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

better quality of vid next time please

Time Link to 00:08:21

Great Vid so far, I definitely have been struggling with my thought process while playing.

Sorry, pretty OT but how are you running Holdem Manager on your Mac? Debating if i should buy Mac version of PT3 or figure a way to run HEM...

better quality of vid next time please

We are unsure what happened here with the video display and are working to get a new version from Linkwood.
-Rusty

Great Vid so far, I definitely have been struggling with my thought process while playing.

Sorry, pretty OT but how are you running Holdem Manager on your Mac? Debating if i should buy Mac version of PT3 or figure a way to run HEM...

Thanks, glad you're enjoying it. Yeah, I run windows concurrently with my mac os. Running windows on your mac is fairly easy as there are a number of ways of doing it rather cheaply. I use Parallels 5, running Windows 7. It is a bit slow at times but I like being able to run windows and mac programs at the same time.

better quality of vid next time please

Yeah, sorry about the problems. Hope to have it fixed soon. Appreciate everyone's patience.

Great vid. Really liked the way you explained things. Found it very easy to understand your thought processes and it gave me a great template for how i should be reviewing my play after a session.

Would love to see a micro/small stakes series from you in the future. With a mix of live play and session reviews.

Thanks, glad you're enjoying it. Yeah, I run windows concurrently with my mac os. Running windows on your mac is fairly easy as there are a number of ways of doing it rather cheaply. I use Parallels 5, running Windows 7. It is a bit slow at times but I like being able to run windows and mac programs at the same time.

Thanks for the reply linkwood, ya I will look into parallels, looking forward to more of your videos.

Thanks, glad you're enjoying it. Yeah, I run windows concurrently with my mac os. Running windows on your mac is fairly easy as there are a number of ways of doing it rather cheaply. I use Parallels 5, running Windows 7. It is a bit slow at times but I like being able to run windows and mac programs at the same time.

FWIW I'm running Parallels 6 now and it's pretty sweet, just figured I'd pass it on. Seems faster than Parallels 5 did.

Rob

FWIW I'm running Parallels 6 now and it's pretty sweet, just figured I'd pass it on. Seems faster than Parallels 5 did.

Rob

Appreciate that. I saw they just released 6. I run version 5, so it sounds like its time for an upgrade. Thanks

Great vid. Really liked the way you explained things. Found it very easy to understand your thought processes and it gave me a great template for how i should be reviewing my play after a session.

Would love to see a micro/small stakes series from you in the future. With a mix of live play and session reviews.

Thanks a lot. I appreciate the feedback and I'm glad you found the information useful.

Time Link to 00:22:18

Would you make the same call with the 55 if the river was not a king but any card ranging from Q to 2?

just wondering why you think calling from the SB w/ 22-44 PF is a bad play seeing as how the game is 4 handed

Definitely his lack of flop raise is bad, but what's wrong with calling with any pocket pair OOP in 4 handed?

First hand:
How can we NOT shove the river here? Villain practically never has a flush, so we're free-rolling for him to do something stupid with a set or two pair.

just wondering why you think calling from the SB w/ 22-44 PF is a bad play seeing as how the game is 4 handed

Definitely his lack of flop raise is bad, but what's wrong with calling with any pocket pair OOP in 4 handed?

I think because villains range from CO and BU are so wide that we wont get paid enough of the time that we do hit a set to justify the times that we check fold. Please correct me if i am wrong.

Would you make the same call with the 55 if the river was not a king but any card ranging from Q to 2?

Against an unknown, its close but prob not, given that his value range is significantly wider. If we knew he could have hands like jto in his range we're more likely to call tho.

just wondering why you think calling from the SB w/ 22-44 PF is a bad play seeing as how the game is 4 handed

Definitely his lack of flop raise is bad, but what's wrong with calling with any pocket pair OOP in 4 handed?

Against a reg who may be aggressive enough to barrel and put you in tough spots calling with small pairs is -EV. A lot has to go right to make calling profitable. I'd rather 3bet or fold unless we're deep or there's fish in the hand.

First hand:
How can we NOT shove the river here? Villain practically never has a flush, so we're free-rolling for him to do something stupid with a set or two pair.

He can have some kxs hands and some other random flush hands. He doesn't always donk his sets and two pair hands. Two pair is less likely to donk than sets and, as said in the video, sets are very unlikely. I think giving him 4-6 combos of worse hands is generous. So when he donks the river the small amount of flushes (maybe 2-4 combos) make up a significant part of his range. If he ever folds worse hands with a significant frequency it would likely be significantly -EV.

I think because villains range from CO and BU are so wide that we wont get paid enough of the time that we do hit a set to justify the times that we check fold. Please correct me if i am wrong.

Yes, plus the amount of times the flop comes 56k with a flush draw and you're in a really awkward spot.

He can have some kxs hands and some other random flush hands. He doesn't always donk his sets and two pair hands. Two pair is less likely to donk than sets and, as said in the video, sets are very unlikely. I think giving him 4-6 combos of worse hands is generous. So when he donks the river the small amount of flushes (maybe 2-4 combos) make up a significant part of his range. If he ever folds worse hands with a significant frequency it would likely be significantly -EV.

That's a great answer. Thanks.

Better quality vid now available in all formats. Enjoy.
-Rusty

Prolly the best micro-vid of the year. You really nailed some of the major problems people have with hand reading.

Things to consider

Fold equity and fold percentage are not the same.

QJ hand: Alternative line is to use position check turn and bluff at blank rivers. The reason the river has to be blank is that it allows us to rep the widest value range - are we really betting JJ on a Q, A or spade river? I would most likely use that line for hands that did not pick up any equity on the turn (and we should have plenty of those in our range) - and less often with QJ.

I don't remember if you mentioned it in the vid - but we are bluffing on any spade river when we are betting the turn with QJ - at least sometimes QJ is the perfect hand (When we have QJ there are fewer KQ, KJ in villain's range).

Prolly the best micro-vid of the year. You really nailed some of the major problems people have with hand reading.

Things to consider

Fold equity and fold percentage are not the same.

QJ hand: Alternative line is to use position check turn and bluff at blank rivers. The reason the river has to be blank is that it allows us to rep the widest value range - are we really betting JJ on a Q, A or spade river? I would most likely use that line for hands that did not pick up any equity on the turn (and we should have plenty of those in our range) - and less often with QJ.

I don't remember if you mentioned it in the vid - but we are bluffing on any spade river when we are betting the turn with QJ - at least sometimes QJ is the perfect hand (When we have QJ there are fewer KQ, KJ in villain's range).

Thanks for the comments. Good points on the QJ hand. The one reason I would hesitate to use the bet, check, bet line is that villain is still relatively unknown and fish are notorious for getting real curious when you check a street. Plus making the primary decision point in the hand on the turn tends to have more fold equity than making it on the river. Having to consider folding a hand that someone thinks could possibly be best creates a psychological tension. If you make the possibility of releasing that tension farther away by the threat of making two calls instead of one, you increase the likelihood that villain will relieve the tension through allowing himself to believe that he's beat and make the "appropriate" action.

Great vid ty - agree with improva - best micro-vid for some time.

For the QJ hand, you only calculated our foldequity and said it was +EV, but I don't understand why you didn't calculate our euity if we checked.
It's like saying openshoving AA is profitable. It is profitable, but probably more +EV to raise.

The fact that you are going to get a curiosity call when you take a bet check bet line makes it likely that you have implied odds when you hit a Q or J, since he is likely (which I don't think is good) going to lead a Kx OTR.

So doing some rough calculation, I though it was a pretty close spot to 2B or check back.

Excellent, excellent video.

For the QJ hand, you only calculated our foldequity and said it was +EV, but I don't understand why you didn't calculate our euity if we checked.
It's like saying openshoving AA is profitable. It is profitable, but probably more +EV to raise.

The fact that you are going to get a curiosity call when you take a bet check bet line makes it likely that you have implied odds when you hit a Q or J, since he is likely (which I don't think is good) going to lead a Kx OTR.

So doing some rough calculation, I though it was a pretty close spot to 2B or check back.

Its kind of a rough analogy given the situational differences. We can certainly run the calculations, but the problem with figuring out the EV of checking back is it involves a significant amount of assumptions that could sway the EV one way or the other. To name a few, we don't know if villain folds kx on the river and if so at what frequency (unlikely but possible). We certainly have the potential to get called by more pocket pairs, but again, at what frequency. Also, if we check are we bluffing some rivers? If so we have to figure out what ones and what frequency we expect villain to fold on those various rivers.

Additionally, we have 12.2% equity when called on the turn, but that doesn't mean that 12.2% of the time we can confidently value bet the river (in actuality our equity would be higher if we check, given that he can have more weaker hands that he folds if we bet the turn). Our Q and J outs likely will not be value bet by us. So we have 4 tens that we will value bet. One of those completes a flush draw, which may or may not change villains calling frequency. So lets say he calls on the Ts 50% of the time, so we really will be able to confidently value the river 7.6% of the time. Meaning that 92.4% of the time we will either check back, thin value bet (unadvisable vs an unknown), or bluff. I would also argue that our implied odds are the same, if not better, with a turn bet, given that villain calls the turn with a stronger range/range that is getting stubborn.

Given that we have a known +EV turn bet, plus when we get to the river our chance of improving is similar (although admittedly less than if we check the turn), our implied odds are very similar (if not better), and the amount of unknowns makes calculating the EV difficult, I think opting for a turn bet is better overall. However, this isn't to say that a bet-check-bet line is not good or +EV. It is a viable option and may be close, as you point out. I would assume that betting the turn is better though.

Regarding small PP's calling from the blinds. You discounted these from villain's range somewhat in a couple of spots Vs late position opens as it is unprofitable (no argument there) - however in my experience a large % of 25nl players will call as a default.

Regarding small PP's calling from the blinds. You discounted these from villain's range somewhat in a couple of spots Vs late position opens as it is unprofitable (no argument there) - however in my experience a large % of 25nl players will call as a default.

You could be right as I haven't played 25nl at a high frequency for a while. My gut tells me that all bad regs are not calling with them as a default, but I have no proof of that. I tried to account for the possibility by not eliminating them from the ranges when I did my calcs, whereas normally I would almost completely eliminate them. I do not think that adding them to the ranges would significantly change many of the calcs and thought processes though, as it typically would add only a few combos of hands that beat us, and given the way the hands were played post flop we would discount them significantly anyway in most cases.

You could be right as I haven't played 25nl at a high frequency for a while. My gut tells me that all bad regs are not calling with them as a default, but I have no proof of that. I tried to account for the possibility by not eliminating them from the ranges when I did my calcs, whereas normally I would almost completely eliminate them. I do not think that adding them to the ranges would significantly change many of the calcs and thought processes though, as it typically would add only a few combos of hands that beat us, and given the way the hands were played post flop we would discount them significantly anyway in most cases.

Yep - fair enough - it was just a comment re. that general assumption.

Looking forward to next one...

Yep - fair enough - it was just a comment re. that general assumption.

Looking forward to next one...

Thanks for the comments everyone. Should have some more vids coming very soon.

I think my post got misunderstood by some people.

would most likely use that line for hands that did not pick up any equity on the turn (and we should have plenty of those in our range) - and less often with QJ

The part people seemed to skip when reading. So in other words I would not take the alternative line with QJ - but bet!

I just wanted to bring it up because we see the turn card with a range of hands and not just QJ.

This was a really excellent video Linkwood. I can see why Jared raves about you being his best student. Look forward to seeing a lot more.

Time Link to 00:34:15

Do you think he would check a monster expected to check raise if we bet?

Time Link to 00:35:02

nevermind

Man this guys voice was way to nasally and put me on extreme tilt. I could not finish the video.

Time Link to 00:13:51

To me is a clear raise, anyone with the same opinion?

To me is a clear raise, anyone with the same opinion?

Given that villain can easily have some flushes, doesn't have that many sets, and might fold almost everything worse when we do raise since our range includes a lot of flushes (we'd barrel all turned flush draws) I would say that it is at best a very thin raise and at worse a clear call.

Time Link to 00:14:11

Easy shove on the river. Maybe he has Kx of spades some of the time, but he'll stack off with any 2 pair or better which makes it a nobrainer imo.

Easy shove on the river. Maybe he has Kx of spades some of the time, but he'll stack off with any 2 pair or better which makes it a nobrainer imo.

See my response above your post.

Great vid. I need to figure out how to layout my HEM HUD just like yours, with the stat name abbreviation displayed. Didn't know I could do that, and the stats you are showing are all I need. (Or is that just the way the replayer is displaying it?)

Great vid. I need to figure out how to layout my HEM HUD just like yours, with the stat name abbreviation displayed. Didn't know I could do that, and the stats you are showing are all I need. (Or is that just the way the replayer is displaying it?)

Thx.

My hud is very similar to JK3As hud, which he uploaded here: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=5QNZGSSB

So you can try that if you want.

Man this guys voice was way to nasally and put me on extreme tilt. I could not finish the video.

easily tilted?

Time Link to 00:05:02

When we analyse villain's range on the flop here, we obviously come to the conclusion that 95% of time or so, villain will not have a monster hand here. If we expect him to 3bet KK, and usually fold 22 and 44, and never call preflop with K2/K4/24, then for the most part the best hand villain can have here is KQ, and a lot of time it's mid PPs or broadway that didn't connect with the board. Given this info, do you think a good plan for the hand on the flop is to triple barrel, regardless of whether we pick up equity or not? If we conclude that villain never has a very strong range here, doesn't this mean that a large percentage of the time he isn't going to check-call 3 streets with his marginal strength hands, thus making a triple barrel extremely profitable with almost ATC in this spot? Not sure whether I'm giving 25NL regs too much credit for being able to fold TP type hands by the river.

Great video!
Scenario 1: The 55 hand when the K land on the river. What do we doing if the river is the 5 of diamond and he bets out?

Scenario 2. What do we do if the river is the 5 of diamond and he checks, we bet and he raise us?

Would be veru pleased for an answer!

Great video!
Scenario 1: The 55 hand when the K land on the river. What do we doing if the river is the 5 of diamond and he bets out?

Scenario 2. What do we do if the river is the 5 of diamond and he checks, we bet and he raise us?

Would be veru pleased for an answer!

Scenario 1 probably just call. It feels gross but I doubt we can get much value from worse. If we had a read that he's bad we can raise/fold.

Scenario 2 probably fold most of the time. Guy's don't c/r with worse very often, if at all.

When we analyse villain's range on the flop here, we obviously come to the conclusion that 95% of time or so, villain will not have a monster hand here. If we expect him to 3bet KK, and usually fold 22 and 44, and never call preflop with K2/K4/24, then for the most part the best hand villain can have here is KQ, and a lot of time it's mid PPs or broadway that didn't connect with the board. Given this info, do you think a good plan for the hand on the flop is to triple barrel, regardless of whether we pick up equity or not? If we conclude that villain never has a very strong range here, doesn't this mean that a large percentage of the time he isn't going to check-call 3 streets with his marginal strength hands, thus making a triple barrel extremely profitable with almost ATC in this spot? Not sure whether I'm giving 25NL regs too much credit for being able to fold TP type hands by the river.

Would be interested in your opinion on this linkwood, tyvm.

Would be interested in your opinion on this linkwood, tyvm.

3barreling sometimes def would be good as long as we know they can fold. But its likely that there's enough PPs that he would fold to make it profitable.

Time Link to 00:23:03

This hand made me money!!

Grabbed by Holdem Manager
NL Holdem $0.20(BB) IPoker
SB ($22.54)
BB ($19.80)
Hero ($21.10)
UTG+1 ($13.07)
CO ($20.30)
BTN ($21.24)

Dealt to Hero J J

Hero raises to $0.70, UTG+1 calls $0.70, fold, fold, fold, BB calls $0.50

FLOP ($2.20) 9 6 6

BB checks, Hero bets $1.80, UTG+1 folds, BB raises to $3.80, Hero calls $2

TURN ($9.80) 9 6 6 3

BB checks, Hero bets $3.80, BB calls $3.80

RIVER ($17.40) 9 6 6 3 T

BB bets $11.50 (AI), Hero calls $11.50

Hero shows J J
(Pre 56%, Flop 76.0%, Turn 86.4%)

BB shows Q K
(Pre 44%, Flop 24.0%, Turn 13.6%)

Hero wins $38.38

This hand made me money!!

Grabbed by Holdem Manager
NL Holdem $0.20(BB) IPoker
SB ($22.54)
BB ($19.80)
Hero ($21.10)
UTG+1 ($13.07)
CO ($20.30)
BTN ($21.24)

Dealt to Hero J J

Hero raises to $0.70, UTG+1 calls $0.70, fold, fold, fold, BB calls $0.50

FLOP ($2.20) 9 6 6

BB checks, Hero bets $1.80, UTG+1 folds, BB raises to $3.80, Hero calls $2

TURN ($9.80) 9 6 6 3

BB checks, Hero bets $3.80, BB calls $3.80

RIVER ($17.40) 9 6 6 3 T

BB bets $11.50 (AI), Hero calls $11.50

Hero shows J J
(Pre 56%, Flop 76.0%, Turn 86.4%)

BB shows Q K
(Pre 44%, Flop 24.0%, Turn 13.6%)

Hero wins $38.38

NICE!

I think Linkwood did such a good job with this video explaining range defining, range narrowing, and how to just take a moment to interpret what you opponents actions mean that I had to post a response. (This is the 1st video I've ever posted a response for). IMO he did that good.

At 43:00: The As9h:

Why would a set raise a 3-flush-turn?

If I had a set there, I would expect to get called by made flushes, and fold air and non-flush hands. At that point I'd use my set as a bluff catcher by calling the turn, and maybe the river.

(Obviously, with the actual river, I'd bet/shove.)


I ask, not because I think I'm right, but because your comment indicates a flaw in my thinking and I hope to understand why I'm wrong.

At 43:00: The As9h:

Why would a set raise a 3-flush-turn?

If I had a set there, I would expect to get called by made flushes, and fold air and non-flush hands. At that point I'd use my set as a bluff catcher by calling the turn, and maybe the river.

(Obviously, with the actual river, I'd bet/shove.)


I ask, not because I think I'm right, but because your comment indicates a flaw in my thinking and I hope to understand why I'm wrong.

I think what I meant to say is that he would have bet the flop with most sets, so we can discount them very much because of that, plus he will raise sets some decent % of the time on the turn, to protect his hand means that a set is very, very unlikely.

One thing I would say about your thinking in general, is if we have a set and villain checked the flop as the pfr then we can expect him to have a flush draw on the flop rarely, meaning that our hand is the best hand the overwhelming majority of the time. Plus, if you think about the hand range that raises pf and then checks the that flop it has lots of showdown type hands. So he doesn't have a ton of air in his range most of the time, making bluff catching less good against your average reg. Raising allows you to get value from the part of his range that is now a combo draw (pair + draw) or big flush draw (Asx or Ksx), both might call a raise. It also gives us the betting lead so we don't have to make tough decisions on certain rivers (e.g. we can check back spade rivers if we want).