Not sure if serious, but the answer is likely between 0 and 1.

If we conclude that check/calling would be difficult OOP, then shouldn't we c-bet in position because our opponents will have a hard time check/calling...

Great job. Thanks a lot for taking the time.

Can you provide some examples, elaborate on this?

Edit: Didn´t see post above.

Good catch D.M.O.U. (this was a test and you passed!! ) Actually the statement about checking in position and positional advantage being diminished by short stacks was added during our collaboration and should have been edited differently. This should have been separate paragraph of it's own (ie not tied to the dynamic flop texture concept) and re-reading it I'm going to say probably should be reworded a bit. I think the intent is more that position provides the luxury to control the free card and therefore allows us to check back.

Not only should we recognize what you are saying but in fact there are certainly spots that we as the preflop raiser should check even medium strength made hands as well as preserve some stronger hands for our check/call range when we are OOP on these boards lest we be punished by good tricky players who can bluff raise or float.

The section should read something like:

I'm going to let cbrewer chime in first but i'm going to ask the mods to make an edit to that section so that it is less confusing.

Thanks!

Yeah the checking behind part was not meant to be included with the dynamic board part. That was just a bad edit by me. The point I was trying to make is that in marginal c-betting spots often IP it will be best to check back while OOP we would prefer to bet because we don't have much SD value and therefore x/call is going to be a bad option.

Here is an example I can think of to illustrate my point:

We have JQ and open EP to 15 and 3 players call. Both players are fit/fold and loose-passive. They are likely to fold 5x but will call with some Tx, Kx, and draws. We are first to act on KT5 with a pot of 60 dollars. We have 4 potential options

A: Check/call
B: Check/raise
C: C-bet
D: Check/fold

Lets evaluate our options

A. Check/call is my second least favorite here because we leave ourselves very few ways to win the pot other than spiking. Bluffing OOP after a x/call is hard. Our range looks very weak and if we try to lead turn or river sticky fish are pretty likely to look us up. It is also possible we let them get to showdown with hands that we could have folded out like Ax and 5x. While a x/r bluff is possible on the turn vs passive villains it seems optimistic that they will bet their Tx or weak Kx again after betting flop.

B. A potential option vs aggressive players that will bluff, but vs these passive players we will not always get the chance to pull the maneuver. We also get a much worse price on our bluff so it is only worthwhile if it folds out a significant portion of their range that a c-bet will not. It is player dependent, but in the right spots can be the best play.

C. The simplest and in my opinion best option. If we c-bet here we often get folds as the board is relatively dry. We have good equity when they do call and have a hand that is pretty comfortable barreling turn and can often fold out a lot of the weakest Kx/Tx/draws on turn. Betting into three people here I would expect that we get called on flop often, but due to our equity and ability to barrel turn I think it is still plus ev. Occasionally we will get raised which sucks, but from there we just have to look at pot odds/implied odds and continue on.

D. I guess this is an option, but seems like a waste of equity

Now consider how these options change IP we can either

A. check behind
B. C-bet

A. If we check behind we can guarantee that we see the turn card for free and still have good bluffing options on future streets. If the Vs check to us on turn we can delayed c-bet and if they lead into us we can either call then play river, or raise. Either option is fine depending on image and Vs. When we do spike it is much easier to get value than it is OOP when we choose to check.

B. Now the c-bet has all the pros mentioned before plus we get to continue IP and can play turns/rivers better, but I don't think it is the best option anymore (though it is still close). As I said we often don't get it through all three players so checking behind and guaranteeing a free card has a lot of perks. Getting check/raised here is a pretty sad result when we could have seen a free card for a chance at a big pot.

In this example above by the way I think c-bet/check are both plus ev just I lean towards the check behind being a little bit better. The difference between likely having to call a bet and being able to guarantee a free card changes the incentive for us to bluff so much.

Cliffs: Position is the nuts

I don't think this is necessarily true, and the reason why not is a big leak I used to have and have hopefully mostly plugged by this point.

Just because we are in a spot where we would have difficulty check/calling out of position, does not mean it's a spot where whoever we're betting into would have the same difficulty. The theoretical "difficulty" might still exist for our opponent, but he may choose to ignore it or even not be aware of it. And if either of those is the case, you have a lot less fold equity than you were counting on.

Here's an example of a hand I played a long time ago that this question reminded me of. I was playing 2/5 and raised preflop with 99, and I got a few callers including one very loose player. The flop came queen-high with no flush draw possible, I bet hoping to take the pot down before another overcard came, and the loose player called. When he calls I'm pretty sure he has a queen with a kicker that I would consider weak.

The turn is an A putting a backdoor flush draw on board. This looks to me like it should be a great card to turn my hand into a bluff and try to take him off his queen. So that's exactly what I did--I put a big bet in on the turn hoping to bluff him...and he tank-called. On the river, he checked and I checked back, giving up rather than firing again. It turned out he had QJ but also with the backdoor flush draw.

To this day I have no idea whether he would have folded if he had not had the flush draw, nor do I know whether he would have folded to a bet on the river (I thought he would have called but obviously I don't know). What you would have done, or what I would have done, or whatever we think he should have done, is of course not relevant. But I do think that when he and I are in pots together, knowing what his turn play would be in spots like that is extremely relevant to how much I want to c-bet flops I miss.

+1 and one of the main things I wanted to get across in this COTM. Our C-bet/barreling decisions are all about our opponents and their continuing range. Our range does matter, but only to the extent of how we should create it to exploit vs level 1 players. Vs level 2 players you should consider your perceived range.

I don't want this to come across as never bluff/barrel because that would be bad too, but just be aware of your villains and their continuing ranges on flop/turn/river. Some people will call flops wide and fold turns frequently, others call everything wide, some are constantly tight, and some call flop tight then don't fold future streets.

edit made.

I think if you're continuation betting frequency, in heads-up pots, isn't around 65% - 80% that's probably a leak. Some people may not be aware that most of these stats that we read about come from online games where most pots are heads-up and don't really apply to multi-way pots.

You can find typical stats here: http://faq.holdemmanager.com/questio...rticle+%231%29


In my way of looking at math 17% more than 33% is 1.17 * 33% or 38.6%. I think Villains need to fold almost 52% (50%/33% - 1) more often, if you bet pot rather than half-pot.

I think good players are continuation betting more often in position than out of position.

I know the prevailing wisdom is that all our Villains are idiots but I think many of them will notice if you have leaks like
-- consistently checking the flop planning to fold
-- consistently continuation betting the flop oop, and then frequently checking the turn planning to fold

Good stuff. I have a tendency to C-bet way too much I'm sure.

I can cite an example from Sunday night. No matter what my range is here, I'm never getting enough folds to justify betting this flop.

I raise Qd Jd to $20 and get 4 callers at a $1/$3 game. Checks to me on a A32 flop rainbow. I bet $40. I get 3 callers. It doesn't matter if I have AK here because I am getting called by all As for at least one street. When I get 3 callers, I might as well fold (or I can hit a Q on the turn and a J on the river take it down).

That's a reasonable frequency. It's so hard live to get a sense of an actual frequency so the numbers we put out are really really really intended to be used as a ref point. And targeting a number even online would not be productive. I agree that looking at a fair sample and identifying a Cbet % outside the ranges mentioned would indicate a potential leak but we would then drill down to see what was going on within that sample. We wouldn't just say "oh 58%... Start cbetting more".

And yes we will be cbetting more heads up than multiway but what are we cbetting more? Air, med strength, strong value hands? From what I observe live players bet too much heads up with med strength hands. They Cbet, take the pot and assume that was success. In heads up pots it's difficult to know that you might be losing value because you will have the positive reinforcement of winning the pot so much more often.

Many players will continue betting way ahead way behind spots because they are more often the way ahead guy.

The easiest example is holding KK on a flop of A94r. I see some guys bet this practically always. They'll win the pot right there or shut down and do the "Awww ace magnets woe is me thing"

More how we look at English rather than math... Agreed a more correct wording would have been to say we need an additional 17% rather than 17% more often.

Simple way to illustrate being:

Villain lands on flop with 100 combos. We have total air. Pot is $100. To break even:

$50 bet needs to fold 33 combos within villain's range.

$100 bet needs to fold 50 combos.

cAmmAndo,

Nicely done COTM. Bravo on the good followup posts as well. This is definitely one of the best COTMs posted in this forum.

Why do you think betting $30-$35 on a T97ss ($61) board is superior to betting $40-$45? I think the article itself says that you should be willing to cbet larger on relatively wet boards, just like you would with a flopped set on this board. You don't want to give worse hands a good price to call with their pair+draws, fds, etc.

excellent post OP. i also enjoyed this blog which reviews one player's cbetting over 350k hands:

http://www.awesemo.com/blog/?p=151

he reviews his success cbetting on ten different types of boards, and my experience live / micro 6max mostly fits with his. basically a more concrete grid which gives us some observations about how opponents (and # of opponents) think a board hit our range, and how it hit them.

one interesting example, he has more luck cbetting K-high boards into 3 people than 1...

Thanks for the link, very interesting read.

Based on the COTM & the above link, it appears that WCGRider's post back in 2008 still holds true. Thoughts?

This is something a few micro guys have approached me asking about recently. When i started poker, id attack with guns blazing every flop. Make em make a hand.

Well the problem here is, sometimes they call without a hand, and it puts you in some rough spots. Lets analyze factors that are important to analyze when considering making a CBET.

Factors in favor of a CBET

+++ Board is Ace or King high
++ Board is Queen or Jack high
++ Board does not contain a flush draw
++ Board is relatively not connected
++ Heads up pot
+ Checked to
+ Opponent often folds to Cbet
+ You have a hand very unlikely to have showdown value

Factors AGAINST a CBET

--- Pot is multiway. (The more players, the worse)
-- Flop has a flushdraw
-- Flop contains a Ten and a card somewhat near a ten
-- Flop is monotone
-- Flop is very connected
-- Flop is low
- OOP
- Opponent rarely folds to cbets
- Your hand may have some limited showdown value.

These are all things to note, the more +'s or -'s it has the more important it is. For a rough guide on whether to cbet or not, add up the +'s and the -'s. If you have more +'s, then a cbet is probably better. Vice versa applies.

Now, lets talk about Double Barrels *Note! You should NOT be double barreling with any sort of frequency at very low levels*

Double barrels are ONLY good when the board dynamic changes in a way that DRASTICALLY changes the value of a given hand.

For example a good double barrel.

You open 89s in late position and are called from a fairly decent player in the blinds.

Flop

Tx 5x 4z

He checks, you fire 7 bb, he calls

Turn Ax

He checks, Hero fires 2/3 pot.

This is a great card to double. The flush got in, and an ace hits. without at least an ace +, he is never going to continue here. Dont be afraid of the flush yet, fire out at that board!

Always think about possible opponent hand ranges and how a card changes their value. That is the key to successful double barreling.
http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...63&postcount=1

Interesting article. I'm assuming "c bet success rate" means opponents folded to his flop bet. Ie. barreling is not considered.

The K hi 3 player thing is interesting. Could be an outlier but it's one I'll be thinking about possible explanations for the rest of the day.

I'm glad you posted this. My original draft had a place holder to post a link to this very thread. In my haste to post I didn't get a chance to find the link.

One part of this is, if we correct for Hero's position, i.e. when Hero is the PFR from LP, we can see that EP callers are less likely to have KX hands, because they would have opened.

So, though there is a chance that 1+ of the 3 opponents has a hand which he'll call with, there is also the fact that medium-strength hands are likely to fold because of the multiway pot. If you are the 1st or 2nd V, you're not likely to call with most of your range because you have to worry about the 2nd and 3rd V behind you (and the PFR). The 3rd V probably has the highest likelihood of calling the Cbet because he has ultimate relative position on the PFR.

I never said it was superior. It's my standard cbet size that I would use based off of my value cbets vs. bluff cbets, lack of reads or history against an opponent, and fold equity/minimum defense frequency. I personally don't mind giving V's a good price to chase their draws on the flop cause a good amount of the bluffs I'm cbetting on the flop are going to be flush draws and most villains are going to play their hands in a way that let you know when they hit their flush.

In short, this is just my style.

Draws aren't folding to the difference of $5 - $10, plain and simple.

Most people fail to recognize that the key lies in turn sizing against draws, not flop.

If you consider betting a flush draw on the flop as a bluff (not a semi-bluff/semi-value thing), I assume you're never cbetting here as a pure bluff with hands like AK, AQ, 55, etc.?

You would be assuming wrong.

So you're betting 1/2 pot with your entire range and if called (which you apparently don't mind as you like giving them a good price to chase), how are you treading along?