Poker Video: No Limit Hold'Em by terp (Micro/Small Stakes)

Time Link to 00:02:29

Also notice the two aces on board- I guess he's mucking Quads... (after seeing a straight flush?)

Also notice the two aces on board- I guess he's mucking Quads... (after seeing a straight flush?)

ha! i hadn't

if you look at the rest it looks like a steel wheel is supposed to be possible?

I wish this video examined the different scenarios in greater detail. I like the idea of being taught how to think about the situation and not some rote memorization, but I feel that there wasn't much guidance on how to analyze the situations. We were told that we need to think how the Villain is going to react and then make adjustment to our 3-bet bluffing range. I totally agree. But I feel that this point was just reiterated in different ways without it being explored in greater detail. Just barely scratched the surface of some of the topics.

What I would prefer is some greater detail for those situations. For example, let's assume that we believe the Villain will never call our 3-bet. In other words, we expect the Villain to 4-bet or fold. In this case, we do not need to know how our hand will do post flop. And instead, we just need to use the hand which will do best against his 4-betting range. In this case, we will want to bluff with hands which will have blockers to his 4-betting range. This will have 2 immediate benefits, one less obvious than the other. The obvious advantage is that there is less likelihood that the Villain will have a hand he will 4-bet, therefore we can expect to get more folds which is what we want to accomplish with the bluff. The less obvious advantage is that the Villain will need to adjust by adding in more bluffs to his 4-betting range to make up for the hands missing from his range due to our blockers, but there is technically no way for him to know whether or not we are using blockers to bluff, since he never calls our bet. So when he folds, he doesn't know that we had a blocker. When he 4-bets us, we fold and he doesn't know if we had blockers. The point is that it's impossible for him to know if we're using blockers, so it could be difficult for him to adjust quickly. Now I don't think this is telling us how to play, but it does help explain how to analyze the situation.

good points

it can be tough trying to decide what to put in the videos and sometimes a discussion i have planned might not make it as i look at the slides and think out loud. the discussion thread is a good place for this to be corrected!

blockers actually tend to be overvalued. mess around with pokerstove/combo counting and you'll see it has a realllllllly small impact on ranges.

another thing: i am not sure if i talked about it in the video, but card removal can work both ways. for instance, take an ace out of the deck. yes, he has fewer stack off hands, but he also has fewer hands that he opened in the first place! you would like blockers to change the ratio of hands that continue to a 3b/4b compared to the number he had already. just looking at how much his stack off range is reduced is an incomplete analysis.

for instance, assume someone opens the range A2s+, ATo+, KTs, QTs+, 22+, T9s+ UTG. assume also his 4b range is JJ+, AKo. he probably will also 4b bluff a few hands and might also use blockers to determine. we won't really ever know, though, so we'll have to work with his 4b/call range and extrapolate a bit (how often he 4b/folds here, if that info is known).

the ace is just important as the king to block his 4b range! taking an ace away knocks AA from six to three combos and AK from 16 to 12. taking a king out has the same effect on KK and AK. however, taking an ace out dramatically reduces the number of combos he opens, whereas taking out a king does not A2s+/AT-AKo/AA versus KQo/KTs/KJs/KQs/KK. so a hand like K9s is great since it blocks some combos and isn't a total disaster if he decides to flat us with a hand like TT or AQs.

I really like your points!

for instance, assume someone opens the range A2s+, ATo+, KTs, QTs+, 22+, T9s+ UTG. assume also his 4b range is JJ+, AKo. he probably will also 4b bluff a few hands and might also use blockers to determine. we won't really ever know, though, so we'll have to work with his 4b/call range and extrapolate a bit (how often he 4b/folds here, if that info is known).

the ace is just important as the king to block his 4b range! taking an ace away knocks AA from six to three combos and AK from 16 to 12. taking a king out has the same effect on KK and AK. however, taking an ace out dramatically reduces the number of combos he opens, whereas taking out a king does not A2s+/AT-AKo/AA versus KQo/KTs/KJs/KQs/KK. so a hand like K9s is great since it blocks some combos and isn't a total disaster if he decides to flat us with a hand like TT or AQs.

I think the points here are all real great. Not sure if KJo is in our flatting range, but you'd choose to 3-bet it over K9s if we weren't calling with it. Right? It has a little better high card strength, close to the same amount of semi-bluffing strength (less flush draw but more gut shots and oesd), and more blockers to his 4-bet range with the J?

blockers actually tend to be overvalued. mess around with pokerstove/combo counting and you'll see it has a realllllllly small impact on ranges.

I'd like to discuss this a little more. So I'm not sure in which way you feel that they're overvalued. In the example, I brought up, I was assuming that the Villain would never call us (4-bet or fold), in this case, isn't it the ONLY factor that is important?

But even if we plan on being called some significant portion of the time, I think blockers can be quite important. Looking at your example, if we 3-bet with K9s, we will decrease the frequency in which he continues 15% of the time. I think this is pretty significant, don't you? He would need to add in TT to his 4-bet range in order to be defending enough again (assuming he was defending enough initially). When you look at his tight calling range -- I think it's a pretty big adjustment.

What do you think is more important. For example, in your scenario. Would you rather 3-bet with KJo or KTs -- I think there pretty close.

---------------------------------------------

Can we examine some other situations?

Q1)
We're 3-betting out of the blinds against a wide Button opening and low fold to 3-bet and low 4-bet -- i.e. he calls 3-bets a lot. How would you rank the importance of these following factors:
- High Card Strength
- Semi-Bluffing Strength
- Blockers
- Helps your range hit a wider set of boards (i.e. you can make hands on lower boards or hit Q high boards, etc)


Q2)
We're 3-betting out of the blinds against a TAG UTG open. The UTG opener will defend an optimal range with a combination of 4-betting and flatting. How would you rank the importance of the following factors:
- High Card Strength
- Semi-Bluffing Strength
- Blockers
- Helps your range hit a wider set of boards (i.e. you can make hands on lower boards or hit Q high boards, etc)


Q3) We're 3-betting out of the BB against a CO opens, who has a 70% fold to 3-bet but doesn't have a 4-bet range. Postflop: The Villain plays pretty fit or fold when facing a 3-bet... doesn't float much, doesn't bluff raise, etc. How would you rank the importance of the following factors:
- High Card Strength
- Semi-Bluffing Strength
- Blockers
- Helps your range hit a wider set of boards (i.e. you can make hands on lower boards or hit Q high boards, etc)

Q4) We're 3-betting out of the BB against a CO opens, who has a 60% fold to 3-bet but doesn't have a 4-bet range. Postflop: The Villain has a low fold to continuation bet in 3-bet pots of 25%. He plays passive post flop, but he will call down super light. If he has a hand -- regardless of how weak it is, he's going to showdown.
How would you rank the importance of the following factors:
- High Card Strength
- Semi-Bluffing Strength
- Blockers
- Helps your range hit a wider set of boards (i.e. you can make hands on lower boards or hit Q high boards, etc)

Q5) We're 3-betting out of the BB against a CO opens, who has a 60% fold to 3-bet but doesn't have a 4-bet range. Postflop: The Villain is pretty aggro. He will raise a lot of flop continuation bets with gutshots, and over-cards with back-door draws. He'll float a lot of pots. He has a pretty good call down range.
How would you rank the importance of the following factors:
- High Card Strength
- Semi-Bluffing Strength
- Blockers
- Helps your range hit a wider set of boards (i.e. you can make hands on lower boards or hit Q high boards, etc)

* SPOILER * Below are my answers, in case people wanted to answer them before seeing others answers.


Q1:
1) High Card Strength
2) SemiBluffing Strength
3) Balancing Range
4) Blockers

Since he's defending wide by calling, high card strength will be important since it should allow us to get and win at showdown against a large portion of his range.
Semibluffing is the next important because I think we'll need to double barrel a fair amount because he's going to have a pretty weak range on the flop and turn since he's defending so wide.
Balancing Range -- probably is a little more important than blockers in this situation since I'll want to be able to play back at him on a variety of different boards.
Blockers aren't very important since he's defending so wide and mostly by calling.


Q2)
We're 3-betting out of the blinds against a TAG UTG open. The UTG opener will defend an optimal range with a combination of 4-betting and flatting. How would you rank the importance of the following factors:
- Semi-Bluffing Strength
- Blockers
- High Card Strength
- Helps your range hit a wider set of boards (i.e. you can make hands on lower boards or hit Q high boards, etc)

I think this one is pretty tough because I think it's tough to decide what is more important high card strength or blockers.
Semibluffing hands are important because when the Villain does continue on the flop after we continuation bet, he likely has a hand and a strong hand at that. So we'll want hands which on the turn can end up being stronger than top pair.
Blockers are important because an UTG range is going to be tighter, so I think blockers will have more influence against his tighter range.
High Card strength -- I actually think this is important as well, but I can't decide how important -- I guess it will depend on the frequency I think our high card strength will be ahead on the flop vs the frequency I think we'll hit on the flop and be dominated.
Balance -- I don't think this is as important, but it's something pretty interesting to think about since some UTG ranges will be capped on very low boards.


Q3)
- Semi-Bluffing Strength
- High Card Strength
- Blockers
- Helps your range hit a wider set of boards (i.e. you can make hands on lower boards or hit Q high boards, etc)

I think semi bluffing is the most important, since he continues post flop with a tight range and we'll want hands which can end up making stronger hands then TPTK when we c-bet and are called.
I think High Card strength is more important here than blockers (compared to the last hand) because he'll probably play passively, we'll probably see some showdowns. Where as, his hand range is wider so blockers aren't gong to matter as much.
Balancing: This is important but I feel that it's mostly important against really strong players who can read hands well and know your game.

Q4:
- Highcard strength
- Semibluffing hands
- balance
- blockers
Highcard strength for thin value. I think it might be kinda important between semi bluffing strength and balance. semi bluffing strength is fine because you make strong hands, but in some ways I think balance is even more important because we're going to be playing on a variety of boards and want our hands to hit them (i think the idea of balance on hitting different boards is kind of interesting).

Q5:
Depending on how aggro he is. But I would guess...
- High card strength -- for showdown value
- semi bluffing hands -- for rebuffing
- balance
- blockers

I also don't have a super solid sense of how balance works out with 3-bet hands. So we will often 3-bet a hand like AK but not a hand like AQ. If this is the case, our range is going to be a lot stronger on K high boards vs Q high boards. How much of a problem do you think this is?

There's obviously a few more K high boards than Q high boards, but if we assumed the frequency was equal -- are we still very vulnerable? For example, if we remove some Kings and add in some Qs to our 3-betting range, we're going to at least hit some Top Pair on Q high boards but our range is going to be weaker on King high boards (although we'll still hit Top pair on that as well). So since our range on King high will be weaker, we're not going to be able to play it as strongly.

So I guess the question is: Is it more important to hit a variety of boards than it is to be able to play strongly on one type of board? I would think so, but I have know way of really proving it mathematically. I think the main reason has to do with having a less transparent range, so the Villain can't play closer to optimal against us.

I would appreciate any of your thoughts on this subject. (I know that the AK or AQ aren't part of our 3-bet bluffing range, but maybe you can talk about 3-betting hands like low suited connectors so we hit low boards. Although I don't know if hitting something like 7 high boards is as important, since 7 high boards are relatively infrequent compared to Q high boards.).

I really like your points!



I think the points here are all real great. Not sure if KJo is in our flatting range, but you'd choose to 3-bet it over K9s if we weren't calling with it. Right? It has a little better high card strength, close to the same amount of semi-bluffing strength (less flush draw but more gut shots and oesd), and more blockers to his 4-bet range with the J?



I'd like to discuss this a little more. So I'm not sure in which way you feel that they're overvalued. In the example, I brought up, I was assuming that the Villain would never call us (4-bet or fold), in this case, isn't it the ONLY factor that is important?

But even if we plan on being called some significant portion of the time, I think blockers can be quite important. Looking at your example, if we 3-bet with K9s, we will decrease the frequency in which he continues 15% of the time. I think this is pretty significant, don't you? He would need to add in TT to his 4-bet range in order to be defending enough again (assuming he was defending enough initially). When you look at his tight calling range -- I think it's a pretty big adjustment.

What do you think is more important. For example, in your scenario. Would you rather 3-bet with KJo or KTs -- I think there pretty close.

i will respond to this for now

KJo v K9s. obv pretty close hands. both have very similar impact on both his opening and continue-to-3bet ranges. which i'd pick would probably depend on the opponent, though they're really close and i'd probably just make a situational decision and 3bet either at a time when i thought a 3bet would be good.

KTs is a pretty clear call. i would argue that you could profitably call with any two suited broadways on the btn 100bb+ (and probably shallower, though my experience with those stacks is in responding to people who have them and who are usually fish).

as far as the combo reduction: again, you absolutely must investigate the effect on his opening range. our goal is to figure out how often he continues here, not how many combos we block. it is actually an error to say he continues 15% less often, since our K affects the combos he opened, too. i am assuming you are looking at the percentage by which his range JJ+/AKo has shrunken, but if you are not, please correct me - i do not have these numbers right now.

your goal should be to figure out how often he continues to a 3bet given the blockers. suppose his opening range is 140 combos and his continue range is 40. now suppose you 3bet a hand that blocks six continuing combos, but also blocks 21 of his opens. his fold to 3bet will be the same! you have not 'blocked' anything.

this is why it is important to count. you will almost always see a reduction in the % of time someone continues (this example was exaggerated for effect), but you should KNOW how much that % is.

i will respond to this for now

KJo v K9s. obv pretty close hands. both have very similar impact on both his opening and continue-to-3bet ranges. which i'd pick would probably depend on the opponent, though they're really close and i'd probably just make a situational decision and 3bet either at a time when i thought a 3bet would be good.

KTs is a pretty clear call. i would argue that you could profitably call with any two suited broadways on the btn 100bb+ (and probably shallower, though my experience with those stacks is in responding to people who have them and who are usually fish).

as far as the combo reduction: again, you absolutely must investigate the effect on his opening range. our goal is to figure out how often he continues here, not how many combos we block. it is actually an error to say he continues 15% less often, since our K affects the combos he opened, too. i am assuming you are looking at the percentage by which his range JJ+/AKo has shrunken, but if you are not, please correct me - i do not have these numbers right now.

your goal should be to figure out how often he continues to a 3bet given the blockers. suppose his opening range is 140 combos and his continue range is 40. now suppose you 3bet a hand that blocks six continuing combos, but also blocks 21 of his opens. his fold to 3bet will be the same! you have not 'blocked' anything.

this is why it is important to count. you will almost always see a reduction in the % of time someone continues (this example was exaggerated for effect), but you should KNOW how much that % is.

I don't have the numbers in front of me. I just used to an EV calculator which won't be named. But I know it adjusts the opening range and the continuation range. Well, give me a minute, I will do it by hand real quick...

Ok. So without blockers the Villain will be defending 19.8% of the time. With the K9s blocker, the Villain will be defending 17.6% of the time. With a difference of about 11%. This is less than the 15% I claimed, but it's still significant I believe. And along the same line, if we use something like KJo, we will be getting folds an extra 16.7% of the time.

ok, thanks. the slight difference in immediate ev between those two hands could be overcome postflop depending on his calling range and how he plays it postflop.

interesting discussion though for sure