I've got to actually play some poker today, so I can't post an essay here lol. Thanks alot for the food for thought guys! That last post you made, RoSeeker, looks exactly like something I'd post, regarding that players aren't taught to think; I'm glad to see I'm not the only one with that concern.

ajrenni, nice counterpoint with the exponential pot breakdowns. So, if we assume our c-bet never works when we raise pf, when we limp small PP 8.5 times, we lose ~7bb. When we raise small PP to 4bb, then we lose ~21bb. So, I could adjust our expectation from 52bb from limping to 45bb from lost bbs. And our 100bb down to 72bb, right? (-4bb*7 misses). So, you need to get an extra 27bb in the pot on your limped set to offset the difference. Even then, you'd need to either bet more than pot, or get villain to call a big overbet on the river. Plus, even at 2NL, c-bets have some success. So, the argument for aggression wins this round handily, right?


I'm hijacking my own thread here. I'm getting ready to play and I like to warm up by messing around with some bluff equity calcs to help me get my aggro on Can someone check my numbers for me, please? I'm just going to think of all the bets in terms of P (pot), instead of bringing numbers into it:

I'm oop on the turn with naked FD. Villain always bets 1/2P here, whether he has anything or not. I'm considering: A) betting P, B) betting 2/3p, C) check/calling. I don't think betting pot vs. 2/3 gains me any extra fold equity, but I'm considering both anyway. I estimate 33% FE.

.33P+.67[(.19*2P)+(.81*-P)=-.09P ----->semi-bluff by leading pot

.33P+.67[(.19*1.67P)+(.81*-.67P)=+.11P ----->semi-bluff leading 2/3 pot

(.19*1.5P)+(.81*-.5P)=-.12P ----->check/call, no semi-bluff

Obviously 2/3P is better than 1P if there's no increase in FE by betting the extra 1/3P. When I set this up, I figured 33% success is pretty low, so I figured c/c and a semi-bluff with 33% success rate would be close in EV, but it appears they're pretty far apart, right? (.23P difference) In fact, c/c has negative expectation until I take implied odds into consideration; but if villain was betting 1/2P whenever I checked the turn, whether he had a hand or not, then my IO may not be enough to make this play +EV, unless I bluff on the river.

So, did I do this right? It looks right to me, but I'm surprised by my results.

too late

hehe. I fail at being succinct, again.

Gotta love my in-thread schizophrenia too. We should be more passive. We should be more aggro. No, passive. Wait, here's some maths showing why you should be aggro

Ro I agree with basically everything you said itt, but I would just note that there is a time for training wheels. I spent my first 2K hands at limit poker with a copy of the starting hand chart from SSHE and a chart of drawing odds next to the computer. These devices enabled me to stay out of major trouble as I adjusted to a new game, which helped me win, which made the game more fun, which made me want to learn more about it. The numerous adjustments and counter-adjustments that need to be made in poker require experience at the tables, so that a player can recognize different situations, betting patterns, and opportunities to deviate from the "standard." IMO, while a player is gaining that experience, there is nothing wrong with having hard and fast rules, so long as the player is open to questioning those rules as he/she develops.

By way of analogy, I am a former English instructor, who has taught remedial English at community college (1st year college students who write at a 6th grade level) as well as more advanced composition classes at major Universities. With the remedial students I was extremely strict with respect to their grammar, because it was clear that they didn't know the fundamentals and their writing was basically incomprehensible. But with the more advanced students, who knew the "rules" cold, I was able to talk about how to break the rules for rhetorical effect. Sometimes a sentence fragment is exactly what is needed to drive a thought home. Sometimes repetition is not boring redundancy but rather a powerful way to build a theme or to build emotion. It's all situational. But it doesn't follow that just because the best writers are those who can adapt to their rhetorical situation rather than slavishly following a set of "guidelines," that having guidelines hinders the remedial students' development. Their development is impossible without them. At some point, hopefully, they get to the point where the training wheels can come off, and they can think about why the rules are what they are, and therefore why breaking them may be effective. But like the beginning poker player, what they need most is a foundation to build on, that will give them a vocabulary with which they can evaluate the rules and their limitations.

Aces, your calcs are correct. FE is your friend.

Superbad - using a set over set situation as something that shows how good passive play is, is just terrible, makes me want to slap you. Flatting JJ that deep is perfectly normal though.

Also Aces, I would like to add that even if you get called but don't flop a set with 88 or 99, you can still win at showdown. You are not obligated to cbet, also. I think sometimes lots o regs cbet way too much and in the wrong spots, whereas some regs (maybe HU) cbet way too seldom (I am very much guilty of this) as an adjustment to people calling down.

One thing I preach, maybe too much, is constantly thinking about what you are trying to achieve with your action, check, call, bet, or raise. Is it Value, Bluff, or Protection? Is it for metagame/information purposes (easily and very often overused, but not totally inapplicable). You don't need to cbet all that much with a mid pocket pair vs some players.

Anyway, to training wheels... Yeah, I think they definitely have their places, but it's also important that some people stand out and say, BEWARE OF BECOMING A TAGFISH. It is important that the words aren't held as universal truths. As long as it is acknowledged that these are safe plays, not optimal ones, it is fine.

Yet very often I find player saying that it is NEVER right for a new player to start trying to bluff, that bluffing NEVER WORKS at micro stakes, and that playing looser is VERY VERY BAD. Someone would post a hand where he completes in the SB with J8s vs supoer loose passive UTG and MP limpers, and random uNL donks will shout FOLD PRE FOLD PRE when in reality a decent player can complete almost ATC there and it'd probably at least break even. I've seen this so much that I think it is clearly the tagfish mentality we're afraid of, not the lack of guidance-- there are lots of hand charts and advice for staying out of trouble available, but not enough on when to loosen up. As a result some players never do, and others take lots of time and perhaps watching higher stakes videos or personal coaches before they understand how to become more optimal.

Oh, and I appreciate your analogy. I am an Eng Lit and Creative Writing student, and the concept of form and breaking of form is one I can relate to. I very much agree that one needs to understand rules in order to break them.

Then again, my grammar is absolutely horrid for someone who's taking Eng Lit. Eh, at least I try.

Ro, to piggyback on your last post, I think that playing 6+ tables often accellerates the development into TAGfisherry, as the decreased time to make decisions leads to more reliance on "standard plays"

That wasn't exactly to show a good example of passive play, it was more an example of how playing hands different than regs would expect "that range" to play wins you more monay

QFT

I know tons and tons of very successful poker players would vehemently, violently disagree with me, but imho 6-max should refer to the number of players at the table and the number of tables you play, while you're on your way up if not beyond then. To each their own, but I think 25NL/50NL is full of very successful TAG-fish that have mastered the art of making 2bb/100 on 15 tables.

Thanks for checking my numbers, ajrenni. Pretty crazy that a bluff that is twice as likely to fail as succeed is the best line there, huh? If I just played with my gut, I'd be so lol-terrible.

I don't agree with a passive approach in the micro-limits.

You should make things as simple as possible and not simpler. The reason for playing pocket pairs and high cards is that you avoid marginal situations: if you play only 22+ and any suited face card as the aggressor (and ideally in position) you have binary decisions on the flop as either you hit your hand and go to value town or you did not and give up the hand. It is IMPOSSIBLE to put fish on certain hand ranges and advocating a passive style where you are aware of pot odds and equity presupposes you can put your opponent on hand ranges which is clearly IMPOSSIBLE AT THESE STAKES. I had numerous nights, where I was in bed crying, as I thought about the hand where the fish called my all-in on the river flush card with 3rd pair. Forget calculating equities and putting them on hands, where they will keep you honest with every pair.


Secondly, you have to think how you can exploit those stakes. THe way to exploit them is to

Secondly,

This is not true... I even made a video at 5NL where I did this, and made fairly good calls on villain's hand and hand ranges. You can always put people on ranges, it may simply be that it is at times super wide. Doesn't mean there is no range.

You clearly do not understand what "putting people on ranges" mean. The concept of range itself basically assumes that you are not sure of what he may have, but merely gives a guideline on what are most or at least more likely, and then tells us what to do in reaction this this knowledge/estimation.

Playing fewer tables definitely helps, and is the way to go, but I don't think playing more necessarily makes it impossible to learn. Eh, I am just too lazy. I have bad experiences with variance. Yeah, I have no excuse. I make more than 2ptbb/100 though =P

FWIW, I think the threshold of tables you can play whilst still making active reads and think through your lines depends on each person and his or her ability to think quickly about things. Experience helps a tonne also.

I think you are misunderstanding what OP means by "passive." The point (I think) is that often hyper-aggressive preflop play is just spew precisely because the fish won't fold. Getting to see the flop for cheap and then using your hand reading skills to figure out when you can bet for value is passive in the sense that you aren't raising pre and probably aren't bluffing post, but the overall strategy is to aggressively bet for value on the later streets, where the real money is made. RoSeeker's point about completing J8s in the SB against a bunch of limpers has the same idea behind it. You don't try to blow the fish away with a big raise, since they won't fold. Nor do you necessarily just assume that the hand can't be profitable and fold. You take a flop and look for a chance to realize some value against players who will call down on a J629K board with A6 or 77, or who will stack off with AT on a T88K2 board.

Glad to see a good thread pop up in the old beginner forum

To take a very neutral approach, I think part of adjusting opponents is adjusting how aggressive you are. Some players just want to get some money in the pot, and some players run at the first raise you give them. So as usual in poker, i think an argument for passivity vs aggression always ends in 'it depends'.

^^^Good translation of my ramblings

FWIW, I play ~30/25/3.8 on 4-6 tables @ 20NL. I'm far from being an advocate of passive play, though if you just popped this thread open, you might think so I just decided to play Devil's Advocate itt to ask some questions I thought needed to be asked

Limping 99 behind 2 limpers is criminal, you don't just raise 99 for isolation and initiative, you raise 99 behind 2 limpers to increase your expectation for the times you do hit your set. The times you don't hit your set, if you've managed to fold out the first limper and the big blind, then you can either Cbet or check back with less odds of opponent(s) drawing out vs your shown down value. Some people limp 22 behind 2 limpers, but that's because 22 has little to no show down value, in which case it's irrelevant whether or not one opponent or 3 opponents are in the pot. The problem tho' is that you're relying on your opponents behind you to raise, otherwise you're winning a small pot with a big hand - which sucks.

Also, I think it's really, really important to ask yourself whether or not you're "railing" against group think or whether or not you "just don't get it." Of course "good" poker is about adaption, but for 99% of uNL adaptation is unnecessary. A firm understanding of the fundamentals is enough to establish yourself as a winner, and once you're a winner, you can move up - which is worth more than "thin value" or profiting from marginal spots. You shouldn't pay attention to "thin value" or profiting from marginal spots until you're no longer a winner, at which point you have to start finding value elsewhere (other than "fat value") If you start by looking for "thin value" and marginal spots, you'll probably lose money to begin with. This is counter productive, because it costs you time between moving up, where the value you would've made from higher stakes and higher RB is more than worth what you would've lost (obviously) or gained from those situations.

When you build a foundation, you begin with the "rules." After you've learned those "rules," overtime, you'll learn how to expand them or break them thru' further education or experience. If you try to build a foundation by trying to teach your students to think dynamically, you'll fail, because they don't have the education or experience to properly analyze or recognize where and when those dynamics should be applied.

Random musings,

I agree, MP 55+ makes little to no sense, because 66-22 are more or less the same hand. You should open raise any PP from any position 6MAX, but in this case I think the idea is to fold the small PPs so you'll flop more over pairs and less under pairs.

Ok, WTF @ AJ > KQ, AJ is dominated by both AK and AQ, while KQ is dominated by either AK or AQ. KQ > AJ, because it both reduces the number of times you'll be out kicked and it weights your range towards K and Q which is optimal for Cbetting Kxx or Qxx boards. The only time AJ > KQ is vs "Any Ace Anny," where your value range is huge.

A2s > A9s, weighting the irrelevant kicker vs the relevant gut-shot in NL is a big, big rookie mistake.

You made several good points after this, but please don't grunch a thread and suggest something mildly offensive like "I just don't get it." I don't play this way. Look 1 post above yours to see how I play. And I'm a pretty big winner in 20NL, largely thanks to aggression. I'm a huge advocate of aggression. Huuuuuuge advocate.

I'm not railing against group think. I just thought I'd start a thread warning of the danger of it. And you can't deny that people are really, really quick to flame anyone that suggests something a little different from the standard line; so, as a group, we viciously fight to squash alternative ideas. However, on the case of aggression, that's probably because alternative ideas are generally incorrect. It's far more dangerous to maintain the status quo than to challenge it.

Thanks for your thoughtful post, but please don't grunch in my threads, then reach conclusions about me; I type waaaay too much fluff and point/counter-point for you to skim them and develop any idea what kind of player I am. Not trying to start a flame war, because you raise valid points. I'm just saying, I do "get it." Aggression in poker==lots of monies.

When I said "you just don't get it," I didn't mean YOU just don't understand poker or YOU'RE just a bad player. What I meant was you in the non-descript sense of the word, i.e. if you're the dissenting view point and you're arguing an unorthodox line, then you have to both ask yourself whether or not you understand the standard view point or if your unorthodox line is worth deviating from the standard view point. The reason 99% of experienced players reject dissenting view points is because more often than not they're either uneducated or unnecessary. If more people bothered to question themselves or listen to others in the first place, most discussions would be more fulfilling - that was my point.

The problem tho' is that after you've mastered the fundamentals, the rest of the strategy and tactics is dissenting view points and unorthodox lines - it's just unfortunate these discussions are either A) Kept in the dark or B) cluttered with every dr00ler throwing in their 2cents.

Sorry man, didn't mean to single you out or anything.

Aaaahh, I see what you meant. I.e., If people are assailing the views you express, more often than not, there's a good reason for it. Fair enough. Standard is standard for a reason.

That's the problem with forums lol. Very imprecise form of communication. So, I assumed you were taking the standard line for a dissenter lol I appreciate the clarification

Not to derail the thread, but I'm doing a paper on internet communication with the use of forums as a subpoint. Thanks for the idea! *jots it down*

I dunno. Hero's turn barrel here seemed kinda fat and thin at the same time (vs. a 63/13). But against ranges this wide I'm not sure how thin or fat this is.





The admonitions against slowplaying, are slightly exaggerated, imo. Against the right opponents, trapping seems right, such as against this same donk who cb's the flop 70%, cb's turn 67%, and bets the river 65%, but who can fold total air.




(I mainly wanted an excuse to post these absurd screen shots.)

dismal I think you misunderstand what SirCuddles meant by "Thin Value" and "Slowplaying".

With respect to thin value, he isn't talking about value betting TPMK on the turn against a donk who has done nothing but call (your first example); he is talking about spazzing out with marginal hands against a donk who has raised. In his example of JTo on a J66 board, it is possible that Villain is raising with a hand like 88 or J9, but if there is any value to be gained from the hand, it is not worth Hero's stack. Big pots are for big hands, and TPMK is not a big hand by any stretch of the imagination. In your example, there are a ton of hands that a donk will call Hero's turn bet with: 89, the wheel draw, 88, 99, J9, J8, 87, A7, 76, or some junk that picked up a flush draw. Assuming Villain hasn't raised yet, it is much more likely that he has one of those hands than a set or TPTK. So Hero can bet for value and fold to a raise. If there's an issue about the bet being thin, I think it's the size of the bet - I would have bet like $3 here to give myself a better chance of being called by worse.

As far as slowplaying goes, SirCuddles is saying that when you have a monster hand that wants a big pot, slowplaying is counterproductive, particularly when there are draws out there to hands that can beat you. If you have a set and Villain is willing to call big bets with a flush draw or top pair, you are missing tons of value by checking back a street or betting tiny and possibly costing yourself the hand. In your second example, Hero has a good but not great hand that wants a small pot, where if Hero is ahead on the flop, Villain is drawing either to 2 outs (say he has 88) or 3 outs (say he has A5) or no outs (total air). If Hero is behind to a better ace or a 6, he is crushed. So it makes so sense for Hero to be dumping $ in the pot, since the only hands that will remain are the ones that crush him. This is slowplaying int he sense that he is trapping with the better hand, but it is not what SirCuddles was warning against.

The phrases you are looking for are pot controlling and WA/WB.

FWIW, some players call with such wide ranges that you can bet fairly thinly for value, you just have to know when. Avoiding thin value spots is a waste of money, imo. In the long run it will make a lot of difference.

Also, not raising 99 vs limpers is indeed criminal. 99 is not a low or mid pocket pair anymore. You can play postflop with it fairly decently.

Yeah I figured I would avoid using the terminololgy and stick to the thought process. And just to clarify that we are on the same page w/r/t 99 against limpers, here was my earlier response.

I liked you analysis there. I think I see what you're saying... So my first example is more an example of "fat value" (from the call) than thin value? It just seemed 'thin' because of its lack of absolute strength, but you're right that it was in fact fairly strong in relative to his calling range.

Or perhaps "fat value" should be reserved to those hands that are still +EV calling/re-raising a raise...


My take is that a slowplay is done for two reasons:

1. Extract value from villain value bets
2. Extract value from villain bluffs

I understand why slowplaying can be counter productive when done for Reason 1:

i) they're not catching up enough to vbet enough of the time,
ii) or if they do, they've caught up too much and outdrew you, or
iii) a scare card shuts down the action.

But regarding Reason 2, there are many spots, vs. an aggressive and predictable opponent, that you're getting tons of value from playing it as a bluff catcher, whereas leading out is 0 EV at best. Especially on a dry flop.