September 27th, 2009 | 
Author: Although you can still use "raise to find out where you are" as a strategy with "majority play" hands, it's not as powerful a move as it was in playing the top ten hands. Now that we're playing the majority play hands as well, two things will change dramatically. The first is your table image; the second is the power of the hands you're playing.
Your table image is the way the other players in the game are likely to be viewing you. When you're playing the top ten hands only, people will fear your hands when you raise the pots, because you're playing only very powerful hands—if they've been paying attention (but remember, some people won't pay attention, no matter how consistently you play). Now that you're playing some weaker hands too, your opponents will fear your raises less and therefore call (or raise) you more.
When you add the "majority play hands" to your acceptable starting-hand list, you'll find yourself playing well over twice as many hands as before. Therefore the power of the average hand that you're playing will go way down, and in time your more astute opponents will begin to perceive that as well (your table image is now altered). Both of these changes will have a direct impact on the way you should play your hands on the flop. You should continue to raise to find out where you are in some hands, but now discretion and deception become very important.
Shakespeare, as we know, wrote that discretion is the better part of valor. In poker, valor (courage) and aggressiveness are winning traits. You will win many more pots by playing your hands aggressively, but it takes a lot of valor to raise someone on a flop of Q-J-2 when you're holding pocket tens! Shakespeare never played poker, but in Hold'em there are indeed times when discretion is the better part of valor. There is a time to throw your hand away after the flop, rather than putting up a fight. Sometimes, "saving bets" is the name of the game in Hold'em; and the only way you can save them is by folding your hand in a timely manner.
For example, if you three-bet with 4-4 and three opponents take a flop, and then the flop comes down Q-9-2, you're better off not calling any bets or making any raises. Folding is a pretty good choice at this point. Even if somehow your 4-4 was the best hand preflop, when you're facing three opponents who have hung in to play for three bets, and you see two high cards on the flop, there's a pretty good chance that your little pair is now losing. Yes, you could be up against A-K, 7-6 suited, and J-10 suited, which would technically mean you're still winning. Notice, though, that even if that rather unlikely "best-case scenario" was in fact what you had wandered into, you will lose if any A, K, J, 10, 8, or 6 hits on the turn or the river. Save your valor for another hand.
Examples
To give you a greater sense of what you need to do on the flop while playing the "majority play hands," I'll lead you through several examples.
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