I'll try to answer this one, and let the more experienced 6-maxers improve on my answer. (Virtually all my 6-max experience is at $100 NL. Your mileage may vary and all that.)

You raise a whole bunch of hands in position because position is often more important than cards. Here's how hands typically go, against typical opponents who aren't used to playing against positional raisers. Cards don't even matter.

(1) You raise, everybody folds.

(2) You raise, get 1 caller. (Raise enough so that you'll only get 1 caller most of the time. 2+ callers = ick.) Flop they check, you bet 3/4 pot, they fold.

(3) You raise, get 1 caller. Flop they check, you bet 3/4 pot, they call. They then check the turn to you.

#1 and #2 are obviously good results no matter what cards you hold. #3 is a generally bad result if you have crap. But if you have suited connectors and you check behind on the turn, you're seeing the river relatively cheaply, against someone who has already told you they have a hand. So you have seen all 7 cards. If you still have nothing on the end, you fold to their bet. (They almost always bet 2/3 pot to full pot on the end, either as a steal or because they hit something big on the flop and were trying to slowplay it.) But you may have lucked into a big hand and you can push and stack them.

The other consideration is that most people raise big cards. People don't put you on little cards so they're not scared of boards full of little cards.

Here's a hand from last night. I raised 65s otb and the SB called. Flop came 742. Check, bet, call. Turn 5. Check, check. River 8. He bets pot, I push, he calls and flips 87. There's 4 to a straight on the board, but he "knows" I don't have the straight because I preflop raised.

Also, people very often get it into their heads to slowplay their big hands. So if you pfr into someone with AK, he'll often flat call and then check/call an Axx flop and then check it to you again on the turn. If you catch some weird straight or backdoor flush on the end, he'll stack off most of the time.

So if you preflop raise with SCs in position, you will win a lot of small pots, lose a few medium-sized pots, and win the occasional very big pot.

The other thing that's important is not to telegraph your hand by raising smaller with SCs. At $100 NL, if you would raise AA to $6 after 2 limpers, then raise 65s to the same amount. Psychologically, it's difficult to do that the first couple of times you try it. But it becomes easier, especially when you watch the whole table fold a couple of times and you pick up the $3.50 uncontested with a hand you used to fold.

Obviously some opponents are more aggressive and will do things like bet pot into you on a semi-regular basis. You have to adjust when you see that. But against the typical weak-tighties, preflop raises in position are an easy moneymaker.

Good luck.

POTY, good job kid

Ok. How do we feel about treaing one gap SC's the same as true SC'?

Great post Xas, exactly what I was looking for.

I understand this is very small stakes however I am practising my thoery at the moment. However I adopted raising with almost any decent cards from late position and it did my image no hard whatsoeva. Here's my favorrite hand, due to the fact that villan was incredibly tight but must have gotten pissed off with me:-

Party Poker
No Limit Holdem Ring game
Blinds: $0.02/$0.04
4 players


Pre-flop: (4 players) Hero is Button with
UTG calls, Hero raises to $0.24, SB calls, 2 folds.

Flop: ($0.56, 2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $0.24, SB calls.

Turn: ($1.04, 2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $0.72, SB raises to $1.44, Hero raises to $4.6, SB calls.

River: ($10.24, 2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $0.72, SB calls.

Results:
Final pot: $11.68