2013: Make or break

Working on your wedding day? You should be drunk by now!

Have a great day man!

Thanks for the good wishes!

Just got back from two weeks away in Italy. Went to Venice, Florence/Tuscany (Siena, Pisa as well), Sorrento (day trips to Positano, Amalfi, Capri) and Rome.

Was pretty amazing, and had some ridiculous weather. Almost too hot really, 37 celsius for a few days in Rome! But no rain is fine by me. Pretty sure every other couple we met there that didn't have any kids was also on their honeymoon.

Wedding day went really well too. Really much smoother than I could have hoped for. Perfect weather for an outdoor wedding, and no drama amongst my parents (who are split up) etc is also a bonus. So that's great. Not used to saying 'wife' yet though.

Hopefully get my first grinding in this weekend, which is a long weekend here!

Say wife as much as you can. She should be the best thing that ever happened to you and the word should reflect that. Drunk btw.

Went to woodbine casino yesterday. I hadn't grinding any online since I got back from my honeymoon (been mostly working on GTO math), so that was my first grind.

My live crushing continues so that's good! Up $4.5k yesterday. I'm definitely running hot, but live players are still very bad which is also helping. I'm up $12k now for my last 4 casino visits.

Notable hands from yesterday:

1) Started playing 2/5 until the 5/5 $1k game opened up.
Table broke to 5 handed. 500 effective
Loose utg opens, bad bad btn calls, and I call in BB.
Flop is one diamond. I c/c utg cbet (he had been cb every board).
Turn 5 (luckbox), I c/r utg and he ships (shipping is so bad vs my range here) QQ and I win.

+500ish

2) Early on in the 5/5 $1k table it's only 5 handed. One young asian guy is rampant 3betting me IP (ie: every time I open). One hand I opened 44 to $20, he 3b me IP to $65 and I called 44 OOP $1k effective. c/r KQ5 dry board he called, bet turn 2 he called, riv ck/ck he has KTo.

-400ish
I change seats to get on his left (bad etiquette live?). Next hand I open is 44 UTG, and he 3b me in BB this time. I call and flop QxJh4x. He cbet I call, turn Qh he doubles $300 (leaving $500 behind), I jam he folds. I could call here, that might be better.

+$500ish

3) 5/5 $1k game. $1k effective.
I steal button (I had been stealing often) with
reasonably active 3bettor 3b me $20 to 65 in sb. I 4b to $185 and he calls very quickly OOP.
Flop comes and he quickly donks $300 into like $390 which made zero sense to me on this board. I put him on air here for sure and expected to face a check often on turn.
Turn comes and he shoves $500 remaining half pot into $1k. Getting 3:1 I have to call here I think, with assumption of 12 outs.
I call and my read was right, he had air, but his air beat mine, he had and won, so I got owned haha.

-$1k

4) HUGE cooler hand, $1450 effective. Live pro young asian guy opens CO, aggro guy from hand 2 3bets $35 to $165 in SB. I have AA in BB and re-pop him to $390. PFR folds, SB 5bets to $900 - I shove, and hold vs his KK.

I think I'm VERY polarized in this spot, given these stacks. I really don't think he should be 5b KK here or at least not that huge. I'm never making a move over that.

+1500ish

5) UTG opener just won a big pot, $1800 effective. He opens $25, seems like some live reg/pro type player. I 3b on btn to $85 (I hadn't been 3b much since I got deep). SB (horrible player, who has been cold calling tons of hands), cold calls my 3b, and UTG calls.
Flop is , checked to me, I bet $250 into $260. SB folds UTG calls.
Turn he donks $300 into $760. This donk makes just no sense here, and in my experience is ppl block betting or trying to price their draw cheaply and hope they get a fold. I shove all-in for $1200 more or so he folds (later that session he says he folded AK).

Guy to my right says I knew you knew he didn't have it, I show him my ATo. SB in the hand says 'show one show all', so I tell everyone I had AT offsuit, so everyone knows I ran a big bluff.

+750ish

6) Few mins later, ~$1k effective meh player opens $25 MP.
I 3b on CO to $85 with and same donk cold caller from last hand cold calls again, PFR also calls.
Flop comes , I bet $140 and only PFR c/c.
Turn and assuming I have a bad bluffy image I overbet shove like $760 into $520ish.
He tanks and ends up calling pocket 8's and I hold and win.

+1100ish

Nice! I was just wondering how you remembered these hands. Do you take notes at the table?

Originally Posted by griffey24

I change seats to get on his left (bad etiquette live?).

meh i used to do it ALL the time and come up with bullshit excuses for doing it like "i like sitting next to the dealer" "i hate having my back to the room" (if the table happens to be in somewhat of a corner), "that seat has gone cold", "it's bad luck" etc etc. probably bad etiquette but this was probably the most recreational live 500nl game going around so i got away with it. most of the old guys i was playing against were superstitious about gambling anyway so that made it easier.

Haha that's ok that's good drunk advice

Naah no notes. I have the worst memory in the world haha, but I can remember hands reasonably well. Or at least the general gist of them.

I'm positive the actual suits in these hands aren't right, or at least the suits on the boards aren't, but the general idea of the hands are right. The cards are right, and whether or not certain streets became suited are right.

I think if you lose $1k in a hand, it sticks in your brain pretty well

1-2 live, no one really cares / understands , higher up they might. Just give any reason if questioned. "that seat ran bad earlier why would you move there" "It's due now" etc etc. Sure regs know what you are doing. You are trying to exploit people at the poker table. Maybe the fish even notice but its still very ev to hop into good seats.

Yah thanks guys! It just didn't feel right, but I moved anyway cause I knew that guy would be a headache to me haha.

But I do agree, I think tons of ppl just move seats cause "their seat is running bad", and maybe I could even look like a donk that way.

Heading to the casino again this Saturday. I've hardly played online since a month ago before my wedding. It's tough to motivate grinding 1/2 nl online in tough games, 8 tables at a time, when I can grind $1k buyin soft live games and make more in 4 visits than I would make in 5 months online.

So we'll see if my live run good / play good continues!

did you suggest a combined Vegas wedding /honeymoon ?

Haha no I don't think I would want that! bachelor party in Vegas was enough!

Went to the casino again yesterday. Was slower day than previous days. No 5/5 - $1k game was running until the last hour or so I was there, so played only 2/5 - $500 max buyin unlike previous days.

Was up $900 yesterday, so that's $12.9 in my last 5 visits. Still pretty good. I'm feeling good about how I ran yesterday being pretty meh/average, so it's good to see I can still book almost $1k at the lower game when I'm not running hot.

More and more regulars are recognizing me now though, so people might get more reads on my style though soon, so I have to keep this in mind for sure going forward.

My big pots were the following:

1. Like 3 minutes into sitting down at 2/5 one nitty reg I played with before opens MP. I flat TT on CO, SB older guy sq him 15 15 to 45 and has a $240 stack. MP Opener folds, and I shove TT and hold vs his AK. MP says he folded JJ in that spot, WHAT! NITS!

+$250

2. My friend I came to the casino with isolates limpers 5 5 to 35. He had been isolating a TON. I haven't been 3betting him at all the last 4 times we came to the casino, mostly just staying out of his way. He's pretty tight overall. I decide to 3b AKo on the btn 35 to 105, we have like $600 effective. He calls OOP. Flop is KT5, pot is like $230 and I cbet $105 he c/c. Turn brick is $450 and I jam $390 and he folds. When I'm driving him home he says he folded AK... another WHAT. This shows how tight I have been playing against him in previous sessions, cause he's putting me almost solely on KK/AA here.
+$220

3. Later on, EP opener to $20, MP calls, CO huge fish calls, SB calls and I sq KJo to $110 in the BB. Everyone folds but the CO. Flop is like Qh6c4c - pot $270 and I cbet $153 he calls. Turn pot $576, turn is 9d I ck he cks behind, river is Ad I lead $225 and he folds.

+$160

4. Two limpers EP I iso MP to $35 with A8hh, two callers and board is 852dd, one check, fishy player donks into me $35 into like $120. I raise him to $115 he calls. Turn he checks brick 7x I jam like $290 he c/c A9dd and river is Jd.

-$400 or so

Won a bunch of other mid-sized pots, 3b SQ AA and get 2 callers and win on the flop, cbets etc.

Success at the live games is definitely killing my drive to play online though. Which is kind of a shame cause a month ago I did a ton of GTO math / calculations etc etc. So hopefully I play a bit this week.

Went to woodbine again yesterday to grind some live. Once again, I played 2/5 most of the time because the $1k game didnt open until I was about to leave in 2 hours. So it's a tradeoff of 4 hours worth of reads vs moving up for 2 hours. I ended up staying at the 2/5 game, because at the time the avg stack at 2/5 was $990 and avg pot was like $320 (over the previous hour). So not bad!

The game died off after that, so prob should have switched. My mega boom switch is slowing, but still haven't booked a loss at the casino in probably the last several yrs worth of live play. Could be running hot, who knows. up $240 yesterday, and $13.2k in last 6 visits, but lost one huge hand yesterday which was probably bad.

Few big hands.

1. Lost QQ vs AK for $300

-300

2. iso'd AQo hard on button, limps 5 5 I make it $35. Huge whale horrible player calls, $165 effective. Flop is 255cc he checks I bet 45 he c/c. Turn 2, he cks I shove he calls K9o and spikes river K.

-$165

3. I 3b 89ss vs utg bad player open from MP, 25 to 85. Button older guy cold calls (I put him on a big pair, AK/AQ based on how he was playing). bad player calls. Pot is like $260, 2c3x5c flop one ck, I ck, btn cks (I remove big pairs, only AK/AQ left). Turn 8d, one check I bet $135, btn calls, EP folds, pot $530. River Jc , I check, btn bets $240, I c/c and beat his AQ.

+570

4. 4 limps, BB special I have 35s. Flop Q35 rainbow, I lead 13 into 30, MP (180 effective) raises me to 35, I jam he tank calls and I beat his QJ.

+$200ish

5. MP raises, I call QJs on btn, blinds call, EP limper calls. Pot $100. Blinds open jams $140 on Q46 rainbow flop everyone folds to me I call, and beat his 45.

+$200ish

6. This is my BIG loss.

EP two limps, I have been isolating NON STOP (by far most aggro person at table)
I isolate BTN with to $35
SB 3b me smallish to $85 ($1300 effective) - small 3b is odd, avg 3b size is usualy $100-130ish
I call
Flop is
Villain bets $100 into 180, I call.
Turn is
Villain bets $225 into $380, I call
River is brick
Villain bets $700 into 830, leaving $200 behind.

I really should have folded here. I felt like he was wide based on his sizing preflop, and that he was very narrow here (QQQ,KK/AA) mostly only. Wasn't even sure he'd bet AQ this hard on river.
I called, he was wide as expected pre, but he had 888 for a set. Should fold river for sure. Rest I don't mind.

If I don't donk off that hand, I finish up around $900 again for session which is pretty decent. Will probably head back in a couple weekends.

-$1100

My streak of live casino invincibility has come to an end sadly. Booked a pretty big loss yesterday, -2.8k. After my last seven visits, up $10.4k. We had a 5/5/10 game running (biggest game is 5/5 but we added a mandatory 10 straddle).

I started the day playing pretty high variance and pushing every slight edge I thought I had. Slowed it down for the last few hours.

1. I had been opening a fair bit. I raised to 35 with AQo from MP, I get 3 callers, btn aggro (probably best/most aggro solid player at table) squeezes me to 155. He had squeezed a few ppl already so far. I shove all-in for $1k he calls with AK and wins.

-1k

2. EP limps (this guy has limped a few times, and limped raised already). MP raises to 35, LP calls, I call AJo in BB, EP back raises to 160. Folds to me. I jam for $800, he tanks and eventually calls JJ and wins. (later I see him limp/raise hands like KQ/A9s/AQ). My read was that I had enough fold equity to jam here. In retrospect I think I probably need about 5% better equity or so than AJo vs his calling range, but I don't hate it. High variance though.

-$800

3. I open 35 on btn with AQss. BB calls and straddler calls. TT3dds flop ck to me, I bet small $35 into 105 flop. BB calls, straddler (very aggro guy) c/r me to 120, I 3b to $250ish. Straddler calls. Turn is an Ace, ck ck, river brick he leads around $440ish into $600ish. I tank call, I think this spot is pretty close. He has T8o.

-$800

4. Last hand of day. I open to $40 MP with QQ, solid player 3b me on btn to $155. I jam $1k he calls AA and wins. Size of opening raises and 3b live makes it somewhat hard to 4b smaller than jamming, but I might try to look into a good sizing for spots like this.

-$1k

almost inspired to go sit at the local casino and play some 1-2 mixed nlhe/nlo. I've been there to play only once in over three years of living here....

Originally Posted by daven

almost inspired to go sit at the local casino and play some 1-2 mixed nlhe/nlo. I've been there to play only once in over three years of living here....

You should do it for sure! From playing here and in Vegas casinos at 5/10, I'm pretty confident that 1/2 at most casinos would be very soft.

Went to the casino last night. Was my first friday night visit and it was RAMMED. All the tables were full and there must have been wait lists of 20ish ppl across the different limits.

I started at 1/2 due to lack of seats at other stakes and was up $200 and then moved to 2/5 and was up $1100 there. I could have moved up to the 5/5 game but it looked a lot more solid than the 2/5 table I was at.

The last 8 visits, up $11.7k. I'm going to estimate an average of about 5 hours per visit, so running at an hourly $292.50/hour. Somehow that seems unsustainable, but we'll see how it goes.

Last night was an interesting session variance wise. I was running VERY cold preflop in hands, so I probably played the tightest I have ever played last night. That being said, I ran hot post-flop in a couple of spots.

1) This was the biggest luckbox hand I played. I'm constantly iso-ing this one awful older player. He limps EP, I iso to $25 on HJ, and this kinda spewtard player (who is straddling every hand, and often raising all the limps from his straddle kinda player), 3b me very small to $62 on btn. EP limper cold calls the 3b (this means nothing IMO, I've seen him cold call pocket 3's etc). I have , I decide to 4b to $165 (pretty small, I really think 3bettor has bs and will fold most). 3bettor flats and EP limper flats.

Pot is like $500, with $350 behind. Flop is rainbow. EP checks to me, I shove all-in. PF 3-bettor tanks and is like "I know you have AA so sick... I gotta call though" and calls with KINGS lol as if tanking. EP limper folds. I bink the turn Q for my luckbox.

+ 660ish

2. 3 limpers in front of me, I iso on btn and get 3 callers. Pot is around $110 on flop.

Guy on my right has CONSTANTLY been donking into me. I've seen him donk quite often with top pairs, and some overbet donks into other players with draws. This is the third time he's donking into me, cks to him he donks $55 into $110 on a board, and we have about $850 behind. I call, the rest fold.

Turn is for the nuts. He leads $80, I raise him to $210 and he snap calls. Pot is $660.

River is and he donks $110 into $660. I ponder shoving for the remaining $600 or so, but raise to $405 instead. He calls and goes on a berating "how do you call flop with that?" spree, saying he flopped two pair? (Q4 / Q2? lol who knows)

+700ish

Isn't hand 2 the perfect spot to limp behind?

Originally Posted by Pelion

Isn't hand 2 the perfect spot to limp behind?

I don't believe in limping behind. Let these fish pay to see their beloved flops haha.

I'm RARELYYY limping behind. I might limp behind if I had been very active, or if my hand was weaker (35s or something) but with dynamic and with my reads on these players I'm gonna jack it up with guaranteed position. If anything I might limp EP if I had been getting too carried away with raises or there was a lot of 3betting.

BIG pots IP and small pots OOP seems fine by me.

Originally Posted by griffey24

BIG pots IP and small pots OOP seems fine by me.

Well, kinda sorta, but BIP SPR IP and SMALL SPR OOP is really more applicable. [Generalization]OOP you should mostly be playing hands with fat value as quickly as possible to keep you out of tough situations, and IP you can play weaker hands with a fat SPR knowing that your biggest advantage comes with postflop position (especially against bad players).[/Generalization] As such, you should be limping behind on the button a lot at live games.

I actually think 65s on the button 160bb's deep at a live table behind 3 limpers is an interesting spot. Playing the deepstacks position game is tough because you're mostly gonna get high-RIO two pairs, high-RIO flushes and even your straights are vulnerable sometimes. 65s plays much more comfortably as a semi-bluff hand, but iso'ing 3 players live is mostly gonna get you in a multi-way pot, so unless you have reads on a place where you can expect villains to fold, then you're gonna be bloating the pot with 6-high.

It gets all the more interesting given your reads on one of the limpers that he donks an unsustainable amount. This might be the answer to the question of what part of villains' games are exploitable because you have a great semi-bluffing hand for raising a lot of his donks. You damn-well better be on your A-game if this is your exploitation plan because your plan when putting the first dollars into the pot is to win a pot vs 4+ players by putting 30bb's in the pot a lot of the time with an unmade hand. I know that we'll be playing poker and not just blindly putting a $125 raise 100% of the time or that this will be the only time we win money, but it's still an exploitation plan that's ripe for some spew if there's any reason you think you're not on your A-game.

Anyway, I probably go somewhere in-between in and juice it. Something like 3.5bb's ($17) doesn't usually raise eyebrows that badly, and it puts the SPR in a comfy cozy zone for a baby straight/baby flush/baby two pair type hand, and it makes it so that raising a flop donk is more like a 15-20bb investment.

I'm open to thoughts on this though. This is the fun thing about live. Preflop is sosososo much more interesting. Deeper stacks, worse players, more limpers. Heck, there's even variables like catching people reaching or having people make accidental raises and shit that makes for a lot more interesting spots.

GTO Implementation

A while ago I started posting about how I've been making an attempt to play GTO, or at least incorporate it into my online game.

I've started playing using a random number generator, with fixed "IP 3b bluffing ranges" and "OOP 3b bluffing ranges", and pending on the random number generated hands in this range would be either folded or 3b. Stuff like Q9dd, J8dd etc. This should ensure, over the long run, that I'm 3b/5b at an appropriate frequency and not folding too many 4b or jamming over too many 4b with bluffs.

That being said, it is MUCH easier to implement an accurate GTO strategy pre-flop than it is post-flop. I haven't yet figured out the best way to implement this post-flop yet (with regards to flop raising ranges being well balanced, or even calling ranges well balanced from street to street). Anyone have any strategies they use? Purely practice and experience?

Probably making it to Tremblant once or twice during the ski season, but still trying to find a good excuse to make it to Toronto, haha. Glad to see the live play is treating you well! Dont really follow any of the logs but decided to see what you guys were up to and as a GTO nerd, wanted to chime in a bit. Hopefully my stream of consciousness isnt too convoluted.

Originally Posted by griffey24

That being said, it is MUCH easier to implement an accurate GTO strategy pre-flop than it is post-flop. I haven't yet figured out the best way to implement this post-flop yet (with regards to flop raising ranges being well balanced, or even calling ranges well balanced from street to street). Anyone have any strategies they use? Purely practice and experience?

In a literal sense of the term GTO, this definitely isnt true. The fewer decisions you have remaining, the easier it will be to construct a GTO range for that specific decision. Im probably being overly nitty, but poker players in general love to create 3bet/4bet ranges that CardrunnersEV or whatever tell them are GTO, but unless these ranges are created using some postflop model and all limps and cold calls, they arent going to be accurate. When it comes to any reasonable stack size of HU poker, we cant do that, and when it comes to 6-max or FR, we cant even come close.

What we can do is come up with realistic ranges for our opponents and then use those to help construct ranges we can use readless, but again the reason I am making this distinction is because we cant forget that we are allowed to call and also that many hands we play are going to go postflop, both of which have significant impacts on our ideal ranges.

For postflop stuff, I would honestly just play around with CardrunnersEV using reasonable ranges and seeing how adding and removing certain hands from their ranges affects your optimal strategy. You have fewer players involved in the pots, more money already in the pot [so smaller stacks behind] and fewer decisions left to make, so they should be easier to figure out once you are confident in the ranges your put your opponents on.

For preflop I am not saying this type of work is unimportant, I am just saying that you shouldnt confuse it with GTO and you shouldnt let contrived 3bet/4bet ranges prevent you from thinking about cold calls. You are a very talented and creative player, so I know you think about these things, I am just speaking from personal experience that it is easy to fall into the trap of defaulting to "GTO" ranges created behind too many abstractions to the game.

Originally Posted by andy-akb

Probably making it to Tremblant once or twice during the ski season, but still trying to find a good excuse to make it to Toronto, haha. Glad to see the live play is treating you well! Dont really follow any of the logs but decided to see what you guys were up to and as a GTO nerd, wanted to chime in a bit. Hopefully my stream of consciousness isnt too convoluted.



In a literal sense of the term GTO, this definitely isnt true. The fewer decisions you have remaining, the easier it will be to construct a GTO range for that specific decision. Im probably being overly nitty, but poker players in general love to create 3bet/4bet ranges that CardrunnersEV or whatever tell them are GTO, but unless these ranges are created using some postflop model and all limps and cold calls, they arent going to be accurate. When it comes to any reasonable stack size of HU poker, we cant do that, and when it comes to 6-max or FR, we cant even come close.

What we can do is come up with realistic ranges for our opponents and then use those to help construct ranges we can use readless, but again the reason I am making this distinction is because we cant forget that we are allowed to call and also that many hands we play are going to go postflop, both of which have significant impacts on our ideal ranges.

For postflop stuff, I would honestly just play around with CardrunnersEV using reasonable ranges and seeing how adding and removing certain hands from their ranges affects your optimal strategy. You have fewer players involved in the pots, more money already in the pot [so smaller stacks behind] and fewer decisions left to make, so they should be easier to figure out once you are confident in the ranges your put your opponents on.

For preflop I am not saying this type of work is unimportant, I am just saying that you shouldnt confuse it with GTO and you shouldnt let contrived 3bet/4bet ranges prevent you from thinking about cold calls. You are a very talented and creative player, so I know you think about these things, I am just speaking from personal experience that it is easy to fall into the trap of defaulting to "GTO" ranges created behind too many abstractions to the game.

Thanks for the post andy!

Yah I think I'm focusing on GTO preflop in a few spots:

1. As PFR IP or OOP from 3bettor, making sure I'm defending enough of my opens by either 4b or call (obv calling more IP).
2. AS PFR IP or OOP from 3bettor, making sure I defend enough of my 4bets by calling a shove
3. AS PFR 3bettor, 3betting at an appropriate frequency related to their opening range
4. AS PFR 3bettor, defend at appropriate frequency vs their 4b by 5b shoving (not really assuming much 4b calling)

I think the main spot where the calling a 3b prob comes into play is on the button. If you purely defended a 50% btn open by 4b or folding, I don't think that would be ideal at all.

I guess when I said I was having more trouble implementing is that, I can have fixed 3b/5b ranges for a particular villains open. I can also have approximate open/4b/call of ranges from all my position, since I know what I'm opening with at every spot. So these ranges can mostly be fixed, with obviously some dynamic calling ranges vs diff opponents.

But postflop, where every board has a diff number of combos I might want to call, or raise or fold vs diff villains, it's tough to stay perfectly balanced.

How's your grind these days?

I think my decision to raise or limp behind in that spot is HEAVILY dependent on my image for the day. If I have a good image and think I can get away with making moves post-flop I'm more likely to raise there, because I don't feel my winning is heavily dependent on actually making a decent showdown hand.

If I have a horrible image then I'll probably just limp behind and keep the pot small and wakeup postflop when I hit something.

Agreed 100%. 65s is a tough hand to limp here, though.

Just a quick update:

I know the title of this blog was "make or break", and I won't say that I've "made" anything, out of fear of jinxing. But really focusing / studying GTO the last 3 months has made me start thinking about poker from different perspectives.

I've been reading GTO online articles. I'm reading Janda's book right now, and I've done a lot of studying just using excel, combonator and lately CREV.

Also once upon a time I had this drive and ambition in poker. A drive to keep moving up as high as possible, and the last year or two I've started getting lazy and just content grinding out whatever stakes. I think with all this studying my ambition is back to move up. Started playing 2/4 again on Stars and will move up to 3/6 when I'm up 50 buyins ($20k). I'm about 13 buyins towards that so far.

I feel like something has just clicked lately. Hard to pin-point exactly what it was, but here's hoping it's legit. Either way I think I'm feeling good enough about my game right now that 2013 won't be a "break" year, so that's something!

How do you like CREV? Do you think there's any value in it for people like me at a more beginner stage? It's not cheap as poker software goes - I use combonator and think that was good value, but I'm not sure whether I'd get enough out of CREV at this stage to make it worth dropping $100 on.

I like CR EV a lot. I have made some pretty big /complex tree's and it's hard to say how accurate their EV estimates are for complex trees. But it is interesting having the ability to run some scenarios over and over again, and just see how often you'll flow down a certain path given certain requirements.

Like if you knew on a certain board, you would ck back flop in certain conditions and call turn leads, to see how often that happens and how often you are actually calling. Or just other generic type spots where it's hard to really know frequencies without running some monte carlo simulation.

It's steep though at $100. I don't think it should be necessary at all at lower stakes, but it does make GTO studying easier.

Been playing around with overbetting on turns and rivers lately in different spots, and specifically in spots where villain is capped. Seems to be going well so far.

Hand 1)
$2/$4 No Limit Holdem
6 Players
Hand Conversion Powered by weaktight.com

Stacks:
UTG ($1,027.29) 257bb
UTG+1 ($400) 100bb
CO ($1,069.48) 267bb
Hero (BTN) ($451.11) 113bb
SB ($87.85) 22bb
BB ($160) 40bb

Pre-Flop: ($6, 6 players) Hero is BTN
UTG raises to $8, 2 folds, Hero calls $8, 2 folds

Flop: ($22, 2 players)
UTG checks, Hero checks

Turn: ($22, 2 players)
UTG bets $14.98, Hero raises to $44, UTG calls $29.02

River: ($110, 2 players)
UTG checks, Hero bets $154, UTG folds

Final Pot: $110

Hero wins $415.20 (net +$209.20)

UTG lost $52


Hand 2)
$2/$4 No Limit Holdem
5 Players
Hand Conversion Powered by weaktight.com

Stacks:
UTG ($400) 100bb
CO ($814.46) 204bb
Hero (BTN) ($825.96) 206bb
SB ($465.46) 116bb
BB ($420.11) 105bb

Pre-Flop: ($6, 5 players) Hero is BTN
UTG raises to $12, 1 fold, Hero calls $12, 2 folds

Flop: ($30, 2 players)
UTG bets $21.49, Hero calls $21.49

Turn: ($72.98, 2 players)
UTG checks, Hero checks

River: ($72.98, 2 players)
UTG bets $52.64, Hero raises to $190, UTG folds

Final Pot: $178.26

Hero wins $450.18 (net +$226.69)

UTG lost $86.13


Hand 3)
$2/$4 No Limit Holdem
6 Players
Hand Conversion Powered by weaktight.com

Stacks:
UTG ($409.19) 102bb
UTG+1 ($146) 37bb
CO ($408) 102bb
Hero (BTN) ($408) 102bb
SB ($1,052.70) 263bb
BB ($690.75) 173bb

Pre-Flop: ($6, 6 players) Hero is BTN
UTG raises to $8.88, 2 folds, Hero calls $8.88, 2 folds

Flop: ($23.76, 2 players)
UTG checks, Hero bets $14, UTG calls $14

Turn: ($51.76, 2 players)
UTG checks, Hero bets $60, UTG calls $60

River: ($171.76, 2 players)
UTG checks, Hero bets $136, UTG calls $136

Final Pot: $443.76
UTG shows

Hero shows


Hero wins $440.96 (net +$222.08)

UTG lost $218.88


Hand 4)
$2/$4 No Limit Holdem
6 Players
Hand Conversion Powered by weaktight.com

Stacks:
UTG ($400) 100bb
UTG+1 ($433.03) 108bb
CO ($656.80) 164bb
BTN ($306.86) 77bb
SB ($645.14) 161bb
Hero (BB) ($905.71) 226bb

Pre-Flop: ($6, 6 players) Hero is BB
4 folds, SB raises to $12, Hero calls $8

Flop: ($24, 2 players)
SB bets $11.46, Hero calls $11.46

Turn: ($46.92, 2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $38, SB calls $38

River: ($122.92, 2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $184, SB folds

Final Pot: $122.92

Hero wins $488.12 (net +$242.66)

SB lost $61.46

In the second hand with 99, do you think you pushed him off a better hand? His line looks like a fairly normal pot control top pair line. The A is a scare card but it should hit his range too. Given that you might be beat there, do you think it would have been better to call the river and take the showdown? I don't understand that hand, it looks strange.

How often do you overbet bluff? Do you think anyone has twigged to you doing this more? Do you expect regs to start playing back at you in these spots or is it more weaktight or you're just very stealthy about it?

And wow it must be exciting to play 400 nl.

99 hand - Think he can have anything from air to AJ, AK, AT, or maybe some other Axs.

More importantly, I can easily have AQ/AJ/KTs here, while I really don't think he can (think he double barrels all those hands, with AJ potentially checking turn sometimes). So his range has no v strong hands in it, while mine does. It's a gross spot for him on river cause his range is capped, so if I did have AJ+ here I can easily raise.

I've been overbetting in a lot of spots, so I don't think I'm too skewed to bluffs. I probably need about 60% value for GTO, and I'd guess I'm probably a bit less than that at the moment, maybe around 40%.

OK thanks. That makes total sense if he always barrels AQ. I see what you mean by capped range.

Things have been very swingy so far at 2/4. Started on a huge upswing, up $13k and the last 5 days have been a solid downswing of $8k. I haven't been playing too great. Most of my losses though have been in spots where at 1/2 I would almost always expect folds, but ppl at 2/4 definitely have better c/c frequencies than at 1/2.

Here are a few hands at 2/4. I have to re-think about my propensity to turn hands into bluffs at 2/4.

Hand 1)
-villain is an aggro spewtard and I was pretty sure I was ahead of his range on turn, but decided to turn it into bluff on river for good measure, rarely expecting a c/c from such an aggro villain. I pondered jamming turn but ended up just calling clearly.

$2/$4 No Limit Holdem
6 Players
Hand Conversion Powered by weaktight.com

Stacks:
UTG ($429.81) 107bb
UTG+1 ($850.20) 213bb
CO ($418.67) 105bb
Hero (BTN) ($556) 139bb
SB ($400) 100bb
BB ($993.52) 248bb

Pre-Flop: ($6, 6 players) Hero is BTN
1 fold, UTG+1 raises to $12, 1 fold, Hero calls $12, 2 folds

Flop: ($30, 2 players)
UTG+1 bets $30, Hero calls $30

Turn: ($90, 2 players)
UTG+1 bets $110, Hero calls $110

River: ($310, 2 players)
UTG+1 checks, Hero bets $404, UTG+1 calls $404

Final Pot: $1,118
UTG+1 shows

Hero shows


UTG+1 wins $1,115.20 (net +$559.20)

Hero lost $556


Hand 2)
-Villain 4b often, but I don't like my line. If i'm going to jam I should just jam turn when he checks. Still surprised he c/c here, I have quite a bit of Ax when he 4b so small

$2/$4 No Limit Holdem
6 Players
Hand Conversion Powered by weaktight.com

Stacks:
UTG ($1,026.52) 257bb
UTG+1 ($400) 100bb
CO ($424.47) 106bb
Hero (BTN) ($716.04) 179bb
SB ($513.78) 128bb
BB ($406) 102bb

Pre-Flop: ($6, 6 players) Hero is BTN
2 folds, CO raises to $14, Hero raises to $42, 2 folds, CO raises to $76, Hero calls $34

Flop: ($158, 2 players)
CO bets $82, Hero calls $82

Turn: ($322, 2 players)
CO checks, Hero checks

River: ($322, 2 players)
CO checks, Hero bets $276, CO calls $266.47

Final Pot: $854.94
CO shows

Hero shows


CO wins $852.14 (net +$427.67)

Hero collects $19.06 (net -$414.94)


Hand 3)
-I don't mind this hand. I assumed villain had a capped range once he c/c the turn, and I have quite a few flushes in my range.
-Lesson to me to not assume passive players have capped ranges

$2/$4 No Limit Holdem
6 Players
Hand Conversion Powered by weaktight.com

Stacks:
UTG ($208.72) 52bb
UTG+1 ($570.19) 143bb
CO ($401.20) 100bb
Hero (BTN) ($477.40) 119bb
SB ($402) 101bb
BB ($404) 101bb

Pre-Flop: ($6, 6 players) Hero is BTN
2 folds, CO raises to $12, Hero calls $12, 2 folds

Flop: ($30, 2 players)
CO bets $16, Hero calls $16

Turn: ($62, 2 players)
CO checks, Hero bets $42, CO calls $42

River: ($146, 2 players)
CO checks, Hero bets $407.40, CO calls $331.20

Final Pot: $808.40
CO shows

Hero shows


CO wins $805.60 (net +$404.40)

Hero collects $152.40 (net -$325)

Hands are interesting and I'm obviously not good enough to understand any of them and the levels of thinking at 2/4! Interested to get your take on the following though:

1) I wouldn't expect villain to fold anything on the river that beats you versus your line (particularly an aggro spewtard). From villain's perspective, I doubt he expects you to flat pot-sized bets on flop and turn with two pair/sets/6x/JT and I think you are pretty much capped at TT/T9s/J9s. Those hands probably can't call a third barrel but may turn those hands into a bluff, so I think villain's river chk looks okay in a vacuum versus an aggresive regular?

2) Your line seems odd from villain's perspective for Ax, unless you would normally check back the turn with Ax and then jam the river for nearly pot when villain looks like he is giving up?

3) I think you get your image used against you here big time (assuming it's as aggressive as it appears to be)? Also, do you really have that many flushes in your range that don't raise the flop against a passive player? And would you then overbet huge on the river with the flush when villain looks capped?

After a few weeks playing at 2/4 the one thing I've started doing more is calling down with strong hands. Villains start ramming on you in spots if they perceive you to be capped, so you have to make sure your call down ranges have some strong hands, even on drawy boards.

Hand 1)
Considering the above, vs a laggy aggro opponent who's already overbetting, I woul definitely call down with JT or 6x here. The only hand that makes sense for villain to c/c on river is 6x, or at least that's what I would have expected. Needless to say vs these regs in my post, I will be checking back a lot more now and they will be losing a lot of value if they start checking such strong hands to induce my bluffs.

Hand 2)
villain doesn't know my range, but I'm not 3b JTs or KJ on the btn so I actually have NO air in this spot. He's putting me on air to c/c me here (KJ/JT). I have a lot of Axs and some AQ that 3b btn and peeled his 4b, so frequency wise I'm ok with this play overall since it will get me action later. This is just one of those spots where you have to know your own range well and how many combos of each you have. As long as I have like 66% or so Ax here I'm ok.

Hand 3)
Once villain takes a c/c line on turn I'm jamming my entire range of bluffs and flushes for sure. I would never expect a flush after he c/c, so if I somehow had top set or something I would even jam that. Again similar to my opening sentence, I'm starting to call down with some strong hands to make sure my call down range is stronger, so I do have some Axss here. Also I don't mind this bluff, since looking at the board I pretty much have NO air getting to the river, except for this exact hand I happen to have.

Reviewing these hands, I dislike Hand 1 because he can c/c 6x and maybe even c/c JT after running flush gets there. Hand 2 I don't mind given my frequency of Ax (weak Ax hands that won't bet turn), and Hand 3 - don't hate it, but a smaller overbet would be fine as well, $170ish instead of $330ish.

Studying... studying... studying.

After my downswing, I spent the entire last week studying (pretty sure I studied 20+ hours and grinded zero). I was mostly focused on doing similar hand combos exercises as Janda's latest book does. Taking my btn range for calling 3bets and ensuring that street by street on each board I'm defending 60% of my range.

This kind of exercise takes FOREVER. I have CREV and also have combonator, but I think each program is missing some functionality that I would like, such that I can't actually automate this in any way. So gotta do it by manually. I'm using combonator, but I'm still selecting continuing hands manually as opposed to using the "top 60% vs hero" feature for example.

I've now shifted to singled raised pots. Currently testing out some ranges for calling down about 60% from BB vs BTN on diff boards, and then I'll do the same for BB vs SB and BTN vs CO.

I think after I focus on that I'll look at my cbetting and checking ranges as PFR. Putting more emphasis on protecting my checking ranges OOP and my check-back ranges IP such that I can at least continue about 30-50% of the time. I'm pretty sure I'm giving up too much in those spots right now.

Just thinking about all the stuff I could conceivably be studying is overwhelming. There's really just SOOO much you can do. This realization is both encouraging (so much room for improvement) but also daunting (takes forever!).

As an extension to my last post:

One realization I made doing this exercise is that I am able to open button 50%, and call 3bets 28% of the time (corresponding to 14% total range), and call down 60% of my range on each street such that my river calling range is actually VERY strong. Stronger than I would have imagined in some instances.

For example, on quite a few run outs I took my final river calling ranges vs diff hero hands (over pairs, TPTK etc) and my range would often have somewhere between 33-45% on river. Compared to needing at most 33% facing a river pot shove, and realistically needing about 30%. Also depending on your preflop calling ranges and how you setup your postflop calling ranges, you can be pretty comfortable call down on most types of boards and most run outs.

Seems like a really wide calling range, it's interesting to hear you end up with such a strong river range here, but I guess if you're flatting 3bet this much you're not 4b so much on the button? I also open 50%, I defend 21% of my button range (10% of total hands) by flatting, and 10.5% of my button range (5% of total hands) by 4betting, so my total defence range seems pretty similar - ie. about 15% of total hands, but I'm not flatting so wide.

I think my last estimate was to attempt to maintain a fold to 3b of 55% (defend 45% of my button range). So calling 28% and 4b 17% approximately.

So yah defending quite a bit and still 4b quite a bit too.

I've been reading your blog and the hands that you've played I surely wouldn't play lol, I'm to scared to play them like that, but you seem to know what your doing I suppose, what stakes are you currently playing at, are you hoping to move up shortly ?

Originally Posted by SinkieCon

I've been reading your blog and the hands that you've played I surely wouldn't play lol, I'm to scared to play them like that, but you seem to know what your doing I suppose, what stakes are you currently playing at, are you hoping to move up shortly ?

Yaah the scared money feeling will diminish after you've been playing for a long time, or for a while at a certain stake. But I'd say if you're feeling scared in any spot, then that means you feel the monetary value too much and you should drop to a lower game where the actual value of the money isnt impacting your decisions.

I'm playing 2/4 right now online, and $500 or $1k buyin games live. I probably won't think about moving up until I have 50k hands at 2/4 and I'm feeling good about things.

Haven't posted in a while. I think I'm approaching he 50k hand mark at $2/$4 over the last few months, so once I hit that mark (likely this weekend) I might post a progress graph and a stat-summary by position.

Are there any particular stats ppl would be interested in seeing by position?

Lately I've been getting in a good mix of grinding and studying. I've started grinding sessions and then studying 1-2 hands in more detail by doing a hand comb analysis.

I'm at home now so I don't have the hand history but yesterday I called a 3b with A4hh on btn. Flop was 2x8hQh turn was 7s and river as an Ad. Villain double barreled and checked the river. This is an interesting river card, and especially interesting facing a check. His check can mean he has a hand like KQ/KK and doesn't want to jam, or he can have AK/Ax and thinks I might have AQ too often to jam himself.

I ended up jamming pot here and villain c/c AJ to own me. I say own because I value towned myself in a spot where I might have folded if he jammed, but now jammed myself to his check. This is a spot where you can determine your GTO ranges such that you are jamming a range which makes hands like KQ/KK indifferent to calling, and a hand like AJ less fistpump calling (in this spot it's a clear fistpump cause I'm jamming all worse Ax and all air as well, as played). My studying determined that I should only be jamming AJ+ and all my air.

Hey guys,

As promised, here is my last 50k hand checkup at 2/4 with a graph and positional stats.

One realization moving up from 1/2 to 2/4 is that in some ways the games are actually less aggro. People at 1/2 just had very bad frequencies overall. Rampant 3b but so much folding to 4b, rampant 4b but so much folding to jams. So much barreling as PFR, but very weak checking ranges. So although the games were more aggressive, ppl were putting themselves in spots to be exploited a lot more often.

2/4 by contrast, regs seem to have a lot better frequencies. I've seen a lot of plays/river calls which while surprising, I can only conclude that some of these regs are trying to play close to GTO and understand their ranges better and hands that need to call in some spots are sometimes wide, but they are able to make these calls.

I haven't posted images / screenshots in a while, so hopefully this works alright. Someone let me know if the stats one isn't visible /and or how I can make it more legible if it isn't. (also - running hot is nice )

Hey Griffey:
Didn't realize you were playing so much live. What kind of adjustments, if any, do you make playing live?

I have to agree that I prefer limping behind 65s on BTN. The way my games play, if I raise I typically get 5-7 callers, and playing a small speculative hand with tiny SPRs isn't ideal. I'm sure there is a difference in game dynamics that would make overlimping less appealing -- in my games there is always a non-zero chance that someone is looking to limp-rr me when I'm BTN, but you're probably getting 3-bet more from the blinds. I think deeper stacks and bigger SPRs are going to work well with your skill/positional advantage.

Questions:
1. I'm actually surprised that your stats are this tight. I've never played this high online of course and haven't played regularly online since BF. I'm sure you spent a lot of time working on ranges by position. Are your stats typical for regs at this level?
2. I'm particularly interested in how much you flat from the BB. I always feel like we should flat a huge range from the BTN, including occasional strong hands if blinds like to squeeze, and play fairly nitty HU from BB.
3. What kind of OOP flop checking ranges do you have as PFR?

Hey baudib, how's it going?

Biggest adjustments live off the top of my head:
1) Way bigger pre-flop raising sizing pre (5x or 6x pre), and isolate weakness HARD. I'd rather 3b a hand very hard and get one caller than 3b less and get two callers but the pot to flop being similar size.
2) Way tighter postflop cbet frequencies. Because of point 1) and because of more callers pre, the effective stacks are much less post, so less room for moves.
3) Smaller cbet sizing in polarized spots. I might cbet like 18 into 60 on an Axx or Kxx flop because ppl generally don't defend the appropriate frequencies, and won't play back at me by raising light. They will likely just call so I can still see 3 streets with any two (assuming I have position).

Those are the two off the top of my head. I actually haven't played live in like 2 months, cause online has been going well but i'll probably make it back this month. I'll add some more points when I refresh my head to how bad the games are haha. How goes the online grind?

1. As for my tightness online - This is ALLL a result of my GTO studying. I was never this tight in my last 5 yrs of play (especially this 3b stat). I'm definitely way on the tighter side of regs in my game with regards to my 3b stat. Also my AF is low which is also a result of my GTO studying, and trying to keep my call down ranges strong and uncapped.
2. I definitely don't think ppl flat enough from the BB. Given my BB cold call includes calling vs all positions (28%), means I'm calling vs LP probably around 35% or so. I'd imagine this is far more than most ppl. Also yah I do flat some strong hands on the button now, partly due to squeezers and partly because I'm noticing my low 3b is causing ppl to fold to 3b more.
3. Trying to check a stronger range that can actually c/c down multiple streets. I used to c/c transparent hands like KK on AT8cc board, but you're just asking to get blown of this. I'd rather c/c A4cc on AT8cc instead.

This is a good example of a c/c line that I never would have taken in the past. Villain wasn't anything too crazy either, it's not like i was trying to exploit his crazy bluffing ways. I was simply trying to balance my c/c range better.

$2/$4 No Limit Holdem
5 Players
Hand Conversion Powered by weaktight.com

Stacks:
UTG ($936.90) 234bb
CO ($400) 100bb
BTN ($96.79) 24bb
SB ($445.20) 111bb
Hero (BB) ($503.99) 126bb

Pre-Flop: ($6, 5 players) Hero is BB
1 fold, CO raises to $10, 2 folds, Hero raises to $32, CO calls $22

Flop: ($66, 2 players)
Hero checks, CO bets $32, Hero calls $32

Turn: ($130, 2 players)
Hero checks, CO bets $68, Hero calls $68

River: ($266, 2 players)
Hero checks, CO bets $268, Hero calls $268

Final Pot: $802
Hero shows

CO shows


Hero wins $799.20 (net +$399.20)

CO lost $400

Your blind stats and CC stats are far different from mine. You seem to CC more in general and from the BB way more than I thought was good. Mind you, you are pkaying far higher too. Is that because of a difference in the aggression of the stakes or do you have a different opinion on cold calling IP and out?

Originally Posted by jyms

Your blind stats and CC stats are far different from mine. You seem to CC more in general and from the BB way more than I thought was good. Mind you, you are pkaying far higher too. Is that because of a difference in the aggression of the stakes or do you have a different opinion on cold calling IP and out?

There may be a few factors to this:

1. Confidence in playing OOP post-flop. Some people just aren't comfortable with playing well OOP without initiative, so they choose to 3b or fold pre.
2. People at higher stakes often stealing for a min-raise LP or 2.5x, whereas I'd imagine at lower stakes 2.5x or 3x might even be more common? So getting a better price on a call from BB.
3. People not really focusing on what the benchmark for a call to be. The call does not have to be >0bb/100, the call has to be better than -100bb/100. So people really need to use that as a frame of reference.
4. Having a low 3b % should strengthen your cold call ranges. This should also give you more flexibility to raise flops or call down on some boards more credibly.

Also I've done a lot of GTO studying on ranges, and call down ranges. I think just having done a lot of studying gives you confidence in knowing your call down ranges are based on fundamentals. Again that relates to point 1 and being confident in playing post-flop OOP.

Not to mention the standard at lower stakes and I imagine at least 100nl (probably higher) is to 3bet FAR too wide and it gets to a point when people can play against it that it's just killing any postflop edge you can have on people and it's probably where the biggest edge is going to come from.

Would you agree with that Griffey?

Originally Posted by ImSavy

Not to mention the standard at lower stakes and I imagine at least 100nl (probably higher) is to 3bet FAR too wide and it gets to a point when people can play against it that it's just killing any postflop edge you can have on people and it's probably where the biggest edge is going to come from.

Would you agree with that Griffey?

Yah definitely agree. People just auto 3b KJ/KQ/AJ/AQ ALL the time from the blinds.

OFCOURSE you're gonna hate your life cold calling from BB playing post-flop OOP when you don't have ANY good hands / good kickers on any board J high and up.

Not to mention most ppl are also rampant 3b low-mid pairs from blinds as well, since they don't want to call these. So now not only do you not have good top pair hands but you also have no sets when you call pre.

Thanks for that HH. Nice insight into the kind of hands to have in a c/c range. Would you also sometimes c/c the same hand in a single raised pot OOP as the pfr?

Originally Posted by BorisTheSpider

Thanks for that HH. Nice insight into the kind of hands to have in a c/c range. Would you also sometimes c/c the same hand in a single raised pot OOP as the pfr?

Yah something like TP+FD is a pretty great hand to c/c with. It has value on it's own and it improves on run-outs that villain is most likely to bluff (since it's perceived we're capped and can't have a FD).

Also betting TP+FD and somehow getting it in on the flop facing a raise is usually likely going ot be flipping (vs two pair or sets), unless you get it in with a worse FD or something. So you're rarely way ahead in that situation.

I notice your overall 3bet would be considered 'low' by community standards.

however I def think most regs 3bet too wide...

its not that its bad in a vacuum per say, but it really screws up cold call ranges

and if you play a mixed strategy of flatting AA sometimes....

with that said you can probably use that to your advantage in exploiting some select regs

Originally Posted by Micro2Macro

I notice your overall 3bet would be considered 'low' by community standards.

however I def think most regs 3bet too wide...

its not that its bad in a vacuum per say, but it really screws up cold call ranges

and if you play a mixed strategy of flatting AA sometimes....

with that said you can probably use that to your advantage in exploiting some select regs

Yah maintaining some strong hands in your calling range is pretty important imo.

An example of using a low 3b to your advantage vs regs.

$2/$4 No Limit Holdem
6 Players
Hand Conversion Powered by weaktight.com

Stacks:
UTG ($440.40) 110bb
UTG+1 ($528.11) 132bb
CO ($492.34) 123bb
Hero (BTN) ($500.40) 125bb
SB ($400) 100bb
BB ($765.01) 191bb

Pre-Flop: ($6, 6 players) Hero is BTN
2 folds, CO raises to $9, Hero calls $9, 1 fold, BB raises to $44, CO raises to $93.50, Hero raises to $146, BB folds, CO folds

Final Pot: $233

Hero wins $338 (net +$192)

BB lost $44
CO lost $93.50

The AQ hand reminds me of something that was sort of a lightbulb moment for me recently. I think it was M2M who said something in a thread about C-R smaller flush draws (BB vs. BTN) but taking a c/c line with NFD/overs, because we have soooo much equity vs. button's value range and will end up with strong hands on so many runouts.

Everyone is concerned with 3-bet/4-betting ranges OOP, whether to merge or polarize and when, etc., that everyone ignores what their other ranges look like.

Griffey, can you explain QJs hand?

I get that you are flatting strong hands and they know you rarely 3-bet and that you're only risking $137 to win $150ish when both are out of line very often.

The problem to me seems to be that you'll have better hands to bluff with. QJ is blocking what would seem to be a huge part of these guys' 3-4-bet/fold range (JJ,KJ, KQ, AQ). Since we have so much equity with this hand vs. CO's open range and BB's squeezing range, wouldn't it serve us better to put it in our BTN 3-bet range?

Originally Posted by baudib

Griffey, can you explain QJs hand?

I get that you are flatting strong hands and they know you rarely 3-bet and that you're only risking $137 to win $150ish when both are out of line very often.

The problem to me seems to be that you'll have better hands to bluff with. QJ is blocking what would seem to be a huge part of these guys' 3-4-bet/fold range (JJ,KJ, KQ, AQ). Since we have so much equity with this hand vs. CO's open range and BB's squeezing range, wouldn't it serve us better to put it in our BTN 3-bet range?

Yah I'm making a move here definitely due to the blockers.

As for 3b QJs, I think it's a strong hand to keep in our flatting range here. If PFR had folded I probably would have just called the squeeze IP, so it's not like I'm folding after I get squeezed.

It could be ok to 3b once in a while though.

Just bought Janda on Kindle, will report back.

Originally Posted by baudib

Just bought Janda on Kindle, will report back.

Nice yah it's good! I think it's good to def keep in mind that most of the book is talking about defending vs any two, whereas in most situations ppl aren't betting any two. It could def be easy to get carried away and start way over defending, esp in spots where ppl have very skewed ranges towards value hands.

Some more things I wanted to ask in relation to Janda and/or your stats:

1. What is your cbet% like and do you feel that regs are still cbetting too often?

2. What hands are you c/c with when PFR OOP? I've been thinking about just c/cing some hands that give us strong hands on the river in a lot of cases that I would have simply just cbet before. Not exactly slowplaying, and not in WA/WB spots, but spots where you have good equity but not necessarily the best hand and cbetting just makes their turn ranges so much stronger.

1. Looking over my last 60k hands or so, my flop cb on avg (across all positions) is 66%, turn 46.5% and river 58.9%.

I think I could stand to lower my flop cbet a touch, esp IP, so that my ck back + turn calling range is stronger. This is especially true because of all the spots where we should be worried about ppl betting close to "any two", it's probably
a) We raise PF OOP and check the flop (where ppl really don't defend enough)
b) We raise PF IP, ck back turn and face a turn lead (where ppl really don't defend enough or have too weak of a defending range).

I still have a lot of studying to do on my ranges as PFR though. Most of my studying so far has been as the caller of 3bets or cold caller.

2. I think similar to comments above in previous posts. It's probably preferable to c/c hands with decent equity. Pair + FD seems not too bad, or overs + FD or something like 78s on 679 board or something.

I got owned by a reg bvb the other day who c/c Q9 from sb on Q9Thh board, and I overbet the turn (assuming he was capped) and he c/c brick turn and 3h riv he c/c my overbet shove on flush card.

Also we should think about protecting our checking ranges more on boards we are checking often. For example, if we're cbetting some dry A72 board 80% of the time, maybe we don't care that we're exploitable 20% of the time we check. By contrast, if we're cbetting 89Jhh only 40-50% of the time, then it's a lot worse if we're not protecting our checks in that spot when we're checking so often (50-60% of the time).

Went to the casino for the first time in months today. Up around $3.1k today, playing 5/5 ($1k buy-in) for about 10 hours or so. Was my longest grind thus far. Always seems crazy to me that in all that time it was only 600 hands or so. This makes it up about $15k in the last 9 visits, not too bad.

I'd imagine the last 9 visits total about 50 hours, at 60 hands/hour, so 3000 total hands. It's good to think about these stretches in terms of hands. Especially when being online grinders gives us good perspective on what kind of variance you can have over a 3k hand stretch. I can easily be running super hot, but I'll take it for now.



1. I had one SUPER luckbox hand today.
UTG+1 opens to $35 ($1k effective), MP short stack calls ($450 or so), Hero calls in CO with
Flop is
UTG+1 checks, MP checks, Hero bets $100 into $115, UTG+1 calls, MP shoves, Hero shoves, UTG+1 calls.
UTG+1 shows:
MP shows:
Pokerstoving after the fact, I realized I had about 10% equity here, which isn't quite as bad as upon first inspection.
Board runs out Flop is and hero scoops the pot with a runner flush.
Hero +~ 1450ish

2. Another hand, hero 3bets a NITTTY reg's utg open on btn with ATo. This reg has been pretty vocal about making very big folds (ie: folding big pairs pre to 3bets/heat, or folding AA etc postflop to flop raises and barrels). Given this my plan from the start of the hand was to rep a monster.

Nit UTG opens to $25 (deep effective stacks, around $2700), Hero 3b on btn to $80 with
Flop comes UTG checks, hero fires $155 into $170.
Turn , UTG checks hero fires $465 into $480. I'm betting HARD here, to let nitfest know we'll be playing for stacks on river. Nit folds, and shows QQ.

3. I had been opening for raises a TON in LP (HJ/CO/BTN). Villain on my left at one point freaked out very vocally about how I'm non stop stealing LP, and said he was getting fed up. he proceeded to 3b me $25 to $300 with KQ, and called my shove for $90 more or something. I had AK, but he rivered a Q.

4. I think the above villain setup my image pretty well though. Later on a very solid online playing reg (I think he's SNE on stars even), 3b my BTN open in SB $25 to $100. I 4b to $225 with KK and he ships 79hh and I hold.

I really should keep going to play live until my run hot runs dry!

1st hand don't you wanna squeeze pre and and iso the shortstack? Assuming utg+1 isn't nitfest.

Play more live, what's wrong with you!

Well "short stack" is still almost 100bbs right? $450 stack at 5/5, everyone else is just $1k+ stacks.

I feel like squeezing TT vs UTG+1 open full-ring is kind of over playing a bit no? Especially since it seems like ppl are doing stuff like flatting AA in MP's spot.

As for playing more live - It's such a hassle haha, and takes sooo much time. That was a ten hour grind, 12 hours when you count leaving my house till getting home. But yah probably should :P

Also note about the 60 hands per hour. This is video poker, with the screens and no dealers and a time limit per action. Obviously 'real' live poker is waaay less hands per hour than this.

Yeah, table stacks and raises seemed so big that $450 seemed like a SS. True, people do flat AA in MP's spot, call is legit, you can squeeze more polarized.

Sick that you get 60 hands/hour! Lucky to get 25 with human dealers.

Nice suckout on TT hand, I approve.

So was 2013 Make or Break?

Originally Posted by !Luck

So was 2013 Make or Break?

Haha well I think it was "make enough".

I think studying GTO the last half of the year has given me a lot more confidence to be playing well at 2/4, so I'm hoping that will continue over into the new year.

It's definitely been "make" in my live game. I'd imagine 2014 will be a much larger split of live and online than I ever would have anticipated, so that's good.

My goals for 2014 are pretty simple:
1) Grind enough on Stars to make Supernova by June/July
2) Keep studying GTO (a LOT)
3) Go to Casino at least once per month, and ideally twice a month.

Griffey, looking back at your OP, you said you were focusing on avoidable losses as well as varying bet sizes. How did these things work out for you in the past year?

Avoidable losses - I think this improved SIGNIFICANTLY over the course of the year. I think last week I was getting bombed for a $4k losing session, and that was the first session in months and months that I think I did some monkey spew.

I'm pretty confident that all my GTO studying helped a lot with this. Having a foundation that you're sticking to definitely helps keep you in line. Decisions don't seem arbitrary anymore, they are based on fundamentals and being done for a reason. (ie: I'm not just randomly 4b whenever I feel like it, but it's based on solid ranges that I've worked on, for example).

Varying bet sizes - I think I've also been working on this too. I think again this ties into GTO studying. For example, I'm thinking more along the lines of, "If I bet X size, then villain needs to continue with Y% of his range.", which extends to: "I would like to bet Z range in this particular spot. In order for betting this range to be profitable, I need villain to call with Y% of his range. If I bet X size, then villain needs to call with Y% of his range, therefore my bet will be profitable"

If that makes any sense? haha. Really just thinking a lot more about my sizing, and what that means for villain and how often he has to continue.

ie: If I bet half pot on the river, villain needs to continue with 66% of his range. So in that spot I know that I'm winning more than 50% of the time if he calls with 66% of his range. So villain is in a crappy spot where he can either call appropriately, but my range beats his more than 50% of the time, or he can fold the bottom of his range such that his calling range beats my range but he's folding too often.

Originally Posted by griffey24

Avoidable losses - I think this improved SIGNIFICANTLY over the course of the year. I think last week I was getting bombed for a $4k losing session, and that was the first session in months and months that I think I did some monkey spew.

I'm pretty confident that all my GTO studying helped a lot with this. Having a foundation that you're sticking to definitely helps keep you in line. Decisions don't seem arbitrary anymore, they are based on fundamentals and being done for a reason. (ie: I'm not just randomly 4b whenever I feel like it, but it's based on solid ranges that I've worked on, for example).

Varying bet sizes - I think I've also been working on this too. I think again this ties into GTO studying. For example, I'm thinking more along the lines of, "If I bet X size, then villain needs to continue with Y% of his range.", which extends to: "I would like to bet Z range in this particular spot. In order for betting this range to be profitable, I need villain to call with Y% of his range. If I bet X size, then villain needs to call with Y% of his range, therefore my bet will be profitable"

If that makes any sense? haha. Really just thinking a lot more about my sizing, and what that means for villain and how often he has to continue.

ie: If I bet half pot on the river, villain needs to continue with 66% of his range. So in that spot I know that I'm winning more than 50% of the time if he calls with 66% of his range. So villain is in a crappy spot where he can either call appropriately, but my range beats his more than 50% of the time, or he can fold the bottom of his range such that his calling range beats my range but he's folding too often.

Nice work.

How's real life job going for ye, this is my annual catch up post

I've been thinking about bet sizing a lot lately. It seems to me that most players make serious mistakes in sizing, especially with good hands...I often find myself thinking, "how do you expect someone to call with worse here?" I've always tried to tailor bets to opponents' ranges and think it works well most of the time. But I've been finding myself in spots with nutty hands where I could probably make more but I underestimate how strong people are. I'll post more about this in a couple days in my own thread...relates to some goals for 2014.

haha real life is good! First full year at the new job went well, but still ready to retire any day now if I could.

Raptors are doing a good job anti-tanking right now, so I'm torn on that.

How are things going with you?

Not surprisingly, after approximately a year of playing like a total nit (3b of around 6% or so), I've started the year at the complete opposite end of the spectrum (3b of 13%).

My "nit experiment" went well.

The advantages to having a low 3b:
1. 3b have more fold equity, so you can add some bluffs that will often get folds
2. You rarely get 4b, so even your bluffs get to see flops
3. Your cold calling range is much stronger, so you can defend barrels more easily and raise more flops
4. Your cold calling range is much stronger, so you can back-raise more credibly over squeezes
5. You keep in hands you will dominate post-flop

Disadvantages of having a low 3b:
1. Difficult defending enough from the SB by cold calling (getting squeezed by BB often)
2. Difficult cold calling in general, getting sq often
3. Difficult getting action on big hands. (I would almost never get it all-in with someone if I was the 3bettor, and would only be likely to stack someone if they 3b me and I 4b)
4. Having strong premium'ish hands (JJ/QQ/AQ/AK) that make good one pair hands often go multi-way (I flat raise and get callers behind). Which could be an ok thing, but sometimes not ideal.
5. Can be capped on certain board textures in 3b pots. ie: you 3b and flop comes KQ9 or 789. Villain can put a lot of pressure on you knowing you don't have JT.
6. While you keep in hands you dominate, you also allow these hand to realize their equity.

After a small-ish sample of 8k hands or so playing much laggier, my observations are.
Advantages of 3b wider:
1. Obviously you get much more action on your big hands. Big pairs getting all-in pre with lower pairs much more often.
2. Can widen blind defense ranges. Can defend wider in SB by 3b, and can also widen BB defense range by 3b some hands that you would otherwise fold.
3. People start 4b you wider (some wider for value, but many 4b bluff more as well). This means that your 5b range either gains equity vs the calling range, or gains fold equity and some more dead money.
4. Not capped on certain board textures.
5. People will start 4b much wider (air - lots of Ax etc). So flatting 4b becomes more viable, as often ppl will have pretty well defined ranges.

Disadvantages of 3b wider:
1. Cold call ranges are weaker, so might be more difficult to call down appropriately. That being said, when you 3b more often then the frequency of cold calling also goes down significantly. So although calling down becomes harder, you also have to do it much less often.
2. You fold out hands you would have otherwise dominated.
3. Facing many more 4bets, esp btn 4b when you're in the blinds. Need to be willing to either 5b shove much lighter or start calling 4b (even OOP), to not be exploited by 4b.
4. Sometimes end up bloating pots OOP when deep.
5. 3b IP lowers SPR and minimizes our positional advantage. "Drawing" hands like SC's etc go down slightly in value, while hands that make decent top pairs go up in value.
6. Having a wide 3b, it's safe to assume that you would use your image and almost always 3b your strong hands. This leaves you even more vulnerable to squeezes the times you do flat.

I'm sure many of these points are quite obvious, but just running through them anyhow. I'm sure there are others. Personally, already after a week or two I can tell that the more laggy style is my preference.

In the past I would lagg it up and have pretty messed up frequencies, but this time I'm focusing much more on GTO and ensuring that despite my wider 3b ranges, that I'm defending appropriately to 4b etc.

Originally Posted by griffey24

The advantages to having a low 3b:
1. 3b have more fold equity, so you can add some bluffs that will often get folds
2. You rarely get 4b, so even your bluffs get to see flops
3. Your cold calling range is much stronger, so you can defend barrels more easily and raise more flops
4. Your cold calling range is much stronger, so you can back-raise more credibly over squeezes
5. You keep in hands you will dominate post-flop

I imagine the biggest advantage you had was that you always knew what the fuck you were doing, where you were in your range, etc. People tend to think of this as extra-theoretical or as a non-play consideration or something, but it actually is a cold-hard theoretical advantage to have a well defined range for which you have a plan. Money isn't so much won or lost on whether you 3b J8s in BU vs BB, so much as it's won or lost depending on how that play fits into your overall range on that street, your overall plan throughout the hand and your overall exploitation plan against that player.

So people naturally equate "It's not what you play, but how you play it" with some rhetorical bullshit akin to "You can't hug your kids with nuclear arms," but really it's actually solid theory.

So yeah, I'd throw up there on the board, "Advantage #6, you much more often knew what the fuck you were doing and why you were doing it."