yeah i agree, and i think there are plenty of spots that call for multiple sizings. i do think you gain less on the flop by splitting (and give up more in complexity) vs on later streets, though.

re doodoo's post: i guess i would say that i agree there are plenty of spots where a rough description of the best bet size is one where you put a lot of the weak part of V's range in a tough spot (eg betting 1/4p in a spot where V must now continue with K hi no draw or fold too often), i just strongly disagree with it as a hard and fast rule.

It 100% applies in solver land.

That's why I prefaced my statement with theory. If we are talking about strictly GTO. Which means GTO vs GTO ranges. Then my statement is correct.

You keep saying maximize EV like it isn't some subjective thing. Every opponent is different. Every line will be different to maximize EV vs that opponent.

I am talking objectively with my statements. "Maximizing EV" is obviously the goal against every opponent, but it isn't an achievable goal because you will never know your opponent's exact ranges in every spot.

i think we will have to agree to disagree here. with that said, "theory" means something broader than gto to me so i guess we disagree slightly less.

i still dont understand what point you are making. "maximizing ev" is an objective/goal, and its not subjective - *how* to achieve that goal of course has subjective elements as you said.

to bring this back to the betsizing argument: we agree that the only actual goal in poker is to maximize ev; if you also say that we should choose our bet sizing to maximize the % of V's range that is 0ev, then you are implicitly saying that doing so *always* maximizes ev (in a nash pair), which i disagree with/i see no reason why that must be true.

Theory is synonymous with GTO in colloquial terms so I just use them interchangeably.

Yes the point of bet sizing is to put your opponent's in bluff catching situations with the highest percentage of their range. That logically follow's that it will maximize EV - if we are playing against a solver.

But it's much easier to just use examples to illustrate my point.

2 BTNvsBB spots.

T94r board - which sizing do you use?
A72r board - which sizing do you use?

We use completely different sizing's here but the underlying premise remains. Our bet sizing always has one goal.

Ok that’s fine, we are on the same page now

I don’t agree that it logically follows, which is the point I was making

I can’t see how 2 examples are going to prove anything but please proceed

Depends completely on the ranges. You certainly can have situations where a 20x shove makes 100% of the opponents range indifferent. Nuts/air vs. bluffcatcher toy game is an easy example. Realistic examples are harder because ranges tend to have a mixture of a lot of different types of hands with different qualities. You won't make 5-high, top pair and middle set indifferent with the same shoving range.

Not really. Maximizing EV means something different in a theoretical vs exploitative context, but both exploitative and theoretical approaches are attempting to maximize EV. The maximally exploitative strategy is maxing EV against a single specific strategy. NE strategy is maxing EV against the maximally exploitative counter-strategy to itself. In a NE both sides take the highest EV action 100% of the time, and mix actions with equal EV.

I have to agree with jvds that this isn't clearly true. It may be true, but most of this forum doesn't know enough about theory to see that clearly. I'm not hard-core into theory, but I know more than most of this subforum and it's not obvious to me, either.

Okay.

So in the A72r spot we mostly bet small. Why? To put Weak K high/Strong Q high/Strong J high/Strong T high in terrible spots. All pairs obviously call but that's not what we are targeting.

We bet small to cover the largest percentage of opponent's range. Here it is air hands.

#2.

This is a classic overbet spot. Why? #1 We overbet OTF more on non FD boards because less turns dramatically change equities. So if you put this exact same spot but added a FD on it - we would use smaller sizing than an OB for most our range.

We also want to leverage our nut advantage. We have all 99+ in solver land and BB should be 3betting all those hands. So when we bet huge - we immediately put all pairs in bluff catch mode. Even some weak top pair should fold vs this sizing.

Our sizing is a function of our range + our opponent's range. That's why we go small on polarizing flops like A72 but huge on T94. Both bet sizing's are trying to accomplish the same goal - which is to make our opponent indifferent between calling and folding (i.e we want them to have a tough decision).

This is exactly why using examples is far superior. It's very easy to get caught up in the nomenclature of poker. If I say something and you think the definition is something else - then we just run around in circles all day.