I hate open limping in any form.
What happens when you raise 3BB and short stack with 32BB re-pops it to 9BB with Aces and everyone else folds ?
I try to limit my limps to about 20% of the time and raise 80% overall. When I do limp, I do it on the button in position with any hand and with AT-AK or small pairs in early position. I have to be pretty confident someone will put in a raise to limp here with a big pair but I will do that aswell sometimes.
Also, if the table has lots of short stacks then you are limiting your implied odds against these hands so I prefer to see cheap flops against these opponents and will limp more.
Another reason is you don't want blinds to think you are constantly stealing their blinds because they are playing too tight so it's worth letting them see a flop every so often and then making a continuation bet on the flop when they miss the majority of the time and then go back to taking their blinds away by raising when they don't have a hand for the next few rounds. You can even get lucky here and flop a big hand cheaply.
For these reasons alone any reasonable strategy has to include open limping.
with aggro shortstacks present you simply tighten your range.
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