Poker – aside from luck, pure analysis?

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Poker – aside from luck, pure analysis?

by Firsttsunami

The concept of expected value is as indispensable to poker as the cards
the dealer hands out. Without this concept of mathematics, which
indicates what we can expect from a certain decision, poker would not
be the same, since it is required that we we view it as a strategy game
in order to reason with it. The game no doubt owes many of its
followers to this analysis.

Apart from the sober mathematical component, there
is another more irrational factor in poker. The people factor. This is
what makes poker so dynamic and gives it is mysticism. Both components
contribute to the fascination surrounding poker.

With the insight that poker has both rational and irrational components, I will now focus on expected value (EV).

If we sit at a table and play a hand, we can analyse our decisions afterwards by looking at the EV of certain moves.

Suppose we have the situation whereby we want to know whether we have
sufficient foldequity to make a semibluff on the Turn with a
flushdraw. We advance systematically and insert the correct information
into an appropriate formula. We determine our equity and the size of
the pot. Using this information we can determine what percentage of
hands the opponent must fold in order for our move to be +EV.

In order to to make a clean EV-analysis, we must
know the range of our opponent. If we only partially know this, we
cannot make an exact analysis. We therefore make guesses based on the
open raising standards of the opponent and his previous betting
sequences.

Time is an influential factor on people and we can distinguish between two types of EV, Shortterm-EV and Longterm-EV.

Shortterm-EV

The „Shortterm EV“ relates to an isolated decision in a specific situation.

Longterm-EV

The Longterm-EV takes into account the factor of
time, considering the effects of a decision on future events. We can
say that Longterm-EV is a product of Shortterm-EV and history. The
Longterm-EV is therefore very difficult to determine since we must take
into account the whole history and correctly predict the effects on the
game.

The dynamic effects of the people factor is difficult to predict,
therefore it may be impossible to determine the exact EV of a certain
move. When playing live poker we can look the opponent in the eyes and
can get a feel for what he is doing, but online, we have only a
username, not sensory information.

It is generally impossible to predict human actions and emotions. Many
a philosopher has pondered this issue. We can only guess how the
opponent will adapt to our actions and try to stay a step ahead.

A question we ask is:

Can it make sense to make a seemingly unreasonable move based on
shortterm analysis, but that will yield longterm profits owing to
future mistakes made by the opponents? In other words can we make
dispersed shortterm -EV moves with the aim that our longterm +EV will
counterbalance our losses?

We must first ask some preliminary questions:

How quickly does the opponent adapt?

Against an opponent which does not take history
into account and does not adapt to opponents, it makes no sense to use
this kind of move since the longterm EV is not influenced

How strong are the opponents in general on this limit?

On smaller limits such as 1$/2$ or 2$/4$ most of the opponents will not
accurately adapt themselves to the style of an opponent. Without reads,
you should just take into account the current situation.

Are the opponents multitabling?

If an opponent multitables, it is unlikely that they will do anything but consider the present situation.

Does the opponent trust his ability to adapt? Does he know us well?

If the opponent knows us, is a good hand reader
and knows we are not unreasonable he could adapt his game against our
favour, perhaps seeing through our game plan. If the situation is such
that both players are solid TAGs, this move makes little sense.

Under what conditions does such a move make sense? It should be used when the following hold:

• The opponent does not know we are a solid TAG.
• He plays reasonably.
• He is adaptable.
• He isn't playing other tables.

Preflop: Hero is BB with 3, 3
4 folds, SB raises, Hero calls.

Flop: (4.00 SB) A, K, Q (2 players)
SB bets, Hero calls.

Turn: (3.00 BB) K (2 players)
SB bets,

We play a few hands heads up against our opponent. He is unknown, but
we have not noticed him making any significant mistakes and he seems to
use reasonable strategic reasoning. He appears reasonable to us and he
is not playing at other tables.

In this hand we have defended our Big Blind with 33. We play call flop,
raise Turn. This move evidently makes no sense when considering the
shortterm EV, since it is -EV to raise here with a low pair.

On this board the opponent will almost never play bet/fold on the Turn.
We raise here, feeding the opponent some false information, hoping that
our longterm EV will be improved owing to the future mistakes of our
opponent after seeing our suboptimal Turn raise.

The opponent will develop the incorrect impression of us and will no
doubt call us down more loosely after setting us on incorrect ranges.
It will take a while for the opponent to change his first impression of
us, since it will take a number of hands for him to realise that this
was the only exception to our standard play style. We must exploit our
image during this period of time. How should we do this?

It's simple: Because he estimates our turn raising
range more loosely, he will often play bet/call
instead of bet/fold and check/fold. We can therefore make thinner value
bets with our weak made hands, but should not try semibluffs so much as
we lose our fold-equity.

As we have already said, there is no guarantee
that the opponent will adapt and that our changes will really exploit
their behaviour. It is therefore somewhat difficult to define the
Longterm-EV. Should the opponent adapt, and quickly enough, however, he
will be left empty handed.