Live 9 handed 20

Only second orbit for CO. He has 3 bet me twice but didn't show because I folded before the river. He seems competent

I open HJ with As8c, CO 3 bets, folded to me and I call.

2s9hJs...CO bets, I call

2s9hJsJc...CO bets, I call

2s9hJsJc4s.....Is this a calldown? Does cr bluffing make sense?

I think it's close. Look at other Ax unimproved and ask yourself where you think the margin of (profitable call/unprofitable call) is. Then you should call with anything you deem profitable, while bluff raising a portion of combos that are near or on this margin.

Could very well be the case that A8o is a bluff raise and ATo is a call.

That's what I was thinking.

KQo seems like a good raise candidate.

Do you need more info on the villain before attempting this?.......Will he b/f? Does he have a widish range? Will he v bet Ace high? Can he hand read? Etc.

Depends on how big a gap we observe between (what he should do) and (what he actually does) with his range. If he plays perfect poker? The river bluff raise will be exactly 0ev with the top of our folding range. If he misses value? We should eliminate bluff raising from the top of our folding range because the bottom of our calling range should expand.

He would have to basically never be bluffing in order for his bet fold frequency to be so negligible. Knowing how he plays his thinnest value hands which should be bet folds would certainly add some confidence to this play, but knowing that bluff raising the top of the folding range is a part of the optimal solution, I'd rather have a bluff raising range as default and then adjust from there.

It's not necessarily about the width of the opponent's range. It's whether or not the opponent knows that simply bet folding bluffs and bet calling value hands is not a part of the optimal solution; Since on this particular river the cutoff should be bluffing exactly 1/8.25 times, and vs a raise the cuttoff should be folding exactly 2/10.5 times, or 1/5.25 times, we see that there is and should be a group value hands that fold the river vs a raise that create these difference between these fractions, or about 7% of the cutoff's betting range should be value bet fold combos.

I think...

Of course very few players get these frequencies right, but knowing what the frequencies should be can help us see where we may gain or lose ev.

I think that the more important piece of his strategy is where he draws the line between the top of his bluffing range and the bottom of his checkback range, and where this line is relative to where it should be. Again, nobody will guess perfectly, so having the better guess is helpful in gaining ev and understanding where the ev is coming from.

Over 15 years after the poker boom? I just assume there are two types of opponents:

Fun players that don't even try to handread.

Serious players that can both visualize and verbalize their default and exploitive ranges with accuracy and precision.

Great information!

Thanks Bob!

I don’t think he bets anything that is ahead of you that he plans on folding.

I think if you're considering calling then this would be a great hand to bluff raise. He can't have the nut flush and he might be bet folding something like 77.

I don't play this preflop...is opening Ace rag, full rink, in HJ and in a live game standard in this forum?

yes

Yes an actual leak which would classify me to view anyone who doesn't as TAG fish unless of course there are reads on guys behind that requires you to tighten HJ open range.

Mine is like A7o+ I think as default? Looser or tighter based on CO, BTN, blinds

A8o is the bottom of my HJ range.

Not a fan of making made hands into bluffs.

I'd check call river but having A on a
J29J4

May make this a solid river c/r candidate as Bob148 explained in detail.

Me personally I would play same way as OP then chk/call river because I'm a unimaginative TAG fish

P.S.: Thank you as always Bob148 for detailed explanation

Making better hands fold is no longer a necessary condition of bluff raising the river. I fought this battle in the theory forum for a long time before I came to understand that bluffs have no memory; bluffs don't care what the opponent folded; bluffs only care how often the opponent folds.

Vs a perfect non adjusting opponent? It doesn't matter which hands we choose to bluff raise the river with; as long as our bluffing combos would be unprofitable as calls, we may bluff raise from the bottom of our range, or we may bluff raise from the middle of our folding range, or we may bluff raise from the top of our folding range. Each option will give us the same ev on our bluff, zero.

Vs a not so perfect adjusting opponent? Bluff raising from the top of our folding range performs better than bluff raising from the bottom or middle of our folding range. This is because of the opponent's ability to make mistakes. If the opponent folds too much? Our bluffs gain ev. If the opponent calls too much? The loss of bluffing ev is compensated by the gain of value betting ev. If the opponent calls way too much? Then we start to get into the "curiosity call" argument, which I tried to dismiss for a long time, but which happens to be a very real possibility.

Here's some rambling from the theory forum free of charge:

https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/1...46/?highlight=

Thanks to pasita for this: