I hear this phrase quite a bit. I think it might be a cliche or overused. Certainly there are situations where this is obviously true -- if I raised preflop and you didn't, clearly QJT favors my range. But in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qAZr...6D9zYx0G0atTu6, Mercier opens in middle position, and the button flats. The video commenter, Alec T, says something about how the J25hh board hits MP's range harder.

Can anyone explain what range of hands to give the open raiser and the cold-caller that makes a Jc2h5h board "better for the open raiser"? If Mercier is opening as wide as KTo in middle position, he is probably opening 15%-20% of hands here: any suited broadway, most broadways, most pairs, most suited aces, most suited connectors, right? The gap theory says that the cold caller should have a stronger range, i.e., which seems to me to be a lot of the same stuff, pairs, broadways, suiteds, aces, etc.... except tighter.

For example:
Board: Jc 5h 2h
Hand 0: 49.779% 48.58% 01.20% 15697505 386345.50 { 44+, A2s+, K9s+, Q9s+, J9s+, T9s, 98s, 87s, 76s, 65s, ATo+, KTo+, QJo }
Hand 1: 50.221% 49.03% 01.20% 15840434 386345.50 { QQ-55, AQs-A8s, A5s, KTs+, QTs+, J9s+, T9s, 98s, 87s, 76s, 65s, AJo+, KQo }

So what is Wilf calling with, such that we can claim Jc2h5h "hits Mercier's range harder"? I think it's probably more accurate to say the board likely hits neither player, so Mercier can win by virtue of his betting lead when both players miss, but that's an entirely different and unrelated argument.

Am I wrong? If I'm right, what are some better examples of "this board hits my range harder" and "this board hits his range harder"?

That board is pretty much middle of the road, as you have shown with your stove.

This link goes to a post I made a few years ago regarding asymmetrical range stuff in a limit holdem forum, but I believe that the bold points hold true in any game type:

https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/1...10/?highlight=

ps I was drunk on Christmas Eve when I wrote that up haha.

cliffs:

I've since realized that my wording is quite imprecise. I blame beer and booze for that in addition to my ignorance. Oh well. I can only hope that this doesn't turn into a **** show over my poor wording. Instead I hope we can discuss the concepts presented as if "a lot" and "weak" and "strong" are generally understood as being relative qualities.

I think you're right. It obviously depends upon exactly which ranges you assign to each player, but I think neither player has a clear range advantage on that board. Indeed, it's rare for a pre-flop caller to have an overall equity advantage on any board in a single-raised pot, if both players have "good" ranges for their positions pre-flop. (The caller never has KK+, rarely has QQ or AK).
What happens more often, however, is that one player has more "nutted" or "nut-making" combos (strong draws) on a particular board, such that their continuance range will be a clear favourite vs a sub-optimal betting or calling range.

e.g. UTG opens 2.25bb at 100NL. His range is something like: 66+,A2s+,K9s+,QTs+,JTs,ATo+,KJo+.
BB calls very wide due to the pot odds and ability to close the action with something like TT-22,A9s-A6s,A3s-A2s, K2s+,Q6s+,J7s+,T7s+, 96s+,85s+,74s+,63s+,52s+, 43s,AQo-A9o,KTo+,QTo+,JTo. (Some of those hands would be 3-bets at some frequency, but let's not quibble too much for now).

Pre-flop, UTG has a huge advantage, with a 60:40 equity share.

---- Equity Win Tie
UTG 60.17% 58.76% 1.40% { 66+, A2s+, K9s+, QTs+, JTs, ATo+, KJo+ }
BB 39.83% 38.43% 1.40% { TT-22, A9s-A6s, A3s-A2s, K2s+, Q6s+, J7s+, T7s+, 96s+, 85s+, 74s+, 63s+, 52s+, 43s, AQo-A9o, KTo+, QTo+, JTo }

Suppose the flop comes: 6d5d4s, so the situation looks like this:



(I've given AA to UTG and 98s to BB, just as examples as the kind of hands that are in their ranges).

Although UTG's range still has the most equity (both players have a lot of air in their ranges, but UTG has the biggest overpairs, while BB does not), BB's equity on this flop jumps up to 45% from 40% pre.

Board: 6d5d4s
---- Equity Win Tie
UTG 54.83% 52.35% 2.48% { 66+, A2s+, K9s+, QTs+, JTs, ATo+, KJo+ }
BB 45.17% 42.70% 2.48% { TT-22, A9s-A6s, A3s-A2s, K2s+, Q6s+, J7s+, T7s+, 96s+, 85s+, 74s+, 63s+, 52s+, 43s, AQo-A9o, KTo+, QTo+, JTo }

Although BB's overall range has less equity, this board is "good for his range", because he's the only player with the nuts (87s) in his range, and he also has 66/55/44, 65s, 64s, 54s and a lot of pair+draws, gutshots etc. UTG has no straights, no two pairs, fewer draws and only 3 combos of sets (66).
What this means in theory - and probably also in practice - is that it becomes +EV for the BB to donkbet at a high frequency, and also to continue vs a c-bet by calling or check-raising at a higher frequency than he would on AK2 or QQ2, for example. UTG can't c-bet at a high frequency on this 654 flop - especially if he chooses a size larger than half pot - because he reps so few monsters, and the range that continues will be a favourite against him. All the nutted combos are in BB's range, not UTG's.

Excellent post Arty especially about the idea the advantage isn't necessarily about raw equity.

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I like Arty's example. Note that the big blind has invested 27.27% of the preflop money, but has 45% equity on the flop.

Right. Many times I've said something like "this board is good for the preflop caller" only to be corrected by a stove showing that the preflop raiser maintains a slight raw equity advantage and the argument "the board is better for the preflop raiser." This is a very short sighted argument because raw equity doesn't tell the whole story. This bit by Arty is particularly pertinent:

Indeed this is and should be the primary concern. If we make the mistake of value betting too thin and or bluffing too much on that flop as utg, we're going to end up costing ourselves money while our "value" hands become defacto protection bets. I'm not a fan of protection bets in heads up pots with some exceptions that I won't list. The reason is that if you bet a hand that seems strong on this street, but then if your opponent calls you don't like your hand anymore, that bet seems like a mistake to me.

Yes the eq range against range is often very similar and usually open raisor has advantage.
We can use another aproach than just range vs range equity. Select 10-15% top of your hands and 10-15% best hands of V, now compare equity. That are ranges which can go for fat value that are hands which hardly can fold. This way could show range advantage better than comparing value of entire range.

Yeah bob and arty hit on the right answer...

The EV isn't very important. On this flop -

- The villain has all those PP's which have hit. We have PP's too, but we have many more hands in our range and so they are drowned out to some degree.

- The villain has hands like AJ, KJ, QJ, TJ. We too hold those hands, but we have 9J too, maybe even the 8Js. We are getting owned more often.

- In the same way he has stronger draws than us too.

I don't often look to EV calculations ... (I just look to the ranges and work out how much I make off all the individual hands in the villains range as the hand plays out, then I weigh up the hands I beat against the hands I lose to and if I'm in the green I will make the play. I think that's the natural away to make the decision. Weighing up your options.) ... To me, this board looks like it belongs to him, he seems to have hit it harder than we have. I mean, think about how this one will play out, even if we have JQ and he calls our Cbet we're in a very dangerous place on all kinds of turns. If we don't hold the J we could find ourselves barrelling three streets with air. If we're bluffing he has position which helps him a lot, and he'll be soaking up our first Cbet often which drains our initiative, raising us often too. On this board we're probably going to have to put in two bets to have any credibility. AND he has us owned all over the place. This one does not look like it will play out well for us very often. Our implied odds look bad.