aww. no one did my stats

Hi, here are my hands on nl50.
My winrate could have been higher but i had a period where I was playing very very bad. Still happy about the result, this is the first time I tried to actually use the things i read about, like folding tp to a turn raize and stuff like that.

Next step is to stop being a Nit. I try to open up my game, but I dont really know how. Everytime I try I find myself in big pots with marginal hands and dont really know what to do. Also i think i need to lose less without showdown. This will probably go side by side.

Please let me know what you think about my stats.

You asked for it....

First off, the only position where you are truly getting whalloped is the small blind. You're winning back only about a quarter of the money you posted from that position, and you should be able to do MUCH better than that. How can you pull that off? Well, some random thoughts about playing from the small blind:

1. Don't open-limp very much, unless the big blind is a complete ******. You should try stealing VERY often from the small blind if everybody folds to you, mostly because you're getting such phenomenally good odds on the attempt. With a pot-sized raise you're risking $1.25 to win $0.75, so you only have to win 60% of the time to show an IMMEDIATE profit, and most players fold the big blind to a raise at least 2/3rds of the time. Even when the big blind calls, a standard c-bet takes down the pot half the time or more, so you pad your winrate even more.

2. If you have a pocket pair you CANNOT profitably play a raise for set value alone. It always looks soooo tempting: it only costs an extra $1.75 and villain has a whopping $48 behind. With such tasty odds how can I afford NOT to set mine?? Unfortunately, your opponent did not sign an "I'll give you my stack if you hit your set" contract with you preflop. In reality, you'd have to get the pot up to at LEAST $35 before you showed a profit on the deal, and it's going to be hard to convince your opponent to stick in an extra $17.50 ON AVERAGE when you hit your set. Sure, sometimes he'll have AA and stack off, but often he'll have garbage or an obviously second-best hand and he'll dump it. With a smaller pocket pair in the small blind, strongly consider completing instead of raising, especially if you're multiway -- you won't often have enough folding equity to buy the pot very often, and when you miss you'll have some awfully hard decisions OOP and deep when you miss your set on the flop (7.5 out of every 8.5 times). If it's raised in front of you and everybody else has folded, your best bets are either to fold (usually best) or three-bet (only against an aggressive known stealer that you think will lay it down quite often.

3. Go for those orphans. I mentioned in a previous post above how to spot orphaned pots that are stealable; take advantage of it and grab those pots by using your right of first bluff. Alternatively, if you check and it checks through, stab at a pot if the turn card looks like a brick. A great opportunity for turn steals happen when the turn card pairs the board low; people will think your blind got lucky and they'll let you have it quite often. Obviously this is a better play against tight opponents -- don't try to steal against calling stations.

4. Check-raise more. You almost never make a check-raise, even on the flop. At times, it's the absolute best choice available. For example, when you actually flop your set and someone else raised, check to the raiser. Let him bet, and then trap him for a check-raise. If the board is very dry, smooth-call and go for the check-raise on the turn. (Or the river, if you think your opponent will 3-barrel often.) Give your opponent a few chances to bluff before you snap him off; it builds up a bigger pot when you've actually got a hand, and bluff money is tasty money.

----------

The other big issue I see for your play is in your graph: you're bleeding badly in non-showdown pots. Most players at the microstakes lose money from non-showdown hands, but you're taking it to a very unhealthy extreme: you're literally giving back 80% of your showdown winnings in non-showdown hands. That's waaaaay too much. (Side note: my graphs look like the exact opposite of yours. I'm actually winning less than 10% of my total money from showdown hands. Part of the reason is that I'm getting MondoCoolered in all-ins lately, part of it is that I'm a three-fisted aggro-monkey spewtard who chases relentlessly after pots, and part of it is that I play at higher stakes where the term "folding equity" is not purely theoretical.) You need to pick up more of these non-showdown pots. You're actually winning less than 40% of the hands where you see a flop, and considering that you've got TAGgy stats preflop, that's a crime. How can you win more postflop?

1. Make up your freakin' mind. Just because some maniac 44/37/5 check-raises you does NOT mean your JJ is garbage on a Q93 two-tone flop. You do need to make a decision, however. If you think you're good often enough for it to be +EV, call him down. When I say "call him down" I mean "CALL HIM ALL THE WAY DOWN." That does not mean "call the flop raise, call the big turn bet, and fold to the river push." It means "plug your nose and pretend your fold button is broken." You're going to go on Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, here, but if you're convinced it's a +EV situation, stick to your guns and call all the way. Alternatively, if you don't think you have the hand (or the balls) to call him all the way down, then just fold immediately. Don't peel, don't float, don't "see what happens on the turn" -- just dump it and move on. It can be quite frustrating at times, but you lose so much money by calling without commitment (especially against an opponent that you KNOW will bet again) that you're better off just getting away from it up front.

2. Learn to float. So the PFR'er bet the flop. Big whoop. You knew he would, so it's not a big surprise. You've only got KQs (in position), and the board is T73r, so you're done, right? Well, not necessarily. Consider floating occasionally. (NOT always -- that's suicidal. But occasionally.) Especially if you have a read that villain bets flops and gives up on the turn (a handy note to have on an opponent), consider just smooth-calling their flop bet, intending to bet the turn when he checks. You won't have to bet too hard -- 2/3rds pot should do the job -- and you won't have to call if he bets the turn, but this float can be extremely +EV if you use it sparingly.

3. Semibluff -- hard. If you flop a good draw, consider going to TOWN with it. Bet the flop solidly, like you would on any other c-bet, but if you get raised (especially by an aggressive opponent), shove it all in. The combination of folding equity (huge) and outs (several) make this a nice +EV play if the shove isn't much of an overbet. Also, consider the occasional B3BAI on the TURN with a draw, for the same reasons. When you're betting hard you're winning more pots without showdown (+EV), you're disguising your monster hands better (+EV), you're getting harder to read (+EV), and you're going to have more folding equity as players fight back less often (+EV). It's just a hugely winning combination.

4. Go on, make a bluff once in awhile. Here's a nice time to bluff: you smooth-call a raise preflop and the flop comes ace-high with no other broadway cards. It missed you, so you check. Your opponent bets, but he has a c-bet % of over 85%. So you check-raise him to about triple his original c-bet. You're going to have craploads of folding equity, because he's going to absolutely believe that you've got an ace. This kind of play is starting to take baby-steps away from a "fit-or-fold" strategy with your pocket pairs, and it really helps turn those otherwise-losing situations into winners.

Hopefully something in that jumbled mish-mash will prove helpful to you.

Ok, i just looked at them.
I think they are quit similar to mine so that makes it hard to say something smart.

One thing i did notice is that your not positionally aware. Your play the same range of hands from UTG as from the Button. This is bad because you are able to raise much more profitable from later positions because you can play more hands in position. I think you should tighten up UTG, but loosen up on the CO and button.

I don't have time to analyze all of them right now, but your vpip/pfr/w$wsf/wtsd/w$sd/etc look fairly solid. However, the biggest thing I noticed is that you don't seem to adjust to position, and that's why your attempt to steal is fairly low as well.

At 19/15, your utg vpip/pfr should be more like 14/10 while your button stats should be closer to 25/21.... not exactly, but you shouldn't have the same stats for all your positions. The button is a much more powerful position than UTG, and for that reason, you should be much tighter UTG than the Button.

The amount more valuable the cutoff and the button are than UTG and the Hijack isn't linear either, so your VPIP and PFR should rise somewhat exponentially as you get closer to the button. For example, here are my position stats for the past few days since I started applying that principal a little more liberally than I had been in the past:

Pos | VPIP | PFR
UTG| 20 | 20
HIJ | 21 | 19
CO | 27 | 23
BTN| 39 | 34

As you can see, I'm playing a lot more hands in the CO and the BTN while UTG and UTG+1 are basically the same position for the most part (afaik).

Now, you're numbers are obviously going to be lower than that, but if you tightened up a little bit UTG and UTG+1 and opened up a decent amount in the later positions, your profits should see some improvement.

Hope that helped.

Looks like I took too long writing my response ^^^

I'd also like someone to take a quick look at my stats. I've been working on opening my game up a lot lately because I noticed that there are a lot of spots where people just play their hand faceup and you can just abuse them as long as you're paying attention. I've also only been playing 2-6 tables during this time so I can notice any trouble spots or leaks in my game and pay attention to what everyone else is doing better.

I also know that this is a small sample size, but I only wanted to include the hands where I was trying out this laggier style, and I think it's a big enough sample to where VPIP/PFR/AF(ish) and most of the other stats have started to converge enough to be mostly accurate. I also blanked out all of the winrate stats (especially positional wr) just because it is such a small sample size. I was running at about 5 ptbb/100 FWIW, but that's a fairly useless number at 6k hands.

Pokey I tried to talk myself out of asking you because it's a big ask but if you find time to review mine, it doesn't have to be as detailed as your previous responses but it would be much appreciated as I'm about to move up to 50NL and I feel there are some things that need tweaking

Alright, I'll try to hit everyone who's been missed, besides I can't let Pokey have all the fun

17/14 is very tight. It's a fine style of play for multitabling and getting in tonnes of hands and it's definitely profitable at micro stakes. However....you'll improve a lot faster by loosening up and taking on some more marginal situations. Do it gradually obviously but, when your hardest decision is working out how much to cbet with AA on an A83 flop, you're going to find it hard to improve. That said I'm ridiculously biased because I love playing LAGgy.

As for cbetting; if I was playing 17/14 my cbet % would be bordering on 100%. You're going to have the best hand so so often. A couple of things. Dry boards like K82r, A93r, etc. you can cbet smaller, like 1/2 to 2/3 pot. Follow up with close to pot sized bets on the turn a lot, they're great spots for double barreling. More normal boards like QJ7r, T42tt, etc. you should be cbetting somewhere between 2/3 and 3/4 pot. On the wet boards like J94tt, T98r, etc. you should be cbetting between 3/4 and full pot but rarely doing it as a bluff.

Also I disagree with what Pokey said earlier about stealing:
Stealing blinds at micro stakes is like printing money, nobody ever plays back at you. I remember my att.toStealBlinds was at something like 52% back when I was playing 20nl. I've toned it down to a modest 43% now though at 200nl .

Here's some threads about loosening up in late position:

http://archives1.twoplustwo.com/show...0&fpart=1&vc=1
http://archives1.twoplustwo.com/show...Number=5348855
http://archives1.twoplustwo.com/show...Number=6073737
http://archives1.twoplustwo.com/show...Number=3661078
http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showthread.php?t=658

Also your W$WSF is on the nitty side. Here's a thread I wrote about the subject. With your low WtSD and low W$WSF and high AFs it means you're giving up way too easily in certain spots. A lot of times it can be o.k. to peel a turn card when your opponent is very straight forward and against the maniacs it can be fine to call down with marginal top pairs or strong underpairs, especially if you're shown weakness at some point in the hand.

It seems like you have no concept of position, you're playing the same hands from all positions. Go read those threads I linked above.

Your VPIP UTG is pretty high, it's higher than mine and I play 29/22 ffs. If you're comfortable playing SCs, suited gappers and Axs from UTG then it's fine but until you get to that point it should probably be avoided. Unless you're opening things like JTo and K9s or other really marginal hands, which should definitely be avoided.

Also you're losing a tonne of money from the SB, this is natural since you have to pay blinds obv , but you should definitely be taking loads and loads of stabs at limped pots. I'll bet any pair, draw or even backdoor draws in limped pots. I'll also bet with air if the boards dry, like most paired board or Q73r, J83r, etc., etc. and I'll often fire second barrels on those dry boards. Just keep firing out and picking up the 3 or 4 big blinds that are there to be won, it's like printing money.

Yeah you're losing a tonne of money from the blinds as well. In limped pots bet bet bet bet BET. Read my last paragraph. Do you know the way calling stations are always limping into pots? They pick up so many of those because the nits (and even good regs) in the blinds don't care about the 3BBs that are out there. They just min bet and pick it up, it's crazy.

Your CO VPIP is pretty low, I agree with Pokey, there's not a huge amount of difference between the CO and BTN. Read the threads I linked earlier about loosening up in LP.

Your W$WSF looks good though so you're playing pretty aggressively. A 90% cbet% is definitely on the high end, you could tone it down a little bit. Check back on wet boards that hit your opponents range, check back in WA/WB situations where you're unlikely to get called by worse and unlikely to fold better. Like if you opened A3s otb and the BB, a semi-loose reg, calls you and checks a A95r flop. This is a good spot to check behind, control the pot, induce bluffs, etc. Or against maniacs you can check strong hands to them and let them spew off multiple barrels.

22/11 is really, really passive. STOP LIMPING. Raise that **** up ffs. NO LIMPING. Alright you can limp in the SB if there's been a few limpers before you, otherwise raise or fold. And you can limp in late position if there's a limper before you with less then 30 - 40BBs, otherwise raise it up and isolate them.

24% att to steal is too low, 30% AT LEAST, >35% is better though. Go read the threads about loosening up in late position.

You're playing very loosely from the SB, this is o.k. if you're taking lots of stabs at limped pots. Based on your low W$WSF I doubt this though.

I think your low W$WSF could just be a function of being so passive preflop. Without initiative it's much harder to pick up pots. By raising we can cbet and put a lot of pressure on our opponents. Although you're still probably playing a little too weak-tight anyway.

These stats look pretty good. 22/16 is a little passive but nothing to be too concerned about.

29% att to steal is bordering on acceptable, could be brought up a little by opening wider from the CO.

I wouldn't worry about the BTN, 1800 hands is meaningless.

You've got a very healthy W$WSF, keep that up.

It looks like you may be defending your BB a little light though. Playing OOP, without initiative and with a marginal hand is the pits, it's really hard to show a profit doing this against anyone competent. Ironically, the only time you shouldn't be too concerned with winning the blinds is when you're the one posting them.

Again 22/16 is slightly passive but probably o.k.

30% att to steal is acceptable but you could open a little wider from the CO.

39% W$WSF is pretty low and combined with your low WtSD and high AFs indicates that you don't call enough when it's likely you're good. Or even worse, raise in WA/WB situations where calling is infinitely better. Like let's say a competent TAG opens from the CO, you know his range is reasonably wide here and decide to cold call AJs otb. The flop comes down A73tt and he cbets. Calling here is definitely the way to go, raising would be terrible and is more likely to get him to fold AQ then get him to call with worse. So you'd be turning your hand into a bluff and having something like 44 would be much better to raise with, or 65 or something. That's pretty basic poker 101 but it's still important to understand.

Your winrate from the SB looks good but 3K hands is a little meaningless.

I'd filter out the HU hands because they're going to distort the SB and BB in the positions stats.

I'd tighten up a bit from EP and loosen up a bit more from LP.

Although they're probably distorted it looks like you're losing a good bit from the blinds. Take lots of stabs at those limped pots.

If you want to play a LAG style I'd try to get my W$WSF a little higher. It's not bad or anything, could just be higher as I'm assuming you're pretty competent if you can play this style profitably. More second barrels, lots of stabs at pots, etc.

18/13 is pretty tight. Read the threads about loosening up in LP two posts back. It's fine for multitabling but makes it harder to improve your game and playing 12 tables grinding out a marginal winrate at micro stakes is so pointless, get to small stakes first and you can do it then if you feel like it. I'm not saying you do this btw, just a general point.

W$WSF is pretty low, that's means you're playing too weak-tight postflop. Just means you have to get better. Read all these......twice.

Micro Stakes Sticky
2+2 SSNL Master Sticky
Small/Micro Stakes Video Collection
Anthology

Isn't playing LAGgy so much fun?

Your stats look good.

Your WtSD is pretty high though. You've got a good W$WSF and, combined with a mid range AF, this indicates that you may be calling down too light. Be careful you're making calls for the right reasons and don't put it down as a cooler just because you're playing LAGgy and think people are playing back at you lighter.

It may also mean that you're not value betting thin enough either, your 60% cbet% is on the low side, but it's not terrible, and it could be one of the reasons for your WtSD being a bit high.

thanks pokey! pretty much the best poster ever!

Something I've been working on lately. I definitely need to take more time to think about a lot of hands before I stick my chips in the center.

Thanks for taking the time to do this!

I know this isn't a strat thread but I have to disagree with a lot of this.

1. You should be 3betting more frequently from the CO and ESPECIALLY the BTN then you are from the blinds. Position is HUGE and when you 3bet a competent player while OOP he's got a tonne of options. He can
- 4bet.
- call and float.
- call and bluff raise.
- call and make the best hand.

When we're IP he's pretty much limited to
- 4bet.

I'm not saying you shouldn't 3bet from the blinds, of course not, you should just be more inclined to do it when IP. And if somebody is opening their SB into you light you can go nuts.

The next point is about your range for 3betting, this is a style thing to a certain extent but I prefer 3betting SCs and suited gappers rather then PPs. They play extremely differently but the main point is that SCs play far better then PPs when you're the one who has initiative.

From http://archives1.twoplustwo.com/showflat.p...&fpart=all&vc=1

With SCs:

- you have a 5.6% (1 in 18, 17:1 chance) of flopping a good made hand
- you have a ~7% (1 in 14, 13:1) chance of flopping a strong (12+ outs) combo draw
- you have a ~13% chance (1 in 7.5, 6.5:1) chance of flopping a standard OESD or FD

And that's not taking into account times we turn the nuts or a backdoor draw.

With PPs:

- you have 11.8% (1 in 8.5, 7.5:1 chance) of flopping a good made hand
- that's it. (Okay not really, you can flop things like 532 when you have 44 etc.)

Then there's the opportunity cost of not calling with our mid PPs. This sometimes exists when we're in position with SCs as well. I'll get to this in a second because it's really important.

Then there's the fact that to bluff with PPs we pretty much have air but to bluff with SCs we're looking at 30% - 40% equity. This balances nicely with the value portion of our range (overpairs/TPTK) that we'll be also be playing fast.

O.k. back to opportunity cost and it's the second big thing I want to disagree with. Unless you're against a really bad player (i.e. a fish), or you're an extremely good player (if you're reading this you're almost definitely not there yet), your range for 3betting should be polarized. What I mean by this is that your hand should be defined as being a value hand which you're happy to 5bet shove if he 4bets (like QQ+, AK) or a bluff hand (54s - JQs, 64s - KJs, 74s - KTs, A2s - A9s, 22 - 77, etc.) which you know you're going to fold if 4bet but which still plays pretty well those times that you do get called.

The reason for this is that there's only a finite number of hands you can get all-in preflop with. This depends on your opponent, game flow, image, history, position, etc., etc. Sometimes this is going to be KK+ and other times it'll be 99+, AQ+. The point is that it's limited.

So if there's only a limited number of hands we can get in for value then there must also be a limit to the number of hands we can bluff with. We can't 3bet 100% of our range (well sometimes we can but anyway), or else our opponent could just 4bet his entire opening range and show a profit, so we have to decide a good % of our air hands to bluff with. This will depend on the situation, our opponents, history, etc., etc. and on how wide our range for value is. So again there's a finite number of hands we can 3bet bluff with.

What this all means is that, provided the two hands have roughly the same EV when 3bet, we should only 3bet hands that we can't profitably coldcall. Since we won't get called that often and since calling ranges tend to be pretty strong, hands like 88 are pretty much the same as 44 when 3bet. However the EV of cold calling with 88 is much higher then with 44. And the EV of calling with 44 is much higher then calling with something like 65s, and 65s plays better as the 3bettor anyway. So you should 3bet bluff with hands that you can't coldcall profitably but can almost do so. And coldcall the hands you can.

So in your range against a typical micro - small stakes opponent I usually won't be happy getting in with any less then QQ+, AK as a default. That means I'll almost never 3bet with 88 - JJ and AQ from the range you posted since I can coldcall them profitably. 22 - 77 are debatable.

Also just because villain has a wide opening range it does not make it a valid reason to 3bet, it's like saying "I'm ahead of his range" and it's nonsense. We should be more concerned with how wide he defends his opens, rather then how wide he opens. So against a fish who'll call way too often we shouldn't use a polarized range, we can 3bet 88 - JJ and AJ/AQ/KQ, which I'd usually coldcall with, for value because he'll call with way too much stuff.

Not that it's too relevant here but at higher stakes players will call 3bets wider with things like KJ/KT/A9/etc. so 3betting KQ/AQ/AJ becomes almost mandatory.

2. Make that 4 and it's for the reasons I stated above. I can only 3bet bluff a finite number of hands and I'll do this with hands which I'm NOT able to profitably coldcall with and coldcall the ones which I am. Even though 3betting may be higher EV then coldcalling I lose out on the EV of 3betting a weaker hand that I'll now have to fold.

Hi,

I've been playing 20nl through 100nl on Betfair since may. I am showing profit but i fail at something terribly. I can't seem to get steady showdown winnings. Maybe its something that can be analised from my stats, im not sure. But here you go:





Any out of the ordinary ? Maybe its not visible rightaway , but here are some graphicals to emphasize what i mean. I also posted them in uBBV but i think they belong here better.



0-19k = 20nl
20k+ = 50/100nl

oyeah and there is a - 1.25bi of 200nl in there somewhere ( tilt )

Hey all, these are my stats for this month , would love to hear suggestions / comments




Also, i posted the following thread before noticing this thread:

I looked on my NL50 PokerEV graph for this month (its not pretty, tilt and stupidity are killing me) and noticed that over my sample of about 25k , i have been losing about 680$ / big bets , which is 2.7 ptbb / 100 . Now if i got it right, this includes all the blinds / hands where i didnt VPIP'd.
Pokertracker is telling me i was required to post a total of 3600 $ / ptbb

I play about 20/16 on NL50 6max, when i add a "Action preflop is raise / call" filter on pokerEV it tells me i have been winning 41 BB / 100 in total winnings, that includes 19.1 BB / 100 for showdown winnings and 21.7BB / 100 in non-showdown, which is 1266$ over the 5644 filtered hands.

Is it possible to draw any conclusions from these stats .. Is it "acceptable" to lose a few BB per 100 on folding blinds, and if so , how do my stats compare?

Also, how reliable can PokerEV indicate running bad? I have been down 15 buyins over 50k+ hands of NL50 6-max and my SB line has never had a very signifacnt downswing .. however it seems that during the few bumps i had , the divergence got bigger when i lost the pots putting my money in bad while i lost on a few suckouts on my upswings , which made the divergence grow more again. Now i realize it can't treat the aspects of luck like getting action with aces or running with KK into AA , but.. i understand this is a fairly large sample , also a period where i changed my game more than once - is it likely to happen if its just being plain unlucky in the "short" run (3 months and lifetilt) , or is it possible that this apparent difference got compensated by my non-showdown winnings (basically, i draw out, i bet , they fold, and PokerEV wont count it as showdown hand and wont calculate EV ) ?

Any good way for me to analyze this a bit more with PT / PokerEV


Thanks for reading

I can't leave on vacation without responding to this one.

I thought about this for awhile, and y'know what? I actually disagree with this point. I think you SHOULD be 3-betting more from the blinds than from the CO or BTN. Why?? Well, because your folding equity is going to be significantly higher when you three-bet from the blinds, either preflop or on the flop.

Think of it this way: a typical 20/15 TAG raises UTG. If you three-bet from the button he's going to fold a significant fraction of his hands, but probably less than half of them. Remember, the guy is 20/15 on average from all seats combined; from UTG he's probably more like 13/12 or 14/13. He's probably not folding more than half of the 12% of hands that he raised with. Moreover, he's going to four-bet you hard with at least a quarter of his entire raising range, and if you were three-betting light you're going to have to fold those. That means that a light three-bet from CO or BTN against a typical TAG is going to be a dangerous move.

However, that same TAG might have a steal attempt of 30%. (Remember, I specified to only loosen up with three-betting against a frequent blind thief.) NOW how does he respond to a three-bet from the blinds? Sure, he's got position, but he was raising a third of his hands! Odds are that you've caught him with a hand he does NOT want to continue playing. Most TAGs will probably fold 2/3rds or 3/4ths of their hands to a resteal. You've got oodles more folding equity than you did against the EP raiser. Also, the odds of a four-bet go down significantly, since he'll only be fourbetting maybe 1/6th of the hands that he three-bet with. (Mind you, I'm just talking about a typical loose blind thief. If you're dealing with someone who is just a hyper-aggro raise monkey, resteals should again be tight.)

That's only true if the competent player has a tight 3-bet range. If they are stealing a third of the time this reasoning simply doesn't apply. I agree that if we start fighting back 100% of the time that he steals this becomes problematic, but if we're only restealing 1 time in 12 he's probably not going to go all nuts on us: he'll just make a straightforward fold. Ideally, he'll even start stealing our blinds less often -- another +EV coup for us.

No, SCs play far better than PPs when you have initiative AND POSITION. The reason why I still like my range better (especially for people new to light resteals) is that you KNOW what to do after your c-bet meets resistance. After you make your c-bet you'll either have a set or you won't. Binary. Either/or. If you've got a set, you're going to town. If you don't, you're folding most of the time. With a suited connector, things get noticeably uglier. In the article you quote, goofyballer refers to "hitting the board" VERY loosely. For example, in goofy's setup 6 5 would be considered to have hit the board on a flop of 8 7 6. Not to disparage goofy's work, but would you REALLY call that a 13-outer? I certainly wouldn't. If you were to do the study more carefully you'd find that you flop a solidly made hand with your suited connector LESS often than with a pocket pair. Also, when a suited connector gets a miracle and flops a flush there's still a very decent chance that villain has an overcard of the same suit; suddenly you're getting called down by an opponent with seven outs to a bigger hand than you! On the other hand, if villain calls down with an overpair or TPTK when you've got a set, he's only got 0-2 outs to beat you.

The black-or-white nature of a pocket pair's flop makes it ideal for playing OOP postflop. The shades-of-grey I've-got-outs-but-not-to-the-nuts nature of suited connectors make them markedly harder to play well, especially OOP. Three-betting suited connectors is fine if you know your opponent well and you know how they will react to your bet. It's especially useful if your opponent is going to virtually shut down postflop, checking behind when you want free cards and calling down when you want company. Unfortunately, these opponents are extremely rare, and against a typical enemy I'd like the backdoor insurance policy of a possible flopped set more than the lukewarm flops that suited connectors usual yield even when they "hit."

Sometimes it's easier to bluff with air. In a three-bet pot people tend to play a very straightforward game -- "I fit or I fold." It's a rare villain who calls a three-bet preflop and then floats a 15 BB c-bet with garbage. Most of the time they're folding their naked overcards and even their underpairs. However, when you get called (or raised!) I'd really like to have a strong idea of where I stand. This wishy-washy "I've got a crappy pair and an idiot-end one-card straight draw" stuff doesn't fill me with confidence in a three-bet pot where my c-bet got raised. I'm probably going to be forced to go all-in, and I'm going to get stacked a depressing amount of the time. However, with pocket pairs I can escape with 2/3rds of my stack intact if I miss and STILL stack my villain when I hit and he raised my c-bet.

Most of the value from a resteal comes from the STEAL part, not the hand value part. Still, when it comes to insurance policies, I'd rather have the pair with its powerhouse potential than the suited connectors with their mushy half-assed hand potential. Suited connectors seem better for a straight raise than a three-bet, because suited connectors really thrive on implied odds.

I like this idea only if I think a four-bet is a very likely possibility, but even at the $200NL tables, four-bets aren't all that common. The most likely result by far is that villain simply folds to the resteal. Next most likely is that villain smooth-calls to "see what happens." Least likely by far is that villain four-bets. If I'm faced with a four-bet at $50NL, I'll usually treat it as a super-premium and respond accordingly, folding all but my strongest hands and five-betting all-in with the very best of them. It really doesn't matter if my raising range includes "good hands" like JJ or "garbage hands" like 72o; faced with a four-bet, both are going in the muck. It's pretty easy to tell what you should be junking to a four-bet, so I don't see this as a strong argument against my range.

OK, the big disagreement here is about the cold-calling range. In my mind, the profitable cold-calling range is basically "nothing." If I'm first to act after a raise from a probable thief, I'm simply not cold-calling much. Hands like 88 and 44 can't cold-call a standard-sized raise OOP. We trick ourselves into thinking we've got sufficient implied odds to set-mine but we DON'T. When faced with a steal while holding a hand like that I'm either going to three-bet it or fold it, depending on table conditions. Smooth-calling against all but the most straightforward or loose or aggressive players is just suicidal.

...and there I simply disagree with you. I don't think that against a typical loose steal you can profitably play these hands for a cold call. There are just entirely too many things that can go wrong postflop for you to be able to succeed with these hands unless you are an AMAZINGLY good hand-reader or your opponent is AMAZINGLY bad. Even with a hand like JJ there's a 50/50 chance that the flop will have an overcard, and how much will you like your JJ when the preflop raiser fires 3/4ths-pot on a K-high board without a J?

You seem to imply that the two are unrelated. I'm not advocating blindly raising against any steal. I'm not even advocating blindly raising against anybody who steals too much. I'm suggesting that we three-bet often against good opponents who steal too frequently. Our folding equity is solid if we keep our steal frequency relatively small (and 8.3% is relatively small). Combining preflop folding equity, flop folding equity, and the potential to hit a monster makes this a +EV combination. Now, if villain is just a loose maniac idiot who never folds preflop to a three-bet and always floats your c-bets, you should OBVIOUSLY tighten up a bit and play back hard when you hit something. That's just not the typical blind thief.

You CAN'T cold-call much profitably, and you SHOULD be folding the weaker hands. Remember: you're SUPPOSED to lose money from the blinds. Our goal is not to make a fortune by defending; our goal is to staunch the bleeding as best we can. As a long-time blind thief, I find the very best method to avoid getting destroyed from the blinds is to defend very infrequently but very hard. That means that we almost never call a raise -- we're folding the vast majority of the time and raising almost all of the times we don't fold. The only time I really don't mind calling a steal attempt is if we're overcalling, in position, or mixing up our game.

i love you pokey ...

marry me?

Enlightening discussion Pokey and RedJoker. I've gone back and forth on a lot of what you're discussing, though my thought process is nowhere near as sophisticated.

Have a good one .

Standard TAG (whatever that means) opens from the CO. Would you rather 3bet from the BTN or from the SB? Personally my 3bet bluffing range from the BTN will be way wider then my 3bet bluffing range from the blinds.

77+, AQ+ is 6% of hands. You're really arguing that a 20/15 will continue that wide when somebody 3bets his UTG open?

QQ+, AK maybe which looks like 2.6% of hands or 1/5 of his opening range.

Besides I'd still rather 3bet him from the BTN then from the blinds. And I'd rather 3bet his MP open from the BTN then from the blinds.

Yeah absolutely, restealing from the blinds is important, good, profitable, etc. I'm just arguing that it's even better when you've got position.

Yeah that's a fine frequency while OOP. Your IP frequency should be higher though and if you're 3betting him a lot while IP he's going to be less inclined to steal our blinds anyway.

Yeah, but you don't need to 3bet for this to be true about PPs. If you flop a set the pot can be 8BBs or it can be 30BBs, you're still going to town.

From the thread:
"I looked at this long ago. My posts are somewhere in the archives.

If you factor out flopping flush draws on paired boards, and straight draws on paired and 3-flush boards against, I get 23.5% or 3.25:1 against flopping 2 pair or better made hands or at least an 8 out draw for suited max stretch 0-gap connectors.

21.3% or 3.7:1 against for max stretch 1-gap suited connecttors.

18.5% or 4.4:1 against for max stretch 2-gap suited connectors. "

So it seems we should be deducting ~2% from the probability of hitting to account for bad board textures.

Also if you look at this thread.

Anatomy of JTs
Hand -- Probability of Hitting It
Strong Draw -- 0.184
Monster Draw -- 0.04485
Top Pair -- 0.1295
Middle / Bottom Pair -- 0.1134
Two Pair -- 0.02
Trips -- 0.0135
Monster Hand -- 0.0223
Dirt / Weak Draw -- 0.47245

They sum to 28.465% but don't take into account bad board textures.

He seems to get a way higher figure for flush draws for some reason. He also included pair + gutshot (9 outs) which Goofy missed I think.

So 23.5% seems like a pretty good estimate of hitting a made hand or an 8 out+ draw.

Ah come on. If you flop a set on a monotone board against an opponent with an overcard of that suit then he's got 9 outs (but you have a redraw) as well.

Board: 9c 4c 2c
Dead:

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 28.283% 28.28% 00.00% 280 0.00 { AcKd }
Hand 1: 71.717% 71.72% 00.00% 710 0.00 { 4d4s }

Board: 9c 4c 2c
Dead:

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 28.687% 28.69% 00.00% 284 0.00 { AcKd }
Hand 1: 71.313% 71.31% 00.00% 706 0.00 { JcTc }

And if you're against an overpair JcTc has 3.7% more equity then 44. (68.485% vs. 64.747%).

And if an opponent calls you down with an overpair against your straight or flush he's got 0 outs, well runner runner. Although if you flop two pair he does have much better equity with his overpair (27% vs. 10.5%).

So let's say you 3bet from the BB and get called by the BTN. The flop comes down XYZ, you cbet and he calls. The turn falls and you shove. Or he raises the flop and you shove. Your range is either overpairs/ TPTK/ monsters (sets)/ underpairs (with 5% equity), when I jam the turn I've got overpairs/ TPTK/ monsters(str8/flush/2pair)/ draws (with 30% - 40% equity). I know which range I'd much rather have.

The times that he folds preflop or to the cbet are irrelevant obviously.

Personally I find it a lot easier to bluff with 30%+ equity then with 2 outs. Even if it is easier to bluff with air (I'm not sure why it would be though), it doesn't make it better then doing it with equity.

Yeah the steal part is the big part, but it's not what we're debating here. Whether SCs play better as the initial raiser is irrelevant since we don't have that option anymore.

PPs thrive on implied odds, SCs thrive on reverse implied odds. What I mean is that when I'm firing with my draws I'm relying on him folding his marginal made hands because there's also strong made hands in my range and he's in a reverse implied odds situation. That's why initiative is so important with SCs. With PPs I want implied odds for those times that he has a big hand, whether I have initiative or not isn't hugely important to me (although it's still always nice).

If he folds to the 3bet JJ = 72o. If 4bets JJ = 72o. So you've turned JJ into 72o except for the times that he calls.

And how is JJ going to do against his calling range? A wise man once said "Even with a hand like JJ there's a 50/50 chance that the flop will have an overcard" . Yeah JJ will do better then 44 against his calling range, however if I have to make a choice between the 2 of them, I'd rather 3bet with 44 and call with JJ then 3bet JJ and call/fold 44. The reason is that we're not going to get called that often so we could express it as 3bet JJ if:

(Prob of villain calling)[(EV of JJ when called) - (EV of worst alternative when called (in this case 44))] > (EV of calling JJ)

Now you might have both of those in your range so change 44 to 65s and the argument still holds.

You can't coldcall profitably with 88 - JJ and AQ? Really?

O.k. let's say you 3bet JJ and your opponent raises your cbet on a K high board, now what?

They're related in that one is a % of the other. Besides that they're extremely different and his defending range is faaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrr more important then his opening range.

Even if we can't coldcall much profitably, the hands that we CAN coldcall (but can't get all-in profitably) should not be 3bet. Unless your opponent calls 3bets a lot.

I completely agree with you about stopping the bleeding as much as possible. Let's say we can only 3bet bluff a maximum of 8% of hands (assume this maximizes our EV for our value hands and our bluffs), would you rather 3bet hands which you can't coldcall profitably or hands that you can?

I'd much rather gain the EV from coldcalling those hands which I can and still have a roughly similar EV from 3betting a slightly weaker 8% of hands.

Also another major benefit to this approach for micro stakes players, and particularly those players moving up to small stakes, is that it forces you to plan your hand and it keeps you out of really marginal spots.

Like if a TAG BTN opens and you 3bet TT from the BB because it's in your 3betting range. He 4bets and you're there making arguments to yourself; oh I've 3bet him twice already he's probably getting sick of me, small stakes is so much more aggressive I can't let him push me around, tic toc tic toc, **** it I'm all-in. He has QQ, son of a goddamn bitch.

A much better thought process in that spot is: I'm not happy getting TT all-in preflop, I can coldcall this profitably so I'm not going to include it in my bluffing range. I call, let's play a flop.

Geez, RedJoker....If I miss my plane it's your fault.

I think we're agreeing FAR more than it appears in this thread, so let me summarize for the people who think (incorrectly) that we hate each other and are about to throw down.

1. We agree about the "where should I three-bet" stuff. If I've got position on an opponent, I like to three-bet when I can. I also agree that I'm happier three-betting CO's steal from the button than from the blinds because of positional advantages. (However, I'd much prefer cold-calling CO from BTN than cold-calling from the blinds, just because it's SO much easier to turn a potentially unprofitable situation into a profitable one simply by moving from OOP to IP. Also, when you're in position it becomes MUCH easier to float the flop or slowplay a monster, and since you get to see your opponent's actions before you make your move you get many more +EV postflop situations. Therefore, I'd be much more inclined to take the passive line from the button than from the blinds, where I'd just rather resteal and move on with my life.) In my post I was comparing apples to oranges, saying that three-betting from the blinds against a steal attempt by a frequent thief is an almost entirely different situation from any other kind of three-bet, and that as a result we can get away with a wider-than-usual three-betting range because our +EV range is so much larger than it typically would be, so we're in agreement there.

2. Regarding an UTG's range to continue to fight against a three-bet: hmmmm, you're probably right: it's probably narrower than I had originally estimated. However, if you think an UTG raiser only continues with 1/5th of his opening range then you must think that a blind thief who is typically tight but stealing a third of his hands is continuing beyond the flop with something like 1/20th of his preflop raising range. Mind you, I think the thief calls to "see the flop" more often than an UTG raiser, but I think he plays fit-or-fold on the flop. Frankly, I'd much rather have an opponent who calls preflop and folds almost every flop than an opponent who just folds almost all hands preflop -- it creates a much more profitable 3-bet situation, since your average win is markedly higher.

3. We have a fundamental disagreement about win percentages. This could easily stem from the different levels we play, but at $200NL cold-calling pocket pairs to set mine is -EV. My feeling is that a typical player who is not used to blind defense (or who is not GOOD at blind defense) will not be comfortable or adept at spotting good opportunities to "make a move" postflop into a preflop aggressor. They also might not have the gumption to actually pull the trigger even if they spot those opportunities. It happens all the time that someone says "OK, I'll call this $2 raise and then I'll check-raise the flop if it comes with a good resteal opportunity." The flop comes "safe" and villain bets $3. It takes nerves of steel to then actually DO it and fire a $9 bet (18 BBs!) at the preflop and flop aggressor with air. If you have the skill to make these moves when it's appropriate then you can swing an otherwise-unprofitable smooth-call into a +EV move, but I think most people who are struggling to defend the blinds don't have that ability, and when you're cold-calling a 7 BB raise OOP, you've got a looooooooong ways to go to try and get sufficient value out of your set....

4. We did a great deal of quibbling about suited connectors. From my recollection, 2+2ers have been arguing about this topic since the Truman administration. I think much of it is stylistic, to be honest, and your arguments have been quite persuasive for me. I may start three-betting my SCs more often from the blinds (my villains now hate you, RJ). Let's say that "QQ+, AQ+" is a slam-dunk, no-brainer raising range for the both of us, and we're arguing about what's better to add to the 3-betting range: SCs or PPs. Perhaps the answer has been staring us in the face all along, and we just haven't realized it yet: why not raise both? A raising range of "22+, 54s+, AQ+" has us restealing 11% of our hands preflop -- that's one time in nine. It's not SO often that it's going to trigger warning bells for villain, it gives us all the juicy goodness that comes from folding equity, it broadens our defending range, it disguises our hand better, and it still has all the flopability of a nice starting hand. We just got so locked into this "either/or" mentality that we forgot the alternative. Frankly, I wouldn't mind having a wider resteal range, just because it can be so damned effective: in my 25k hands at $200NL I've only had 185 hands where I attempted a resteal from the blinds. (People have only attempted a steal against my blinds 1,930 times, so there's just not much data here yet.) While this isn't much of a sample, I've been winning at a rate of 128 PTBB/100 when I try a resteal, so it seems to be a very effective strategy. In comparison, in the 77 hands where I cold-called a steal I've had a winrate 1/3rd as high, and if you remove the one hand where I slowplayed KK preflop I have a LOSS on the other 76 times that I've cold-called a steal attempt. Maybe I'm just bad at blind defense (a definite possibility!) but my gut feeling tells me that the best defense is a good offense. Why cold-call with ANY of these hands when we could resteal instead? It's not like villains are going to lie down and die when we resteal 8% but suddenly get all ballsy and awesome if we up our resteal rate to 11%....Given my data, restealing is WAY more profitable than cold-calling. Are your results similar? If so, we may have just plugged a leak in OUR games.

5. My comment about "stealing with air being easier than stealing with outs" comes from two places: first is that the steal is +EV on its own merits, and second is that I'd often prefer to fold when villain shows resistance. I went back and did some numbers, and with a healthy number of outs (say, 9+) it's almost never going to be a mistake to get it all-in after we resteal preflop and bet the flop (too much money in the middle already), but it's definitely a rollercoaster ride. Good players can handle that variance, but I'm not trying to preach to the choir, here -- I'm talking to the struggling uNL'er who is inexperienced with blind defense, who may have some tilt issues and who is fundamentally uncomfortable with throwing stacks around with weak hands. The nice thing about pocket pairs is that you can REALLY autopilot them after the flop bet and that's OK. There won't be any hard decisions to face. Suited connectors are a bit more advanced because they require more nuance, a better understanding of the math, and more comfortability with the whole stealing situation. I think I'd still advocate raising only pocket pairs for the beginning blind defender and then having them add in the suited connectors once they get comfortable with the whole concept of blind defense.

6. I'm still not at all convinced that you can profitably cold-call OOP with ANY hands against a blind steal (except for a blatant slowplay with KK/AA or something, which you should do EXTREMELY infrequently, just to mix up your play). Because I deny that premise, I'd prefer to just raise ALL the hands we'd cold-call with and get the uberboost to our winrate from having a wider-than-usual restealing range. Something to remember: while *you* know that you're restealing with 11% of your hands, your *opponent* won't know that. It would literally take tens of thousands of hands for that kind of number to lock up to its true rate. I don't think it's anything to worry about, and I like the benefits of restealing vs. cold-calling entirely too much to give it up on ANY of the hands I'd continue postflop.

7. Regarding the difficulties of postflop play with "weak" resteal hands like TT: first off, that applies to MANY of the hands we've discussed. Second, if we run into the top of his range we're screwed whether we resteal or cold-call. The difficulties of overpair vs. overpair in a raised pot are huge, and whether we resteal or cold-call we run the risk of getting stacked there. So be it -- that's part of the price of playing poker. As to what to do with JJ on a K-high board when we resteal pre and villain raises our c-bet: dump it and move on. Most villains are NOT getting out of line often enough for it to be +EV to defend for our stacks. He REALLY puts his neck on the chopping block when he raises our c-bet, so it gives us the freedom to fold and save 2/3rds of our stack. Just because we say "I'm not happy getting TT all-in preflop" does NOT mean that we shouldn't resteal with it. Remember: villains tend to play a very straightforward game against a resteal because the pot has become large enough that they can't afford to get cutesy. So long as we listen to what our opponents are saying and watch for the (very infrequent) villains who are capable of adjusting to our aggression we'll wind up raking in large sacks of dough by restealing relatively often.

I think Pokey works best when someone tells him he's wrong. I think both Pokey and RedJoker just gave uNL some ridiculously valuable material to think about.

Pokey -

I'd love to hear what you have to say about my stats.

Thx RJ, appreciate the feedback.

Nice summary. I don't know though, all this mathematics and poker theory is o.k. I guess but we could always just settle this argument by duking it out for a few rounds.

Yeah I'm going to have a wider coldcalling range from the button AND a wider 3bet bluffing range. The two aren't mutually exclusive although at first a lot of people would assume so. God I love the button.

Nah, I'm playing 200nl as well but a lot of high stakes players disagree about this too. Raptor and Taylor Caby think it's not profitable. BobboFitos, aejones and luckychewy think it is (provided villain isn't extremely good). I think it almost comes down to image, history and game flow. Like if I've been check raising a lot of flops recently, etc. then my implied odds are much higher. If I've only just sat down then I may find it harder to get paid off but my 3bets will likely get more respect.

Well it's like I told the 17/14 player earlier; when your only decision is how much to cbet with AA on A83 you're going to struggle to improve. The same can be said here; if you never coldcall then you'll never acquire the skills to do it profitably.

I agree it's definitely stylistic, however I'd probably put all SCs, suited one gappers and suited aces, and strong suited two gappers in my bluffing range before I'd include PPs because I feel that they balance a lot better with the value part of my range, they add a semi-bluff segment as opposed to a pure bluff segment. But yeah if I'm in a spot where I want to 3bet bluff more than 9% of my range then I'll probably add PPs.

My range for bluffing depends on my range for stacking off though, if I'm only happy getting in with QQ+, AQ+ (3.8% of hands) then I'm pretty limited to how much I can bluff. In some spots I'll want to use a 1:1 ratio, which would be 54s - KQs and 64s - 97s while in other spots I may be using a 3:1 ratio and going mental with anything pretty. So I think it's important to decide what you'd prefer to 3bet bluff and depending on the situation gradually add-in or take away different hands.

You're not forced to call just because you have outs. However, if it's profitable to make the call then bet calling > bet folding. If we're going to fold anyway then having 9 outs = having 2 outs (assuming our opponent shoves or folds) but let's say we need 20% equity to make the call if shoved on, would you rather have 2 outs or 9 outs? I'd much rather have 9 outs because I can then call and claim back some (re: a lot) of my lost EV.

Well then you could just increase the air hands you 3bet instead of using hands you can profitably coldcall. At some point the EV of 3betting a coldcallable hand will outweight the EV of 3betting the worst alternative + opportunity cost I suppose. That's arguing on the fringes though.

O.k., but we'd rack in even more sacks of dough if we kept the same restealing frequency but used hands which we can't coldcall. Then we gain virtually the same EV from 3betting but a whole new layer of EV from the hands we're now coldcalling.

With JJ on K high, we might as well have had 65s/44 in that spot, they're identical except with JJ we'll often have really awkward decisions.

The best thing about coldcalling these 88 - JJ and AQ/KQ/AJ type hands is that they keep in all the dominated hands which would otherwise be forced out. When we 3bet AJ and get called JJ - AA, AQ+ is a pretty significant part of their range. However, against a loose stealing range those hands are a very small part and things like A2 - AT, J8 - KJ are trapped in the pot with us.

This is more from a theoretical discussion and I definitely agree with you that, for a micro stakes player, having a small coldcalling range and an easy to play 3betting range is perfectly reasonable.