But also I think/almost am 100% sure the sb open strat at 5/10 is going to be waaaah diff because Oop is so incentivized today chop pre so that range should be a lot stronger on avg than the 500z regs
So It’s probably going to be a decent look to decrease the aggression frequency somewhat I’d probably try and roll like 30-50% 3bs here

lol oh **** i just realized that this was sb v bb and not btn v bb. disregard what I said about this hand

No rake in this game fwiw I chop in rake games

Given that most underbluff river (and this is definitely one of those times), and we are IP, I am always calling turn always folding river.

I think preflop is a pure 3bet, how is it not? What is the rationale for flatting? The lack of 4betting and general poor play in 3bet pots in the live population makes me wonder what the point in flatting QTs is. I would flat QTo of course.

What is a baby shot? Is that your nickname?

Ye ^_^

I mean to be fair this:

Could easily say this:


Population of cash players who never ever play BvB almost surely not anywhere near polar enough pre to make QTs anywhere near a pure 3b.

What's the story behind it if you care to elaborate?

As SB becomes more polarized with his open, the less I want to 3bet QTs. It sounds like you are advocating for the opposite though - that SB isnt going to be polarized enough to warrant 3betting. Is that what you are saying?

What does your 3bet range look like here? or maybe that's overasking ... what % roughly would you 3bet QTs here (no rake)?

bb v sb raise is a very difficult and nuanced spot (bvb in general is). There are a lot of different bvb strategies that can capture similar EVs and often a simplified strategy that you play well (ie the strategy that you know best how to play flop turn and river spots) will capture more EV than a complicated mixed strategy; ie, limping all your hands you want to continue as sb or raising all your hands, or 3betting a linear bb range compared to 3betting a polarized range with some K4o, J7o, T7o, Q6o, T4s type hands.

In raked games live the blinds are often (if not always) chopped so the rake argument is a moot point for live games (because in a medium-high rake environment you don't gain much, if any, EV from having a sb limping strategy and should just open raise all your hands that you want to play). So in an un-raked game we definitely gain some EV from having a mixed strategy in the sb; however, to capture all of that EV, you would need to know how to play all of the resulting game trees (or at least play them better or equal to your opponent) which gets extremely complicated. The same can be said for playing the polarized type 3betting strategy from the bb instead of just 3betting linearly.

In my experience it's much better to sacrifice a little EV for a major strategy simplification; for example I know my sb v bb open raise spots very well because I use an only open raise strategy when playing online (because of the rake), therefore that will be default strategy even in unraked live games even though I know a mixed limping strategy would in theory capture me more EV. Additionally, because your strategy will be simplified, you can hopefully implement it very well (because you have less nodes/trees to study compared to a complicated mixed strategy) in all of the other parts of the game tree; a really solid simplified strategy will outperform a poorly implement complicated GTO mixed strategy any day.

That being said, in most live games (excluding 10/25+) your opponent will be relatively unbalanced in these bvb spots and we should have some exploitative deviations depending on his tendencies; we can raise versus people who overfold bb, and limp an unbalanced range of weak-ish hands vs a weaker player while raising our stronger hands. However, bvb spots occur so infrequently in 9 handed live games that you will never truly get a large enough sample to truly exploit with confidence so it's also important to have a solid baseline strategy (which imo the simpler the better).

and FWIW QTs at equilibrium is like a 35% 3bet or something (assuming villain is playing a GTO open limp and raise strategy)

No argument there. Simpler strategies will definitely lead to better results, and BvB can be hard.

Does that change much if SB only open raises?

OP my bad for the derail.

I wouldn't raise flop having a Q. I think it ends up being a little too thin and the Q is blocking some of villains obvious continue range. If we cant go for 3 streets after raising flop I'm not inclined to do it. Readless, I would raise AT and thats probably it for the one pair hands.

I also would not raise river. We should have some single heart combos that make for better raises, but also, I feel like we actually might not have a ton of flushes so we may have to be careful about overbluffing. I also agree with what Jarretman said earlier (although he wants to recall his earlier comments) that your typical opponent is going to talk themselves into calling, more than you think, after betting river small.

If you're card dead and its getting annoying, try to stick to the obvious bluff spots - especially if you are shot taking. The last thing you want to do when shot taking is make a desperate play and have it not work out. Confidence killer. Keep a level head when moving up and just play your normal game, dont get overly creative (not saying this is - but its bordering on it IMO).

Nah this is a good thing to discuss.

TBH when I said polar my MTT background (antes) kicked in. In that environment SB so heavily incentivized to complete (Especially deep) that his open range ends up being quite polar.

Without antes, polar is not the right word, "diffuse" is.

Are population cash players opening SB here with J5s, K8o, 52s, et al? I genuinely don't know but my risky assumption is they are not.

Great post

Would like to see what the equilibrium opening range looks like in that tree all the ones I study seem to imply BB, having such a large incentive to flat and force OOP to fight his way through such a large game tree (being this deep), wants to 3b much, much polar than 35% freq for QTs would imply.

I mean QTs being close to a pure flatvs SB Open 100bb eff no antes.

What open sizing do you use, is it larger than 3x?

It depends. But mostly, no. A good BB will eat you alive.

This spot is in my experience quite profitable as BB IP without rake as a good player with an image that can profitably force OOP villain through the game tree.

I am not sure how varying SPR ratios would affect 3B ranges.

I find this play similar to button straddling or automatically opening in PLO then to isolate a Villian OOP. Players overfold and give off numerous tells or spews when faced with situations they are uncomfortable with OOP. That’s been my bread and butter of successful play as a maniac lag style.

QTs is a pure flat bb vs sb for me.

Well, I guess I was very wrong with my intuition here.

I can see that. It does force SB into difficult spots. I am assuming another part of the reason the solution leans away from 3betting is because we are forced to fold to a 4bet, and this hand has so much equity when we flat?

That's the reason why the polar "GTO" bb 3betting range consists of various "trash" hands that are fine folding to a 4bet, combined with hands that are totally fine calling a 4bet (or jamming). It doesn't "waste" medium strength hands that have to fold to a 4bet.

In this exact case QTs calls vs a 4bet.

This is all 100bb deep of course; 200bb+ deep it changes and I don't know exactly in which ways lol.

200bb+ I think you can 3bet QTs and call a 4bet.

Ok, if it is calling vs a 4bet, then I guess the reason it doesnt 3bet much is to strengthen its very wide flatting range in the BB vs SB case. If we 3bet down to QTs then that flatting range is potentially just too weak. On the other hand it IS mixing here so I'm guessing the EV of flat vs 3bet runs fairly close?

What’s weird about the whole “if a solver recommends mixing it’s because both option have the same EV” argument, is that the EV of which line u take with a hand is dependent on the other hands u have in that range. For example, a weak hand in a strong range has more EV than a weak hand in a weak range.
So the EV of flatting QTs vs 3betting QTs matters heavily on how we’re constructing, and looking at the decision in isolation does no justice.

Well, I was not suggesting that if a solver mixes that its doing so because both options have the same EV. I would expect thats rarely a reason for mixing. I just wouldnt expect the solver to mix very often preflop if the EVs of raise vs call were noticeably different. Is that incorrect?

I'm guessing here, but where I could see this happening - mixing even when EVs are different - is on the river (maybe turn) when, with specific runouts, we end up with a range that doesnt have enough bluff candidates. In that case we may have to pick some 'bluffs' even though the EV of calling/checking with an individual hand in isolation is higher. Obviously this shouldnt be a regular occurrence for a solver range but I would think its possible. I believe I saw this in a video from Finding Equilibrium, he suggested maybe a solver defect but I kind of doubt it.

I'm kind of thinking out loud here. I dont know if this is accurate so feel free to pick it apart. I would really like to know the kinds of scenarios where the solver mixes even when the EVs do not run close. I think those could be interesting spots to study.

Also you can 100bb deep.

This isn't a thing and if it is you are using a broken or terrible solver . In fact for something to be mixed, the EVs (in the solver's "mind") have to be identical or it wouldn't mix them; it would only pick the higher EV option. And yes of course this only means something in the context of a range vs range scenario and the composition of each range matters.

I think i would have two raise sizes on river vs this small bet size. I would raise big (likely a shove) with my flushes and my Kjo with a heart and raise more normal like 3x with my straights and sets vs this river sizing. I think your hand or obv j10 make the best river bluffs here for this sizing.