Since black Friday my play has specifically consisted of live play, and while I have a decent amount of live experience most of my poker career has consisted of online play, roughly a little over 2 million hands since 2006. Since adjusting to the live cash games I can say without a doubt there are a number of common mistakes and basic fundamentals problems that vast majority of recreational players have.

For example, something I see a lot is a player not understanding board texture. Its almost like people are mimicking what they have seen other players do, but have no rhyme or reason behind what they do. It baffles me how bad people c-bet some flops given the board texture. The games have evolved to the point where even the average bad player knows to c-bet the flop a good majority of the time, even though there are players that don’t, compared to 3 or 4 years ago the majority of players will c-bet flops, but what they don’t consider is the board texture. For a SSNL game it’s honestly profitable to get away with cbetting ~90% of the time for a few reasons. One, a lot of players play fit or fold post flop and you pick up a ton of dead money when they wiff their hand and secondly live players fall to pieces at facing heat against a scare turn or river card assuming you can hand read well enough to double and triple barrel scare cards.

As most of you know an ideal board to cbet your air range would be one broadway or ace card and two small cards, for example on a 3-4-K board you should pretty much be c-betting your entire air range 100% of the time. C-betting a super wet flop like 9T7 two hearts hits a cold calling range pretty hard and we can’t rep as much credit as we could on a 3-4-K board. So it’s most likely in our best interest to take a passive line and check. However no matter how wet the flop is in a heads up pot its very rare ill check back twice meaning if I check behind a wet flop and opt not to c-bet my air and its checked to me again on the turn I will almost always delay c-bet the turn. People don’t check two streets enough with slow played hands or strong enough hands to not make it profitable to bet. It can be player dependent though, some live players are really just weak tight and will check two streets with bottom/mid pair but the majority of the time when its checked twice to me that’s a license to steal all day.

With that same 3-4-K board mentioned above, If you notice I specifically say the air portion of your range, because a SSNL game is not going to be filled with competent thinking players and the times where the flop has us miles ahead of their range we need to let them catch up otherwise we lose value, because as acknowledged earlier most SSNL live players play fit or fold post flop. Now obviously this leaves us vulnerable to having our range polarized because we slow down the action when we either have the deck crushed or have their range crushed and any good player would be able to polarize our range, and in a good thinking game you should be c-betting even a higher percentage of your range for balance. A player who can balance their range well is the difference between a good and great player IMHO. A good example of balancing your range can be demonstrated in PF play. For example, say a decent live player opens in the CO, we can assume their range is a little wide, but nothing too crazy and if I’m only 3betting QQ+ and AK+ well now I am leaving my range super polarized where as if I’m 3betting hands that flop well post flop like 89s, 9Ts, JTs etc I get more action with the top end of my range and balance my post flop range at the same time given my PF 3betting range is so well balanced. So lets say we 3bet the CO on the button with 89s and he tanks and cold calls us, well even though 89s, 9Ts type hands are behind the CO’s range, given that we have position and play better post flop poker than him it doesn’t really matter whether or not we are behind or ahead of his range that point. This is why being able to assess proper board textures and associate them against player’s ranges are so important and hands down one of the most profitable skill sets for SSNL.

Most of the time a good board texture to double or even triple barrel a hand would be if a turn peeled a face card, puts a 4 flush on the board, or 4 straight. Cards that do not change the board texture are horrible cards to double barrel! For example if we c-bet a flop of T-2-3r and a player calls, and the turn peels a 2x the board texture hasn’t changed at all and what ever is looking us up on the flop is most likely looking us up on the turn. Now if a king peeled instead, a double barrel is almost mandatory as most players will likely cuss under their breath and complain about how bad they run etc and muck. Live players can be big stations at times and it wouldn’t surprise me if you are looked up once and a while doubling that King turn which is why I would almost always triple barrel ¾ size bet on the river in that situation assuming I don’t think the players hand has improved. A 3barrel makes it look more likely that we actually have a King in our range and its unlikely a king is in their range as there isn’t a lot of hands that flat the flop with a K in it other than one specific hand KT. But even then we most likely would have faced heat on the turn when we double barreled, which is why I think a triple barrel in that situation would be mandatory. Its a lot harder to be stubborn twice than once.

A couple nights ago was I playing in a $1-3 nl game 9 handed, filled with the average recreational players when a good example of utilizing board texture came into play. It folds to middle position where MP+2 (~$500) opens to $12, I’m on the button (~$600) with JTs and 3bet to $33, folds around to MP+2 who flats. Villain is a younger player, aggressive, a little bit on the station side, but is not going to be stacking off in a horrible way. I don’t have that much information on him as I have only played with him a handful of times, but that’s my general thought on the player going into the hand.

Flop comes 5-2-4r, MP+2 checks, I c-bet $52 which I’m going to be c-betting 100% of my range when I 3bet PF and its checked to me, MP+2 flats, and turn is a Tx and MP+2 leads $60 into me. This is actually a pretty odd line because I don’t really have that much information on the player and his line is pretty unorthodox. I have a good amount of showdown value and I don’t need to turn my top pair into a bluff quite yet so I decided to flat and reevaluate the river. His line is actually pretty strong and is unlikely he is out of position floating me, but a portion of his range could be doing this with 77, 88, 99, or ace high that got stubborn on the flop with two over’s and a gutshot and is now trying to take the hand down. River is a 3 and MP+2 checks to me. After I closed the action with a call on the turn I take Ax out of his range because I don’t think a hand with an 6 or Ace will ever check to me on the river because unless I have a straight I will be checking behind, so I believe he would have led for value. Plus it re insures my original thought that it was highly unlike he was OOP floating me. So now I was in a situation where I had to determine whether or not to turn my hand into bluff with that good scare card peeling off. The question I had to ask myself was would I win the pot more by checking behind because I still have some showdown value or will he be leading the turn enough with two pair/set type hands where if I barrel the scare card I get a better hand to fold. After consideration I concluded turning my hand into a bluff was the most optimal play because after the river check I can take out the assumption that he had a big ace and was OOP floating the flop with two over’s and a gutshot because he would have almost always led the river after I flatted the turn, so now I feel his range consists of two pair, sets and 77-TT type hands which will mostly likely all fold to a 3-4/pot size river bet. I end up betting $200 and MP+2 folded 44 face up. Which is ironic because I would have called my river bet with his 44 since I have no ace or 6 in my range, even if I have aces myself and the vast majority of players would have raised the turn and never just flatted. This is why its so profitable to understand their range in relation to the board texture because you can get away with things like this whereas in a tougher game it could be a lot harder to get a fold there since we honestly never have an ace or 6 in our range.

Lastly I have found it extremely profitable bluff raising dry boards IP. For example say we flat a raise PF and the flop comes K-3-4 rainbow and its c-bet to me, regardless of my hand I’m bluff raising this flop a ton because unless he has specifically AK, 33 or 44 nothing will feel comfortable calling a raise here. Even KQ being raised OOP on this board is an annoying situation to be in. Putting weaker players in uncomfortable situations is the approach needed to crush these live SSNL games.

Nice post

i liked it too.

Very nice. Thanks.

very nice post...I feel like i should have paid to read that.

ok, since everyone is praising the post, let me play 'devils advocate'
in all seriousness, it was a VERY good post... really, i only take exception to this statement above:
".. unless he has specifically AK, 33 or 44, nothing will feel comforatable calling a raise here"

in my experience playing 2-5 NL full ring, and small entry fee tournies (100-250), i've found this to be an invalid assumption, as i've seen more than a few players play K with any decent (>8) kicker and even A-3, A-4 with alot of confidence.. now i'm not saying that they will cave to a big sized bet, but i dont think its automatic that they get uncomfortable at all... now mind you, we're talking about a large pool of very weak players here, but more weak in the sense that they dont know when to fold, rather than weak in the sense that they are scared to call a big bet...

just my observations...
~ Slip

i agree to some sense, it can be player dependent as some players are just clueless and believe they have the best hand for the wrong reasons.

Please make moar threads OP.

This is probably the best post I've read on 2+2 yet. Make more OP

i just posted another thread of turning our hand into a bluff if you guys are interested

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/15.../#post28517328

i also publish the articles on http://www.sosickbro.com so you can follow it there too (if im not allowed to post the link mods feel free to delete it)

Great post

I like this and will post a link to it in the Live Low Stake forum.

I'm a little confused as to why you would usually be raising villain's donk bet on the turn with AA. Aren't you normally either way ahead of pocket pairs or way behind sets, two pair and straights? What would a raise accomplish but to fold out weaker? I ask this because you say you never have an A in your range by the river.

Excellent post. I only disagree with one minor thing and that's the J10 vs 44 hand when you say you shouldn't have any Axs in your range which I believe is untrue.

I would raise the turn for value, as i think he peels with a smaller over pair, honestly it's unlikely he flopped a set because he called a 3bet oop, and i think he would peel one more.

Well i wouldn't ever float Ax on the turn in this spot, if anything with Ax folding >> raising >> calling

so other than AA what ace do i have in my range? And even with AA i think i raise the turn for thin value as i think he will peel with a smaller over pair and its unlikely he flopped a set when he calls my 3bet oop

I see players call 3bets all the time with 22-JJ oop -and it turns out in your post villain had a set of 4's. But yeah, his flatting the cbet was pretty tricky.

Donk bets always catch me off guard, but I actually think his is not bad. If you raise his turn donk with AA, are you're folding to a shove or stacking off? If you raise villain will probably fold worse than top pair, so do you really think villain is showing up with KK-JJ or some OOP floated AT enough to merit value betting?

Anyway, basically, whether or not AA is in your range by the river or not, in small stakes live games a three bet PF almost always means AA-QQ or AK, and a typical villain will normally put you on an A here I believe.

I find myself crushing live SSNL when I minimize bluffs and don't cbet >80%. Most people at these stakes are on the level: "F it, I call." Well thought post for sure, I can tell you know your stuff well and will adjust well to what game you're in, but I simply disagree with the level of aggression that you are suggesting for an average live SSNL game.

I believe he thought i could have had an ace in my range too thats why i ended up betting the river, i'm saying if i'm in his shoes i wouldn't put one in mine. I'm not flatting the turn bet with AK and am raising the turn with aa

He has JJ+ enough to raise/call a shove if we have aces on the turn. Sure he b/fs his 77-99s but i think JJ+ enough to raise/get it in

well it's all player dependent, whether live or online you will always have players like "f it, i call" and players who are weak tight. Just like this situation and any poker hand its always player dependent.

(Here's a post I wrote about Cbetting and Board Texture long ago that I'd rather add to this thread than create a new post that would say the same thing)

Flop textures are hard to quantify live because donky players have such wide ranges pre. However, their wideness only adds to the fact that >80% cbet is too much. Why? Because normally, we base our cbets around board textures and villains' related ranges. We can't decide with fair-certainty which boards are best to bet against 1) unknowns, and 2) very-loose players (especially if they're loose-passive).

If I have a read on a guy that his range for calling a raise pre is mostly nut-mining hands like suited connectors and small pocket pairs, then I'm going to be cbetting board textures that have high cards like KJ8 or AAQ or AK9 close to 100%.

Against a player who is very tight pre, I'm going to be using the opposite board textures like 764 or 985 or 5610 or 842. I'm also going to be barrelling often when a scare card hits. For example: if I cbet a 786 board and get called, The 4 is a perfect card to barrel because I know this tight player 1) has basically 0 5x combos in his hand, 2) can't have 2-pair, and 3) is going to be scared of that card with almost his entire range. (Obviously for this example, we also need to know if villain is capable of folding a hand like JJ and how he plays his sets).

However, in these examples we are dealing with players who's ranges are exposed. I am in no way implying that there aren't board textures we can cbet against all types of villains at a high %.These are generally ones that have low connectivity and coordination like for example: Q72 or 994 or K83 or basically any board with low potential simply because they hit less hands.

To add: The generally higher your cbet % becomes, the more you need to start incorporating moves (like 2barrelling, c/raising the turn, 3barrelling, etc.) There are so many reasons for this, but I'm going to focus on the main two that I think are most relevant. For 1: Live Low Stakes players station the flop more than any other street. It goes back to that common saying "they put you on AK" so they call a cbet, but so often they change their mind when facing a double or triple barrel. Sometimes you'll even hear the "You probably have AK but I fold" simply because they can't stand the heat.

Here's an example of a hand that involves this concept: You have AJ, you raise and get 1 caller. The flop is 229. You bet, your opponent calls. Turn comes K and you check, he checks back. River comes 10 and it goes check/check, he turns up 55 and wins the pot. REWIND! Why aren't we betting that turn card? That turn card is an AMAZING barrel card because it 1) rarely hits villain's flop-calling range, and 2) it hits your perceived range so often: "I put you on AK". Even on the simplest level, it's a scary over-card to their 33-88, Ax, or 9x or w/e so you'll get a lot of folds.

The second reason why becoming a one-and-done cbetter is bad is simply because it is unbelievably exploitable. Any decent reg, and even some bad players can pick up on the fact that you are cbetting then giving up. They can then start playing perfect poker against you by floating the flop, calling any piece of the board and folding (the non-nutted parts of their range) if you bet OTT or betting if you check. You just can't rely on 1barrel against these players. I think people scare themselves out of profitable barrelling spots by thinking "Damn, this guy called the flop? He's never gonna fold."

Final thing to add: Cbetting is always going to be better when you have a decent back-door draw. Like, I'd rather be c-betting a Q72 board with 89 than J9 because it helps make barrelling easier on a bunch of turns, regardless of the fact that J9's absolute hand strength is superior to 89 because the only turn that can come to give us a decent draw is 10x, whereas with 89, any club, 6, 10 is going to give us nut-outs, and any J or 5 gives us at least a gutshot. If you do some quick simulations on Pokerstove, you'll see that 89 does better against most calling ranges than J9 does.