PokerStars - 10/20 NL (2 max) - Holdem - 2 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

BB: 700
Hero (SB): 300

Hero posts SB 10, BB posts BB 20

Pre Flop: (pot: 30) Hero has 3 4

Hero calls 10, BB checks

Flop: (40, 2 players) K A T
BB checks, Hero bets 20, BB calls 20

Turn: (80, 2 players) A
BB checks, Hero bets 60, BB calls 60

River: (200, 2 players) Q
BB checks, Hero bets 200 and is all-in

I think, that this spot is massively underbluffed and therefore I am trying to see what happens if I start to bluff wide on broadway runouts w air.

Hand selection is not perfect, but at least I don't block folds. Club would be nice to have otr, but that is just the bonus imo.

I am not sure how much the blocker effect matters. How does it change the chance of villain having a flush... no idea.

Thank you for the insights.

So I think the problem with barreling here is that the average player's check back range contains more AX and KX than GTO at 15bb.

I think average player overfolds flop a bit. They are supposed to continue pretty much any QX and JX combos...I think a lot of players fold a decent amount of JX at least. So they are going to wind up overcalling later streets as a result of that, I think.

When we barrel this turn, GTO is continuing TX combos like 80% of the time. Most villains have more AX/KX though, so in theory I think they don't need to defend TX so often on turn (can't fold it 100% still). I feel like population is probably defending TX on turn correctly, or close.

So let's say we barrel turn, what is our plan on 2 through 9 rivers? If we 3 barrel here, bb really only has to call off KX combos to defend enough in GTO. With villains having more A/Kx combos, I think they're just able to call off to often. I don't think guys are folding KX to 3 barrels here much at all...do you?

On this particular river runout, I think barreling is very good. Villain needs to call KX like 50%ish, and I don't think guys will do that. The problem is there's just the vast majority of rivers that I think barreling is not good, and the turn barrel was not great too.

If you think villain is type to raise KX combos vs limp more than GTO, I think this becomes a really good barrel situation. You are right that this is massively underbluffed. However, even if villains are afraid of barrels here bc of reg tendencies they probably still aren't folding KX.

Lmk thoughts.

I am not sure how often villain folds Kx combos tbh.

And when I look at my play now, maybe I was rather optimistic.

I would probably barrel blank river, too. Because when I already bluff such hand, I think, that I simply have to continue, because it is a bottom of my range.

Still not sure if my hand selection is good.

Very good insight about people not ISOing Ax,Kx combos. I forgot about that in game. Yes, it is 15bb effective, but they can still check some Ax preflop.

And another thing. I was massively underbluffing paired turns. And now I feel like people overfold in that spot a lot.

There is still a lot to learn. Still have a huge room for improvement. But I am also thinking - how do I find the leaks now? Just trial/error?

Maybe I cbet too much, maybe I cbet too little, maybe I call barrels light, maybe too tight... who knows.

Are you playing regs or fish? If it's fish, I think a lot of your thought process here is really suboptimal (not saying its -ev).

Assuming it's versus fish, you are approaching this way too GTO and not playing exploitatively enough based on population tendencies. I don't think you need super in depth database analysis over massive samples to be confident in quite a lot of population tendencies (and I've found 'many' of these tendencies hold true across most sites and buyin levels). For example, fish are in general ISO too little AX/KX at this stack depth, and they are also overfolding flop - resulting in too strong of a range on turns. If our opponent isn't folding enough in a spot, we don't need to bluff and we just bet for value. If villain is playing as I described and is not folding KX ever to river shoves, it's likely your jam is just -ev as villain is calling more often than the minimum defense frequency. In general, if a player overfolds an earlier street, it's going to be hard for them to overfold future streets....I don't continue bluffs much when it requires multiple streets of overfolding. I don't think "I have to bluff bc it's bottom of my range" should be a reason to bluffs in your readless strategy vs fish. Maybe you find a fish is very different from population and seems more competent, and you adjust to a more ~GTO approach until you develop reads and can readjust - that can make sense but should be rare, unless you are playing high stakes. I have a tendency to make this adjustment way too soon - most of the time it's just variance in small samples making villain appear more competent than reality...90%+ of the time.

I suspect you aren't so new to HUSNGs because your strategy understanding seems good to me (too much GTO bias like I said though), so I think you should have a feel for how the population is playing in common spots at least. GTO is useful in two ways, a) a best approach strategy against very good players, and b) as a baseline for informing how to spot leaks and create exploitative strategies. If you don't feel confident in exploitative play based on population tendencies, post hands/questions here imo.

Fwiw, within the past year I noticed I had a very strong bias to not shutting down bluffs on rivers after barreling the turn with the bottom of my range. It just 'felt' terrible to me bc of my work studying GTO, I guess. Analyzing it exploitatively though, there's definitely plenty of spots that make sense to overbluff turn and shut down river. It was pretty hard for me to get past that bias, and I still notice the urge to continue the bluff in-game.

Sorry for the late reply. I totally forgot.

Very good insight indeed. Well, tbh, I just know a 0.01 % of how GTO is playing.

I am not new, but I need to do something. As I think, that HU hypers are slowly dying (mid stakes regs open sitting low stakes lobbies) I need to learn something new.

Anyways, back to this topic. Yeah, like yday I played this hand:

PokerStars - 10/20 NL (2 max) - Holdem - 2 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

Hero (SB): 550
BB: 450

Hero posts SB 10, BB posts BB 20

Pre Flop: (pot: 30) Hero has 6 3

Hero raises to 40, BB calls 20

Flop: (80, 2 players) 9 2 Q
BB checks, Hero bets 30, BB calls 30

Turn: (140, 2 players) 5
BB checks, Hero bets 80, BB calls 80

River: (300, 2 players) 2
BB checks, Hero bets 400 and is all-in, BB calls 300 and is all-in

Basically my first thought was - it pairs, don't continue.

My second thought was - I have bottom of my range here, I don't beat anything, not even his missed draw (well, there is not too many of them). So I decided to shove.

But when the board pairs, I should just shut down if I don't have anything. And especially after villain called two streets already. He might have some weak Qx, too.

I just don't like my play now... I guess it is about making as little mistakes as possible.

Check turn, you dont really fold out much, Id go for bet/check/bet line on this runout.
But as played Im jamming river for sure, folding out draws and some 9x will be good enough, especially after using such a small sizings.

If this were a limped pot, I think barrel turn and giving up some rivers would be fine. However, this is a single raised pot and villain just doesn't have much 2X that can fold out on turn. As played, I agree jam river at this point, but it's NOT bc you have the bottom of your range - it's because villain is very likely folding enough hands that bluffing is better than giving up.

Agree 100 %!

I was trying to experiment with BxB line a bit, do you think, that pot sizing (in BxB line) gets called more often than something like 75 % bet?

Thing is, that w 25 bb stack, there is not much room for overbets (well, there are some exceptions... but in general)

Btw, I remember as you were giving advice here to one member. It was about 3bs any Ax and probing very wide with very wide range. Thank you for these! It helps a lot.

That makes sense.

Yeah, maybe I was thinking, that I got some additional equity w GS. But I don't think, that it is very relevant.

Maybe I get too paranoid when the boards pairs, but I just feel like that people don't give me enough credit for value. And that is why I valuebet using v big sizing.

Imo there is not a big difference so in general Id go bit bigger with value and bit smaller with air.