haha I played a 11/180 final table with you ssnyc.. I remember because I thought your name was weird

The hand I busted you on was hilarious. You over shoved 50+ BB into a 3 BB pot with QQ right into my AA.

[/sick brag]

sounds like a standard spot for me

The FPS piece?

ezz b/f

Pardon the bump of golden thread, but I don't see how adjusting your game vs thinking regs to possibly get an additional bet of value + having an additional bullet of fold equity can ever bring anything other than more power to you.

It's not like I'm advocating doing the double barrel con c/r bluff every other hand against him. Do it something like 20% more often than you expect to have a set, add in another 5-10% of merged top pairs, and you should be good to go!

Lets break his hand down into ranges, and see how each part responds.

T9: You make the most money by checking.
96: You lose the most by b/c, about the same for b/f and c/c.
spades: You make the most by checking.
8x: You make the most by betting an amount that ssync calls.
two pair: You make the most by c/raising or b/c (if somehow ssync manages to raise with two pair here).

What hands do we think he has? We expect him to play most of his strong draws fast, so I'd put him on some gutties + overs (A5/A6; K5/K6), and naked sd's. The value of your hand on the river comes from bluffs, vbets/payoffs w/ worse. I'd make a small induce bet (maybe 80ish) and call a raise, hoping ssync interprets it as a block bet intending to fold to heat. Realize ssync will mistakenly raise for value with some hands when we block bet too; Ax two pair type hands might raise the river for value. I think a check looks too strong; having made a strong bet on the turn, it looks like we're hero calling a large part on the river, as it seems too convenient of a card to bluff considering all of the other possible drawing hands.

I hear you, I'm all for range balancing vs. regs and taking alternate/creative lines, I just wouldn't take THIS line HERE often, if at all. I don't think that you need to be able to take every possible line in every spot and have it always be balanced.

The reason here is a combination of mine and my villains perceived ranges in this spot. If I'm leading here 2 streets, I'm going to be leading with showdown value a lot of the time. If villain is calling 2 streets, it's gonna be with a hand that has showdown value a lot of the time. The only time I'm bluffing here, is when his showdown value > my showdown value, which I don't think happens often after I take this line.

If I'm leading with spades, and a reg calls 2 streets, and the only non-spade draw gets there, his range becomes very strong, since the likelihood he shows up on the river with just missed spades also, and the likelihood that he puts me on them and calls a bit wider, are both increased. If I'm leading with a good pair or better, I often will be able to bet for value again on the river (like in this spot). If we show up with the bottom of our value range, like 8x here, there's not really any value in c/r bluffing unless we really think he called with an Ax draw, and that he's going to b/f it on the river here (which he's probably not going to be, he'll be checking back almost always).

So basically, once I take this line, my range is fairly strong and weighted towards 'something' more than air. When a reg calls my lead twice here, his range is also weighted towards 'something'. I don't see a reason to miss value vs. a bunch of his call down range with a hand that's crushing that range here, or a reason to try to bluff him off of range that consists of a lot of hands that either a) beat me and do not bet the river, b) beat me and do not fold to a check-raise on the river.

Now, with history/meta-game, this can chance a lot, and I can definitely see this line being a viable option, but, as a default I wouldn't force a line in a spot where I feel other more straight-forward lines are almost always more superior.

EDIT: btw p3rc4, I do think that the sentiment of your posts here is still important and it is definitely a necessary idea to incorporate these types of lines and the thought processes behind them vs. other thinking players, so, good posts

This thread caused me to have a dream where perca shared information out of a secret poker notebook with me. One question:

Does such a notebook exist?

lol

i cant tell how many levels there are in this thread.

betting > checking

his value bet range is really tiny here and his bluff frequency if you check as said previously by him is very very small, and maybe its player dependent but i beleive he is calling his entire range on the river vs me besides when he spaz bluffs in which case i snap him off, which is why for me its a b/c.

if ss raises the flop, that changes everything about this hand, or if he raises the turn. but so far he has shown a medium strength holding that wants to get to showdown by calling two small bets, with that information, you cannot assume he is betting anything behind and youre losing way more value by checking.

i respectfully disagree almighty p3, but think youre a wonderful leveler.

...i think ss has pair, two pair or straight OTR. Hands like T8,98,45,65,64 86,85,76,75 would fit perfect.

So i would b/f river cause he will probaly call with his (two)pairs and only raise the straight.
Thats also the reason why i would never cR river here. Thats ugly, cause trip 4s are to weak to play for value but to strong to play as a bluff.

dunno...

what did ss hold?

sick level. you have to be leveling because SS himself said that c/r here isnt the best play against him. he also responded to the part about balancing your "perceived" range

i don't know how this hand has actually got this far.
by far i mean in terms of replies.

That's all fair, and I agree with most of what you're saying. We all need to get our own individual games on, and stop playing "standard" poker. If you feel that you would never ever double barrel oop without a monster, and you think ssnyc is on track, bet/fold is likely optimal!

Also, would I ever put this much effort into a level?