CO...I've played maybe 20 hours with him. He seems to be a decent TAG. Seems fairly straightforward. Not overly combative. I don't think he has a flop 3 bet range IP. He has checked the turn a couple times with UIP over cards. I suspect his opening range is 35% ish.

He probably see's me as TAG.

CO opens and I call in BB with JdTc

7h2dKd....c/c, c/r, or c/f?

Is there a "rule of thimb" equity percentage needed to continue here?

I’d check fold 90% and check raise 10%.

Seems like a spot to CR our whole continuing range. The CO has a wide and attackable range. We won't be peeling a ton of hands on this board texture.

I think this spot is close. Since he is a decent player, folding makes sense.

I think co’s range is quite strong here. I’d rather call my bluffcatchers than fold them or check raise them.

I'm not getting how you think CO range is quite strong. I see a spot were he has many hands he may fold right away or fold on the turn. It seems we are taking the worst of it if we are calling down with bluff catchers on this board against this opponent.

check fold, you're behind very -ev here.

check raise a weaker player.

Relatively speaking, this board is good for the preflop raiser in the cutoff and is bad for the out of position big blind.

Ok but what % of his range is he folding? Combo wise, you're correct that he will fold many combos. Frequency wise, he's probably folding much less than you think.

There are different levels of profitability for unimproved bluffcatchers on the flop:

a) very profitable flop calling hands turn into slightly profitable turn calling hands turn into near breakeven river calling hands.

b) slightly profitable flop calling hands turn into near breakeven turn calling hands turn into unprofitable river calling hands.

c) near breakeven calling hands turn into unprofitable turn calling hands.

If you want to fold group (c) then I wouldn't mind so much, but folding groups (a) and (b) would be a serious error that causes an immediate loss of ev, and opens the door for exploitive preflop open raises by the later positions.

I think this hand is a little too high in your range to check-raise, and that this is a check-fold. You should check-raise your very worst hands as a bluff. I am not a fan of doing something like check-call-lead as a bluff or something.

By selecting your bluffs this way, you're reducing the profitability of your bluffing range. The lack of bluffing range equity that this method results in also minimizes the number of combos you can bluff with.

If JTo is a fold, which is free, or which is 0ev, then those hands with less turn and river draw value which you're choosing to bluff with should also be folds.

If instead you bluff with those hands that have more draw value, then you will maximize the profitability of the bluffing range per hand and you will maximize the number of profitable bluffing combos in your range.

If villain has no flop 3 bet range in position
AND.
has CHECKED turn unimproved with over cards to board,

Makes me lean heavier to consider
Chk/call
chk/fold
Chk/raise
on flop

This depends on what your flop chk/call range has been vs villain in similar spot

It should include 2x, some 7x, Ahi, delay turn c/r monster (cant think of any on this board), some weak flush draws

Forgot what flop chk/call range should be but if we have shown villain it includes some middling hands including pairs, this SHOULD cause villain to chk turn with higher probability so they dont get induced into betting flop turn river as the aggressor while you hold pairs so they are value betting thenselves.

Not sure if applicable in this hand but per DeathDonkey videos in past and in his 3 hour coaching I got like 10 years ago, he did mention importance of having a strong enough flop chk/call hand RANGE so villain cant constantly double barrel or even triple barrel as the aggressor in position.

This concept may not apply in this case but imagine if this was HUHU, chk/folding flop would be subpar at best with 2 overs to 2nd highest card on board (7), two weak redraw (Jhi FD, got shot straight draw, pair outs).

Taking that into account I would probably still consider chk/fold as best option.

I just think chk/call is solid ootion to CONSIDER based on meta created in 20 hours vs villain as it relates to your flop chk/call range in BB In HeadsUp pots.

I think that check calling this hand is unprofitable, or -ev. I don't think that check calling this hand strengthens the check call range; I think check calling this hand weakens the check call range. Reducing the profitability of your range is never the goal of exploitive adjustment, but occasionally it's the result of an exploitive adjustment that causes an ev gain for other parts of your strategy.

For example, if we knew this guy would call the flop check raise at a frequency that makes our flop check raise unprofitable with low equity bluffs, we should check fold our low equity bluffs 100% of the time.

Our exploit here is folding; this strengthens the check raise range.

There is the longshot possibility that an opponent may make the double mistake of both calling the flop check raise too often and checking back the turn too often when the flop bet is called. This would allow us to make the double exploitive adjustment with our low equity bluffs; due to the discount on getting to the river, we may call the flop exploitively with weak draws.

Without that specific read? I still think maintaining an ev of zero is much better than making potentially -ev calls on the flop. Since folding is free, this maintains our minimum ev of zero.

-----

Back to flop bluffing range construction when out of position:

There is a specific hand, although I cannot identify this hand, a hand which is -ev as a call, yet this hand will receive an ev of zero by check raising the flop. This hand is similar to certain preflop raises that are unprofitable when called, yet these hands receive enough profit by winning before the river that these hands are 0ev preflop raises. These preflop low equity bluffs and the specific hand that receives a profit of zero by check raising the flop are characteristically similar in a few ways:

--these hands are unprofitable as calls

--these hands are unprofitable when called

--these hands are not selected from the bottom of the available range of hands that we have to choose from. ie we don't raise 32o preflop in order to polarize our range. Instead we choose to raise hands like 98o and 54s.

--these hands form the bottom of our range which continues to the next action. Those hands with less realizable equity are folded 100% and hands with more realizable equity either check raise or check call.

--the very worst hand in both the preflop raising range and the flop check raise range will have an ev of zero.

----

all that mumbo jumbo is my long winded way of saying that I think check raise bluffing something like 65 while folding JT on the flop K72 is an error in range construction that stems from a misunderstanding of where the ev is coming from.

Bob148

Thank you kindly for this.

Think I'm making a Word file with posts of your detailed posts to save as something to read for pleasure.

Let me know if you ever write a book

You're welcome. I actually have learned a lot by rambling here on 2+2. Cheers.

I took the topic of low equity bluffs to the theory forum. Here's a link:

https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/1.../#post53706056