand on any street, then you are probably leaving money on the table. Also remember that against calling stations we should even consider using pot-size bets or larger where appropriate. Don’t be afraid to make huge overbets where the situation calls for it. At the other end of the spectrum, don’t be afraid to put that small value underbet out there if we feel we can eek a little bit more value from the situation. Master this, and your low limit winrate will skyrocket.

Average means overall population, both recs and regs. "Lower limits" depends on the site. For example Stars we are talking about 100nl and below, whereas on softer networks we are pretty much talking about all games, even some of the high stakes ones.