Poker Video: Limit Hold'Em by PygmyHero (Mid Stakes)

Time Link to 00:07:23

I think you really can't discount JJ here. Because of the presence of flush and straight draws, I'd expect button to bet a set of jacks, but I never ceased to be impressed by the goofy slowplays live players think up.

Given your read and analysis, I think the turn should be a fold. It's a case of if the somewhat optimistic assumptions you (Pygmy) made are right, the call is about breakeven, maybe slightly +EV. But if you've underweighted JJ or overweighted AQ in his range, then the call is a significantly losing play. I really like the hand range analysis you both used in this hand.

Time Link to 00:17:01

Really good analysis and play in the hand. I agree that JT is the kind of hand I think she had. Would you have folded to a raise on the 3 river?

I think you really can't discount JJ here. Because of the presence of flush and straight draws, I'd expect button to bet a set of jacks, but I never ceased to be impressed by the goofy slowplays live players think up.

Given your read and analysis, I think the turn should be a fold. It's a case of if the somewhat optimistic assumptions you (Pygmy) made are right, the call is about breakeven, maybe slightly +EV. But if you've underweighted JJ or overweighted AQ in his range, then the call is a significantly losing play. I really like the hand range analysis you both used in this hand.

Yeah, I think you're making a good point about the prevalence of lol-slowplays in live play. When I reflect I don't think this BTN could have JJ here - I think he would have been more likely to cold call it PF, but your point is well taken.

No matter what this just seems like a fold to me. You make a great point about calling kind of being an inverse freeroll here. I mean, even if BTN tables AK and UTG+1 shows a hand like 88 (so he doesn't kill any of my outs by holding them or something like T8 or a FD) I should still fold. Even with implied odds (if any) I'm not getting the right price, so I'm just unnecessarily increasing my variance by calling (at best).

Really good analysis and play in the hand. I agree that JT is the kind of hand I think she had. Would you have folded to a raise on the 3 river?

No. Ultimately the fact that she was new to me and her hand not really making any sense are just overwhelming factors to me here.

Also, I don't think a BDFD is a huge part of her range so I pretty much would have been color blind on the river. I mean, the J is on the board so we're just not adding in a ton of hands. QT, KT, and some SC's I guess - it feels like too few hand combos for me to change my play. Maybe she can have A Q too but that that's weighted down slightly in my mind as she might 3b it PF (also KT is weighted down a tad as she may put in a raise on the flop or turn).

I think you are right people do play more straight forward in live play.

When I reflect I don't think this BTN could have JJ here - I think he would have been more likely to cold call it PF, but your point is well taken.

Hmmm, if he can't have JJ, I don't think he can have AQ either.

Oh and I agree with your 3 analysis, albeit it's easy to agree with given the results. I agree that there aren't many BDFDs in her range, but at least she would be plausibly representing something.

I guess the question becomes when you are getting 10-to-1 or more in a big live pot and you only have a bluff catcher, how many combos of hands that make sense for villain to have does it take for you to give credit and fold. I'm not sure the answer, but I agree with your first AQ fold and your AK call, and you seem to have at least a good intuitive sense for the answer to this question.

Time Link to 00:23:55

"And the turn's a six."

Walk around to the other side of the table and have another look at that turn card.

"And the turn's a six."

Walk around to the other side of the table and have another look at that turn card.

He's just excited about his pair and the fact he's not going to fold it

I guess the question becomes when you are getting 10-to-1 or more in a big live pot and you only have a bluff catcher, how many combos of hands that make sense for villain to have does it take for you to give credit and fold. I'm not sure the answer, but I agree with your first AQ fold and your AK call, and you seem to have at least a good intuitive sense for the answer to this question.

I sense that you might be asking semi-rhetorically, but I'll take a stab anyway.

Here's how I think about this sort of situation: what you're talking about in terms of bluffing combos is an important consideration. But one other significant component I'm considering is the villain's monster range. What I mean is, how often can they have (in this hand) stuff like AT, KK/QQ/JJ, two pair, T9, etc. and wait for the river to raise.

In my experience against most live players the answer to the second part is a devastating, 'often.' Many players are just plain bad, think slowplaying is brilliant, or are waiting to see if a safe river comes. Putting that together with few bluffing combos that pretty much adds up to a fold.

BUT, against a player who is decent or at least trying to play better I heavily discount the monster range as they should have put action in on the turn. I mean, I think that's why we're saying villain can't really credibly rep anything here.

In other words I'm basically thinking about a ratio like:

bluffing combos : monster combos

So I'm going to decline to give a number of bluffing combos, partly because that's almost impossible and partly because I assume you were just asking as a thinking exercise.

The bottom line is that if the second number in the ratio (monster combos) seems very small to me (as I think it is in this spot), then I really only need villain to have a few bluffing combos in order to call profitably.

Time Link to 00:15:58

another thing that I think bears mentioning here is live player tendencies/ranges. Seat 10 is the typical "Nitty Old Man", his hand ranges are incredibly transparent, as is his play. When he does something slowplay-like we can still assign him a very narrow range of hands and play accordingly. The standard "10BB+ pot, gotta call. Fur coat etc etc" formula doesn't apply as much because we have a tighter read on our opponent. When Seat 5 coldcalls, smoothcalls flop and turn, then raises river, her hand range is wider because she's a fairly unknown player and she hasn't done anything postflop to define her range. Because the hand range is so wide by the river we HAVE to bet and call the large pot because the gray areas are so large that we have the equity by default.

The standard "10BB+ pot, gotta call. Fur coat etc etc" formula doesn't apply as much because we have a tighter read on our opponent. When Seat 5 coldcalls, smoothcalls flop and turn, then raises river, her hand range is wider because she's a fairly unknown player and she hasn't done anything postflop to define her range. Because the hand range is so wide by the river we HAVE to bet and call the large pot because the gray areas are so large that we have the equity by default.

Basically what it came down to is I don't like shrimp, so I called.

Time Link to 00:05:01

I think you can c/f here pretty safely as gross as it seems. I think I paused it right as you were about to say "I can't c/f" but I think you can. He's just NEVER betting worse and he never has a chop. You also probably aren't getting two streets of value against TT. I'd severely discount KK, QQ as well. If the turn goes chk chk you have an easy bet on the river.

I think you can c/f here pretty safely as gross as it seems. I think I paused it right as you were about to say "I can't c/f" but I think you can. He's just NEVER betting worse and he never has a chop. You also probably aren't getting two streets of value against TT. I'd severely discount KK, QQ as well. If the turn goes chk chk you have an easy bet on the river.

Okay first off it's more disgusting than it is gross.

I agree that most of my assessment of his range does NOT change after he checks the flop / after he either bets or raises the turn, which would mean a x/f is fine. As you say the only possible hands I could disagree about are KK/QQ. This was pretty early so I can't say with 100% certitude that he'd never check back KK/QQ on the flop, but I agree it's highly unlikely.

Okay first off it's more disgusting than it is gross.

I agree that most of my assessment of his range does NOT change after he checks the flop / after he either bets or raises the turn, which would mean a x/f is fine. As you say the only possible hands I could disagree about are KK/QQ. This was pretty early so I can't say with 100% certitude that he'd never check back KK/QQ on the flop, but I agree it's highly unlikely.

It's not that he CAN'T have them. It's just that first he'd have to have them then he'd have to bet the turn, both of which I think are at least reasonably unlikely. I'd discount those to about 1 combo between the two of them.

Time Link to 00:12:26

I think this hand and the previous hand show nicely the distinctions between a good solid fold on the river and a good call. The size of the pot, the unknowness of the villian, and the strength of your hand and the WTF action makes hand two a pretty easy call.

I also think from a metagame and psychological aspect the call is important. Anybody who is paying attention will know you have folded probable strong hands in both situations. This will increase the chances that players will make more plays against you. Obviously, not everyone is paying attention or will have the ability or guts to take a shot at you but it is a factor. Interestingly, by calling here, it creates a situation where people may now wonder if you really did fold a strong hand in hand 1.

Folding here may leave you wondering if you made the right play and may put you back on your heels a little bit for the rest of the session.

BTW: I think you making the turn call in hand 1 is not as bad as if a player with less ability did since they probably won't have the ability to let this go on the river.

It's not that he CAN'T have them. It's just that first he'd have to have them then he'd have to bet the turn, both of which I think are at least reasonably unlikely. I'd discount those to about 1 combo between the two of them.

Oh don't get me wrong - I agree with you and I understand what elements go into the parlay / how thin it is.

Hey motienko,

Good summary and compare/contrast of the two hands. I agree with what you're saying about meta factors, though generally I doubt my opponents are going to notice or think about anything (except for Boomer and, well, I already flashed him my cards in the first hand). I actually think concluding I had a FD in hand 1 is reasonable.

Can we expect more hand replaying like in this episode or will future episodes be more powerpointish like ep. 1?

Can we expect more hand replaying like in this episode or will future episodes be more powerpointish like ep. 1?

Right now the plan necessarily includes 1 more PowerPoint, but it will have more hands than episode 1. Everything else will pretty much be HH examples - at most I'll add some PPT slides to summarize a few key points.

I may do one other episode using PPT, but I'm not sure. But if I do go the PPT route I'm really confident you guys will be happy as I have some interesting topics in mind. It will NOT be beginner content (like ep. 1) and would include some stuff I don't think I've seen anywhere else.

Thanks Pygmy for this great series. Live play is clearly an undercovered topic on this site. I am especially greatful since I am transisioning back to live.

With players making it 9 bets with the fourth nut: b/3betting a onecard straight not to the nuts and 3 flush cards present against a super tight player(me...relatively speaking): Over calling with fourth pair on a 4 club board etc etc. makes me wonder why I stopped making the 30 minute drive to the casino and started playing online.....O Yeah! the recession and having to bail out friends and family members= no cash.

Seriously though, if you are close to a Casino that spreads a lot of games isn't it more profitable to play live?

Thanks Pygmy for this great series. Live play is clearly an undercovered topic on this site. I am especially greatful since I am transisioning back to live.

Out of curiosity, whereabouts are you? PM if you'd like.

As for your question about profitability...I mean, that depends almost entirely on the player. A huge factor (this is going to sound stupid) is that live you're constrained to one table. That's not a huge deal for someone like me who usually only plays 2-3 anyway, but obviously massively multi-tabling is a key part of many players profitability. In any event, there's no way around the pace - you get maybe ~1/3rd the hands per hour you'd get at a single online table.

Generally speaking I'd assume most players who are profitable in both environments do better online.

Oooh are you thinking about covering angle shooting?

Out of curiosity, whereabouts are you? PM if you'd like.

As for your question about profitability...I mean, that depends almost entirely on the player. A huge factor (this is going to sound stupid) is that live you're constrained to one table. That's not a huge deal for someone like me who usually only plays 2-3 anyway, but obviously massively multi-tabling is a key part of many players profitability. In any event, there's no way around the pace - you get maybe ~1/3rd the hands per hour you'd get at a single online table.

Generally speaking I'd assume most players who are profitable in both environments do better online.

I play at Casino Arizona.

I have played three times this year and the games are way way way softer than online. I can also play higher limits live like 8/16 and 20/40 and not be playing against worldbeaters.

I'll continue to play both for now.

Time Link to 00:57:27

How do you "assign" a probability? This has been one of my most difficult subjects to deal with. Another type of estimation aside from this video comes from Small Stakes Hold'em by: Miller, Sklansky, and Malmuth, Page 24, Part One: Gambling Concepts.

"Say you have five opponents, and you estimate that, on average, your ace-king will win the hand about one out of four times."

It isn't written HOW they came up with this estimation, it just goes on with their example. I can't begin to tell you how frustrating it is to encounter examples like this. I understand that with experienced players it may be easy to forget that beginning players don't know all of the "how-to's".

I've asked this same question in other forums, and I get replies with Poker Stove. I don't want to depend on a poker software to do the work for me. I want to have the knowledge to tap into and apply to my live game. So, my question here is...

How do you just estimate that your ace-king will win one out of four times against FIVE DIFFERENT OPPONENTS!? These five players could and probably will (assuming on my part) have different hand ranges, and somehow is ESTIMATED that ace-king will just somehow out of thin air win one out of four times.

Now, I know that it's probably not and estimate out of thin air. I know that there is probably some logic behind it. I just need to know how you come up with these estimations. Maybe it's not an appropriate topic here, but if not, give me the knowledge that these pro's use to make these estimations.

Thank you very much.