I'll start this purely empirically over the 10k some odd hands I have in my most recent database: I have a win rate on AA of 9 BB (in my terminology: big BLINDS, not pt's big bets, which are double the BB) and of 17 BB on KK (ave. per hand).

Here's the way I played both: A fair amount of limp-re-raising from EP, otherwise played them very fast with really no difference in play except that I'm much more capable of laying down KK on a flop than I am AA (an A on the flop gives me a good excuse to lay down KK). But I would essentially always bet the flop, probably raise once hard if bet into, etc. I would definitely move in always pretty much on both, given the opportunity (i.e., the old raise/re-raise type situation). And I never even thought about laying down KK PF (as I'm considering now in certain situations).

Actually, looking at this, I'm rather pleasantly surprized on KK and a bit disappointed in AA.

On Stars, what's actually happening probably looks something like this with AA: I get my 2 callers usually at probably about an average of 4xBB, so we have a flop pot of 13xBB. Just winning that pot seems to me a fairly realistic goal on these hands.

Then what we have on big swing type situations is going to be: AQ calls my raise, hits a Q, and loses a lot (similarly on AK and assorted other hands, many of which are horrible calls in the first place). Sets frequently take my whole stack, certainly a big chunk of it. Both of these should actually probably be some kind of wash.

Actually, I'm guessing my AA rates are bad because I remember having a BUNCH of AA all-ins during this phase getting outdrawn (QQ or JJ calls and hits the set, stuff like that).

I'm going to do some sorting on the KK hands in particular and see how my win rate got up there so high on those (that just seems inflated to me, and AA seems deflated).

Anyone care to share their own win-rates on these over a large-ish sample of hands?

Further data: Ok, on KK, by the time I get down to the re-raised hands only on this data, the empirical sample is pretty small.

All of the PF re-raise hands were against short-stacks, and there are only 5 of them. The ONLY hand who responded to a re-raise with an all-in was AA, and I lost that one (surprizingly enough... ).

But I did run into raises from some pretty weird stuff--the strangest being Q9o, who actually called my big re-raise.

Latest Database......Approx 50K hands


AA.....9.2BB
KK......9.95BB

Theses are true BBs (not PTBBs)

I think your stats are pretty friggin good.

OK, this is freaking me out.

At Prima......QQ....8.84BB
At Party.......QQ....-4.22BB

last 15k hands (since party stacks changed) in PTBB/100

AA 3.36
KK 4.95
QQ 3.75
JJ 3.75
TT 1.82
99 1.72

what I find interesting is that TT/99 is my raise/limp cut-off in standard play
I raise pre-flop 63% of the time with TT but only 37% of the time with 99 yet I get identical win rates (at least adjusted for the true difference in strength)..

ice, I honestly think your AA/KK stats are probably about as good as it gets playing these hands against a fairly decent field. Many of mine are at lower stakes from Stars (this database includes that whole "downward trend" phase, where I had some problems at the $100 game, lost a bunch on tournaments and HU, then all of a sudden had major bankrolls issues). I also think your Party QQ is a statistical anomaly (vaguely possible that the typical profile of Party players is somewhat different, but I doubt it).

As first conclusion in this thread, I'm going to say that an ambitious but not crazy goal is: close to 10 BB/hand on these big guys.

On excession's stats: You're again at close to 10 big BLINDS on KK, 7 on AA (10 probably is very difficult to achieve).

I haven't looked at all mine on the other raising hands, but I will say this: I had good success online with raising all of 99-AA (again, frequent limp-re-raise on KK/AA in EP) as well as AK, then betting right out into most flops. That was my basic strategy, anyway, which I think is pretty good against a field capable of laying down.

I do think the profitability of raising TT/99 depends a lot on their ability to lay down (presumably similar on AK), somewhat similar on JJ (where you're going to flop an overcard just a hair more than 50% of the time already).

Anyhow, here's where I'm headed, as you guys can probably imagine: I do think 99-AA and AK are all in principle raisable (anything else is really just a form of bluff-raise, I think, which isn't at all to say that it's necessarily a bad play). But I think there's a lot of fine-tuning one can do within this range to maximize profit from certain table-types.

Here's another example: I feel like online, the 99-JJ raise gains a lot of value from the AK raise. Players on Stars are very much expecting AK when someone just raises. They may still call with some kind of crap, but when an A or K shows up and you bet, they do start to think twice about proceeding there. At least that's my take.

At my B&M game, however, they're often rather surprized at my AK raises--not because they're unusual, but because everyone has been raising any pair at these tables so often that what they're really expecting is some random pair just in among the cards. Moreover, slowplay on set is so rampant that if you bet your set, they don't think you have it. This different expectation, I think, really changes the way these hands are going to play and how you can profit from them.

What has gotten me thinking about the KK laydown PF, which I particularly hate to do after looking at the win-rates on this hand PF, is whether a large number of players at this game tip their hands further by making a larger raise on bigger pairs. Online, I think a big raise is often a bid at taking down some limps PF (actually not all that bad an idea in tourneys, where just the blinds can be very much worth it) or getting it HU against big cards at worst, where you're then in a coinflip situation with a very tricky flop when you have something like 66.

Actually, one thing I'm liking about the fact that this B&M game plays so differently from the Stars players is the opportunity to get a detailed analysis on a certain table-type and adjust my strategy accordingly. There's so much fluctuation online that I find it very difficult to do more than make some minor adjustments within a general functional strategy. If you can stay after the same players day after day, it's very different.

One question I have here (hence my question) is whether AA/KK need to be viewed as good hands for just mopping up a bunch of raises PF. The following situation is at least not rare at my game: EP raises to $25, probably with a little pair or maybe KQs, and gets 3 callers. So, we have a pot of $100 right there (20xBB). If I'm on the button with KK, am I really happy just taking down the pot right there with an exclusionary re-raise (like $125 or even $150)? Our results at least SUGGEST that I am--actually, particularly on KK because, in addition to the set, you may have the blasted A to contend with.

Also, when the mood of the table is running like that, I think the limp-re-raise is very attractive on AA/KK from EP. But, anyhow, I'm rambling again...

Thanks very much for your help on this, guys!

actually encouraged by posts here i started limping more in EP with AA a while back - looks like it isn't working out that well - i will do some more analysis tomorrow,...

I just checked my own stats on AA/KK, from 12k+ hands.

AA: 11.84
KK: 12.84

This is big blinds, not PT big bets.

I play them both super-fast. I practically never slowplay unless there's a maniac at the table. SInce I play PL almost exclusively now I just max-raise these hands every time, if I am re-raised I will just go for another max re-raise.

I play at the low stakes where people will NOT surrended AK, QQ or for that matter AQ and JJ easily, but will call pretty much any bets with those hands. That's probably the main reason for the bigger AvBB/Hand.


Actually I just noticed that the winnings on all my pairs are in descending order, down to 99, AA/KK being the exception.

excession, I really think the limp-re-raise is only good at a table where you're going to have the opportunity. My guideline at the moment: Better than 50% of pots are raised.

Also, if it doesn't work, you have to be rather careful in reading the board and your opponents as the hand develops.

Basically, I like the move, but it's really only good at seriously raisey tables.

I'll also sometimes just raise the minimum in EP if the table is playing more tight-passive.

Rather interesting, I must note, is that we ALL seem to be doing somewhat better on KK than on AA, and I think ice's database is probably also the most representative (because the biggest). There, the difference is minimal.

I honestly think that this has to be because of difficulties (for most of us) in getting away from AA when it's beat.

On my own data, I'm also guessing that AA took some "bad luck" hits and KK gained some on "good luck" in my own data.

Maybe there are two reasons. One of them that it's difficult to get away from AA, but also that if you have two aces, chances are less that you ropponent will have a hand such as AK, AQ, AJ that tends to call big raises. KK gets called by those hands a lot and obviously make a huge profit from them most of the time, and tend to lose small against them when the A flops.

Glad to see I'm not off from your AA/KK results. It looks like my QQ is doing really bad. I have to review my QQ play, I remember looking at these numbers 2-3 months ago and QQ was in the AA/KK range... I'm probably pushing it too hard.

For 27k hands at 50NL:
AA: 9.54 BB/100
KK: 9.28 BB/100
QQ: 0.78 BB/100 - bad
JJ: 6.18 BB/100
TT: 2.74 BB/100
99: 1.98 BB/100

Anyone care to share their QQ stats, maybe I can figure out something from the stats:
VP$IP: 99.24
W$WSF: 50.55
PFR%: 90.15
RFI%: 26.52
LwPC: 0.00
WtSD: 34.07
W$SD: 54.84

I would also appreciate analysis of these numbers. It looks like I never just limped with previous callers. 27% of the time I was reraised, sounds like a lot. Maybe I should raise more, I usually raise $2=4BB.

I'll probably start a QQ thread after I review some of my mistakes.