Hi everyone!
It's time for an interesting longread. If you want to read about web interfaces like wizards, GTOBases and so on, sit back and enjoy.
I will try to explain why GTOpacks calculations/packages can be much cooler than any wizards currently available on the poker market.
Web interfaces have recently been gaining more and more popularity. They often win users by providing some of the content completely for free (by the way that leaves a user hooked and devoid of any common sense and reasoning). Undoubtedly, they have their advantages, but users should also have a detailed understanding of the downsides of web interfaces. I hope I will be able to convey most of the points, and this small article will prove useful.
I would like to start with the preflop, but first I will tell you about a very important fundamental thing,
"distortions" — what they are and why they are important.
1. Distortions.
Imagine that you are playing telephone (“Chinese whispers”), where information must get from point A to point B without distortions; you must transmit it very accurately at all intermediate points. If the information is not transmitted accurately at least once, distortion occurs, and the final result changes. The more intermediate points have distortions, the less accurate the final result.
That is why it is very important to have accurate data from the preflop to the river. If we have an approximate result at different points or the tree is “more or less” correct, we risk getting a rather distorted result that can greatly reduce the quality of your information, and it may even be worse than having no information at all! Let us further explore whether such distortions are to be found in web interfaces.
2. Preflop.
You need to pay attention to several important details on the preflop:
2.1 The quality of solutions. In some interfaces — without naming names, there are obvious problems with the quality of solutions. Even very simple and basic spots display insufficient quality. For example, openraise with 22 can be higher than openraise with 44. Somewhere it is displayed in spots that are completely wrong, and so on. Of course, there can be difficult spots (usually multiway) where we can forgive some glitches, but not here.
2.2 A set of preflop sizings within at least the specified preflop spots. Here we mean, for example, highly unusual sizings of 3-bets and/or squeezes. In 2023, I would like to already have calculations with real sizings of the player pool, and not some incomprehensible random ones that are of no help. Of course you could take a range, but you would have to paste it into your solver, change the pot size for a 3-bet pot / squeezed pot (nobody squeezes 15bb by 2.5x) — and it will still be a distortion, because ideally the range should be different.
2.3 Showing rare scenarios of tiny calls. Let's say the opponent opens from CO, and there is a SB call scenario with 1% frequency. Why do we need it? We will never play this way, and the opponent will never split their range into a call (1%) and 3-bet. That is again a distortion.
2.4 Rake. In 2023, most web interfaces began to move towards calculating preflop for different limits. And that's good, but there are also some problems. For example, on some sites, the rake on the same limit may differ by a factor of two. Let's say on PokerStars the NL50 rake is 4bb, and on 888 it is 8bb. In iPoker, the cap is $3, that is 6bb. NL50 is generally crazy when it comes to rake, there can be a lot of work to do calculations. Higher limits are somewhat easier, but there is still Chico Poker NL200 with a cap of 2.25 and 5.55% compared to Stars NL200 with a rake cap of 1.38 and 5% (do you feel the difference?); and then there is GG where the rake is generally taken from the preflop. And now the question is — when we log into the web interface and choose our limit, do we have an idea about what kind of calculation we are dealing with?
3. Postflop
There are several points worth mentioning related to the postflop. There are not many, but I consider them fundamental.
3.1 The variety of branches in the tree. How can a large number of branches negatively affect the game? It is important to understand what games / limits you are playing. The higher the limit, the less important this factor may be. Let's imagine the following models and try to understand which one is better:
- We play a game where we can choose from an infinite variety of sizings and the opponent can also choose from an infinite variety of sizings — our win rate against this opponent will be the same in this case;
- We can choose from an infinite variety of sizings, and the opponent can only choose one preset sizing on each street, let's say 44 flop, 70 turn, 70 river. Will the EV of GTO strategies in this case be different for both players? Yes, obviously. It turns out that even using the GTO model, having the opportunity to choose sizings, in the second example we will get more value. What does it mean? If we know that the player pool (or our specific opponent) does not use overbets, then we are forced to completely exclude (literally remove) this line from our calculation. Is it possible to do this in the web interface? That’s a rhetorical question.
Perhaps you would also like to simplify the tree in a certain way on some board structures for the Hero, to make it easier to remember the strategy. At GTOpacks, we have had orders for postflop calculations with different sizings on different structures, but they were limited in quantity. It is worth remembering that the web interface developers are not poker players. They can make a lot of errors and create false branches that players usually do not need.
3.2 Lack of branches in the tree. Some interfaces might turn out oversimplified. A sizing might be missing and impossible to add. That is again an issue in customization, but this time it’s worse: if you encounter a sizing that is missing from the calculations, you don’t know how to react to it.
Even if we consider that preflop is calculated quite accurately everywhere, these omissions in the tree can also be considered distortions that can negatively affect your performance.
3.3 Last but not least: exploits. It’s impossible to find out about exploits in web interfaces — that is, to lock ranges or parts of ranges to get max EV. Of course, if you are just starting to master a kind of “software poker”, or are trying to understand where these boundaries are in the optimal game from which you can then deviate, you need to explore GTO strategies. But sooner or later it will become important to deviate from them.
And now the main question: what can we do about it?
The answer is simple — don’t be misled by low prices or free stuff and do not follow the crowd. Be sensible and rational.
Today, just like 10 years ago, in order to really advance your career, you need to work hard and understand that there is no silver bullet that will magically change your poker life. If you need to learn to work with solvers, then this is the only option. At GTOpacks, we recommend using accurate, high-quality preflop calculations with the right set of sizings. Fortunately, it is not expensive, and we even have ready-made packages. You can find them on our website gtopacks.com. We regularly publish new solutions, and we also began to broaden the calculations, introducing various rake sizes for some limits. You can also order tailor-made preflop solutions with custom sizings and rake.
What about postflop?
We recommend solving postflop exclusively in postflop solvers, where you have full customization of the tree and the ability to lock it for calculating the exploit. I use Simple Postflop and consider it a top-notch tool. For those who need an accelerated introduction to Simple Postflop, I offer a personal mini-course. If you do not want to process each postflop spot one-by-one, but want to immediately create a full database of postflop solutions, without bothering with calculations, we can also take up this task.
An innovative project we have recently embarked upon is developing preflop exploit calculations. This is something you will never have in wizards. We'll have to work hard, but we'll try to make something cool out of it and make you happy!
We have recently decided to develop an innovative solution:
preflop exploit calculations. This is something that will never be available in wizards. We have just developed a set of SBvsBB solutions, which has already created buzz in the Russian-speaking community. Order right now and get an edge over 99% of your opponents!
best regards
gtopacks.com team
Last edited by Funpokerrr; 04-03-2023 at 03:49 PM.