Thinking in terms of ranges
Join Date: Jul 2014
Posts: 201
Does anybody know of any good videos/reading which can help me to think in terms of ranges (What I think his range is, what he thinks my range in a given spot is). I noticed when playing that I don't really consider ranges and what I'm going to get called by. I could betting in a spot where I'm not going to get called by worse so it's a bad bet and I think this is a leak for me.
Join Date: Feb 2013
Posts: 10,844
One of the best things I did was pay more attention when I don't have cards. Try to guess what the other players have and then see how close you were if there's a showdown. If you find that you are close, then you may already have a good grasp of ranges but a bad grasp of your 'special/fancy play syndrome' button.
Not to be rude, but you sound like a 'card' player, not a poker player right now. Read through some other content here and make a list of 4-6 things you must consider before making any decisions .. stack size, board content, outs that improve my hand, outs that improve the board.
These are all things you can consider before (and without) considering your opponents cards. Once you completely understand where you stand then understanding where your opponent may stand will come easier. GL
Join Date: Dec 2014
Posts: 13,256
Read Ed Miller's 'How to Read Hands' and 'Playing the Player'.
When you've fully digested those, Matt Janda's book is all about how to play ranges (rather than individual hands) in a pseudo-optimal/balanced manner.
Join Date: Feb 2012
Posts: 14,123
Join Date: Apr 2016
Posts: 56
Jollocks,
You're not the only one that is looking for "range how-to" help. I'm at the point of my poker game where I can focus now on position, texture, pot odds, implied odds, and my hand strength but am seriously lacking on evaluating the other player's ranges. I too am looking for a good book, videos, or resources to help me develop this skill.
The issues I have with assigning ranges are as follows...
When I make a conscious effort to focus intently on hands where I'm not in the hand, so many of the hands are folded without showing their cards, I lose interest. It seems like there are only a small fraction of hands that actually get shown face up.
I play in a loose limpy live low limit home game (that's very lucrative) and people play such bad cards that its really tough to assign ranges because a lot of the players ranges are so huge that I find it tough to narrow down and also find tough to keep interest when I'm surprised at the crappy cards that do show which I wouldn't have expected in addition to the situation described in #1 above.
The times where I can accurately predict hands are generally in live tournaments where people play more standard and by the book. Again though, #1 comes into play where you study intensely on a hand and then it doesn't go to show down and I think to myself...why bother?
I guess I realize that I have an attention issue when playing. I really want to play the range game every hand but when it comes down to it, I find it frustrating with all of the hand no shows and I find it more compelling to assess the other parts of the game that I have more control of (position, texture, etc, etc).
I'll have to check out these books that were suggested above. Most books are written by people that have all of the knowledge and teach everything at once but can't break it down in steps that are practical for me to apply little by little until I get it all. They usually just pull up the dump truck and dump it all.