T9s river x/r-bluff

I like your Bluff since you could have really well raised a flushdraw on the flop so you can credible represent the flush on the River and normally when SB donks out on the Turn again. It means probably just does have a mediocre Hand like A8 or Q8 or a draw himself like QT or something. And raise on the Flop is fine as well since you'd sometimes raise 6x or 8x on the Flop so you also have to raise draws and this is one of your good draws you can raise with. Raising Flop becomes more important since people started acting smarter on the Turn and they do check more so you should shift the action towards the flop. Good Rivercard to turn your hand into a bluff. Nice!

This needs to be 3b pre. I don't like the river. Players donking blank turns generally have made hands in my experience. Lags don't fold hands they consider made hands for one bet BvB more than 22%.

I usually dont 3b in bb pf vs a sb opr. And my read for the turn was more in line that he had a weak 8, 6 or a pp, and didnt want to give a free card. Ide expekt him to 3b stronger hands and stronger draws on the flop, stronger 8s aswell, this is a really wet board and it would be silly of him not to really, since so many cards can mess up the hand on the turn, so why not play it as fast as you can. And the donk doesnt really add up, cause the 2 is a brick and i would bet any hand that ide raised with on the flop, so for a strong hand i think his better choice would be to c/r here. So the donk makes sense in that he does represent something, howerever i dont think it represents a strong hand, not on this turn, unless he expekts me to raise and get a 3b in. Against this player however i thought he was betting out to not give a free card. But I didnt think he had a strong hand in this spot and the K felt like a good bluff card, both for overcard value and for the flush which is very possible in this spot.

That was my thought about it. Prolly shouldve written it when i posted the hand. sorry about that. was lazy.

As for balance the ranges on the flop and turn i find it really difficult to know when the board is this wet and the ranges this wide, cause there are so many draws, and i cant raise every hand on the flop without overdoing it, i prolly would if the board was dry though...

Originally posted by floaty
I usually dont 3b in bb pf vs a sb opr.

This strategy gives up too much value when you're in position against a LAG opponent who will likely cap a wide range pre.

And my read for the turn was more in line that he had a weak 8, 6 or a pp, and didnt want to give a free card.

We agree there. The problem is that he's unlikely to fold any of that imo.

As for balance the ranges on the flop and turn i find it really difficult to know when the board is this wet and the ranges this wide, cause there are so many draws, and i cant raise every hand on the flop without overdoing it, i prolly would if the board was dry though...

That gets in to some fairly deep waters. Basically, you'll need to analyze some spots like this one and develop balanced ranges for them. Then, you'll have a better understanding of how to structure your ranges in these spots.

Originally posted by Leader22

We agree there. The problem is that he's unlikely to fold any of that imo.

But I have to have some bluffs right? If I only raise flushes or 2pairs then my whole range is value oriented and there would be no reason for him to call down with mid-pairs... but perhaps I dont have to think that way in this spot against this opponent...

That gets in to some fairly deep waters. Basically, you'll need to analyze some spots like this one and develop balanced ranges for them. Then, you'll have a better understanding of how to structure your ranges in these spots.

Think I have to do the deep digging here then I recon

Originally posted by floaty

Originally posted by Leader22

We agree there. The problem is that he's unlikely to fold any of that imo.

But I have to have some bluffs right? If I only raise flushes or 2pairs then my whole range is value oriented and there would be no reason for him to call down with mid-pairs... but perhaps I dont have to think that way in this spot against this opponent...

That is the problem with the game theory way of thinking at low limits. There's a prescription sometimes with less experienced players that good play is mostly about balance. That's generally not true below 10/20. The players below that are very often poor and exploitable in clear, consistent ways, and you will rarely be precisely counter exploited by excellent opponents at these limits. Therefore, the focus is not on ensuring against leaks in your game, but maximizing the value of your opponents faults.

Originally posted by Leader22

Originally posted by floaty

Originally posted by Leader22

We agree there. The problem is that he's unlikely to fold any of that imo.

But I have to have some bluffs right? If I only raise flushes or 2pairs then my whole range is value oriented and there would be no reason for him to call down with mid-pairs... but perhaps I dont have to think that way in this spot against this opponent...

That is the problem with the game theory way of thinking at low limits. There's a prescription sometimes with less experienced players that good play is mostly about balance. That's generally not true below 10/20. The players below that are very often poor and exploitable in clear, consistent ways, and you will rarely be precisely counter exploited by excellent opponents at these limits. Therefore, the focus is not on ensuring against leaks in your game, but maximizing the value of your opponents faults.

So how are we to play against an unknown opponent then if not to try and play in a balanced way?

Of course exploitative play is better against players who have obvious leaks, no-one has ever said otherwise, and if anyone has they're wrong, however poker is a game of incomplete information especially if you are unfamiliar with your opponent so just assuming he's not going to adapt or play well against you because you're not in a 10/20 game is a pretty big presumption.

Yes this guy has donked the turn on a brick, something a "standard" player is unlikely ever to do and has been labelled as a "bad lag" but in what way? Without anything more specific how are we supposed to take an optimal exploitative line?

even from an expolitative POV he has to bluff some hands unless his fold equity is 0%, shouldnt he ?

Originally posted by kavboj84
even from an expolitative POV he has to bluff some hands unless his fold equity is 0%, shouldnt he ?

Not necessarily, the pure exploitative way is that if you have less than the required fold equity, you never bluff (cause that's -EV). However, balance and exploit are not a binary thing, it's not either one or the other (as some people think...), that's why "bluffing less but still bluffing" is more than a viable option in most cases.

Originally posted by madorjan

Originally posted by kavboj84
even from an expolitative POV he has to bluff some hands unless his fold equity is 0%, shouldnt he ?

Not necessarily, the pure exploitative way is that if you have less than the required fold equity, you never bluff (cause that's -EV). However, balance and exploit are not a binary thing, it's not either one or the other (as some people think...), that's why "bluffing less but still bluffing" is more than a viable option in most cases.

and what is that if not an exploitative adjustment ?

This is similar to the concept we discussed in last Tuesday's coachings where if your opponent is not bluffing at least at a frequency which makes you indifferent to calling, the optimal exploitative move is to fold 100% of your bluff-catchers because you can't have a +EV call with any of them so the better play is to fold.

Now obviously in the real world, if people are paying attention, this would lead to them noticing very quickly that you fold 100% of, for example, your turn x/b range and thus they could adapt very quickly so usually we recommend some kind of middle ground, especailly when added to the fact you can't get a handle on people's bluffing frequencies immediately, although you can get a good idea.

And to answer your question, yes it's an exploitative adjustment but it's not an exclusively exploitative adjustment becasue you're still bluffing with some of your range rather than going for the "all or nothing" approcach to balance vs exploitation and bluffing 0% of your range (max exploit) or the "correct" frequency (max balance)

I dont get it. Why should you fold just because its -EV If you are playing maxEV poker, why do you suppose maxEV always have to be over zero ? What if you have to choose between two -EV lines ? If my opponent bluffs 19% instead of the 20% required I think its less -EV to fold just a bit more than to fold 100% of them bluffcatchers, as you are not being bluffed out all the time so. If you folded 100% in such a case everyone would have to start bluffing like 5% less than required against you, cause you adjust and they can start making highly profitable bluffs with you not bluffcatching at all.

Originally posted by kavboj84
I dont get it. Why should you fold just because its -EV If you are playing maxEV poker, why do you suppose maxEV always have to be over zero ? What if you have to choose between two -EV lines ? If my opponent bluffs 19% instead of the 20% required I think its less -EV to fold just a bit more than to fold 100% of them bluffcatchers, as you are not being bluffed out all the time so. If you folded 100% in such a case everyone would have to start bluffing like 5% less than required against you, cause you adjust and they can start making highly profitable bluffs with you not bluffcatching at all.

Your arguement assumes you are playing vs a single hand and not vs a range and that's where the problem is coming from

You cannot know exactly what's in your opponent's hand so you can't play as if you do

If you are getting 4-1 to call and your opponent is bluffing 10% of the time with a bluffcatcher you should fold becasue there are only 2 options.

Call:

Win 4BB 10% of the time
Lose 1BB 90% of the time

So the EV of calling is obviously negative, in fact it's a 0.5BB mistake.

Fold:

EV-Fold = 0BB

So the EV of folding is way higher than calling. Therefore we should fold all our bluffcatchers in this spot.

Even if our opponent is bluffing 18% of the time we should fold becasue it's still better EV to fold than to call. Yes he'll get away with his bluffs and win the pot but long term you'll make more money folding here.

Now if our opponent is bluffing at the correct (20%) frequency

Call:

Win 4BB 20% of the time
Lose 1BB 80% of the time

EV of calling 0

Fold:

EV-Fold = 0

So in this case we are completely indifferent to calling or folding, there's no "best play" and any adjustment we make to our calling range away from balance is not going to benefit us and, in fact, could be exploited. The best we can do is call down with a range which is relative alpha (in this case we'd fold the bottom 25% of our range so his bluffs work as often as they "should" and we still win the pot as often as we "should" so the bet is in equilibrium and no=one has an incentive to change strategy).

And obviously if he bluffs more than 20% we should widen our bluff-catching range to take account of his extra bluffs becasue now EV-Call is higher than 0.

Originally posted by kavboj84
I dont get it. Why should you fold just because its -EV If you are playing maxEV poker, why do you suppose maxEV always have to be over zero ?

Cause the EV of checking and folding is 0? Therefore anything below 0 is by definition not maxEV?

Your arguement assumes you are playing vs a single hand and not vs a range and that's where the problem is coming from

Well I think it doesnt, actually I meant a range when I wrote in terms of percentages. Obviously you cannot bluff 19% of a single hand or fold 100% of a single hand, you can do this with a range only.

I understand and knew already what you wrote there,and I have been thinking on it,but I still cant get through one thing. Let me show this with an example:

case #1

You openraise from CO, get a 3bet from the BB,and the flop is A66 rainbow and the BB c-bets. You know the BB is a player who he 3bets AJ only vs you and he does not bluff c-bet the flop, and he x/c-s, x/r-s, x/f-s the flop with a balanced range so your EV can be maximum 0 when he doesnt c-bet. Since he doesnt bluff c-bet you have to fold everything worse than AT(except your bluff hands ofc) and thats OK for now.

case #2

The situation is the same as previously , but he has 10% bluffs in his c-bet range now. You still cant bluffcatch vs his c-bets, cause you need him bluffing ~12%.

The point is, that your opponent wins this pot 10% more often now. Since poker is a zero sum game, and there is no cashflow on the other lines (because both of your EV is 0 there) he must be winning that sum from you.

That would mean that your opponent shouldnt be bluffing balanced against you, but just a few percent below the optimal frequency,because he can realize a 95% successful bluffrange against you instead of a 0% successful, thus his EV being higher compared to his 0EV bluffplay.

No it really doesn't

You have a choice of 2 lines if your opponent is under-bluffing.

A -EV one (call)
A neutral EV one (fold)

You can't make a -EV call just because your opponent occasionally bluffs. Opponents will get away with bluffs sometimes, that's how poker works, you can't bluffcatch just because there's a chance he's bluffing, that's just standard pot-odds.

yeah but then how is it that its more profitable for him to underbluff than to bluff with the correct frequency ? Also how can underbluffing be 'more +EV' for him if its not 'more -EV' for you ?

It's not because he's not getting value with his range

We are folding because too much of his range is value orientated so yes, he's getting away with bluffs but with the vast majority of his range (i.e. value) he's not getting the calls he needs.

ohh I see now, thanks for the explanation Boomer.