The Next Step Part 3

Hi, I'm really enjoying this rebuilding work and I'm learning a lot about preflop hand ranges. However I've come to the conclusion that creating a new preflop strategy is going to be a slow process. I have so many different ranges swimming around my head at the moment it's a little over whelming.

The first part of the new strategy for me to learn is the opening ranges for each position. To begin with I'm going to play a four-bet or fold range defence and gradually add in calling ranges over time. The advantage to this is that I'll be defending my ranges enough against liberal 3-bettors while keeping the initiative in the pots. The disadvantage is that I'll be turning hands into bluffs where they'd realise more EV by calling. Of course range defence is only necessary where opponents are 3-betting too often. But there are a few regs who certainly are and up until now I've only been playing back with KK+ which means they can reraise profitably with any two cards. I cannot allow this to continue and the new ranges are designed with a polarized four bet range and a good frequency of value hands to bluff hands.

I'm also going to start playing a wider range of hands in the blinds versus a steal. I currently fold almost 90% of the time to a steal attempt which is unbelievably tight and certainly a leak. The Janda video series on preflop play has a blind defence range of around 17% of hands which has about 12% 3-bet and the rest calls versus a standard button steal. I intend to adopt this range to begin with and I'm hoping it should bring my fold to steal % down towards 85% which must be better.

Finally I'll create a strategy for playing versus a single raiser as this should be a spot where I'm 3-betting more often than I am currently. I think I'm missing out on a lot of dead money - especially in games where it's so rare to see anyone showdown less than kings preflop.

I'm not sure how interesting these posts are but this will be the last one for a while on this strategy work. I think it will take me a few weeks until I'm happy but I'm going to be back at the tables now as there's a new Take 2 promotion on Full Tilt and I want my free buy-in!

So my quest for a super solid preflop strategy is a work in progress, but when I finally get there I anticipate an improvement in my win rate. Probably not a significant one, but I'll be earning more with a little less variance which is certainly a goal worth the effort. GL at the tables!