If playing too many hands preflop is their leak then why would you replicate that leak? If we do, then we'll end up in the same place with lots of marginal hands post where we're either folding a lot or calling down light.

We play fewer hands so that we have range advantage against these guys, and get fat value against them.

It's not a leak when we do it. Widening our range in response to a too wide range is a natural exploitative adjustment.

If a maniac is opening atc to 3BB, do we widen or tighten our 3! and cold calling ranges against him?

I lol'ed when I read this, but you do have a point. As long as we are isolating them and not widening up *too* much, we are ok.

I don't know where I quoted the 46.7% figure. I was crunchin' a lot of numbers at the time, so I must have go one confused. It's ~33%.

If you look at the top of page 237, you'll see that 1/2 down my quote captured by Garick, that I quote 33% for QdJd.


As far as opening your range when playing against loose players, I've always opened up my range, but not so much that I was playing as loose as them.

Say a loose V opens for 4x in MP with what he has demonstrated to be a 40% range.
I think it would be appropriate [not sure it's right] to iso-raise with a ~25% range. Of course it would depend on what kind of players are left to act.

If he happens to have opened with the top 1/2 of his range, that's 20% & if I happen to have the top 1/2 of my range at the time, that's 12.5%. So, 25% of the time [.5*.5] we'll both be in the top 1/2 of our range & I'll be in the top 12.5% range vs. his 20%.

When that instance occurs, he'll be in the bottom 7.5% of his range 37.5% [7.5/20] of the time when we are both holding the top 1/2 of our range and I will have him dominated even when I'm at the bottom of my range.

25% of the time he'll be on the top 1/4th of his 40% range, which would be the top 10%. Since I'm going up against him with the top 25% range, I'll be in the top 12.5% range 1/2 the time & not so bad off.

I guess I'll agree with you provided he's the type that's fit-or-folding postflop. If he's the calling-down-light type, then we end up bluffing people who aren't folding too often.

Even if he's the calling-down-light type we likely want to widen our range, because our postflop value hands can be much wider that TP+.

If I iso-raise a loose-passive, stationy player with K8o in the CO, it's not to bluff him off of his garbage, but because middle pair on a J85 flop becomes a good value hand.

Basically, if the bottom of my preflop range in a spot is normally KTo, but there are "too loose" players who have limped or are left to act, maybe I add K9o to my range.

I get to the party late. Bad LAG, with 2.5k on my immediately left. I've been there not an hour, but I'm up $175 & have a $475 stack.

We're short handed due to 3 people walkin' & 2 seats open. It's folded to me in the SB with T8o. I ask LAG if he wants to chop, he says "Let's give it a go." I complete, he checks.

Flop:J97 - I flop the str8.

I check, he bets $15, I call.

Turn:J973

I check, he bets $25, I raise to $70, he calls. I saw no reason to fear a flush draw, was just tryin' to extract value.

Thoughts on flop & turn?

I'd fold pre. AP, I'd lead flop and turn for like 2x pot or more each time. AP, I'd x/r at least pot sized (115 ish)

Well, folding pre is out of the question because V is a friendly LAG who is playing for fun. I can't be a bump on the log & just give him my $1.00

+1.

Sat night 1-2 game, 10 way. Relatively standard table, lots of limping and calling. People get sticky when they have a piece. Stacks range from 150-400. Hero has ~250.

Hero in BB with 77.

6 limps to hero, hero calls.

Flop: Q87r. I like it but it's certain to have hit any number of the others. Since I'm first to act and the pot is small, I figure a check raise is more likely to thin the field. I'm not the least bit worried it will check through since nothing has thus far tonight.

H checks, next bets $12 and gets 3 callers back to hero (pot ~55). H raises to...?

we want callers, not folders. Lead out for 15.

There is an exercise you can do where you write down all the possible hands your opponents could possibly call on the flop with.
Put those into pokercruncher, or some other software & see what your equity is.

When you say "people get sticky when they have a piece." Well to mean that means that they are limping with Q2s in late position. So say the flop came Q87

Does sticky mean, that they'll call with Q2s in or , because even though they know their kicker isn't any good against anyone with a Q, they have the chance to catch a bdfd. Is that what you mean by "loose callers" pre? Or, maybe their even silly enough to think their up against top pair, but they have a bdfd & can catch a 2 for two pair?

I gave 1 guy a wide range like that & found that you have 91% equity against him. Now the guy who bet $12 otf probably has a tighter range?

Anyways, to fully understand why mtagliaf recommends what he is, you need to do some homework. Create your ranges for your callers, see how much more you gain by letting them call your bet, rather than raise them off their trash.

Your equity decreases a bit with each subsequent caller, but you more than make up for it in the long run due to the added money in the pot.

Some quick thin value spots from last night that I'm not sure about/might have played poorly:
1/2-100 spread limit (max $100 bet)

Hand 1:
400 eff.
weak lag player opens to in HJ to 8, bad player calls in CO, I call on button with 87o (usually I would 3 bet here, but no one was folding to me preflop), blinds fold.
flop: 5h4d2d checks to me, I bet 16, HJ raises to 40, CO calls, I call.
Turn: 4s checks to me, I check
River: 7c checks to me. How much do you bet between 0 and 100?

Hand 2:
I raise to 10 over 1 limper (since this is the biggest/only nl-type game in the room, it's tough enough and tag enough that this preflop sizing was correct) with AJo in the HJ and I get called by the sb and UTG limper who was extremely loose preflop but very nitty postflop when bets get big.

UTG is the main villain, and my read at the time was that he would never make a value bet larger than $50 with a hand worse than TPTK and he would never make a bluff larger than $50. I'm not sure about how light he calls down when bets get big, unfortunately. He's kind of trappy preflop and postflop as well, and players are starting to limp big hands because I'm raising so often in lp.

Stacks are 200 eff.

Flop (30) AdKd4c
Checks to me, I bet 22, UTG calls, sb folds
Turn (70) AdKd4c2s
UTG checks, I bet 40, UTG calls
River (150) AdKd4c2s8d
UTG checks. How much do you bet between 0 and 100?

hand one I would have folded 3 different times before the river. On the river, check.

Hand 2, maybe 30?

5-10 V in this hand is older Asian fish limp calling a wide variety of hands pre-, V got stacked with QQ against KK (V raised pre- and GII (b/c) on the turn with an overpair). My one previous HH against V was a hand where I raised 35 pre Folds to V in SB who calls, flop is T58xx, V checks, I bet 50 he goes 125, I shove (525ish eff at the start of the hand) V folds.

1 limp, Folds to hero in CO Hero picks up QQ and raises to 35 V (he had changed seats at this point) calls and Limper calls (Limper is pro so range is around SC, small pp). Pro and myself are ~2200 deep and fish is ~1100.

Flop: Td5c6h, checks to me I bet 75, fish calls, pro folds.

Turn:9d checks to me I bet 125, fish raises to 275, Hero ???

78 and T9 are the obvious hands as are sets and 89/79 that picked up equity with a straight draw. Could also be Tx that's trying to get a cheap showdown by blocking. I'd call and evaluate his river sizing.

Giving that his sizing was similar to the flop he raise/folded, I think we can't fold yet. Call turn, evaluate the river and his sizing. We're generally going to fold to most river bets UI

Hero: Lag, driving action preflop. Mostly check/folding postflop due to absurdly amount of terrible boards

V: mawg. Passive overall. But Semi-aggresive with solid starting hands. Likes to see flops cheap with almost ATC. PFR %15ish, not postionaly aware

$450 eff

Hero (Ac,AD) raises to $12 from utg+1,
Call,
V raises to $30 from CO, folds to hero

Hero 4 bets to $95
MP folds, V tank calls

$200 pot
Flop :10h-Jh-Qc

Hero checks
V1 thinks for 10 seconds and bets $150

Bet fairly quickly, didn't pick up any live tells.

Hero folds.

Flame away!!!!!

I would call. Eval river. He could have picked up additional equity.

However his sizing looks like value. So don't hate a fold.

I think you played it perfectly.

Well played!

That's a great hand for analyzing equities. If his range is dominated by qq-tt it's a good fold, obviously. Does he have kk more than tt?

Hard to say. Doesn't KK just ship pre? Vs Lag? Think he probably spazz and ships it on flop also.

My thought was KK has 6 outs. That is best case senerio for me I think. All his flush draws should have massive equity also.

Think it was good fold, but obviously I am not sure.

He had been benefactor of me raising pre and shutting down alot. Just couldn't find a boards I was comfortable cbetting air. When the table was paying off all my value bets.

Can I bet $100/fold? I would be repping AK or KK+. May get to showdown with 1 bet

I expect him to raise QQ+, some AK vs my image. Call 88-JJ and some AQs, AK,....don't see much else in his 3 betting range.