A recent HH post of mine got me to thinking on how thin we induce a Turn bluff on a nasty board when we know we've got the best of it and want to maximize value or get stacks in.

Would you say this is just based on your personal risk tolerance, your bankroll or some form of hand strength or equity? Is there a proper way to measure EV on this?

C'mon... you guys are all smarter than me. What say you?

One of the keys is our opponents tendencies. Does our opponent bluff a lot and do they see us as someone that can be bluffed? Or are they simply a passive ABC calling station that doesn't get out-of-line? Attempting to induce the latter to bluff at us is a bad play, but can be very profitable against the former.

GcluelessNLnoobG

Naturally speaking of the first group of players.

In each of my last two poker sessions I flat-called on the flop with a monster hand and my opponent hit a two-outer on the turn.

Hand 1: Flop was TT6 two clubs. I had T9hh. Pot already had about $50 and my opponent bet $30 on the flop. I flat-called with about $200 behind. My opponent had 44 and turned a 4. I was out of position. He would have folded if I raised the flop but might have fired another bullet even if he hadn't turned a 4 (he is a LAG).

The second time the flop was T32 rainbow. I had 33, my opponent had T2. Pot had been limped around pre-flop so there was only $10 or so out there. $200 eff stacks. I was in position and he check/raised me on the flop. I flat-called because I thought he might c/r with just a T and wanted to let him put in one more bet on the Turn to "pot commit" him. He turned a T but admitted he wasn't likely going anywhere even if shoved the flop. However - we were playing in a home game and he would have ran it twice or three times if we were all-in on the flop so I would have scooped either half the pot or two-thirds of it by getting it all-in early. My opponent is a NIT.

I definitely regret not raising the first hand on the flop. The club draw might have beat me or scared me or scared both of us so my best chance was putting in a raise on the flop. There was already $80 in the pot which would have been a sizable takedown if he folded.

The only advantage I'd have had raising the second hand on the flop would have been running it twice/three times. Since my opponent occasionally check-raises with just top pair, I like flat-calling in position on a dry board (no flush draw and only a minor straight draw that he almost never check raises with). After his flop c/r there was $64 in the pot with about $170 behind in our stacks. If he bet $40 on the turn and I raised all-in, he'd be facing a $130 call to win $274 and possibly even call with just a T. So - even though it increases variance, I'd slow-play there again.

I guess your question boils down to maximizing EV vs reducing variance. I guess I feel that it's so rare to have a monster hand in LLSNL that if you blast away your opponents every time and win a small pot, you will rarely have huge winning sessions. I also play in a game where players make a lot of bad flop calls where they are drawing dead when they are just facing one bet, but easily fold when they are facing a raise. I therefore try to get as many players as possible to call the flop when I flop a monster on a dry board.

EV = % of V calling $x vs % of V betting $x.

Example:

Construct a reasonable range given board texture, action, and V tendency that V will call $100, 50% of the times, EV +$50.

Construct a range where if H checks, V would bet $200, 30% of the times, EV +$60.

Naturally, you want to check to induce.

EV and variance go hand in hand. If you win more, variance goes down.

Problem with a question like this one is that we often simply end up comparing different lines, not so much EV vs variance.

Not necessarily. Going all-in pre-flop every time I have AA or KK reduces variance (since most opponents will fold and I'll rarely have more than one opponent call), but it is generally -EV.

And winning more doesn't make variance go down. It may reduce the frequency of losing sessions. Even if you have 500 winning sessions in a row, it doesn't mean you eliminated variance as the amount you win during each session could vary wildly. You also could be always playing until you are up $1 and then quitting and the variance in the middle of your 27hr session was ridiculous.

Variance goes up when you're making -EV play...

Here's a link to poker variance calculator:

http://pokerdope.com/poker-variance-calculator/

Variables are:

-Win rate
-Standard deviation

Negative EV plays = lower win rate.

Connect the dots.

See above.

Outside the scope. We're discussing on micro level (as in EV of each hand), and you're going into macro level (as in results of a large bulk of sessions).

You lost me here...

The standard deviation is the square root of the variance. The variance has nothing to do with the winrate. What you are most likely thinking about is the chance of downswings.

Let's see..

Higher win rate, higher std dev = more variance
5bb/100 win rate
100bb/100 std dev

Variance range for 100,000 hands ranges = -3,778 to $14,661 = $18,439 range

Lower win rate, lower std dev = less variance

2.5bb/100 win rate
80bb/100 std dev

Variance range for 100,000 hands ranges = -6,785 to $8,891 = $15,676 range

So you are wrong. Higher EV DOES NOT reduce variance. Again, it reduces your chance of having a losing session or losing month, year, risk of ruin, etc. but that is not the same as lowering variance.

You're probably right. I am definitely a n00b in variance discussion.

+1,

the mistake I think a lot of players make is not truly understanding the mindset of their villains and their villain tendencies.

Only a small subset of LLSNL players bluff. And then there is the type of bluff and the amount of the bluff. Most bluffs are weaksauce bluffs, scared money bluffs, like betting 1/4 or 1/5 the pot.

There are two broad categories of players that bluff: thinking players and aggros

Thinking players will bluff when it is their only chance to win the pot. They will also bluff when a good scare card hits however this is often balanced well with thier range making it unprofitable to hero call them on certain scare card boards.

Often, against thinking players if you range them correctly, then you can check to induce them to bluff on whiffed draws as that is your only way of getting paid.

The second category of players are aggros: ego maniac, maniacs, awesome possums (players that just have it in their head they are going to "out play you no matter what"), tilt monkeys, action junkies, etc.

These are the players you really want to induce to bluff and quite often there will be a meta game component. You poke or prod their egos, you beat them in a pot, and they are just itching to get you back. We can induce them to bluff by often showing weakness or even poking their ego with a sharp stick like betting one $5 chip on river when the pot is $300 and then giving them a look like "yeah, what you gonna do about it "

I find that the real skill in "inducing bluffs" is really understanding your villain and identifying the right villains who will bluff.

Lastly, inducing bluffs depends on how you have been playing. If you are the table nit nut peddling all day you are rarely ever going to induce anyone to bluff. HOwever, if you have been mixing it up, done some squeezing, some isolating, made some moves and just in general have a looser image, then you are way more likely to be able to induce bluffs from the aggros as a lot of times they will be itching to show you who is boss. And this goes double if you owned them in any big pots...