Message Board : Steal rises vs value raises in tough LHE games

Hi!

So I am waiting for the Stox's book (shall arrive in a few days) yet I have read carefully the chapters from HPFAP that relate to shorthanded play and I feel much more selfconfident and do well.

I have a difficulty in distinguishing value raises from steal raises by players in late position. How to tell which is which when it is folded around to a player in late MP or in LP who raises?
I've recently run with J9o in BB into AK and rather would not repeat it, and I play in games that get tight from time to time and quite often the rise in LP is with trash and followed with a bluff-betting all the way down (which I happily cought couple of times )

Thanks,
Pawel 

Pawel said:

I have a difficulty in distinguishing value raises from steal raises by players in late position. How to tell which is which when it is folded around to a player in late MP or in LP who raises?

Well, you can't really tell unless you're a mindreader. If you know the player, it helps. If he open-raises a lot in late position (say more than 40%), you know he has marginal hands most of the time, so you can call with J9o (or slightly worse). If he is passive (open raises <20%), then calling with J9o is a mistake.

The thing is, you have to consider the range of hands the raiser has. By 'range' we just mean the complete set of hands he would play this way. An aggressive player has a wide range (his cards can be good or bad) and a passive player has a narrow range (mostly good cards). Also, players tend to raise with a wider range the later their position, so their position says something about their range of hands.

Anyway, you can select which hands to defend with according to how well they do against the raiser's range. Stox recommends hands with at least 35% equity. You can test individual hand equity against a range of hands using PokerStove.

This kind of stuff is in Stox' book, so you have that to look forward to.

You're getting 3:1 on your money 25% Equity would be break even if the table was rake free.  35% should provide a big enough overlay to cover the difference.  The equity difference has to be higher when you see the flop heads up to overcome the rake because the pot will be smaller and you will be contributing a greater percentage of the rake.