So as someone trying to learn an optimal approach to poker, I'm constantly thinking of how poker is a zero sum game. If a player makes a mistake that loses money, there should always be someone who is making money from that, right? I love Ed Miller's description of this in the Course where he explains that the perfect player puts in money with a certain proportion of their hands on each street, and all the profits of a winning player come from players who put money with more hands than the perfect player on at least one of these streets. And the way I understand it, GTO is just trying to have a set of ranges on each street such that you're playing as close to this perfect player so that it just automatically makes money from whenever other players put money in with too many hands on any street.

But I'm trying to learn specifically how every type of mistake of another player gets converted to profit for hero if hero is playing GTO.



Let's take this hand of mine from 2nl:

Hero has Tc 9c in MP

Hero raises to 3 BB, CO raises to 5 BB, Hero calls

Flop : (11.5 BB, 2 players) Ac 8s 2h

Hero checks, CO checks

Turn : (11.5 BB, 2 players) 3s

Hero bets 11 BB, CO raises to 44 BB, Hero folds



Surely there shouldn't be any hands that he plays well by 3betting preflop, checking back on the flop (capping his range), and then raising big into my bluff on the turn.

So either he is doing this with hands like KK and JJ which make sense to 3bet preflop, make sense to check back on the flop but definitely should not be raising on the turn, and I can exploit this by calling down the turn with any Ax in my range.

Or he is doing this with a hand like 5s4s and 33 which make sense to check back on the flop, and make sense to raise on the turn when they pick up equity, however if he is 3betting this wide preflop, then I can exploit that by 4betting wide preflop and making him fold all these hands preflop.

Or he is doing this with something like AA, in which his preflop 3bet is obviously fine, his turn raise is obviously fine, but the check back on the flop is horrible and leaves money on the table. However, I can't really figure out a way to exploit this from my end. Should I just be satisfied that when I call down and lose, he hasn't made as much money as he could have? Is this in itself the way that I 'make' money from his mistake?

I am intrigued by other's answers to this thread as this is an interesting post.

Certainly my first thoughts are that this player is bad because of the small 3bet pre-flop where you may be able to call with 100% of your range as it is just a 2bb raise.

However, if we assume the player made a 3bet to 9bb and the hand played out the same, your points are interesting to me. Which player is truly making the mistakes etc.?

You could say that he was bad because he slowplayed, or that you were bad as you put money in post-flop with ten-high, so which player 'won'?

It is also interesting that you mention he could be 3betting JJ in position pre-flop, when JJ doesn't like 50% of flops so often it has to just check it down and play a small pot post-flop even though it 3bet pre-flop. Not only that but on some safe looking boards you can get value-owned by QQ and a slow played AA/KK. A similar situation occurs with TT and 99 but it is even worse with these hands.

Checking back on flop is not all that bad.

This "GTO arrogance" is not really gonna take u too far. Yes, this guy is probably just a fish due to his 3b sizing, but often times, people deviate from optimal intenctionally and they have their own reasons to do it. Being dismissive about it and just assuming you have an edge is not very smart.

Vs the guys that do this constantly, the exploit comes down to learning their betting patterns and acting accoringly. Fishes check flop with the nuts constantly and get extremely aggressive on later streets because they know it looks like "they can't have it"

AA/A3s/33 + bluffs are all decent hands to make that play with (ignoring the 3bet and raise sizes). Who says that slowplaying isn't ever GTO?

People often say that you have a big hand and so you need to build this pot.

Not saying that I agree, but streamers and a lot of poker players always seem to bet their big hands on the flop.

To answer your question... if someone slowplays too much, then you get to realize equity with hands in spots where you would normally be forced to fold. And then in those spots your hand is disguised and villain usually gets attached and pays you off.


As for the hand... If you are stabbing a ton on the turn vs the c back then villain should be checking back a decent amount here. Including with AA, and other weaker showdown hands that arent worried about scare cards like weak Ax or KK,QQ

This, plus you are losing less on average when you have hands with some value that would call when V bets rather than slow playing. V is missing out on value in these spots. Remember $ not lost are just as good as $ won.

Doesn't villain make up for this by winning EV from hands that you then start bluffing with that would have otherwise folded to the flop bet? For example the hand in question in the OP. By checking back the flop with top set or TPTK, he got value from hero and so you could argue the slowplaying worked here.

So the reason I bluffed here was because I assumed that with a board as dry as this, one of the best bluffs I could have is Tc9c - its value is Ten High, and it has a backdoor straight and flush draw. My value would be 88 and 22 and 33, with 33 having gained from villain slowplaying his AA. However if he only takes this line with AA, then my whole range is still losing completely and I don't know where I've gone wrong/or how playing with GTO principles wouldn't lose EV here...

Maybe I need to invest in a solver, because I'm trying to get answers to all these questions about how playing GTO works and need to see lots of examples

You take the equity they give you and when you hit you can value bet more than you should. Take this hand from last week at 1-2 live.

CO (me): A3s open, BB flasts HU:

Flop: AAA x,x

Turn:Blank x, bet small, raise, raise 2.5x

What could he possibly have when he raises me on turn? 99+ should be 3 betting, and V is not aggressive so I would never see him bluffing KQ here so already I suspect he slow-played something that he shouldn't have. I have been seen bluffing a few times so id decide to fast play a bit. Anyway river.

River: Blank, x,pot bet, call V shows QQ

Now I think theoretically I should bet turn and river very small since I have such a huge range advantage, but since I know V would never raise me without a serious hand I can go for more value then I should.

All because he let me have my equity pre-flop when he could have easily blown me off it.

This is a very simple question if you think through it logically from a big picture viewpoint.

When they check: By slowplaying good hands, their checking range is stronger than normal so you value bet less thin and bluff less against checks. So in the example hand in the OP, simply bluff less in this spot is fine if you have that read on your opponent.

When they bet: Everyone is dealt the same distribution of hands, so by slowplaying too much they take their good hands out of their betting range and we can exploit that too. So if they bet at a "normal" frequency but without a big chunk of their strong hands, clearly they are imbalanced towards weak hands when they bet. Thus, you can hero call lighter and also attack them with raises (both thin value and bluffs).