Flop donk range

I would only donk in 4 or 5 way pots with something like a fd / open ender or weak/mid TP

rest i x/r .. working on getting more hands in my x/r range such as mid pairs (still don't know what spots its cool to do and whats not board wise)

I assume you mean heads up spots? Multiway, it's free donking and you donk then only for value and if you think there is a risk that it gets checked around.

Do you have a 3-betting range in BB?

With that question answered, it is still impossible to give "standard" ranges because it depends on how much the opponent checks behind. Versus a player like Neobot, you must donk some, both on flop and turn, especially if you don't employ 3-betting preflop.

Donks are theoretically good as bluffs because they cost less than a check-raise, and the opponent gets worse odds to call. The problem is that nobody ever folds to a flop donk because it smells bluff. As a standard, I never donk because people almost always c-bet. But I am thinking about 3-betting from BB versus loose opponents, and maybe donking against a selected few.

Ranges ought to be similar to check-raising ranges with bluff and value. Consider the odds you give your opponents and your cost. The math is identical to the check-raising math, but the numbers differ a bit, probably resulting in proportionally more bluffs.

Hint:

Think about board texture and what it means in range-on-range analysis. Especially HU.

as the best coach(pazurrr) said-it all depends

ambitny best coach is boomer ♦:D:D (go away from my tables at 25/50c ♦ PLS)

Boomer2k10:

I get what you say, however I think you should have a donking range on every board not only on those that hit you better than your opponent. And even on those boards that range asymmetry favors the donker, the donker should have a xr-ing range too. If he never xr-es its almost as bad for him as he never donked.
IMO there should be a balance between xr-ing % and donking %, and most likely it changes according the board texture, but I have no idea how to get near to the optimal %-es.

Originally posted by kavboj84
Boomer2k10:

I get what you say, however I think you should have a donking range on every board not only on those that hit you better than your opponent. And even on those boards that range asymmetry favors the donker, the donker should have a xr-ing range too. If he never xr-es its almost as bad for him as he never donked.
IMO there should be a balance between xr-ing % and donking %, and most likely it changes according the board texture, but I have no idea how to get near to the optimal %-es.

I don't think you even need a donk range HU before 5/T+ or even higher.

There is a balance to be struck but on certain boards not following through as a PFR is a mistake and even on check-happy boards the PFR should still be following through 75% of the time

So your donking frequency is dictated by the board texture

As compared to a x/r'ing range I'd say it'd probably be more varied than a x/r'ing range because of the possibility of bet-3-betting (so big hands) and the weaker value hands which you still think are ahead but wouldn't x/r (bottom pair for example) so it'll be made up of a variety of hands including monsters, big draws and pure bluffs like any range should be.

If your opponent has hit the board better than you have there's no reason for him to fail to follow through or it'll be such a rare event (i.e. 1 in 15 or higher) that it's barely worth worrying about.

At lower stakes where 100% c-bet is still the common mode of play there's no reason to have a donking range as you're just introducing unnecessary complexity. 100% c-betting certainly in HUHU is exploitable by calling 100% preflop and check-raising a ton. If your opponent is someone you feel you have to play GTO against in a HUHU cash game, find another game, you're going to lose to the rake.

For 6-max checking back should be even rarer as even best case for the BB it's a 55% range vs a 75% range, it's rare the 55% range is going to be too far behind so I'd be expecting minimum 90% c-bet in virtually all circumstances

The 100% c-bet strategy was at the outset an (extremely) exploitative strategy based on that people fold to much. It doesn't always work well any more, even at 5c/Tc, there are a bunch of players check-raising the hell out of you on boards they see that you have missed. Whether I c-bet missed nasty boards nowadays depends on the opponent. I don't know if these same players have taken it to the point where they check-back themselves on these types of boards, hence necessitating donking. But maybe donking is really needed already at 2/4 6-max.

If this isn't all my imagination, then this is kind of scary. There are a few hundreds, max 1000 people regularly playing, and even the fish are getting harder to beat. Fish, by the way, the ones that actually win a little, thrive on too high c-betting from TAG/LAG aggressors (in addition to beating their fellow fishae).

Some more of Yohan's whimsical theories: Forgetting ranges and all for a while, there are many players that handle donk bets incorrectly. They raise donk bets (regardless of holding) because they hate donks. Against such players, a donk with strong hands may pay better than a check-raise on the flop (you call the raise on the flop and check-raise the turn, they still might not believe you). This is most useful in small stakes very deep stack NL (versus the right players holding an overpair of course ♦), but works to some extent in FL as well.

Drawing cheaply: Versus a PS standard player that mostly just call a flop donk, one could consider donking good draws that aren't quite in the check-raise bluff range, for instance, an king high or ace high flush draw, like A♠ 8♠, on a small board as 2♠ 7♠ 9♥. A blank turn is then checked. It's very likely that it gets checked back, since the opponent now might put you on a small pair and might not bet two high cards (better than ours). If this succeeds, drawing two cards to a flush costs 1 SB. [True enough, a check-raise may still have better EV seing this holding in isolation. The problem is that one cannot check-raise every draw because that leads to a highly unbalanced range. See this as an alternative to check-calling.]

it sounds like you think its neccesary or could be used to have a raise pre check raise flop ? or are you talking about raise pre c/c flop or even just c/f ?

Sorry, I mixed two thing in my post. Was first talking about 100% c-betting with initiative and position. Then speculations about exploitative donks out of position and without initiative.

I don't have a check-raising range on the flop with initiative, but on the turn I have it versus "if you check I'll bet" type of fish with strong but not nut hands. Check-call, check-fold? Yes, but only multiway. EDIT: I guess that means that in HU pots, I have pretty close to 100% c-bet OOP. Balancing a check flop range seems tricky.

Originally posted by Boomer2k10
As compared to a x/r'ing range I'd say it'd probably be more varied than a x/r'ing range because of the possibility of bet-3-betting (so big hands) and the weaker value hands which you still think are ahead but wouldn't x/r (bottom pair for example) so it'll be made up of a variety of hands including monsters, big draws and pure bluffs like any range should be.

Okay but how much of these hands should be in your range. If you fire on all cylinders you wont have ammo for later. You cant donk all value hands cause your x range would become too weak then.
Perhaps it would be better to ask which hands you wouldnt donk and why ?