So this is the first time I've actively tried to breakdown and analyze the way I play with the intention of balancing my ranges in certain situations. Please critique my thinking:

HUNL, Hero is on the button raising to 2.5BB with about 92% range.
Assume Villain calls with around 90% of his range.

OTF: KJ5r

Here is Hero's range broken down using Equilab.



I broke down my value c-bet range into the following: 150

• Pairs higher than MP: 132
• Bottom two: 9
• Sets: 9

And the bluffs to balance those: 48

• Open-enders, gutshots+bdfd, nut bdfd

The bet size would be half pot, as that allows for me to bluff 25% of the time which is about how many bluffs I have in this spot. (If this isn't how pot odds work on the flop please let me know how much of an idiot I am being)
Overall this comes out to 198 c-bets out of 1083 combos.

Reasons I want help:

• Only c-betting 20% of my hands feels very weird considering I normally c-bet about 85% of the time.
• Wondering how to strengthen my check back range. The way I thought about it was to check back middle-low pairs that play poorly vs a flop check raise from the BB, and also checking back some bottom two pair hands that can beat the BB's strong top pair hands that have the rest of my check back range annihilated.
• Should I be afraid of getting check raised on this flop with middle-low pairs? If not I would shift more of these pairs into my c-bet range and maybe lower my raise size to about one-third pot to accommodate more value.

Questions:

• Which pairs are value?
• Is Hero worried about a check raise when holding low pairs?
• How often should hero be c-betting here?

Why do you think that?

Yeah, this isn't how they work.

OK yeah thought so, can u explain how it works on the flop then?

The math for pot odds is the same on all streets.

However, if opponent has "25% pot odds", it doesn't mean that you should be bluffing 25%. It just means that opponent needs to win over 25% of the time in order for his call to be profitable. There's no easy way to calculate how many % you should be bluffing on the flop. Same goes for bet size.

I'm not a HU specialist, but I think if you want to bet 1/2pot on that kind of board, you could bet any pair, any/all draws and any backdoor draw. You might want to check some of your weakest kings, weak jacks and maybe TT/99, 44-22 and some ace highs along with airy stuff like 93s/82s/72s that don't even have a BDFD, but anything that's not drawing almost dead could/should be bet at least some of the time.
The reason SB/BTN can bet at a high frequency with a LOT of bluffs on this board is that BB's range is weak/capped. He usually 3-bets KJ and KK/JJ/55 pre-flop, doesn't he, so he's effectively capped at K5, and doesn't have many Broadway draws either, as a lot of Broadways are also 3-bet pre. He should be check-folding pretty often, and that gives you a lot of scope to c-bet very wide, as your range has the nut advantage.

One note beforehand: Imo half pot is too large of a size, usually in this situation I try to use something closer to 1/3 pot or even 1/4 if the board is extremely dry (K72r or something).

So my questions for this are:

• Betting all of my draws seems like it would be massively overbluffing, so what would you say if I wanted to check back majority of my backdoor draws and try to pick up equity on the turn?
• So since his range is capped at around K5s are we just not worried about getting check raised? I would assume c-betting so frequently with draws would open us to being check raised by V as a bluff.
• How would my c-bet range change if I wanted to bet closer to 1/3 pot?
• Is there any merit in just taking my entire range and c-betting around 1/4 pot? V can't check raise us because of the range advantage but can't quite fold because nearly his entire range has at least 20% equity, so we keep his range wide on the turn?

If your most likely draw comes in you will not have enough hands to continue bluffing so you will want a fairly wide betting range on the flop. You will find yourself in situations where you won't have enough bluffs just based on the board, but you should try to keep your ranges as wide as possible heads up.


Correct. Villain can't just check raise you mercilessly because you have plenty of hands to continue with and it would be hard for villain to bluff appropriately.

It probably wouldn't change much at all to be honest.

Yea you'll be way over betting if you're c betting your entire range here. I mean you opened 92% of hands preflop and that sizing doesn't really help your fold equity for the hands that have little to no chance of winning at showdown.

Im no expert, but in theory I would bet a larger size and add some total air to the bluff range.
This would allow for better fold equity and larger polar spots with careful “eject button” give ups.

There so many things to discuss bc all concepts are related. I just add my grain of salt and notice too often you check back and turn is A you hit. Everytime you cbet and turn is A you dont hit.

Wouldn't that mean villain realizes the equity of his own "air" and backdoors for free? I think it's better for you to make him fold a lot of stuff that is already - or could improve to - the best hand. To put it another way, when villain sees that flop with Q8s or T7s or 76s, he'd really like a free card and/or a chance to bluff the turn/river. Don't let him have what he wants.
What's he going to bluff with? To balance his K5, he could use some QTo and maybe some bottom pairs, but nothing else makes a lot of sense. You have a range advantage and position so can call his check-raises pretty often. (All the Broadway draws you have can continue, along with the obvious made hands). He won't be able to just barrel off if you call the check-raise, because he doesn't have the nuts in his range, while you do.
I think you could increase your betting frequency a little bit if you went smaller, but I wouldn't like to estimate by how much, or which combos can suddenly go into the betting range. A solver is your friend for this kind of thing. FWIW, a quick look at Snowie's suggestions reveal that betting big would force you to c-bet at a much lower frequency, since the range that continues would be so much stronger, and you really don't want to play a big pot with weak Kx/Jx hands if villain doesn't fold immediately. (Thin value) hands like K4 would likely have a higher EV if you bet small.

I should point out, in case it's not obvious, that other flops would require radically different strategies. This KJ5r flop is a board that is pretty hard for villain to "defend" on, so you can bet at a high frequency, with a lot of "air". In other spots, where you don't have as much fold equity, and check-raises will be more common, you'd need to check back much more often.

If you're opening 92% on the button, which I think is too loose, while the big blind is only defending 90%, which I believe is too tight vs a 90% opening range, then I think the best action on the button is to exploit the big blind's preflop tightness by checking more than I would when facing off vs a better big blind defending range.

After that, I only skimmed the thread. It's early here. Maybe later I'll look at the postflop implications.

wtf?

Defending ranges should be wider than the opening range.

You shouldn't think about your range on the flop in this spot IMO. If you're oppening 92% OTB you should have a pretty good reason to do it. Like a super thight blinds or the BB that will fold to a cbet at a very high frequency which would make this spot easy.

It's huhu.

Agree with Bob here. The BB price of entry is too good so normally he can defend wider than a person can open with 0 investment.

I don't know where you heard that, but I don't think that's how it works.

For example, when CO opens 3x, he's usually opening hands like TJo. Regs however aren't really defending TJo from BB vs CO in this spot.
Same goes for HU spots. I assume it's probably optimal to open 80%+, but I can't see it being good for BB to defend this wide.

I defend JTo on Bb vs CO open 3*, you think i m wrong ?

I dont think it s printing money but I dont like to fold too much.

Well you would defend KQo ? QJo ? Yeah... i think JTo is defend... as a general rule

And CO includes many suited and unsuited connectors lower than that... often A7o+, all suited aces, sometimes all suited kings... K9+... i think JTo is a defend

Right but the opener has to make at least 0 ev with her hands (-.5bb for a 1bb/2bb structured heads up game) while investing a full 2-3 bb. BB only has to invest 1-2 additional bb and only has to do better than -1 bb with her hand to make calling better than folding.

Do we agree we re 100bb deep in this game by the way ? It s very relevant bc it tells if there s a turn & river play, room for check raise, 3bet & 4bet game etc...

The thing is it s very difficult to play the check-call game and if opponent really open 92% you should 3bet a lot lot lot until he stop opening that much. Then you just 3bet a lot.

In heads up 100bb deep cash, if SB/BTN opens for 2.5bb with about 80% of hands, BB defends less than 60%.

In 6-max, with someone opening in CO (for example), it's a little different, partly because there is an additional 0.5bb of dead money in the pot from the SB that folded pre.
CO might open 25% and BB calls or 3-bets with about 32%.
In a 6-max game where the SB opens maybe 50% of hands, the BB might defend 65%+, but note he also has the positional advantage in that scenario.

That is a good point I suppose. Overemphasized the losing less than 1 bb aspect.