Here's a good exercise for live poker exploits.

As there's been a lot of convo around using pretty limited history with V's to formulate the proper exploitative strategy. Even some going so far as to give examples of how a single hand can reveal enough info to start making some significant exploits.

Here's a couple hand examples.......without researching spots and such, answer to yourself honestly what you would do against these players going forward.

Things like:

- should I bluff this person more, or less?
- should a value bet this person light more, or less?
- what other exploits can I make against this V?


This only works if you read the scenarios and honestly tell yourself what you changes you will make to adjust to each V separately.


Villian 1:

2/5, 500 effective

V: on BTN raises to $15
H: BB (hand doesn't matter) calls $15

Pot: $32

Flop: Ks 7h 2c

Hero: checks
V: bets $10
Hero: c/r to $50

V: calls

Rest of hand plays out (doesn't matter how) and you see that V called your c/r with Td9d

How would you adjust to this villian?


Villain 2:


2/5 500 effective

V2: raises to $15 in CO
Hero: calls $15 in BB

Pot: $32

Flop: jh 7d 2c

Hero: checks
V2: bets $10
Hero: raises to $50
V2: calls

Hand plays out. And you see that V has 3d3s and called your flop c/r.

How would you adjust to this villian?


Feel free to share what exploitative changes you would make against these Villains.

What's more interesting is the fact that you don't think rest of the hand matters when the guy shows up with T9dd and no re-draw.

That's the funny thing about these "live reads" that most people have no idea what they are suppose to be looking for.

This player could easily be exploiting you and you somehow think there is an angle that you could be exploiting him.

Villain 1 and villain 2: How the hand played out could matter, particularly if villain called to bluff later. What hand hero had and previous history could matter if villain is calling perceived bluffs from hero. In general though if villain is that sticky heads up then bet and check/raise for value more and bluff less. Even if villain correctly thought hero was bluffing when hero check raised villain doesn't have a hand to play back with.

Hand 2 is a slightly better bluff catching hand but not much. One hand isn't enough information to draw a real difference between these villains.

Certainly in first hand where the only line that makes sense for V is intending to float and bluff whether they continued or called our raise then just let us take the pot matters.

I like the thought experiment. Your question is how to use limited information to exploit opponents. I'm sure you'll get a variety of opinions on whether the limited information is valuable.

The example you give has a gap in information--what happened between the flop and the showdown. So I'd never find myself knowing someone's hole cards but not see how they played on the turn and river if the hand went that far. Can I suggest giving a fuller speculative hand history?

Go very thin for value vs these guys and don't bluff them. Top pair good kicker vs these guys is probably very often a check raise on the flop.

You could make an argument for continuing to barrel with your bluffs too, but if they are floating you that wide, it is probably not worth it. At the very least, I think you should think about limiting your bluffs to high equity draws that you think are likely to get paid off when you hit.

Also at least check calling when you connect with the board in any way, but that isn't necessarily an adjustment.

With villain no #1, the obvious adjustment is to shut down your bluffs and value bet him to death. The harder adjustment is to try realizing on what street he's releasing his trash and run multi-street bluffs. This obviously is a higher variance adjustment.

With villain #2, it's trickier because it depends on what Hero's image is. Theoretically and in practice, the BB has a ton of check raises vs cbets in those boards and as a result the PFR needs to call pretty widely as well. I don't know if 33 is part of that range though.

Given that 99.99% of live players don't think this deep, our adjustment should probably be the same as hand #1, but there is a chance that Villain 2 is a far tougher to play against and that requires more not less GTO.

Imo both could potentially be whales but until acquiring further info, I'd just note that they hate folding flop and that's it. It might indicate they are all around stations but it's not easy to overdefend on further streets when you have so much garbage. So I wouldn't do anything extreme, just valuebet the flop thinner and never one and done bluff them. Bluffing multiple streets is still possibly good, but betting flop to give up later is exactly what they want.

I lean towards cbetting polar against a guy like this. Still rangebetting the K72r type boards, but not auto 1/3 as many textures as vs unknowns. It's really effective live still, and probably ok against them too because the fact they float lots doesn't mean they raise anywhere near the correct frequency. The issue is it would lead to decision points where you either give up turn (that we don't want), or overbluff tons with low equity hands against a possible station. It's much easier to avoid undesirable spots with bad hands if you have the chance to check flop.

I would also tighten up slightly pre vs them, the weaker stuff that wins a lot by having fold equity obviously suffers against guys like this while the value portion gains EV so it makes sense to have more of the latter. I'd try to remember if he saw something in my game that he tries to exploit by floating trash or it's just his default style.

Sorry but your hypotheticals here are a little silly. You intentionally are making both situations extremely dry boards. Them using a very weird flop raise. Only two of you in the hand. No 3 bets.

I doubt you'll encounter these players anywhere. You could have just asked how to dealw ith people calling flops with nothing. The answer to that is you are ahead and they have nothing to bet and get them to call.

Poker is very easy. Bet when you're ahead and fold when you're way behind.