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AK-AT bet big sometimes to get value from weaker Ax. We see big bet bluffs from hands like QJ ♠ and K4 ♠ because there are no obvious draws out there, but these hands can make runner-runner straights or flushes. This is how the BTN responds when all the criteria are exactly the same, but we are at that final table with ICM pressure influencing the action: At first glance, nothing has changed, this is once again a range bet making the most of a significant range advantage in favor of the BTN. But on closer inspection, something significant has happened, the BTN no longer mixes their actions. They almost exclusively choose the smallest bet size . This is the ‘ Downward Drift ’ effect alluded to at the start of this article. Let’s compare the frequencies strategies side-by-side to visualize this effect: Downward Drift refers to how solver actions seem to drift downwards towards more passive lines when ICM is a factor. Big bets become small bets, small bets become calls, close calls become folds, etc. A lot of players observe that bet sizes go down in these spots and assume that it is because you are trying to make your opponent fold as cheaply as possible. The opposite is true, solvers are always trying to build a pot when they’re ahead, even when ICM is a factor. Betting bigger would mean the opponent folds too often. They also bet small as a defence against check/raising, the solver does not want to bet bigger, get check/raised by a larger amount and face a horrible decision for, potentially, their tournament life. Solvers are always trying to build pots when ahead, even when under ICM pressure, but they manage the pot by taking lower variance lines. Response to flop bet comparison Let’s move one step further and see how the Big Blind responds to the most common bet sizing of 25% pot in both instances. First, let’s examine the ChipEV example: We see BB calls 42% of the time with pretty much anything in the range that has flopped some sort of equity, and folding 48% of the time with the complete misses. The check-raises happen just over 10% of the time with strong top pair and sets for value. The XR bluffs are hands like 52 ♠ with a gutshot and backdoor flush draw. Now let’s compare that to the ICM example: At first glance, they look very similar, but on closer inspection there is less folding and more calling. This might confuse many of you who would assume there is more folding in the ICM range. The Big Blind covers the BTN, so they can afford to call more and will be able to exert more ICM pressure on later streets. The other notable difference is that this example has more check-raising. Over 12% compared to 10% of the time. This is a small difference in terms of the way the whole range is played, but a 20% increase in the amount of hands that can check/raise. There are slightly more

bluffs in the check-raise range too. Fewer top pair hands value raise and in their place, hands like 44 get turned into bluffs which can also runner-runner a straight. The covering player gets to be more aggressive post flop when ICM is significant. The more they cover their opponent, the more aggressive they can be. This is another trend you will see time and time again when studying postflop ICM. The covering player gets to be more aggressive . In this example, the Big Blind is at a significant positional and range disadvantage, but they still check-raise 20% more than in the ChipEV example because the BTN has to fold more often due to ICM pressure. If you ran this sim with more extreme ICM pressure – for example, flatter payouts or a bigger chip lead for the BB – you would see the BB play even more aggressively. What happens on a ‘blank’ turn? Let’s assume the BB calls the small bet and the turn is a 2 ♥ . This is a card which is better for the BB who has more 2x and both 45 ♠ and 45o, but it is still mostly a blank turn. 2x is a small proportion of the BB range and the BTN does have 45 ♠ and A2 ♠ in their range too. This is BB’s turn strategy in the ChipEV example: As suggested, this turn doesn’t change much most of the time. BB now has range advantage of 57% because they folded all their junk on the flop, but the BTN still has lots of strong hands as well as position, so as such the BB checks 100% of the time. Let’s now look at what happens in the exact same situation, but when ICM is a factor: The difference in this example is staggering. All the parameters are otherwise the same, but the impact of ICM means that the BB can lead out more than 25% of the time on the turn compared to never in the ChipEV example. When you study ICM spots postflop you will often see the BB ‘donk leading’ out on every street despite having the weaker range, because the in-position player has to play much more passively. The covering player gets to be more aggressive when ICM is a factor, in every conceivable way. Lastly, let’s examine a turn report to see how BTNs strategy changes across all turn cards when ICM is a factor. The following graph shows BTN’s aggregate turn chipEV and ICM strategy in this line : Again, the downward drift is apparent. Many of BTNs overbets have become half-pot bets as the solver opts for lower-variance lines. Conclusion This is just a single example, but I think it highlights some of the key differences between postflop ICM pots and ChipEV pots. Most notably, you should always be acutely aware of who covers whom. Most of us do this instinctively in tournaments, but few people would know the postflop strategy adjustments a solver would make as the covered/covering player in these spots. Key

Takeaways There is generally less 3-betting in ICM scenarios, pre and postflop The degree to which you cover a player dictates how aggressive you can be Solvers choose small bet sizes to extract value when the opponent would otherwise fold often to medium-sized bets Solvers also choose small bet sizes to lower variance The covering player can be more aggressive regardless of position or range advantage GTO Wizard the #1 App for Poker players Study any spot imaginable Practice by playing vs. GTO Analyze your hands with 1-click START CRUSHING NOW JOIN DISCORD Author Barry Carter Barry Carter has been a poker writer for 16 years. He is the co-author of six poker books, including The Mental Game of Poker , Endgame Poker Strategy: The ICM Book , and GTO Poker Simplified . Latest article Preflop Raise Sizing: Examining 2 Key Factors It amazes me that, after nearly twenty years of playing no-limit hold ‘em professionally, I… How to Handle Loose-Passive Limpers Solver charts and presolved solutions do not offer much in the way of explicit guidance… Top 5 Mistakes in Spin & Gos As a Spin and Go poker coach, I regularly encounter common mistakes that players make,… An Introduction to Spin & Gos I was playing Tournaments for the first decade of my career. But after my first… Relationships and Poker In my more than 15 years of poker coaching, I’ve helped hundreds of clients improve… Do Multiple Sizes Matter? Should I work out the other tools or just stick to the crowbar? Solver results… The Science of Learning Applied to GTO Wizard The way we were taught to study in schools was flawed and has negatively impacted… Check-Raising a Single Pair In this article, I will address a question raised by Twitter/X user ’Matt Riley’, who… The Turn Probe Bet Imagine yourself defending as the BB caller vs BTN preflop raiser in a 100bb cash… When To Encourage Multiway Pots in PKOs I was recently shown this fascinating PKO hand from the GTO Wizard PKO library. Somebody… Protect Equity and Prosper When we think about the best hands to bet in a given situation, we tend… Do Solvers Have Targets? Targeting has long been a staple of exploitative poker thinking. When you’re value betting against… Disciplining Big Blind in Limped Pots When the BTN open-limps off a short stack, the postflop play against the BB should… I’d Rather Be Drawing Which is the better hand on a K♥8♦5♦ flop: K♠T♣ or 7♥6♥? OK, I’ll admit… The Curious Case of Open-Limping Buttons Before the advent of solvers, open-limping was considered the province of passive, gambley recreational players… Cleaning Out Sticky IP Callers A “sticky” player on your left, one who calls your preflop raises too often and… Defending Against Tiny 3-Bets Tournament poker is about precision. Cash games, where stacks typically run into the hundreds of… Heads up! Exploiting SB’s Preflop Mistakes Heads up (HU) tournament play presents unique challenges to the average player. Many tournament players,… C-Betting As the OOP Preflop Raiser Position is an extremely valuable advantage in

poker. Most players would describe the comfort zone… Overchoice: Making Sense of Multiple Sizings Solver solutions with multiple bet sizes often involve a lot of mixing between those sizes,… River Refinements: When Your Opponent Won’t Check-Raise One of the biggest strategic differences between playing in versus out of position involves betting… Turn Barreling in 3-Bet Pots There are two articles on the GTO Wizard blog that make good prerequisites to this… The Right Way To Think About Protection Suppose Paul the Protector is in a 200bb cash game and opens A♠A♣ in the… The Importance of Board Coverage The first public version of the GTO Wizard announced AI upgrade already has some useful… How To Adjust When Villain Has No Bluffs “They always have it!” is a common, semi-joking expression in poker to describe the tendency… Adjusting on Later Streets After Exploiting Flop The key to exploiting opponents profitably is knowing when to stop. I’m not referring to… C-Betting IP vs Passive Poker Players A preflop raiser enjoys a significant range advantage over a BB caller, enabling them to… C-Betting Against ICM Preflop Ranges You raise from early position (EP) in a multi-table tournament and the BB calls. Both… The Art of Bluff Catching Bluff catching—calling a bet with a modest hand which you expect to win only if… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by IP On some flops, it is simply not possible for the preflop raiser to continuation bet… Is Limping Pimping? In a past Discord post, one of our members noted that an upside of implementing… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by OOP A preflop raiser who continuation bets too often is always a potential target for exploitation,… Preflop Button Mastery in PKOs Playing from the Button presents many unique opportunities in any tournament format, especially in PKOs.… The Worst Turn Card Greetings from GTO land. In today’s article, we will use the Turn Reports feature to… Navigating Range Disadvantage as the 3-Bettor Picture this: We’re playing a NL500 6-max cash game, and we’ve won a few pots,… Mastering Three-Bet Pots In Position in MTTs Playing in position against a three-better is a lesson in playing to your advantages. As… Mastering Three-Bet Pots Out of Position in MTTs Three-bet pots are scary. Playing out of position is scary. Put them together, and you’ve… The Greatest Final Table in Triton History Today, we’ll examine one of the most epic final table battles I’ve ever witnessed! Our… Mastering Thin Value Bets in Checked-Down Pots Valuing your hand appropriately—determining whether it’s strong enough to value bet or so weak you… Maximizing Value on Monotone Flops Monotone flops tend to provoke great anxiety among poker players. It’s easy to imagine that… How to Defend Against Turn Donk Bets Responding effectively to donk bets on the turn is tricky;, there’s no getting around that.… How and Why You Should Use Turn Donk Bets Donk betting–taking the betting lead away from the previous street’s aggressor–on the flop is rarely… How Stack Sizes Change Your Range In this series, we have looked at factors that can influence ranges in otherwise

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be a devastating weapon… Using New Skills at the Poker Table How many times has it happened to you that you make a mistake only to… Flatting Ace-X Hands Shortstacked Playing out of position is tricky, but it’s an essential part of tournament play. With… Playing Limped Pots as the BB in MTTs Success as the BB in limped pots begins before the flop. The BB’s equilibrium strategy… The Absurd Game Theory of Chopped Boards A “chopped board” in poker is one where the community cards make up the best… Playing Limped Pots as the SB in MTTs MTT confrontations between the small blind and big blind force no-limit players into uncomfortable situations,… The Art of Learning Poker In his book The Art of Learning, chess and Push Hands champion Josh Waitzkin describes… Is Donk Betting for Donkeys? “Donk betting”, or betting from out of position into the player who was the aggressor… Delayed C-Betting This is a companion piece to Probe Betting. It stands on its own, but understanding… Probe Betting As far as rules of thumb go in poker, “check to the raiser” is a… ICM and Blind Battles: The Big Blind This is a companion piece to this article on the SB’s strategy for blind vs… ICM and Blind Battles: The Small Blind ICM incentivizes more conservative play, which means that at stages of the tournament where risk… The Initial Bettor’s Advantage The mathematics of poker holds a little-known secret: the first bettor enjoys better bluffing odds… Mastering the Chiplead: The Scalpel and the Sledgehammer When you have a lot of chips at a final table or in another situation… Flop Heuristics: IP C-Betting in Cash Games Our never-ending quest for money and fame leads us to the flop. We open the… How ICM Impacts Restealing From The Blinds When I first started working with preflop solves, one of the features I found most… The ICM Benefits of Late Registration in Poker Tournaments Why do so many professional poker players register late for tournaments when they clearly would… Flop Heuristics: OOP C-Betting in MTTs Playing against an in-position cold-caller is dramatically different–and dramatically more difficult–than playing against a caller… Counterintuitive Calls Solver outputs such as those provided by GTO Wizard are models of no-limit hold ‘em,… How To Negotiate Final Table Deals Most people’s first introduction to the Independent Chip Model (ICM) is not from studying bubble… How does ICM impact PKO strategy? If you have read The Theory of Progressive Knockout Tournaments you already know why we… Understanding Blockers in Poker Often when looking through a solver’s meticulously crafted grid of deception, one of the following… Flop Heuristics: IP Cold-Caller in MTTs A Cold-call refers to the act of calling a preflop raise when you don’t close… Flop Heuristics: IP C-Betting in MTTs In the world of poker, the flop is a crucial stage of the game that… Flop Heuristics for Defending the Blinds in MTTs The field of Game Theoretically Optimal poker is extensive, and thus, to simplify our strategy,… Multiway strategy in Progressive Knockout Tournaments Progressive

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Understanding The Impact Of Field Size On ICM In Poker When people talk about game selection in multi-table tournaments (MTTs), they invariably talk about the number of recreational players there are, and/or the prize pool that is being guaranteed. What doesn’t get as much attention is the field size itself. The number of runners in the tournament is actually the most important metric to consider where game selection is concerned. Field size also plays a significant role in guiding endgame ICM strategy decisions. Before we go further, let’s define what a large field is in MTTs. It’s a relative metric. 500 runners would be quite small in a World Series of Poker bracelet event or online in a $11 MTT at GGPoker, 100 runners is a lot in a Super High Roller or a local casino tournament. For the purposes of this article, let’s say that a small field is 150 players or less, a large field is 500 or more players, and a medium field is everything in between. If you tell me your average field size, I could tell you a few things about your poker career . Let’s explore the reasons to play small fields or large field MTTs. Reasons To Play Small Fields If you play in small fields, you will invariably get more practice in tough ICM spots. If you specialize in 100-runner fields, you will get to the bubble, final table bubble, final table, and heads-up much more often. You will develop muscle memory for these spots much faster, so when a tough spot comes up you know what to do. If, however, you play 1,000+ runner MTTs then it will take longer to reach these crucial spots, and you might be rusty when you get there. You can, of course, practice endgame spots as much as you want using GTO Wizard’s ICM database of sims. However, there is no substitute for experience in these high-equity situations. Smaller field MTTs have much less variance in them, which you can easily identify using a tournament variance calculator . Let’s compare a player in $50 MTTs with an ROI of 10% in a 100-runner MTT that pays 15 players, to the same situation in a 1,000-runner MTT that pays 150 players. This is the 100-runner example, showing 20 sample runs of a simulation: Return after playing one thousand 100-runner MTTs, 20 random samples This is the 1,000-runner example: Return after playing one thousand 1000-runner MTTs, 20 random samples The highs are higher but the lows are lower, and more frequent, in the large field simulation. We win more often in the small field simulation. There is a probability of loss of 40% after 1,000 tournaments in the large field simulation and the required bankroll is $23,069. There is only a probability of loss of 18% in the small field simulation and the required bankroll is just $8,742. If you zoom in on the ‘Best Run’ in both examples, look at the shape of the graph to get a sense of the variance involved: In the 100-runner field, the

graph is a slow steady increase, with lots of small peaks and troughs. In the 1,000-runner field, we get a handful of sharp, steep, upswings. Crucially, there are long periods of loss with essentially no big scores . And remember, this is the best case scenario out of 20 samples This is not a perfect comparison because as you are about to see, ROIs should be higher in larger field MTTs. If you find this interesting, check out Tombos21’s video on bankroll management . The low variance and ICM practice both contribute to perhaps the best reason to specialize in small fields – mental game. It is much easier to handle the swings of poker in small-field tournaments. Bubbling a final table is much easier to handle when you make them often, but bubbling a final table when you haven’t even come close in months is a tough ask. Players who specialize in large runner fields can be doing everything right and still have losing years, they also tend to require more staking and are in makeup more often. Lots of good players have gone needlessly broke, or at least gone through periods that have made them question their own game because they prioritized large field MTTs without realizing how significant the variance is. This is also why most large field MTTs end in a final table deal of some sort, to reduce variance. This is not an issue for players who specialize in small fields. Despite the fact they are playing against the best players in the world, the reduced variance in small-field Super High Roller events is probably very appealing to the players who frequent them, compared to playing tough $5k-$20k events with 600+ runners. Reasons To Play Big Fields The main reason to play in large fields is they have bigger prize pools. A single result could define your year, double your bankroll or even allow you to turn professional overnight. Winning an $11 MTT with 200 runners is nice, but winning the $11 Sunday Storm Anniversary on PokerStars could pay your bills for a year and/or allow you to move up several stakes at once. Good players enjoy a larger edge, the bigger the field is . I believe it is GTO Wizard writer Andrew Brokos who first said this when he remarked (and I paraphrase) “a 1,000-runner field must be soft because there aren’t 1,000 good players”. The bigger the field, the bigger your win rate should be. Some very good players comfortably assess their ROI in a large field event like the World Series of Poker Main Event at 200+%. Compare that to something like Single Table Tournaments and the best players in the world tend to have less than a 10% edge (not a perfect comparison at all because the WSOP Main Event has a deep slow structure and SNGs tend to be fast). I pulled a SharkScope Leaderboard winner at random who played a similar number of 6-18 man SNGs as he played 27-90 man SNGs. Here are his stats in 6-18 man SNGs:

Here they are in 27-man SNGs to 90-man SNGs: Notice his ROI in the smaller fields is 6.9% and 9.4% in the larger fields. His ITM is a little higher too in the smaller fields. His sample for regular MTTs, with 802 average entrants, is not as large but as you can see his ROI is much greater, it’s 20.6%: This is an imperfect comparison for lots of reasons, but this is a solid winning player with a large sample of games in each type of field size. The ROI is greater the bigger the field becomes, but notice the green graph under the profit history – it’s much steadier in the smaller fields. Finally, one of the reasons that the ROI is greater in the larger fields is that experience is much more valuable. Knowing how to play a tough final table bubble in a 1,000-runner MTT, and crucially not crumbling under the pressure, reaps dividends. Weak players in large fields don’t know how to navigate these tough spots – you only have to see how nitty amateur players become on the WSOP Main Event bubble to demonstrate this. Bubble Factors & Risk Premiums We have made the claim that large fields have a greater ROI and smaller fields have lower variance and mental game benefits. What are the big strategic differences from an ICM perspective? The general adjustment is that the smaller the field, the tighter you should play. Locking up payouts and laddering is more important, and bubbling is a disaster, when the overall field sizes are small. ‘Playing for the win’ or at least to make the final table, by accumulating chips, is more of a priority when the fields are large. You should play looser in large-field MTTs. We have made the claim that large fields have a greater ROI and smaller fields have lower variance and mental game benefits. What are the big strategic differences from an ICM perspective? The general adjustment is that the smaller the field, the tighter you should play. Locking up payouts and laddering is more important, and bubbling is a disaster, when the overall field sizes are small. ‘Playing for the win’ or at least to make the final table, by accumulating chips, is more of a priority when the fields are large. You should play looser in large-field MTTs. We can use a simple Toy Game to demonstrate this. In every example that follows we have a six-max table in a tournament where everybody has an average stack of 40BBs and 25% of the field remains. We are going to look at the Bubble Factors at this table assuming different field sizes. The reason we keep all the details identical is so that any difference in Bubble Factors must be due to the change in field size. First of all, here they are for a 45-Man SNG on PokerStars. 11 players remain, which is 25% of the field: The average Bubble Factor is 1.56 and the average Risk Premium is 10.9%. That means each player roughly would need 61% equity

to get all-in against another player. In the next example all the details are the same, the average stack is 40BBs, but this time it is a PokerStars 90-Man SNG. 22 players remain, which again is 25% of the field. Here are the Bubble Factors: All the details are the same except the field has doubled in size, and the Bubble Factor has reduced to 1.38. The players now need 58% equity to call an all-in. Let’s look at an identical spot, but this time it is a PokerStars 180-Man SNG, with 45 players remaining, which is 25% of the field again: Now the average Bubble Factor has come down to 1.22, meaning our players need just 55% equity to call an all-in against each other. Just for fun, I then ran this for a 1,666-runner field with 416 players remaining, which, again, is 25% of the field: As you can see, the Bubble Factors are the same as in the last example and the Risk Premium is only slightly greater, which shows that there is a floor for how low the Bubble Factor will go in spots like this. What this means in practical terms is that you should play looser the larger the field is. The more runners there are in a tournament, the further away the big payouts at the final table are, so you should take more risks to get there. This should make intuitive sense because the overall prize pool is much greater as well as the field size. In small fields, prioritizing making the money positions is more important. The mincash is a bigger proportion of the overall prize pool, so it is more valuable. In the 45-Man example, the mincash was 3.5% of the prize pool, in the 90-Man example the mincash was 2.26% of the overall prize pool, in the 180-man the mincash was 0.65% of the prize pool, and in the 1,666-runner field the mincash was a mere 0.2% of the prize pool. Plus when you do make the money in a small field MTT with a short stack, you are much nearer to the big final table payouts. You don’t require anywhere near the same number of double-ups to win the whole thing as you would if you did the same thing in a large field MTT. Conclusion The differences between small fields and large fields in MTTs are substantial, in fact, field size may be the most important factor in game selection. Small fields are lower variance, a much better way to gain experience at every stage of a tournament, and significantly easier from a mental game perspective. You will go broke less often if you specialize in small fields and will generally have a much smoother playing experience. The differences between small fields and large fields in MTTs are substantial, in fact, field size may be the most important factor in game selection. Small fields are lower variance, a much better way to gain experience at every stage of a tournament, and significantly easier from a mental game perspective. You

will go broke less often if you specialize in small fields and will generally have a much smoother playing experience. Large fields are more profitable, both in terms of expectation and also the sheer monetary value of the prize pools. They are much, much swingier, and you need a much larger bankroll to play in them. The larger the field, the more important it is to play for the big prizes at the final table. In smaller fields, prioritizing not bubbling and laddering is more important because the min-cashes make up a much greater portion of the prize pool. However, it is always a balancing act. You should try to win every tournament you play and also avoid bubbling, regardless of field size. Strategically you should play tighter and exert more ICM pressure in small-field MTTs, and play much looser in large-field MTTs. The ideal approach is to play both types of field sizes. Playing small field MTTs as a way to reduce variance and maintain a steady profit, while taking regular shots in large field MTTs. It’s still important to know the differences, however, from both a variance perspective and a strategic one. GTO Wizard the #1 App for Poker players Study any spot imaginable Practice by playing vs. GTO Analyze your hands with 1-click START CRUSHING NOW JOIN DISCORD Author Barry Carter Barry Carter has been a poker writer for 16 years. He is the co-author of six poker books, including The Mental Game of Poker , Endgame Poker Strategy: The ICM Book , and GTO Poker Simplified . Latest article Preflop Raise Sizing: Examining 2 Key Factors It amazes me that, after nearly twenty years of playing no-limit hold ‘em professionally, I… How to Handle Loose-Passive Limpers Solver charts and presolved solutions do not offer much in the way of explicit guidance… Top 5 Mistakes in Spin & Gos As a Spin and Go poker coach, I regularly encounter common mistakes that players make,… An Introduction to Spin & Gos I was playing Tournaments for the first decade of my career. But after my first… Relationships and Poker In my more than 15 years of poker coaching, I’ve helped hundreds of clients improve… Do Multiple Sizes Matter? Should I work out the other tools or just stick to the crowbar? Solver results… The Science of Learning Applied to GTO Wizard The way we were taught to study in schools was flawed and has negatively impacted… Check-Raising a Single Pair In this article, I will address a question raised by Twitter/X user ’Matt Riley’, who… The Turn Probe Bet Imagine yourself defending as the BB caller vs BTN preflop raiser in a 100bb cash… When To Encourage Multiway Pots in PKOs I was recently shown this fascinating PKO hand from the GTO Wizard PKO library. Somebody… Protect Equity and Prosper When we think about the best hands to bet in a given situation, we tend… Do Solvers Have Targets? Targeting has long been a staple of exploitative poker thinking. When you’re value betting against… Disciplining Big Blind in Limped Pots

When the BTN open-limps off a short stack, the postflop play against the BB should… I’d Rather Be Drawing Which is the better hand on a K♥8♦5♦ flop: K♠T♣ or 7♥6♥? OK, I’ll admit… The Curious Case of Open-Limping Buttons Before the advent of solvers, open-limping was considered the province of passive, gambley recreational players… Cleaning Out Sticky IP Callers A “sticky” player on your left, one who calls your preflop raises too often and… Defending Against Tiny 3-Bets Tournament poker is about precision. Cash games, where stacks typically run into the hundreds of… Heads up! Exploiting SB’s Preflop Mistakes Heads up (HU) tournament play presents unique challenges to the average player. Many tournament players,… C-Betting As the OOP Preflop Raiser Position is an extremely valuable advantage in poker. Most players would describe the comfort zone… Overchoice: Making Sense of Multiple Sizings Solver solutions with multiple bet sizes often involve a lot of mixing between those sizes,… River Refinements: When Your Opponent Won’t Check-Raise One of the biggest strategic differences between playing in versus out of position involves betting… Turn Barreling in 3-Bet Pots There are two articles on the GTO Wizard blog that make good prerequisites to this… The Right Way To Think About Protection Suppose Paul the Protector is in a 200bb cash game and opens A♠A♣ in the… The Importance of Board Coverage The first public version of the GTO Wizard announced AI upgrade already has some useful… How To Adjust When Villain Has No Bluffs “They always have it!” is a common, semi-joking expression in poker to describe the tendency… Adjusting on Later Streets After Exploiting Flop The key to exploiting opponents profitably is knowing when to stop. I’m not referring to… C-Betting IP vs Passive Poker Players A preflop raiser enjoys a significant range advantage over a BB caller, enabling them to… C-Betting Against ICM Preflop Ranges You raise from early position (EP) in a multi-table tournament and the BB calls. Both… The Art of Bluff Catching Bluff catching—calling a bet with a modest hand which you expect to win only if… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by IP On some flops, it is simply not possible for the preflop raiser to continuation bet… Is Limping Pimping? In a past Discord post, one of our members noted that an upside of implementing… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by OOP A preflop raiser who continuation bets too often is always a potential target for exploitation,… Preflop Button Mastery in PKOs Playing from the Button presents many unique opportunities in any tournament format, especially in PKOs.… The Worst Turn Card Greetings from GTO land. In today’s article, we will use the Turn Reports feature to… Navigating Range Disadvantage as the 3-Bettor Picture this: We’re playing a NL500 6-max cash game, and we’ve won a few pots,… Mastering Three-Bet Pots In Position in MTTs Playing in position against a three-better is a lesson in playing to your advantages. As… Mastering Three-Bet Pots Out of Position in MTTs Three-bet pots are scary. Playing out of position is scary. Put them together, and you’ve… The Greatest

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Beardsell and Marc-Antoine Provost, a team of Canadian programmers from Quebec, developed… GTO Wizard AI Explained We are excited to introduce GTO Wizard AI, formerly known as Ruse, the world’s best… GTO Wizard AI Benchmarks GTO Wizard has combined the power of artificial intelligence with traditional solving methods to bring… Table Management in PKOs Perhaps the most important strategic consideration in Progressive Knockout Tournaments (PKOs) is making sure you… Overcalling From the BB In poker, overcalling refers to calling a bet or raise after another player has also… Understanding Which Mistakes Cost You the Most Money I am fortunate enough to have worked for many years with the mental game coach… Overbetting The Flop in Cash Games Although most commonly analyzed on turns and rivers, flop overbetting can be a devastating weapon… Using New Skills at the Poker Table How many times has it happened to you that you make a mistake only to… Flatting Ace-X Hands Shortstacked Playing out of position is tricky, but it’s an essential part of tournament play. With… Playing Limped Pots as the BB in MTTs Success as the BB in limped pots begins before the flop. The BB’s equilibrium strategy… The Absurd Game Theory of Chopped Boards A “chopped board” in poker is one where the community cards make up the best… Playing Limped Pots as the SB in MTTs MTT confrontations between the small blind and big blind force no-limit players into uncomfortable situations,… The Art of Learning Poker In his book The Art of Learning, chess and Push Hands champion Josh Waitzkin describes… Is Donk Betting for Donkeys? “Donk betting”, or betting from out of position into the player who was the aggressor… Delayed C-Betting This is a companion piece to Probe Betting. It stands on its own, but understanding… Probe Betting As far as rules of thumb go in poker, “check to the raiser” is a… ICM and Blind Battles: The Big Blind This is a companion piece to this article on the SB’s strategy for blind vs… ICM and Blind Battles: The Small Blind ICM incentivizes more conservative play, which means that at stages of the tournament where risk… The Initial Bettor’s Advantage The mathematics of poker holds a little-known secret: the first bettor enjoys better bluffing odds… Mastering the Chiplead: The Scalpel and the Sledgehammer When you have a lot of chips at a final table or in another situation… Flop Heuristics: IP C-Betting in Cash Games Our never-ending quest for money and fame leads us to the flop. We open the… How ICM Impacts Restealing From The Blinds When I first started working with preflop solves, one of the features I found most… The ICM Benefits of Late Registration in Poker Tournaments Why do so many professional poker players register late for tournaments when they clearly would… Flop Heuristics: OOP C-Betting in MTTs Playing against an in-position cold-caller is dramatically different–and dramatically more difficult–than playing against a caller… Counterintuitive Calls Solver outputs such as those provided by GTO Wizard are models of no-limit hold ‘em,… How To Negotiate Final Table

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a game of small edges and big swings. Every hand is an investment… What is Valor in poker? Can a poker hand be courageous? How does your ability to value bet future streets… Pot Geometry “Pot Geometry” refers to betting an equal fraction of the pot on each street, such… A Beginner’s Guide to Poker Combinatorics Combinatorics is a fancy term for evaluating the number of possible “combinations” (combos) of any… Stack-to-pot ratio Stack-to-pot ratio, or SPR, is a way of measuring how deep the effective stack is… Equity Realization In poker jargon, equity expresses how much of the pot a hand will win, on… Variance and Bankroll Management Variance and Bankroll Management. Vital Soft Skills for Every Poker Player. How to Become a GTO Wizard Welcome to the wonderful world of game theory optimal poker! This article will serve as… The Three Laws of Indifference Indifference in poker is one of the most misunderstood concepts. The word “indifference” means that… Poker subsets and abstractions An “abstraction” is a way to simplify the game of poker. This game is so… Mathematical Misconceptions in Poker Pot Odds and MDF are foundational mathematical formulas in poker. How to solve toy games Poker is a complicated game. It’s impossible to calculate GTO strategies on the fly. By… The Value of Fold Equity – Experiment The term “fold equity” is ambiguous in the poker community. Firstly, it’s an EV equation,… MDF & Alpha MDF & Alpha. Minimum Defence Frequency and Alpha are metrics on poker that determine how… What are Pot Odds in poker? Pot odds are a fundamental calculation in poker. In the simplest terms, pot odds tell… Does your range affect your strategy? Advanced players will often tell you that your range affects your strategy. Visualizing implied odds Implied odds are the value you expect to gain over and above your raw equity.… ICM Basics As a tournament player, you may have heard about the concept of “ICM”, but what… What is Equity in Poker? The term “Equity” is ubiquitous throughout poker theory. Equity refers to your chances of winning… Range Morphology “Morphology” is the study of form or structure. You’ve probably heard terms thrown around such… What is Expected Value in Poker? Expected value (EV) is the most fundamental metric in poker. Every decision you make is… Why doesn’t my solution match GTO Wizard? So, you’ve got your own solutions to some spot, compared it to GTO Wizard, and… Understanding Nash Distance Understanding Nash Distance. One of the most common questions when studying with solvers is “Why… Combinatorics Poker Puzzle Today we have a special puzzle for you that will test your intuition as a… The 10 Most Important Concepts for New Poker Players The 10 Most Important Concepts for New Poker Players. Fundamentals are one of the most… What is GTO in Poker? The meaning of GTO in poker is Game Theory Optimal. Game theory is a study… What does GTO aim to achieve? So what exactly is a GTO strategy? What makes it “unexploitable”? What does it try…

When To Ladder in Tournaments How Mega or Micro-Stacks Distort ICM Strategy In my last two articles, I wrote about the effect field size and payout structure have on ICM. There is another factor outside of your control that I wanted to discuss that significantly changes your strategy in endgame spots, and that is the stack size of the other players in the tournament . Not the effective stack size of your opponent in the hand, I’m referring to the impact some outlier stack sizes can have, even when they are not involved in the hand. It can even be players on another table. In particular, the presence of a micro-stack or a mega-stack in the tournament, when ICM is significant and the field is getting smaller, can dramatically impact your strategy. There is being covered, then there is being really covered. We can look at a spot in the GTO Wizard that highlights this. In this example, the average stack is 40bb, and we are near the bubble: We have selected an example where the stacks are near each other in size. This is CO’s opening range . Note that BB covers us by just a few chips. Now, let’s look at a very similar spot . This is also a 40bb average near the bubble, but the stacks are a bit more widely distributed: The CO has virtually the same stack in this example and is once again opening into a BB who covers him. However, the BB has 100bb this time, not 52. The CO also covers the two players next to act, just like in the first example. This is his opening range: It is much tighter. On the surface, everything is the same. The CO covers the BTN and SB, but is covered by the BB. It is the bubble, meaning losing an all-in to the BB would eliminate the CO from the tournament. Let’s rewind one step. In both examples, the LJ has around 30bb. When the LJ opens (it’s a similar range in both examples) , the CO responds like this in the first example: However, CO responds like this when the BB has a mega stack : When the BB has a huge stack, the CO plays more cautiously. They play fewer hands and they flat call much less often. To see why that is, let’s look at how the BB responds when the CO does call. First when they have 52bb: Then, when BB has 100bb: The BB plays a lot more hands when they have a mega stack, and also squeeze a decent amount more. This is why the CO flat calls less often when they do play, they do not want to encourage the BB to come along. In both examples, we (roughly) have a 30BB LJ, a 50BB CO, and a BB that covers them both, on the bubble. On paper that seems like an identical spot, so why are the strategies so different? You may have already guessed that the bigger the chip lead, the more ICM pressure a

player can exert. In the 52BB example, the BB would be almost as hurt as the CO would if they lost an all-in, so they have to proceed cautiously. Having a mega stack, where you can lose an all-in and still cover most of the table, means you can be a lot more cavalier with your chips (remember a tenet of ICM is that the more chips you have, the less each one is worth). Another ICM impact when one player has a huge stack is that, for the other players, winning the tournament becomes less likely. Laddering and avoiding bubbling, therefore, becomes more important. This may sound defeatist, but taking on the big stack is often ICM suicide . It’s often more prudent to stay out of the way and let them keep busting people for you, to help you ladder. Finally, and you may not have spotted this, but while the average stack in both examples was 40bb, there were also more short stacks in the second example . Not only does the presence of the mega stack make us play tighter, but the presence of short stacks, who would likely bust ahead of us, paradoxically also makes us play tighter. Not only does the presence of the mega stack make us play tighter, but the presence of short stacks, who would likely bust ahead of us, paradoxically also makes us play tighter. The Impact of Mega Stacks Let’s look at a Toy Game example to highlight the impact of a mega stack at the table. This is the bubble of a 9-man SNG with $50/$30/$20 payouts. The stacks are as follows: In this Toy Game where the players are only allowed to shove or fold , these would be the GTO ranges for the CO to shove, followed by the calling ranges for the other players, assuming the previous players had folded: The CO gets to shove very wide because this is the bubble and they cover everyone. The calling ranges are very tight for the BTN and BB because they are close to guaranteed to win a seat. Both of them can only call with JJ +, and AK is a fold here (A quick note worth internalizing: medium to high pocket pairs like JJ hold up much better against wide ranges than strong A x hands). The SB can get it in fairly wide because they are almost guaranteed to bust if they do not make a move, and taking on the chip leader who will have the widest range is their best chance to double up. This is represented in the Bubble Factors ; the BB has the highest Bubble Factor against the CO, because he has the most to lose. The SB, however, has a very low Bubble Factor of 1.13. Let’s keep all the factors the same, but this time we will give the CO 400bb, instead of 40bb. Nothing else has changed; the same players are covered by the same players, but one player has a massive lead. These are the new ranges:

The first thing to note is that the CO has almost doubled their shoving range. It was already wide, but now they can shove any two cards profitably. There is no risk of bubbling for this player, even if they lose several flips in a row, so they can shove with impunity. The calling ranges for the BTN and BB have gotten tighter, now the BB needs at least KK to call. For some reason, which we shall get to in a moment, bubbling is worse for the BB and BTN if the chip leader has a bigger overall lead. The SB, however, gets to go a little wider. They are still in the same position of needing to make a move, but the CO has gone so wide that the SB has more profitable calls. Notice the negative correlation between how wide the CO can shove, and how wide the SB can call. The CO can shove almost twice as many hands, in response the SB only increases their range by 16%. These are the new Bubble Factors: The two things to notice are first that the CO has a Bubble Factor of essentially 1 against everybody, meaning there is no ICM pressure on them at all. The BB, however, has seen their Bubble Factor almost double against the CO. Finish Distributions Why is it that bubbling is so much more of a disaster when the chip leader has a huge lead, compared to a small lead? Why do we have to play so much tighter against them? We can answer that by looking at the (ICM-estimated) finishing distributions. An ICM calculation is essentially a breakdown of the odds of every remaining player finishing in every single position. These are the finishing distributions for our first example when the CO had 40bb: As you can see, the chance each player has of winning the tournament is their percentage of total chips in play. The CO has 40% of the chips in play, so they have a 40% chance of winning. The SB has 10% of the chips in play, so they have a 10% chance of winning. After that, it gets more complex. The SB bubbles this tournament 55.1% of the time, which is why they have to make a move to avoid blinding out. The BB makes the money 87% of the time. This is all assuming equal skill, which ICM does. Compare that to the finish distributions when the CO has 400 bb: The CO wins the tournament 87% of the time, they are so dominant they could probably lock up a better-than-first-place final table deal . They are so locked up, in fact, that their chance of bubbling is 0%. Look at the BB. In the first example, they won the whole tournament 30% of the time and bubbled 13% of the time. Now they only win the tournament 6.5% of the time and they bubble 15% of the time. This is why the strategy shifts considerably. The presence of a mega stack dramatically reduces the chances of

the other players winning the tournament. So much so the more profitable thing those players can do is to play for 2nd place. That often means playing very tight and even blinding out, hoping the other players bust because they have to make a move first. A reminder that ICM guides us on the most profitable decision, not the decision that means we win the tournament the most often. When we are at such a handicap where chips are concerned, the most profitable thing we can do is play for 2nd. The Impact of Micro Stacks We have looked at what a mega stack at the table does for our decisions. What about the opposite? In this example, we have returned to the CO having 40bb, but we have given the SB just 2bb . These are the new ranges: The CO is much tighter this time. This is in part because it would be an ICM disaster if they got called and lost to the BTN or BB, but it is mostly because the SB is forced to call so wide. They can call almost any two cards because they are so short and are getting such a good price on the call. The BTN or BB has been forced to go even tighter, however. Now, the only hand they can call with is AA, and they even have to fold KK! Once again, here are the Bubble Factors: When the chip leader has a massive stack, the medium stacks have to play tighter. When the short stack has a micro stack, the same players must still play tighter. Why is it that a micro or mega stack has the same impact on a medium stack’s strategy? Again, let’s look at the finishing distributions: In this example, the BB has a decent shot of winning the whole tournament, so one would think playing for the win would be a good strategy. Look at the chances of each player bubbling. The SB bubbles 87.6% of the time, and the BB bubbles just 3.5% of the time. The BB has a good chance of winning but, more importantly, they get a money payout 96.5% of the time. Throwing that away would be a disaster. You would literally be handing equity to the SB if you took a stand against the CO with an inferior hand (which, in this situation, would include KK ). In the 400bb example, the chances of winning the tournament are so low, that the most profitable thing you can do as the BB is to play for 2nd. In this example, the chances of bubbling are so low that the BB should avoid it at all costs. The correct strategy here is to play tight, secure the mincash, then play for the win . Interestingly, the BB calling range gets wider when the SB calls the shove. They can call with this range: 3.8% TT+ AQs AKo This is because the BB has an excellent chance of not bubbling now that the SB has committed all-in. If they beat

the CO, they at least get a nice double-up; if they beat both players, they more than double up and make the money. If they beat the SB but not the CO, the SB bubbles, and the BB busts with third-place money. If the CO has the best hand and SB has the 2nd best hand, the SB still bubbles and the BB still gets third place money, because they started with more chips. It’s only when the CO beats the BB and the SB beats everyone, that the BB bubbles the tournament. Interestingly, the BB calling range gets wider when the SB calls the shove. They can call with this range: 3.8% TT+ AQs AKo This is because the BB has an excellent chance of not bubbling now that the SB has committed all-in. If they beat the CO, they at least get a nice double-up; if they beat both players, they more than double up and make the money. If they beat the SB but not the CO, the SB bubbles, and the BB busts with third-place money. If the CO has the best hand and SB has the 2nd best hand, the SB still bubbles and the BB still gets third place money, because they started with more chips. It’s only when the CO beats the BB and the SB beats everyone, that the BB bubbles the tournament. Just for fun, this is what happens when there is both a 400BB mega stack in the CO and a 2BB micro stack in the SB: These are the Bubble Factors: The BB has a Bubble Factor of 7.71, which means they need 88% equity to call the shove. Even Pocket Aces is not that strong in this spot, so the BB’s correct strategy is to fold everything (they would need JJ + to call if the SB called the shove). One more time, here are the finishing distributions: This sums up why the correct strategy is to tighten up whether it is a mega or micro stack at the table. The BB is only 6.6% to win and only 3.9% to bubble. Both of those results are outliers. The BB is 89.4% to come 2nd or 3rd, plus they come 2nd more than half the time, which looks quite appealing right now. With ICM guiding us, the most profitable thing we can do against outlier stacks is to avoid bubbling, ladder when we make the money, and then pray we get lucky heads-up. Conclusion An ICM calculation looks at the chances of each player finishing in each position and then guides the strategy accordingly . The presence of a micro or mega stack at the table creates a degree of certainty about which position some players will finish. The mega stack will almost certainly win, and the micro stack will almost certainly bust next. ICM will always guide us to make the most profitable decision, not the trophy-seeking decision, so the correct strategy for those with middling stack sizes is to let the inevitable happen. Let the micro stack bust

before we try to spin it up, or play for 2nd when the chip leader is unstoppable. The outlier stack doesn’t even have to be involved in the current hand or be at your current table. It is quite often the case, for example, that a player with just an ante dictates the action on an adjacent satellite table. It’s not the most glamorous strategic adjustment you can make in poker, but playing tight when an outlier stack is at your table is the most profitable course of action. The flip side is that you get to play like it’s your last day on Earth when you are the one with the outlier stack. GTO Wizard the #1 App for Poker players Study any spot imaginable Practice by playing vs. GTO Analyze your hands with 1-click START CRUSHING NOW JOIN DISCORD Author Barry Carter Barry Carter has been a poker writer for 16 years. He is the co-author of six poker books, including The Mental Game of Poker , Endgame Poker Strategy: The ICM Book , and GTO Poker Simplified . Latest article Navigating Nasty Rivers Out of Position Playing out of position (OOP) is hard. It’s fundamentally disadvantageous to act on each street… Crack the Shell of Nut Draw Strategy Nut draws hold obvious appeal as betting and raising candidates. They benefit from fold equity,… Preflop Raise Sizing: Examining 2 Key Factors It amazes me that, after nearly twenty years of playing no-limit hold ‘em professionally, I… How to Handle Loose-Passive Limpers Solver charts and presolved solutions do not offer much in the way of explicit guidance… Top 5 Mistakes in Spin & Gos As a Spin and Go poker coach, I regularly encounter common mistakes that players make,… An Introduction to Spin & Gos I was playing Tournaments for the first decade of my career. But after my first… Relationships and Poker In my more than 15 years of poker coaching, I’ve helped hundreds of clients improve… Do Multiple Sizes Matter? Should I work out the other tools or just stick to the crowbar? Solver results… The Science of Learning Applied to GTO Wizard The way we were taught to study in schools was flawed and has negatively impacted… Check-Raising a Single Pair In this article, I will address a question raised by Twitter/X user ’Matt Riley’, who… The Turn Probe Bet Imagine yourself defending as the BB caller vs BTN preflop raiser in a 100bb cash… When To Encourage Multiway Pots in PKOs I was recently shown this fascinating PKO hand from the GTO Wizard PKO library. Somebody… Protect Equity and Prosper When we think about the best hands to bet in a given situation, we tend… Do Solvers Have Targets? Targeting has long been a staple of exploitative poker thinking. When you’re value betting against… Disciplining Big Blind in Limped Pots When the BTN open-limps off a short stack, the postflop play against the BB should… I’d Rather Be Drawing Which is the better hand on a K♥8♦5♦ flop: K♠T♣ or 7♥6♥? OK, I’ll admit… The Curious Case

of Open-Limping Buttons Before the advent of solvers, open-limping was considered the province of passive, gambley recreational players… Cleaning Out Sticky IP Callers A “sticky” player on your left, one who calls your preflop raises too often and… Defending Against Tiny 3-Bets Tournament poker is about precision. Cash games, where stacks typically run into the hundreds of… Heads up! Exploiting SB’s Preflop Mistakes Heads up (HU) tournament play presents unique challenges to the average player. Many tournament players,… C-Betting As the OOP Preflop Raiser Position is an extremely valuable advantage in poker. Most players would describe the comfort zone… Overchoice: Making Sense of Multiple Sizings Solver solutions with multiple bet sizes often involve a lot of mixing between those sizes,… River Refinements: When Your Opponent Won’t Check-Raise One of the biggest strategic differences between playing in versus out of position involves betting… Turn Barreling in 3-Bet Pots There are two articles on the GTO Wizard blog that make good prerequisites to this… The Right Way To Think About Protection Suppose Paul the Protector is in a 200bb cash game and opens A♠A♣ in the… The Importance of Board Coverage The first public version of the GTO Wizard announced AI upgrade already has some useful… How To Adjust When Villain Has No Bluffs “They always have it!” is a common, semi-joking expression in poker to describe the tendency… Adjusting on Later Streets After Exploiting Flop The key to exploiting opponents profitably is knowing when to stop. I’m not referring to… C-Betting IP vs Passive Poker Players A preflop raiser enjoys a significant range advantage over a BB caller, enabling them to… C-Betting Against ICM Preflop Ranges You raise from early position (EP) in a multi-table tournament and the BB calls. Both… The Art of Bluff Catching Bluff catching—calling a bet with a modest hand which you expect to win only if… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by IP On some flops, it is simply not possible for the preflop raiser to continuation bet… Is Limping Pimping? In a past Discord post, one of our members noted that an upside of implementing… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by OOP A preflop raiser who continuation bets too often is always a potential target for exploitation,… Preflop Button Mastery in PKOs Playing from the Button presents many unique opportunities in any tournament format, especially in PKOs.… The Worst Turn Card Greetings from GTO land. In today’s article, we will use the Turn Reports feature to… Navigating Range Disadvantage as the 3-Bettor Picture this: We’re playing a NL500 6-max cash game, and we’ve won a few pots,… Mastering Three-Bet Pots In Position in MTTs Playing in position against a three-better is a lesson in playing to your advantages. As… Mastering Three-Bet Pots Out of Position in MTTs Three-bet pots are scary. Playing out of position is scary. Put them together, and you’ve… The Greatest Final Table in Triton History Today, we’ll examine one of the most epic final table battles I’ve ever witnessed! Our… Mastering Thin Value Bets in Checked-Down Pots Valuing your hand appropriately—determining whether it’s strong enough to value

bet or so weak you… Maximizing Value on Monotone Flops Monotone flops tend to provoke great anxiety among poker players. It’s easy to imagine that… How to Defend Against Turn Donk Bets Responding effectively to donk bets on the turn is tricky;, there’s no getting around that.… How and Why You Should Use Turn Donk Bets Donk betting–taking the betting lead away from the previous street’s aggressor–on the flop is rarely… How Stack Sizes Change Your Range In this series, we have looked at factors that can influence ranges in otherwise identical… How to Leverage GTO Wizard’s EV Comparison Tool With the advent of solvers, some troubling new turns of phrase have entered the poker… Should You Ever Cold Call a 3-Bet? When there’s been a raise and re-raise before the action is on you, you will… When ICM Breaks Down If you have read my previous GTO Wizard articles and my books, you’ll know I… When Is It Correct To Fold AA Preflop? One of the criticisms of ICM is that it is boring and robotic. In my… OOP C-betting vs Loose Cold-callers In a previous GTO Wizard article, I asserted that “Playing against an in-position cold-caller is… Short-Stacked Play in MTTs Playing a short stack well is an essential tournament skill. It is extremely rare to… When To Ladder in Tournaments In my last two articles, I wrote about the effect field size and payout structure… How Payout Structures Impact ICM Last time we discussed the ICM considerations in game selection, we looked at field size,… C-Betting IP in 3-Bet Pots When you three-bet before the flop and the original raiser calls from out of position,… C-Betting OOP in 3-Bet Pots Continuation betting from out of position can be a dicey proposition in single-raised pots. Cold… Dynamic Sizing: A GTO Breakthrough Dynamic Sizing is a revolutionary new poker algorithm that automatically simplifies your strategy with the… Dynamic Sizing Benchmarks Dynamic Sizing is a revolutionary new poker algorithm that automatically simplifies your strategy with the… Understanding The Impact Of Field Size On ICM In Poker When people talk about game selection in multi-table tournaments (MTTs), they invariably talk about the… Defending vs BB Check-Raise on Paired Flops This is a companion piece to Attacking Paired Flops from the BB; you will get… Mastering PKO Final Tables Final tables can be the most exciting and rewarding phase of a tournament, and being… Attacking Paired Flops From the BB Paired flops present unique challenges to both a preflop raiser and a BB caller. The… KK vs QQ vs JJ at WSOP Main Event With only fourteen players remaining in the 2023 WSOP Main Event and blinds of 400K/800K/800K,… Responding to BB Squeezes You open raise, someone calls, and the BB squeezes. How should you construct your strategy?… Crushing a Top HUNL Poker Bot In 2022, Philippe Beardsell and Marc-Antoine Provost, a team of Canadian programmers from Quebec, developed… GTO Wizard AI Explained We are excited to introduce GTO Wizard AI, formerly known as Ruse, the world’s best… GTO Wizard AI Benchmarks GTO Wizard

has combined the power of artificial intelligence with traditional solving methods to bring… Table Management in PKOs Perhaps the most important strategic consideration in Progressive Knockout Tournaments (PKOs) is making sure you… Overcalling From the BB In poker, overcalling refers to calling a bet or raise after another player has also… Understanding Which Mistakes Cost You the Most Money I am fortunate enough to have worked for many years with the mental game coach… Overbetting The Flop in Cash Games Although most commonly analyzed on turns and rivers, flop overbetting can be a devastating weapon… Using New Skills at the Poker Table How many times has it happened to you that you make a mistake only to… Flatting Ace-X Hands Shortstacked Playing out of position is tricky, but it’s an essential part of tournament play. With… Playing Limped Pots as the BB in MTTs Success as the BB in limped pots begins before the flop. The BB’s equilibrium strategy… The Absurd Game Theory of Chopped Boards A “chopped board” in poker is one where the community cards make up the best… Playing Limped Pots as the SB in MTTs MTT confrontations between the small blind and big blind force no-limit players into uncomfortable situations,… The Art of Learning Poker In his book The Art of Learning, chess and Push Hands champion Josh Waitzkin describes… Is Donk Betting for Donkeys? “Donk betting”, or betting from out of position into the player who was the aggressor… Delayed C-Betting This is a companion piece to Probe Betting. It stands on its own, but understanding… Probe Betting As far as rules of thumb go in poker, “check to the raiser” is a… ICM and Blind Battles: The Big Blind This is a companion piece to this article on the SB’s strategy for blind vs… ICM and Blind Battles: The Small Blind ICM incentivizes more conservative play, which means that at stages of the tournament where risk… The Initial Bettor’s Advantage The mathematics of poker holds a little-known secret: the first bettor enjoys better bluffing odds… Mastering the Chiplead: The Scalpel and the Sledgehammer When you have a lot of chips at a final table or in another situation… Flop Heuristics: IP C-Betting in Cash Games Our never-ending quest for money and fame leads us to the flop. We open the… How ICM Impacts Restealing From The Blinds When I first started working with preflop solves, one of the features I found most… The ICM Benefits of Late Registration in Poker Tournaments Why do so many professional poker players register late for tournaments when they clearly would… Flop Heuristics: OOP C-Betting in MTTs Playing against an in-position cold-caller is dramatically different–and dramatically more difficult–than playing against a caller… Counterintuitive Calls Solver outputs such as those provided by GTO Wizard are models of no-limit hold ‘em,… How To Negotiate Final Table Deals Most people’s first introduction to the Independent Chip Model (ICM) is not from studying bubble… How does ICM impact PKO strategy? If you have read The Theory of Progressive Knockout Tournaments you already know why we…

Understanding Blockers in Poker Often when looking through a solver’s meticulously crafted grid of deception, one of the following… Flop Heuristics: IP Cold-Caller in MTTs A Cold-call refers to the act of calling a preflop raise when you don’t close… Flop Heuristics: IP C-Betting in MTTs In the world of poker, the flop is a crucial stage of the game that… Flop Heuristics for Defending the Blinds in MTTs The field of Game Theoretically Optimal poker is extensive, and thus, to simplify our strategy,… Multiway strategy in Progressive Knockout Tournaments Progressive Knockout (PKO) tournaments are much more complex than traditional MTTs. The fact that players… How To Calculate Raises In Poker One of the most frequently asked questions in poker is how to calculate the size… Principles of River Play The river offers the least complicated strategy of any betting street. With no further cards… Exploitative Dynamics GTO solutions are designed to be unexploitable, performing reasonably well no matter how your opponents… How ICM Impacts Postflop Strategy Most players understand how the Independent Chip Model (ICM) in poker impacts their strategy preflop,… 10 Tips for Multiway Pots in Poker While lots of work has been placed into research and explanation of heads-up pot strategy,… What is the Bubble Factor in poker tournaments? The Independent Chip Model (ICM) shows us the real money implications of tournament chip decisions.… The Theory of Progressive Knockout Tournaments In poker, a PKO (Progressive Knockout) tournament is a type of tournament where a portion… How To Analyze Turn Textures In Poker Master the art of turn analysis in poker. Understand how the turn card changes the… Principles of Turn Strategy Learn the principles of turn strategy in poker and discover what makes the turn unique.… Poker Strategies: Tournaments vs. Cash Games Tournament poker is not as different from cash game poker as people sometimes assume. Most… How Solvers Work A Game Theory Optimal solver is an algorithm that calculates the best possible poker strategy.… The Most Powerful Play in Poker The central strategic implication of stack depth is the question of how much equity a… When does ICM become significant in MTTs? The Independent Chip Model (ICM) was invented in 1987 by M. Malmuth and is one… How to Study GTO Solutions Tools like GTO Wizard and other solvers should not be used to memorize specific strategies.… Principles of GTO Game theory, or GTO (for Game Theoretically Optimal), is best understood not as a rigid… Interpreting Equity Distributions GTO Wizard’s range vs range equity distribution graphs are an excellent tool for visualizing which… What is Leverage in poker? Leverage refers to the risk of future betting. When you call a bet on the… Reasons for value betting in poker You’re probably accustomed to thinking of bets as either value or bluff. In this taxonomy,… The Science of Poker Performance Poker is a game of small edges and big swings. Every hand is an investment… What is Valor in poker? Can a poker hand be courageous? How does your ability to value bet future streets… Pot Geometry “Pot Geometry”

refers to betting an equal fraction of the pot on each street, such… A Beginner’s Guide to Poker Combinatorics Combinatorics is a fancy term for evaluating the number of possible “combinations” (combos) of any… Stack-to-pot ratio Stack-to-pot ratio, or SPR, is a way of measuring how deep the effective stack is… Equity Realization In poker jargon, equity expresses how much of the pot a hand will win, on… Variance and Bankroll Management Variance and Bankroll Management. Vital Soft Skills for Every Poker Player. How to Become a GTO Wizard Welcome to the wonderful world of game theory optimal poker! This article will serve as… The Three Laws of Indifference Indifference in poker is one of the most misunderstood concepts. The word “indifference” means that… Poker subsets and abstractions An “abstraction” is a way to simplify the game of poker. This game is so… Mathematical Misconceptions in Poker Pot Odds and MDF are foundational mathematical formulas in poker. How to solve toy games Poker is a complicated game. It’s impossible to calculate GTO strategies on the fly. By… The Value of Fold Equity – Experiment The term “fold equity” is ambiguous in the poker community. Firstly, it’s an EV equation,… MDF & Alpha MDF & Alpha. Minimum Defence Frequency and Alpha are metrics on poker that determine how… What are Pot Odds in poker? Pot odds are a fundamental calculation in poker. In the simplest terms, pot odds tell… Does your range affect your strategy? Advanced players will often tell you that your range affects your strategy. Visualizing implied odds Implied odds are the value you expect to gain over and above your raw equity.… ICM Basics As a tournament player, you may have heard about the concept of “ICM”, but what… What is Equity in Poker? The term “Equity” is ubiquitous throughout poker theory. Equity refers to your chances of winning… Range Morphology “Morphology” is the study of form or structure. You’ve probably heard terms thrown around such… What is Expected Value in Poker? Expected value (EV) is the most fundamental metric in poker. Every decision you make is… Why doesn’t my solution match GTO Wizard? So, you’ve got your own solutions to some spot, compared it to GTO Wizard, and… Understanding Nash Distance Understanding Nash Distance. One of the most common questions when studying with solvers is “Why… Combinatorics Poker Puzzle Today we have a special puzzle for you that will test your intuition as a… The 10 Most Important Concepts for New Poker Players The 10 Most Important Concepts for New Poker Players. Fundamentals are one of the most… What is GTO in Poker? The meaning of GTO in poker is Game Theory Optimal. Game theory is a study… What does GTO aim to achieve? So what exactly is a GTO strategy? What makes it “unexploitable”? What does it try…

How to Become a GTO Wizard Welcome to the wonderful world of game theory optimal poker! This article will serve as your roadmap to GTO Wizardry. Mastering poker requires study, practice, and dedication. You can’t learn a new language or how to play an instrument overnight, and poker is no different. Luckily, we live in an age where resources are available to fast-track your progress! Gameplan to Become a GTO Wizard With so many resources, where do you start? How do you go from novice to master? We need to build a gameplan: Learn the fundamental concepts Master your tools Develop a routine Study GTO solutions and reports Quiz yourself with our poker puzzles Practice against the GTO Trainer regularly Analyze your hand histories Review our weekly coaching videos to learn from the best Join poker communities, such as our Discord Channel Starting Out These articles are perfect for newer members! Six Reasons Why You Should Use GTO Wizard – Outlines the main benefits and features of GTO Wizard . The 10 Most Important Concepts for New Poker Players – This article is designed to help you overcome common leaks and improve how you study to achieve long-term success as a player. GTO Wizard Trainer – Tips and Tricks – Learn how to get the most out of the GTO Trainer. The art of learning poker – Learn to build your strategy from the top-down, starting with broad ideas and working to refining it over time. Master Your Tools The first step to becoming a Wizard is mastering your tools! Watch this video to learn how to use and study GTO solutions. Building a Training Routine We recommend building a training routine to get the most out of your subscription and improve as quickly as possible. A daily routine helps you stay disciplined with your studies. Try it as a warm-up before your session or a cool-down afterwards. Example Training Routine Upload your most recent hand histories first These will serve as step two for tomorrow’s review. Reviewing one day later allows Wizard to analyze everything and gives you time to cool down and look at things more objectively. Review yesterday’s uploaded hand histories This step should take between 10 minutes to an hour depending on volume. Make sure to sort the table by EV loss to find your biggest blunders. Mark a few of the most interesting hands with a star Use these hands as inspiration for new spots to study tomorrow! Review today’s Daily Dose of GTO Try to formulate your answer before looking at the answer! 50-100 hands with the GTO Trainer Use Preflop to River drill for general training, or practice a more specific scenario. Adjust the length of your training session as needed. Study one new type of spot in the Solution browser (10-20 minutes) Use interesting spots from your hand history review as motivation. (Tip – Study similar textures to extrapolate similarities between different flops, e.g. BTN vs BB SRP, monotone.) Browse aggregate reports for that spot (5-10 minutes) Don’t forget to utilize grouping and filters!

You can also browse turn reports. Construct one range for that spot in the Rangebuilder (15 minutes) This helps you to think about your strategy globally. Extra Join weekly coaching (if applicable), or watch one previous coaching. This training routine should take between 1-2 hours per day. It utilizes every aspect of GTO Wizard and is designed to be used in conjunction with regular play. Users with a Starter subscription can forego uploading hands if they’ve reached their monthly limit, and just input interesting hands manually into the Solution browser instead. Tips for Studying GTO Solutions GTO can be intimidating to those who are new. Solutions are complex, and there’s just so much data! So how can one go about turning these charts into workable strategies? Study Ranges, Not Hands! Trying to memorize every hand is impossible. Poker is simply far too complex. Instead of trying to mix every frequency correctly, focus on the overall strategy! The goal is to understand why rather than what the solver is doing. Focus on Thresholds Learning basic thresholds is one of the fastest ways to become a solid poker player. Which hand classes are reasonable stack-offs in this spot? What is the strongest hand class that starts to mix folds here? What’s the weakest hand that can value bet here? Thresholds guide and sculpt your strategy. Instead of trying to memorize every hand individually, you should focus on things like the bottom of your continuation range. For example, in this spot (CO vs BB SRP, CO bets 33% pot on JJ4 ), we should note that a made hand never folds. Open the filters tab in the Solution browser and look for blue lines which indicate folds. This is the bottom of your continuation range. Study Hand Classes One useful study technique is to break down the strategy into different hand classes using filters. Then, compare strategically similar boards and review different hand classes to develop an intuition about their strategy. You can also use the Breakdown Tab (press 3 in the Solution browser) to see how different hands behave. You’ll see similar patterns on a lot of boards after a while. Think About What You’re Targeting with Your Bet Size Every bet you make targets some part of your opponent’s range. By “target”, we mean those hands are indifferent between calling and folding facing your bet. The hands you target determine your value bet thresholds. Consider how to get value and what sizing makes sense to target those parts of their range. So how do we know what hands we’re targeting? Well, you need to look at villain’s response to a bet. Look at Villain’s Response It’s important to look at villain’s strategy to see how they respond. Then, ask yourself if their response is realistic and what adjustments you might make against different mistakes. Looking at their response helps you to understand why the solution works in the first place, understand blockers, and think through your strategy. Use Aggregate Reports to Study Trends Rather than studying one board at a time, you can

study aggregate reports. Apply filters to study strategically similar flops and look for general trends in the strategy at different points on the flop. Ask yourself 🤔 “What sizing does it generally use on low paired flops in this spot”? “Why is that”? Try to develop a broader heuristic that explains the cause>effect relationship. You can also study turn reports for one particular flop. Turn reports are great for developing follow-through strategies. Use the Ranges Tab to Understand the Big Picture The ranges tab lets you compare both player’s ranges at the same time. Comparing range asymmetries and equity distributions can be used to understand the motivations behind the GTO strategy. You can compare different hand classes and equity buckets. Fundamental Poker Math Poker is intuitive in practice, but mathematical in nature. Humans cannot calculate optimal strategies at the table. However, it’s imperative to learn these fundamental concepts so that you can apply them in an abstract sense. You should understand that you don’t need to defend wide when your opponent puts in more money relative to the pot. You should understand the basic shapes of ranges and how that influences your strategy. You should know the principle of indifference. You should learn how pot odds connect to the required bluffing frequency. The goal is to understand these concepts on a broad, abstract level. Expected value – Every decision you make is underpinned by one common goal – to maximize return. Equity – Equity refers to your chances of winning a hand if the pot were checked down. Range morphology – Ranges are easier to understand when you think of them as shapes. ICM basics – Learn how tournament survival pressure affects your strategy. Visualizing Implied odds – The value you expect to gain on future streets when you outdraw your opponent. What are Pot Odds in poker? – This essential risk/reward calculation tells you when a call becomes profitable. MDF & Alpha – Minimum Defence Frequency is the shield you use to prevent your opponents from running you over with bluffs. Learn how wide to defend in poker. Mathematical Misconceptions in Poker – Address common misunderstandings and develop a more nuanced understanding of these mathematical concepts. How to solve toy games – Put it all together by learning how to solve toy games. Understanding GTO Why do people want to learn “game theory optimal strategies?” What does that even mean? What if my opponents aren’t playing GTO? (Spoiler, they’re not). Read these articles to learn more about the goals and nature of GTO. What is GTO in Poker – What does GTO mean? What does GTO aim to achieve? – What is the purpose of GTO in poker? The value of fold equity – Learn about the value of relative fold equity with an experimental approach. Does your range affect your strategy? – A philosophical theory article about the nature of fixed strategies and where your EV comes from. Understanding Solvers Solvers are the engines we use to approximate optimal poker strategies. These articles cover the practical application, nuances, and limitations

of poker solving algorithms. Our solutions – The parameters used for our initial preflop and postflop solutions. Understanding Nash Distance – Learn about solver noise and how to interpret solver accuracy. Why doesn’t my solver match GTO Wizard? – Learn about the chaotic nature of solvers and how small input changes can drastically change outputs. Poker Puzzles 🧩 Combinatorics Poker Puzzle – This simple puzzle is surprisingly tricky, but the solution is elegant! Videos Weekly Coaching – Fast-track your progress by watching these coaching videos made by world-class players. Join our coaching seminars every Wednesday! Check out our YouTube playlist of GTO Analysis deep-dives! GTO Wizard the #1 App for Poker players Study any spot imaginable Practice by playing vs. GTO Analyze your hands with 1-click START CRUSHING NOW JOIN DISCORD Latest article Preflop Raise Sizing: Examining 2 Key Factors It amazes me that, after nearly twenty years of playing no-limit hold ‘em professionally, I… How to Handle Loose-Passive Limpers Solver charts and presolved solutions do not offer much in the way of explicit guidance… Top 5 Mistakes in Spin & Gos As a Spin and Go poker coach, I regularly encounter common mistakes that players make,… An Introduction to Spin & Gos I was playing Tournaments for the first decade of my career. But after my first… Relationships and Poker In my more than 15 years of poker coaching, I’ve helped hundreds of clients improve… Do Multiple Sizes Matter? Should I work out the other tools or just stick to the crowbar? Solver results… The Science of Learning Applied to GTO Wizard The way we were taught to study in schools was flawed and has negatively impacted… Check-Raising a Single Pair In this article, I will address a question raised by Twitter/X user ’Matt Riley’, who… The Turn Probe Bet Imagine yourself defending as the BB caller vs BTN preflop raiser in a 100bb cash… When To Encourage Multiway Pots in PKOs I was recently shown this fascinating PKO hand from the GTO Wizard PKO library. Somebody… Protect Equity and Prosper When we think about the best hands to bet in a given situation, we tend… Do Solvers Have Targets? Targeting has long been a staple of exploitative poker thinking. When you’re value betting against… Disciplining Big Blind in Limped Pots When the BTN open-limps off a short stack, the postflop play against the BB should… I’d Rather Be Drawing Which is the better hand on a K♥8♦5♦ flop: K♠T♣ or 7♥6♥? OK, I’ll admit… The Curious Case of Open-Limping Buttons Before the advent of solvers, open-limping was considered the province of passive, gambley recreational players… Cleaning Out Sticky IP Callers A “sticky” player on your left, one who calls your preflop raises too often and… Defending Against Tiny 3-Bets Tournament poker is about precision. Cash games, where stacks typically run into the hundreds of… Heads up! Exploiting SB’s Preflop Mistakes Heads up (HU) tournament play presents unique challenges to the average player. Many tournament players,… C-Betting As the OOP Preflop Raiser Position is an extremely valuable advantage in poker. Most

players would describe the comfort zone… Overchoice: Making Sense of Multiple Sizings Solver solutions with multiple bet sizes often involve a lot of mixing between those sizes,… River Refinements: When Your Opponent Won’t Check-Raise One of the biggest strategic differences between playing in versus out of position involves betting… Turn Barreling in 3-Bet Pots There are two articles on the GTO Wizard blog that make good prerequisites to this… The Right Way To Think About Protection Suppose Paul the Protector is in a 200bb cash game and opens A♠A♣ in the… The Importance of Board Coverage The first public version of the GTO Wizard announced AI upgrade already has some useful… How To Adjust When Villain Has No Bluffs “They always have it!” is a common, semi-joking expression in poker to describe the tendency… Adjusting on Later Streets After Exploiting Flop The key to exploiting opponents profitably is knowing when to stop. I’m not referring to… C-Betting IP vs Passive Poker Players A preflop raiser enjoys a significant range advantage over a BB caller, enabling them to… C-Betting Against ICM Preflop Ranges You raise from early position (EP) in a multi-table tournament and the BB calls. Both… The Art of Bluff Catching Bluff catching—calling a bet with a modest hand which you expect to win only if… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by IP On some flops, it is simply not possible for the preflop raiser to continuation bet… Is Limping Pimping? In a past Discord post, one of our members noted that an upside of implementing… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by OOP A preflop raiser who continuation bets too often is always a potential target for exploitation,… Preflop Button Mastery in PKOs Playing from the Button presents many unique opportunities in any tournament format, especially in PKOs.… The Worst Turn Card Greetings from GTO land. In today’s article, we will use the Turn Reports feature to… Navigating Range Disadvantage as the 3-Bettor Picture this: We’re playing a NL500 6-max cash game, and we’ve won a few pots,… Mastering Three-Bet Pots In Position in MTTs Playing in position against a three-better is a lesson in playing to your advantages. As… Mastering Three-Bet Pots Out of Position in MTTs Three-bet pots are scary. Playing out of position is scary. Put them together, and you’ve… The Greatest Final Table in Triton History Today, we’ll examine one of the most epic final table battles I’ve ever witnessed! Our… Mastering Thin Value Bets in Checked-Down Pots Valuing your hand appropriately—determining whether it’s strong enough to value bet or so weak you… Maximizing Value on Monotone Flops Monotone flops tend to provoke great anxiety among poker players. It’s easy to imagine that… How to Defend Against Turn Donk Bets Responding effectively to donk bets on the turn is tricky;, there’s no getting around that.… How and Why You Should Use Turn Donk Bets Donk betting–taking the betting lead away from the previous street’s aggressor–on the flop is rarely… How Stack Sizes Change Your Range In this series, we have looked at factors that can influence ranges in otherwise identical… How

to Leverage GTO Wizard’s EV Comparison Tool With the advent of solvers, some troubling new turns of phrase have entered the poker… Should You Ever Cold Call a 3-Bet? When there’s been a raise and re-raise before the action is on you, you will… When ICM Breaks Down If you have read my previous GTO Wizard articles and my books, you’ll know I… When Is It Correct To Fold AA Preflop? One of the criticisms of ICM is that it is boring and robotic. In my… OOP C-betting vs Loose Cold-callers In a previous GTO Wizard article, I asserted that “Playing against an in-position cold-caller is… Short-Stacked Play in MTTs Playing a short stack well is an essential tournament skill. It is extremely rare to… When To Ladder in Tournaments In my last two articles, I wrote about the effect field size and payout structure… How Payout Structures Impact ICM Last time we discussed the ICM considerations in game selection, we looked at field size,… C-Betting IP in 3-Bet Pots When you three-bet before the flop and the original raiser calls from out of position,… C-Betting OOP in 3-Bet Pots Continuation betting from out of position can be a dicey proposition in single-raised pots. Cold… Dynamic Sizing: A GTO Breakthrough Dynamic Sizing is a revolutionary new poker algorithm that automatically simplifies your strategy with the… Dynamic Sizing Benchmarks Dynamic Sizing is a revolutionary new poker algorithm that automatically simplifies your strategy with the… Understanding The Impact Of Field Size On ICM In Poker When people talk about game selection in multi-table tournaments (MTTs), they invariably talk about the… Defending vs BB Check-Raise on Paired Flops This is a companion piece to Attacking Paired Flops from the BB; you will get… Mastering PKO Final Tables Final tables can be the most exciting and rewarding phase of a tournament, and being… Attacking Paired Flops From the BB Paired flops present unique challenges to both a preflop raiser and a BB caller. The… KK vs QQ vs JJ at WSOP Main Event With only fourteen players remaining in the 2023 WSOP Main Event and blinds of 400K/800K/800K,… Responding to BB Squeezes You open raise, someone calls, and the BB squeezes. How should you construct your strategy?… Crushing a Top HUNL Poker Bot In 2022, Philippe Beardsell and Marc-Antoine Provost, a team of Canadian programmers from Quebec, developed… GTO Wizard AI Explained We are excited to introduce GTO Wizard AI, formerly known as Ruse, the world’s best… GTO Wizard AI Benchmarks GTO Wizard has combined the power of artificial intelligence with traditional solving methods to bring… Table Management in PKOs Perhaps the most important strategic consideration in Progressive Knockout Tournaments (PKOs) is making sure you… Overcalling From the BB In poker, overcalling refers to calling a bet or raise after another player has also… Understanding Which Mistakes Cost You the Most Money I am fortunate enough to have worked for many years with the mental game coach… Overbetting The Flop in Cash Games Although most commonly analyzed on turns and rivers, flop overbetting can be a

devastating weapon… Using New Skills at the Poker Table How many times has it happened to you that you make a mistake only to… Flatting Ace-X Hands Shortstacked Playing out of position is tricky, but it’s an essential part of tournament play. With… Playing Limped Pots as the BB in MTTs Success as the BB in limped pots begins before the flop. The BB’s equilibrium strategy… The Absurd Game Theory of Chopped Boards A “chopped board” in poker is one where the community cards make up the best… Playing Limped Pots as the SB in MTTs MTT confrontations between the small blind and big blind force no-limit players into uncomfortable situations,… The Art of Learning Poker In his book The Art of Learning, chess and Push Hands champion Josh Waitzkin describes… Is Donk Betting for Donkeys? “Donk betting”, or betting from out of position into the player who was the aggressor… Delayed C-Betting This is a companion piece to Probe Betting. It stands on its own, but understanding… Probe Betting As far as rules of thumb go in poker, “check to the raiser” is a… ICM and Blind Battles: The Big Blind This is a companion piece to this article on the SB’s strategy for blind vs… ICM and Blind Battles: The Small Blind ICM incentivizes more conservative play, which means that at stages of the tournament where risk… The Initial Bettor’s Advantage The mathematics of poker holds a little-known secret: the first bettor enjoys better bluffing odds… Mastering the Chiplead: The Scalpel and the Sledgehammer When you have a lot of chips at a final table or in another situation… Flop Heuristics: IP C-Betting in Cash Games Our never-ending quest for money and fame leads us to the flop. We open the… How ICM Impacts Restealing From The Blinds When I first started working with preflop solves, one of the features I found most… The ICM Benefits of Late Registration in Poker Tournaments Why do so many professional poker players register late for tournaments when they clearly would… Flop Heuristics: OOP C-Betting in MTTs Playing against an in-position cold-caller is dramatically different–and dramatically more difficult–than playing against a caller… Counterintuitive Calls Solver outputs such as those provided by GTO Wizard are models of no-limit hold ‘em,… How To Negotiate Final Table Deals Most people’s first introduction to the Independent Chip Model (ICM) is not from studying bubble… How does ICM impact PKO strategy? If you have read The Theory of Progressive Knockout Tournaments you already know why we… Understanding Blockers in Poker Often when looking through a solver’s meticulously crafted grid of deception, one of the following… Flop Heuristics: IP Cold-Caller in MTTs A Cold-call refers to the act of calling a preflop raise when you don’t close… Flop Heuristics: IP C-Betting in MTTs In the world of poker, the flop is a crucial stage of the game that… Flop Heuristics for Defending the Blinds in MTTs The field of Game Theoretically Optimal poker is extensive, and thus, to simplify our strategy,… Multiway strategy in Progressive Knockout Tournaments Progressive Knockout (PKO)

tournaments are much more complex than traditional MTTs. The fact that players… How To Calculate Raises In Poker One of the most frequently asked questions in poker is how to calculate the size… Principles of River Play The river offers the least complicated strategy of any betting street. With no further cards… Exploitative Dynamics GTO solutions are designed to be unexploitable, performing reasonably well no matter how your opponents… How ICM Impacts Postflop Strategy Most players understand how the Independent Chip Model (ICM) in poker impacts their strategy preflop,… 10 Tips for Multiway Pots in Poker While lots of work has been placed into research and explanation of heads-up pot strategy,… What is the Bubble Factor in poker tournaments? The Independent Chip Model (ICM) shows us the real money implications of tournament chip decisions.… The Theory of Progressive Knockout Tournaments In poker, a PKO (Progressive Knockout) tournament is a type of tournament where a portion… How To Analyze Turn Textures In Poker Master the art of turn analysis in poker. Understand how the turn card changes the… Principles of Turn Strategy Learn the principles of turn strategy in poker and discover what makes the turn unique.… Poker Strategies: Tournaments vs. Cash Games Tournament poker is not as different from cash game poker as people sometimes assume. Most… How Solvers Work A Game Theory Optimal solver is an algorithm that calculates the best possible poker strategy.… The Most Powerful Play in Poker The central strategic implication of stack depth is the question of how much equity a… When does ICM become significant in MTTs? The Independent Chip Model (ICM) was invented in 1987 by M. Malmuth and is one… How to Study GTO Solutions Tools like GTO Wizard and other solvers should not be used to memorize specific strategies.… Principles of GTO Game theory, or GTO (for Game Theoretically Optimal), is best understood not as a rigid… Interpreting Equity Distributions GTO Wizard’s range vs range equity distribution graphs are an excellent tool for visualizing which… What is Leverage in poker? Leverage refers to the risk of future betting. When you call a bet on the… Reasons for value betting in poker You’re probably accustomed to thinking of bets as either value or bluff. In this taxonomy,… The Science of Poker Performance Poker is a game of small edges and big swings. Every hand is an investment… What is Valor in poker? Can a poker hand be courageous? How does your ability to value bet future streets… Pot Geometry “Pot Geometry” refers to betting an equal fraction of the pot on each street, such… A Beginner’s Guide to Poker Combinatorics Combinatorics is a fancy term for evaluating the number of possible “combinations” (combos) of any… Stack-to-pot ratio Stack-to-pot ratio, or SPR, is a way of measuring how deep the effective stack is… Equity Realization In poker jargon, equity expresses how much of the pot a hand will win, on… Variance and Bankroll Management Variance and Bankroll Management. Vital Soft Skills for Every Poker Player. How to Become a GTO Wizard Welcome to the wonderful

world of game theory optimal poker! This article will serve as… The Three Laws of Indifference Indifference in poker is one of the most misunderstood concepts. The word “indifference” means that… Poker subsets and abstractions An “abstraction” is a way to simplify the game of poker. This game is so… Mathematical Misconceptions in Poker Pot Odds and MDF are foundational mathematical formulas in poker. How to solve toy games Poker is a complicated game. It’s impossible to calculate GTO strategies on the fly. By… The Value of Fold Equity – Experiment The term “fold equity” is ambiguous in the poker community. Firstly, it’s an EV equation,… MDF & Alpha MDF & Alpha. Minimum Defence Frequency and Alpha are metrics on poker that determine how… What are Pot Odds in poker? Pot odds are a fundamental calculation in poker. In the simplest terms, pot odds tell… Does your range affect your strategy? Advanced players will often tell you that your range affects your strategy. Visualizing implied odds Implied odds are the value you expect to gain over and above your raw equity.… ICM Basics As a tournament player, you may have heard about the concept of “ICM”, but what… What is Equity in Poker? The term “Equity” is ubiquitous throughout poker theory. Equity refers to your chances of winning… Range Morphology “Morphology” is the study of form or structure. You’ve probably heard terms thrown around such… What is Expected Value in Poker? Expected value (EV) is the most fundamental metric in poker. Every decision you make is… Why doesn’t my solution match GTO Wizard? So, you’ve got your own solutions to some spot, compared it to GTO Wizard, and… Understanding Nash Distance Understanding Nash Distance. One of the most common questions when studying with solvers is “Why… Combinatorics Poker Puzzle Today we have a special puzzle for you that will test your intuition as a… The 10 Most Important Concepts for New Poker Players The 10 Most Important Concepts for New Poker Players. Fundamentals are one of the most… What is GTO in Poker? The meaning of GTO in poker is Game Theory Optimal. Game theory is a study… What does GTO aim to achieve? So what exactly is a GTO strategy? What makes it “unexploitable”? What does it try…

The Value of Fold Equity – Experiment The term “fold equity” is ambiguous in the poker community. Firstly, it’s an EV equation, not an equity equation. The classical definition of fold equity is: EV = (how often they fold x size of the pot). However, this definition misses something obvious – fold equity is relative to your hand! Put another way, the value gained from making your opponent fold depends on how their folding range interacts with your hand. If you only fold out hands you had dominated, did you actually gain anything? This article will explore this concept through experimentation and measurement. The end goal is to give you a more concrete way to think about the relative value of fold equity. We’re going to cover 3 different experiments A flop fold equity analysis A turn fold equity experiment A river toy game experiment You can learn more about the value of fold equity in this video: BTN open, BB call, flop is A22tt (tt = two-tone) Why do the weakest underpairs prefer to bet more often? Let’s copy BB’s folding range and put that into an equity calculator. Here’s our underpair equity against their folding range: Results: Higher underpairs do not fold out equity that can outdraw them and are less incentivized to bluff. KK has 98% against the folding range, so the value of fold equity for this hand is nearly zero relative to checking. You only fold out hands that you have absolutely dominated. This hand is not incentivized to generate folds and can only gain by making worse hands call. 33, on the other hand, only has 76% against the folding range since we fold out so many overcards to our pair that can outdraw us later. Therefore the value of fold equity with 33 is much higher. This hand has more to gain from generating folds. Conclusion: The value of fold equity impacts your incentive to bet. More vulnerable pocket pairs are more inclined to bet. Next we’ll take a look at a turn spot. Here we have BTN vs BB on K ♦ 8 ♥ 2 ♥ 9 ♦. BTN open, BB call BTN cbet 33% flop, BB call BB check turn, action on BTN to bet 90% pot or check In this experiment, we’re going to change the strength of BB’s XR bluffs and observe its effect on our response. We’ll look at three scenarios: The GTO solution BB nodelocked to check-raise with strong value and strong draws BB nodelocked to check-raise with strong value and complete trash Baseline (GTO) Here we see the default GTO Wizard strategy on the turn. Too Polarized (bluffs are too weak) Now let’s nodelock BB’s check-raise bluffing range. We’ll keep the value range the same (two-pair+ hands), but remove all bluffs/draws and replace it with 43o. 43o has about 5% equity and is as close to a pure bluff as we can get. As you can see, BTN responds by calling everything. Furthermore, we never need to raise as there’s no incentive to try and fold out 43o.

This hand has no equity against our range. Raising only donates to BB’s nutted hands and folds out a complete airball bluff. Too draw-heavy (bluffs are too strong) Next, let’s increase the strength of BBs bluffs. Instead of a GTO range I’ve shifted their bluffs upwards to contain many strong draws which have good equity against the top of our range. The BTN now responds to this check-raise with a raise/fold strategy, opting never to call. This is because BB’s bluffs are too strong, which decreases the value of calling. Furthermore, we are more incentivized to try and fold out these strong bluffs, which have decent equity against our continuing range. Results This experiment shows that the value of a raise is directly tied to the value of fold equity. If the villain’s bluffs (as defined by hands that fold to a raise) are too weak, the value of fold equity decreases. The optimal response becomes call/fold without raising. The only hands with an incentive to raise are those that can polarize over the villain’s value range, and if you’re calling wide enough, even those value hands prefer to slow play. Conversely, when their bluffs have too much equity against the top of your range (e.g. raising too many strong draws), the value of fold equity increases drastically. This encourages raise/fold strategies, even if we sometimes jam into a stronger hand. Baseline: Hero’s range (GTO Wizard link): OOP is nodelocked to check with: 1 combo of 77 (nuts) 1 combo of 9d8d (nuts) 12 combos of 43o (bluffs) Result : IP rangechecks back, since there’s no value in folding 43o. This makes sense, as 43o has 0% equity against Hero’s range. So betting only folds out worse and gets called by better. This is true for every hand in hero’s range. Ok, now let’s change OOP’s 43 to 32, a hand with 45% equity against hero’s range Result: Hero is betting more than half the time Conclusion: When we increase the value of fold equity, we increase the incentive to bluff. Conclusion The value of fold equity is a fundamental incentive to be considered at every decision point. If your opponent folds hands that have no value against your range, then you haven’t actually gained anything relative to checking. We saw in the flop analysis that fold equity impacts which underpairs prefer to bet. We saw in the turn experiment that increasing the strength of villain’s bluffs incentivized us to fold/raise rather than call. Decreasing the value of villain’s bluffs incentivized us to fold/call rather than raise. In the river toy game, we saw that we would never want to bet against a perfectly polarized range. If we increase the equity of the bottom of villain’s range then we are more incentivised to bluff them off that hand. In summary, you need to consider the value of your opponent’s folding range when deciding to bet. GTO Wizard the #1 App for Poker players Study any spot imaginable Practice by playing vs. GTO Analyze your hands with 1-click START CRUSHING NOW JOIN DISCORD

Author Tombos21 Tom is a long time poker theory enthusiast, GTO Wizard coach and YouTuber, and author of the Daily Dose of GTO. Latest article Preflop Raise Sizing: Examining 2 Key Factors It amazes me that, after nearly twenty years of playing no-limit hold ‘em professionally, I… How to Handle Loose-Passive Limpers Solver charts and presolved solutions do not offer much in the way of explicit guidance… Top 5 Mistakes in Spin & Gos As a Spin and Go poker coach, I regularly encounter common mistakes that players make,… An Introduction to Spin & Gos I was playing Tournaments for the first decade of my career. But after my first… Relationships and Poker In my more than 15 years of poker coaching, I’ve helped hundreds of clients improve… Do Multiple Sizes Matter? Should I work out the other tools or just stick to the crowbar? Solver results… The Science of Learning Applied to GTO Wizard The way we were taught to study in schools was flawed and has negatively impacted… Check-Raising a Single Pair In this article, I will address a question raised by Twitter/X user ’Matt Riley’, who… The Turn Probe Bet Imagine yourself defending as the BB caller vs BTN preflop raiser in a 100bb cash… When To Encourage Multiway Pots in PKOs I was recently shown this fascinating PKO hand from the GTO Wizard PKO library. Somebody… Protect Equity and Prosper When we think about the best hands to bet in a given situation, we tend… Do Solvers Have Targets? Targeting has long been a staple of exploitative poker thinking. When you’re value betting against… Disciplining Big Blind in Limped Pots When the BTN open-limps off a short stack, the postflop play against the BB should… I’d Rather Be Drawing Which is the better hand on a K♥8♦5♦ flop: K♠T♣ or 7♥6♥? OK, I’ll admit… The Curious Case of Open-Limping Buttons Before the advent of solvers, open-limping was considered the province of passive, gambley recreational players… Cleaning Out Sticky IP Callers A “sticky” player on your left, one who calls your preflop raises too often and… Defending Against Tiny 3-Bets Tournament poker is about precision. Cash games, where stacks typically run into the hundreds of… Heads up! Exploiting SB’s Preflop Mistakes Heads up (HU) tournament play presents unique challenges to the average player. Many tournament players,… C-Betting As the OOP Preflop Raiser Position is an extremely valuable advantage in poker. Most players would describe the comfort zone… Overchoice: Making Sense of Multiple Sizings Solver solutions with multiple bet sizes often involve a lot of mixing between those sizes,… River Refinements: When Your Opponent Won’t Check-Raise One of the biggest strategic differences between playing in versus out of position involves betting… Turn Barreling in 3-Bet Pots There are two articles on the GTO Wizard blog that make good prerequisites to this… The Right Way To Think About Protection Suppose Paul the Protector is in a 200bb cash game and opens A♠A♣ in the… The Importance of Board Coverage The first public version of the GTO Wizard announced AI upgrade already

has some useful… How To Adjust When Villain Has No Bluffs “They always have it!” is a common, semi-joking expression in poker to describe the tendency… Adjusting on Later Streets After Exploiting Flop The key to exploiting opponents profitably is knowing when to stop. I’m not referring to… C-Betting IP vs Passive Poker Players A preflop raiser enjoys a significant range advantage over a BB caller, enabling them to… C-Betting Against ICM Preflop Ranges You raise from early position (EP) in a multi-table tournament and the BB calls. Both… The Art of Bluff Catching Bluff catching—calling a bet with a modest hand which you expect to win only if… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by IP On some flops, it is simply not possible for the preflop raiser to continuation bet… Is Limping Pimping? In a past Discord post, one of our members noted that an upside of implementing… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by OOP A preflop raiser who continuation bets too often is always a potential target for exploitation,… Preflop Button Mastery in PKOs Playing from the Button presents many unique opportunities in any tournament format, especially in PKOs.… The Worst Turn Card Greetings from GTO land. In today’s article, we will use the Turn Reports feature to… Navigating Range Disadvantage as the 3-Bettor Picture this: We’re playing a NL500 6-max cash game, and we’ve won a few pots,… Mastering Three-Bet Pots In Position in MTTs Playing in position against a three-better is a lesson in playing to your advantages. As… Mastering Three-Bet Pots Out of Position in MTTs Three-bet pots are scary. Playing out of position is scary. Put them together, and you’ve… The Greatest Final Table in Triton History Today, we’ll examine one of the most epic final table battles I’ve ever witnessed! Our… Mastering Thin Value Bets in Checked-Down Pots Valuing your hand appropriately—determining whether it’s strong enough to value bet or so weak you… Maximizing Value on Monotone Flops Monotone flops tend to provoke great anxiety among poker players. It’s easy to imagine that… How to Defend Against Turn Donk Bets Responding effectively to donk bets on the turn is tricky;, there’s no getting around that.… How and Why You Should Use Turn Donk Bets Donk betting–taking the betting lead away from the previous street’s aggressor–on the flop is rarely… How Stack Sizes Change Your Range In this series, we have looked at factors that can influence ranges in otherwise identical… How to Leverage GTO Wizard’s EV Comparison Tool With the advent of solvers, some troubling new turns of phrase have entered the poker… Should You Ever Cold Call a 3-Bet? When there’s been a raise and re-raise before the action is on you, you will… When ICM Breaks Down If you have read my previous GTO Wizard articles and my books, you’ll know I… When Is It Correct To Fold AA Preflop? One of the criticisms of ICM is that it is boring and robotic. In my… OOP C-betting vs Loose Cold-callers In a previous GTO Wizard article, I asserted that “Playing against an in-position cold-caller is… Short-Stacked Play

in MTTs Playing a short stack well is an essential tournament skill. It is extremely rare to… When To Ladder in Tournaments In my last two articles, I wrote about the effect field size and payout structure… How Payout Structures Impact ICM Last time we discussed the ICM considerations in game selection, we looked at field size,… C-Betting IP in 3-Bet Pots When you three-bet before the flop and the original raiser calls from out of position,… C-Betting OOP in 3-Bet Pots Continuation betting from out of position can be a dicey proposition in single-raised pots. Cold… Dynamic Sizing: A GTO Breakthrough Dynamic Sizing is a revolutionary new poker algorithm that automatically simplifies your strategy with the… Dynamic Sizing Benchmarks Dynamic Sizing is a revolutionary new poker algorithm that automatically simplifies your strategy with the… Understanding The Impact Of Field Size On ICM In Poker When people talk about game selection in multi-table tournaments (MTTs), they invariably talk about the… Defending vs BB Check-Raise on Paired Flops This is a companion piece to Attacking Paired Flops from the BB; you will get… Mastering PKO Final Tables Final tables can be the most exciting and rewarding phase of a tournament, and being… Attacking Paired Flops From the BB Paired flops present unique challenges to both a preflop raiser and a BB caller. The… KK vs QQ vs JJ at WSOP Main Event With only fourteen players remaining in the 2023 WSOP Main Event and blinds of 400K/800K/800K,… Responding to BB Squeezes You open raise, someone calls, and the BB squeezes. How should you construct your strategy?… Crushing a Top HUNL Poker Bot In 2022, Philippe Beardsell and Marc-Antoine Provost, a team of Canadian programmers from Quebec, developed… GTO Wizard AI Explained We are excited to introduce GTO Wizard AI, formerly known as Ruse, the world’s best… GTO Wizard AI Benchmarks GTO Wizard has combined the power of artificial intelligence with traditional solving methods to bring… Table Management in PKOs Perhaps the most important strategic consideration in Progressive Knockout Tournaments (PKOs) is making sure you… Overcalling From the BB In poker, overcalling refers to calling a bet or raise after another player has also… Understanding Which Mistakes Cost You the Most Money I am fortunate enough to have worked for many years with the mental game coach… Overbetting The Flop in Cash Games Although most commonly analyzed on turns and rivers, flop overbetting can be a devastating weapon… Using New Skills at the Poker Table How many times has it happened to you that you make a mistake only to… Flatting Ace-X Hands Shortstacked Playing out of position is tricky, but it’s an essential part of tournament play. With… Playing Limped Pots as the BB in MTTs Success as the BB in limped pots begins before the flop. The BB’s equilibrium strategy… The Absurd Game Theory of Chopped Boards A “chopped board” in poker is one where the community cards make up the best… Playing Limped Pots as the SB in MTTs MTT confrontations between the small blind and big blind force no-limit players

into uncomfortable situations,… The Art of Learning Poker In his book The Art of Learning, chess and Push Hands champion Josh Waitzkin describes… Is Donk Betting for Donkeys? “Donk betting”, or betting from out of position into the player who was the aggressor… Delayed C-Betting This is a companion piece to Probe Betting. It stands on its own, but understanding… Probe Betting As far as rules of thumb go in poker, “check to the raiser” is a… ICM and Blind Battles: The Big Blind This is a companion piece to this article on the SB’s strategy for blind vs… ICM and Blind Battles: The Small Blind ICM incentivizes more conservative play, which means that at stages of the tournament where risk… The Initial Bettor’s Advantage The mathematics of poker holds a little-known secret: the first bettor enjoys better bluffing odds… Mastering the Chiplead: The Scalpel and the Sledgehammer When you have a lot of chips at a final table or in another situation… Flop Heuristics: IP C-Betting in Cash Games Our never-ending quest for money and fame leads us to the flop. We open the… How ICM Impacts Restealing From The Blinds When I first started working with preflop solves, one of the features I found most… The ICM Benefits of Late Registration in Poker Tournaments Why do so many professional poker players register late for tournaments when they clearly would… Flop Heuristics: OOP C-Betting in MTTs Playing against an in-position cold-caller is dramatically different–and dramatically more difficult–than playing against a caller… Counterintuitive Calls Solver outputs such as those provided by GTO Wizard are models of no-limit hold ‘em,… How To Negotiate Final Table Deals Most people’s first introduction to the Independent Chip Model (ICM) is not from studying bubble… How does ICM impact PKO strategy? If you have read The Theory of Progressive Knockout Tournaments you already know why we… Understanding Blockers in Poker Often when looking through a solver’s meticulously crafted grid of deception, one of the following… Flop Heuristics: IP Cold-Caller in MTTs A Cold-call refers to the act of calling a preflop raise when you don’t close… Flop Heuristics: IP C-Betting in MTTs In the world of poker, the flop is a crucial stage of the game that… Flop Heuristics for Defending the Blinds in MTTs The field of Game Theoretically Optimal poker is extensive, and thus, to simplify our strategy,… Multiway strategy in Progressive Knockout Tournaments Progressive Knockout (PKO) tournaments are much more complex than traditional MTTs. The fact that players… How To Calculate Raises In Poker One of the most frequently asked questions in poker is how to calculate the size… Principles of River Play The river offers the least complicated strategy of any betting street. With no further cards… Exploitative Dynamics GTO solutions are designed to be unexploitable, performing reasonably well no matter how your opponents… How ICM Impacts Postflop Strategy Most players understand how the Independent Chip Model (ICM) in poker impacts their strategy preflop,… 10 Tips for Multiway Pots in Poker While lots of work has been placed into research and explanation of

heads-up pot strategy,… What is the Bubble Factor in poker tournaments? The Independent Chip Model (ICM) shows us the real money implications of tournament chip decisions.… The Theory of Progressive Knockout Tournaments In poker, a PKO (Progressive Knockout) tournament is a type of tournament where a portion… How To Analyze Turn Textures In Poker Master the art of turn analysis in poker. Understand how the turn card changes the… Principles of Turn Strategy Learn the principles of turn strategy in poker and discover what makes the turn unique.… Poker Strategies: Tournaments vs. Cash Games Tournament poker is not as different from cash game poker as people sometimes assume. Most… How Solvers Work A Game Theory Optimal solver is an algorithm that calculates the best possible poker strategy.… The Most Powerful Play in Poker The central strategic implication of stack depth is the question of how much equity a… When does ICM become significant in MTTs? The Independent Chip Model (ICM) was invented in 1987 by M. Malmuth and is one… How to Study GTO Solutions Tools like GTO Wizard and other solvers should not be used to memorize specific strategies.… Principles of GTO Game theory, or GTO (for Game Theoretically Optimal), is best understood not as a rigid… Interpreting Equity Distributions GTO Wizard’s range vs range equity distribution graphs are an excellent tool for visualizing which… What is Leverage in poker? Leverage refers to the risk of future betting. When you call a bet on the… Reasons for value betting in poker You’re probably accustomed to thinking of bets as either value or bluff. In this taxonomy,… The Science of Poker Performance Poker is a game of small edges and big swings. Every hand is an investment… What is Valor in poker? Can a poker hand be courageous? How does your ability to value bet future streets… Pot Geometry “Pot Geometry” refers to betting an equal fraction of the pot on each street, such… A Beginner’s Guide to Poker Combinatorics Combinatorics is a fancy term for evaluating the number of possible “combinations” (combos) of any… Stack-to-pot ratio Stack-to-pot ratio, or SPR, is a way of measuring how deep the effective stack is… Equity Realization In poker jargon, equity expresses how much of the pot a hand will win, on… Variance and Bankroll Management Variance and Bankroll Management. Vital Soft Skills for Every Poker Player. How to Become a GTO Wizard Welcome to the wonderful world of game theory optimal poker! This article will serve as… The Three Laws of Indifference Indifference in poker is one of the most misunderstood concepts. The word “indifference” means that… Poker subsets and abstractions An “abstraction” is a way to simplify the game of poker. This game is so… Mathematical Misconceptions in Poker Pot Odds and MDF are foundational mathematical formulas in poker. How to solve toy games Poker is a complicated game. It’s impossible to calculate GTO strategies on the fly. By… The Value of Fold Equity – Experiment The term “fold equity” is ambiguous in the poker community. Firstly, it’s an EV equation,… MDF &

Alpha MDF & Alpha. Minimum Defence Frequency and Alpha are metrics on poker that determine how… What are Pot Odds in poker? Pot odds are a fundamental calculation in poker. In the simplest terms, pot odds tell… Does your range affect your strategy? Advanced players will often tell you that your range affects your strategy. Visualizing implied odds Implied odds are the value you expect to gain over and above your raw equity.… ICM Basics As a tournament player, you may have heard about the concept of “ICM”, but what… What is Equity in Poker? The term “Equity” is ubiquitous throughout poker theory. Equity refers to your chances of winning… Range Morphology “Morphology” is the study of form or structure. You’ve probably heard terms thrown around such… What is Expected Value in Poker? Expected value (EV) is the most fundamental metric in poker. Every decision you make is… Why doesn’t my solution match GTO Wizard? So, you’ve got your own solutions to some spot, compared it to GTO Wizard, and… Understanding Nash Distance Understanding Nash Distance. One of the most common questions when studying with solvers is “Why… Combinatorics Poker Puzzle Today we have a special puzzle for you that will test your intuition as a… The 10 Most Important Concepts for New Poker Players The 10 Most Important Concepts for New Poker Players. Fundamentals are one of the most… What is GTO in Poker? The meaning of GTO in poker is Game Theory Optimal. Game theory is a study… What does GTO aim to achieve? So what exactly is a GTO strategy? What makes it “unexploitable”? What does it try…

Building Exploits From Showdown CASH , Exploit Understanding how and when to exploit opponents at a live poker table is a delicate affair. It’s… 08/04/2024 13 min. / 30 sec.

ICM and Blind Battles: The Big Blind This is a companion piece to this article on the SB’s strategy for blind vs blind play under ICM pressure . In that piece, we saw that, though ICM incentivizes both players to avoid big confrontations, the BB has more leeway to grow the pot on early streets. Their position enables them to bluff , control the size of the pot , and realize equity more effectively than the SB, making it less dangerous for them to start growing the pot pre-flop. Though ICM incentivizes both players to avoid big confrontations, the BB has more leeway to grow the pot on early streets. The following chart shows the BB’s strategy for responding to both a limp and a raise from the SB at various stages of a tournament. All these simulations were run with 40bb symmetric stacks, meaning all players have the same stack size. Note that the final table solution was run for 35bb. Although the BB raises less aggressively as their risk premium mounts, they retain a robust raising range even under the most intense ICM pressure. At this stack depth, raising is simply less dangerous for the BB . Re-raising from out of position is extremely risky for the SB, so the BB can mostly expect to see a flop and continue exercising their positional advantage even if the SB does not fold immediately. BB’s response to a raise appears not to change so dramatically as the tournament progresses, but this is deceptive. As the risk premium increases, SB’s raising range gets stronger, yet BB’s raising and calling frequencies tighten only slightly. This implies that BB contests the pot with weaker hands relative to the SB’s range as the risk premium increases . The higher the risk premium, the more valuable the BB’s positional advantage, increasing their equity realization. The higher the risk premium, the more valuable the BB’s positional advantage, increasing their equity realization. Shallower Stacks With 20bb stacks, we see a clearer pattern of the BB playing more conservatively as risk premiums increase. This reflects not only their own increased risk, but also the SB’s stronger limping and raising ranges. BB can re-raise more effectively at this stack depth, as the re-raise is now primarily a shove that denies SB the opportunity to move all-in themselves and put BB to an existential decision. When ICM pressure is most extreme, there is even room for BB to develop a range for three-betting less than all-in. Despite the small size, this raise is extremely polar , as the SB responds almost exclusively by shoving or folding. Contesting a large pot post-flop from out of position is simply too risky a proposition on the bubble or at the final table; any hand good enough for the SB to call would be good enough to shove and would value the fold equity that comes along with that. The following chart shows BB’s response to a 3bb SB open on the final table with 20bb effective stacks. Hands in light red are non all-in 3bets.

Notice how BB draws their bluffs from the top of their folding range, hands that are either barely or not quite good enough to call. There’s no sense in wasting a profitable calling hand on a bluff that will rarely see a flop. There’s no sense in wasting a profitable calling hand on a bluff that will rarely see a flop. A good rule of thumb for “normal”, low risk premium tournament situations is that if you raise to a size where you’d be getting 2:1 to call a shove (meaning your raise committed roughly ⅓ of the effective stack), then you might as well shove because any hand you raised would be priced in to call the shove anyway. With a high risk premium, there is more room to fold after committing ⅓ of your stack because the last of your chips are worth so disproportionately more than those you’ve already committed. The large raise enables strong but vulnerable hands to deny equity more effectively while still giving you room to escape with the last of your chips should you be caught in a bluff. The Big Raise There was an interesting anomaly in the first chart we looked at – with symmetric 35bb stacks at a nine-handed final table . The BB has a range for raising to 7bb facing a SB limp. This range is actually most robust with 30bb stacks. With 50bb or more, smaller raises suffice, and with 20bb and fewer, shoving over the limp is preferable, as we see in this chart of the BB’s strategy at a nine-handed final table with various symmetric stack sizes. The composition of this range can be seen most clearly with the 30bb strategy , where BB uses it most often. BB 7bb Iso Raise vs. SB Limp Strong but vulnerable hands drive the range: AK o, AQ o, and JJ – KK . Aces prefer a smaller 3bet. AA gains less from denying equity and blocks much of SB’s shoving range. Where AK o is happy to force folds from QT o and 98 s and to induce shoves from A5 s, AA gains little from the former and blocks the latter. At the final table, even KK benefits from forcing a shove-or-fold response from much of SB’s A x; AA is a uniquely robust hand. At equilibrium, this raise is not especially profitable as a bluff. Thus, BB goes for the 7bb bluff with only their worst hands, those with the least interest in checking and seeing a flop. Many similar hands that raise rarely or never at equilibrium have EVs quite close to that of checking, so the real takeaway here is that, against the right opponent who will limp and/or fold too often, you should consider this large raise with many of your worst hands . Hands in the middle, like QJ o or 98 s, mostly check to avoid exposing themselves to a re-raise , but when they do raise, they use the 3.5bb size, as they perform better against the SB’s wider calling range

when using this size. This big raise loses appeal with deeper stacks of 50bb or 60bb. Stealing the blinds and antes is worth less, and even the big pocket pairs (besides AA ) are not appealing to stack off with if SB calls or three-bets the big raise. When the BB Covers In a scenario where the SB has 35bb but the BB has 40bb , the BB’s risk premium is reduced from 12.2% (when stacks were symmetric) to 11.3%, while the SB’s risk premium is slightly increased to 13.1%. The result of this risk advantage is a slightly more aggressive strategy from the BB, who raises to 7bb with 7% of hands (up from 5% with symmetric stacks) and to 3.5bb with 28% of hands (up from 24%). Facing a raise from the SB, the BB’s response does not look much different than with symmetric stacks: they call 28%, three-bet 14%, and never shove. However, as we have seen before, the SB’s increased risk premium is built into their raising range , so the BB’s response is similar despite the SB having a stronger range. When the SB Covers Facing a limp from a 100bb SB , a 35bb BB never uses the 7bb raise. Instead, they have a small shoving range of about 4% of hands. These are not quite the same hands as raised to 7bb with symmetric stacks. When covered, BB’s shoving range relies heavily on blocking calls, with A9o – AQo and A2o comprising the majority of it. Despite being covered and facing a risk premium of 15.2%, the BB raises to 3.5bb with 29% of hands, more than the 24% they raise with symmetric stacks. This is a response to the covering SB limping a much wider and weaker range. The SB in this scenario almost never folds, and they mostly raise their strong hands. If anything, a combined raising frequency of 34% seems low compared to the SB’s wide and weak limping range. SB Limping Range Conclusion With symmetric stacks, the BB has just as much interest as the SB in avoiding big confrontations when under ICM pressure. They have an extra tool for doing so, however, which is using their position to control the pot size after the flop. Consequently, it is safer for them to start growing the pot with a pre-flop raise even when covered by the SB at a final table. At certain stack depths, they have some unconventional options to consider as well, notably a tiny three-bet and a big raise over a limp. Many human players will be unfamiliar with these plays and respond poorly to them, so with a little experimentation, they should yield especially good results. GTO Wizard the #1 App for Poker players Study any spot imaginable Practice by playing vs. GTO Analyze your hands with 1-click START CRUSHING NOW JOIN DISCORD Author Andrew Brokos Andrew Brokos has been a professional poker player, coach, and author for over 15 years. He co-hosts the Thinking Poker Podcast and is the author of the Play Optimal Poker books,

among others. Latest article Preflop Raise Sizing: Examining 2 Key Factors It amazes me that, after nearly twenty years of playing no-limit hold ‘em professionally, I… How to Handle Loose-Passive Limpers Solver charts and presolved solutions do not offer much in the way of explicit guidance… Top 5 Mistakes in Spin & Gos As a Spin and Go poker coach, I regularly encounter common mistakes that players make,… An Introduction to Spin & Gos I was playing Tournaments for the first decade of my career. But after my first… Relationships and Poker In my more than 15 years of poker coaching, I’ve helped hundreds of clients improve… Do Multiple Sizes Matter? Should I work out the other tools or just stick to the crowbar? Solver results… The Science of Learning Applied to GTO Wizard The way we were taught to study in schools was flawed and has negatively impacted… Check-Raising a Single Pair In this article, I will address a question raised by Twitter/X user ’Matt Riley’, who… The Turn Probe Bet Imagine yourself defending as the BB caller vs BTN preflop raiser in a 100bb cash… When To Encourage Multiway Pots in PKOs I was recently shown this fascinating PKO hand from the GTO Wizard PKO library. Somebody… Protect Equity and Prosper When we think about the best hands to bet in a given situation, we tend… Do Solvers Have Targets? Targeting has long been a staple of exploitative poker thinking. When you’re value betting against… Disciplining Big Blind in Limped Pots When the BTN open-limps off a short stack, the postflop play against the BB should… I’d Rather Be Drawing Which is the better hand on a K♥8♦5♦ flop: K♠T♣ or 7♥6♥? OK, I’ll admit… The Curious Case of Open-Limping Buttons Before the advent of solvers, open-limping was considered the province of passive, gambley recreational players… Cleaning Out Sticky IP Callers A “sticky” player on your left, one who calls your preflop raises too often and… Defending Against Tiny 3-Bets Tournament poker is about precision. Cash games, where stacks typically run into the hundreds of… Heads up! Exploiting SB’s Preflop Mistakes Heads up (HU) tournament play presents unique challenges to the average player. Many tournament players,… C-Betting As the OOP Preflop Raiser Position is an extremely valuable advantage in poker. Most players would describe the comfort zone… Overchoice: Making Sense of Multiple Sizings Solver solutions with multiple bet sizes often involve a lot of mixing between those sizes,… River Refinements: When Your Opponent Won’t Check-Raise One of the biggest strategic differences between playing in versus out of position involves betting… Turn Barreling in 3-Bet Pots There are two articles on the GTO Wizard blog that make good prerequisites to this… The Right Way To Think About Protection Suppose Paul the Protector is in a 200bb cash game and opens A♠A♣ in the… The Importance of Board Coverage The first public version of the GTO Wizard announced AI upgrade already has some useful… How To Adjust When Villain Has No Bluffs “They always have it!” is a common, semi-joking expression in

poker to describe the tendency… Adjusting on Later Streets After Exploiting Flop The key to exploiting opponents profitably is knowing when to stop. I’m not referring to… C-Betting IP vs Passive Poker Players A preflop raiser enjoys a significant range advantage over a BB caller, enabling them to… C-Betting Against ICM Preflop Ranges You raise from early position (EP) in a multi-table tournament and the BB calls. Both… The Art of Bluff Catching Bluff catching—calling a bet with a modest hand which you expect to win only if… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by IP On some flops, it is simply not possible for the preflop raiser to continuation bet… Is Limping Pimping? In a past Discord post, one of our members noted that an upside of implementing… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by OOP A preflop raiser who continuation bets too often is always a potential target for exploitation,… Preflop Button Mastery in PKOs Playing from the Button presents many unique opportunities in any tournament format, especially in PKOs.… The Worst Turn Card Greetings from GTO land. In today’s article, we will use the Turn Reports feature to… Navigating Range Disadvantage as the 3-Bettor Picture this: We’re playing a NL500 6-max cash game, and we’ve won a few pots,… Mastering Three-Bet Pots In Position in MTTs Playing in position against a three-better is a lesson in playing to your advantages. As… Mastering Three-Bet Pots Out of Position in MTTs Three-bet pots are scary. Playing out of position is scary. Put them together, and you’ve… The Greatest Final Table in Triton History Today, we’ll examine one of the most epic final table battles I’ve ever witnessed! Our… Mastering Thin Value Bets in Checked-Down Pots Valuing your hand appropriately—determining whether it’s strong enough to value bet or so weak you… Maximizing Value on Monotone Flops Monotone flops tend to provoke great anxiety among poker players. It’s easy to imagine that… How to Defend Against Turn Donk Bets Responding effectively to donk bets on the turn is tricky;, there’s no getting around that.… How and Why You Should Use Turn Donk Bets Donk betting–taking the betting lead away from the previous street’s aggressor–on the flop is rarely… How Stack Sizes Change Your Range In this series, we have looked at factors that can influence ranges in otherwise identical… How to Leverage GTO Wizard’s EV Comparison Tool With the advent of solvers, some troubling new turns of phrase have entered the poker… Should You Ever Cold Call a 3-Bet? When there’s been a raise and re-raise before the action is on you, you will… When ICM Breaks Down If you have read my previous GTO Wizard articles and my books, you’ll know I… When Is It Correct To Fold AA Preflop? One of the criticisms of ICM is that it is boring and robotic. In my… OOP C-betting vs Loose Cold-callers In a previous GTO Wizard article, I asserted that “Playing against an in-position cold-caller is… Short-Stacked Play in MTTs Playing a short stack well is an essential tournament skill. It is extremely rare to… When To Ladder in

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Poker Strategies: Tournaments vs. Cash Games Tournament poker is not as different from cash game poker as people sometimes assume. Most of what you learn about poker strategy – big concepts like hand reading, value betting, and hand classes – will apply in both formats. If you understand the theory of poker, there is not a lot you need to do differently to adapt from one format to the other, except for understanding ICM, which is a hugely important concept at certain stages of a tournament. Following are some heuristics that will help you consider how tournament play differs from cash game play. Some of these, such as the presence of antes, are not intrinsic to tournaments but by convention are more relevant in a tournament context. Others, like the value of folding, are central to what makes tournaments tournaments. Antes Incentivize Wider Ranges Antes are a common feature in multi-table tournaments (MTTs), but they are not as common in cash games. However, it is possible to find some cash games that do use antes, and some MTTs that do not. Despite this, antes are often seen as one of the main distinguishing factors between MTTs and cash games , and this is one reason why pre-flop strategies can vary significantly between the two formats. Antes are a type of forced bet that all players are required to pay before the start of the hand. Antes increase the size of the starting pot, which gives all players a larger prize to fight for and can incentivize them to play more hands from every position. This is especially true for the big blind, whose calls typically close the action. Antes cause players to contest pots with weaker hands compared to a game without antes. Antes increase the size of the starting pot, giving all players a larger prize to compete for, incentivizing players to contest pots with weaker hands The source of the ante is not important, only the size . Whether a single player (typically the BB) antes an amount equal to the big blind or eight players each ante an amount equal to ⅛ of the big blind, the amount of chips in the pot will be the same. So there is no strategic difference between these formats. Unlike the big blind, which is live and counts toward the BB’s pre-flop wager, antes are dead money. Once they are in the pot, it does not matter who paid them or where they came from. Here is BTN’s range for opening 2.5BB in a six-handed cash game with 100BB stacks and no ante : Cash Game – BTN Open Strategy + EV Compare this to the BTN’s range for opening 2.5BB in a six-handed MTT with 100BB stacks and an ante : MTT – BTN Open Strategy + EV BTN opens 42% of hands in the cash game compared to 53% in the MTT . Notice that the EV of all hands is also higher in the MTT because there is more money in the pot. Opening Aces is worth 13.29BB when

antes are in play but only 9.62BB without antes. This effect is even more dramatic for the big blind, who closes the action and has the option to contest the pot at a discount . When any other player considers entering the pot, they must assess not only the amount they will wager relative to the pot but also the risk of other players behind them calling or re-raising 🙋‍♂️ This forces them to play tighter than pot odds alone would dictate. In a single-raised pot, the BB’s call closes the action, so pot odds more directly determine which hands will show a profit . More money in the pot also increases the value of the chips BB has already invested 💰 In a cash game, the BB must call 1.5BB into a pot of 4BB. Facing the same raise in an MTT, they must call 1.5BB into a pot of 4.8BB. In an 8 or 9-handed MTT, the ante would typically be larger still, and the BB would be incentivized to play even weaker hands. Here is BB’s response to the BTN raise in the cash game . They call ~26% of hands and raise ~14%, for a total VPIP (Voluntarily Put Money in Pot) of ~40%: In an MTT with antes , the BB again raises ~14% of hands (though the composition of this raising range is somewhat different) but calls ~61% of hands, for a total VPIP of ~75%, nearly twice what it was in the cash game without antes . One final note These tournament charts are based on ChipEV models. As we will see, some of the other distinguishing features of MTTs incentivize players to value their survival in addition to chips won or lost, and that incentivizes more conservative play. Even so, the general point holds : antes incentivize all players to contest the pot with wider ranges than they would in an identical scenario without antes. Stack Size Dynamics Because of the rising blinds and inability to reload more chips, you are more likely to see a wide range of stack sizes at your table in an MTT than in a cash game. You are also more likely to encounter shorter stacks in general, and to see your own stack size fluctuate in strategically significant ways. Thus, understanding the strategic implications of a larger or smaller effective stack as well as of various stack distributions around the table is a far more important skill in MTTs than in cash game play . The most important thing to understand is the power of moving all in, which enables a player to deny equity to opponents while guaranteeing full equity realization for themselves. With all but your strongest hands, you will be incentivized to find opportunities for moving all in yourself while avoiding situations where opponents can easily deny you equity by moving all in on you . You can learn more about these tactics in this article . A useful heuristic is that the shorter stacks at the table usually have an advantage because of their

reduced risk of moving all in . With short stacks behind you, you must play somewhat tighter than you otherwise would because of the risk of one of them moving all in. When you are one of the shorter stacks at the table, you can move all in somewhat wider than you would if everyone had a stack of your size, because players who call your shove will not be all in themselves. When all players have 9BB , the CO shoves 31.6% of hands: MTT cEV – CO 31.6% Push – 9BB Symmetrical When the players behind have deeper stacks (29, 21, and 32BB, respectively), the CO can shove 35.3% of hands. CO risks the same 9BB in both scenarios, but the players behind must take on greater risk when they have more chips. If the SB calls the shove, they are putting in nearly half their stack and so effectively committing 21BB to the pot should the BB wake up with a strong hand. MTT cEV – CO 35.3% Push – Stacks: CO 9, BTN 29, SB 21, BB 33 Notice that CO pushes wider when players behind them are deeper? 🤔‼ The BTN has room to call and still fold some hands to a BB shove, but even that comes at a cost. Those hands the BTN folds have a chance of winning, which means they lose equity when they fold to BB. The risk of being denied that equity discourages calls from some hands that could have called if BTN also had just 9BB. This does not mean a short stack is more valuable than a larger one. On the contrary, a player with more chips is more likely to win a larger prize, so the cash value of their stack is greater. However, when contesting a pot, the short stack does enjoy some advantages that make it a bit easier for them to accumulate chips. Folding is +EV In a cash game, if you fold, you win nothing. That means any play with a positive expectation, no matter how small, is better than folding. In a tournament, survival has value. That means folding has a positive expectation, not $0 as in a cash game. In a tournament, survival has value. Whenever another player is eliminated, the value of your stack increases, even if you were not the player who took their chips . You are now that much closer to locking up the next prize. The closer you are to a pay jump, the more it’s worth it to you to fold and let other players take risks against each other. You should only contest a pot by calling or raising if you believe the EV of doing so to be greater than the EV of folding. Although you will not be able to calculate these values precisely at the table, you can build intuition around them by studying charts calculated using the Independent Chip Model, or ICM. Here is the CO’s opening strategy with 20BB stacks and 50% of the field remaining , which raises 30.7%

of hands: MTT ICM (50% field remains) – CO Open – 20BB Symmetrical Compare this to the CO’s opening strategy with 20BB stacks and 25% of the field remaining : MTT ICM (25% field remains) – CO Open – 20BB Symmetrical CO tightens up to 28.6% of hands, and hands that were at the margins of their opening range with 50% remaining (44, K4 ♠ , Q6 ♠ ) now strictly prefer to fold. Slightly stronger hands (55, K6 ♠ , Q7 ♠ ), which were pure opens with 50% remaining, are now on the margins and indifferent between raising and folding. This reflects not so much a reduction in the value of opening these hands as an increase in the value of folding them. ICM EV is measured as the change to your table equity percentage compared to folding. Table equity percentage is your portion of the table’s $EV in a tournament. For example, if your stack is worth $100 after folding, and the sum of the $EV value of everyone’s stack at your table is $1000, then your table equity percentage is 10%. In the picture above, AA has an EV of 2.95, meaning you’d increase your table equity by 2.95% after raising. This may seem like a modest difference – the CO opens only about 5% tighter in the second scenario–but keep in mind that with 25% of the field remaining, the first pay jump, the bubble, is not especially close, and already we see CO adjusting with slightly more conservative play. There are extreme examples on the exact bubble where folding KK or even AA can be correct. You will only be able to approximate the value of folding in a given situation, but it is valuable to know how to do so. Following are the major factors that determine the value of folding. Factors That Determine the Value of Folding Proximity to a pay jump – The closer you are to locking up a larger prize, the more incentive you have to avoid risk until it is locked up. The larger the pay jump, the greater your incentive. Presence of short stacks – The value of folding lies in the possibility of other players getting eliminated before you. The more short stacks there are in the field (not just at your table), the more value there is in folding and giving them the opportunity to bust before you. Your stack size – The more chips you have, the less likely you are to lose them all in a given hand, which reduces your incentive to fold. This is especially true if no one else at your table covers you. Players remaining – The incentive to take risk is to accumulate chips and give yourself a better chance of winning one of the largest prizes for the top few finishers. The closer you are to those prizes, the more incentive there is to take those risks. When dozens or even hundreds of players remain, accumulating chips does not greatly increase your odds of winning a large prize, so

you have less incentive to take risks. Opponent Skill – If the other remaining players understand tournament strategy, they will share your risk aversion, making it less likely they will take risks against one another after you fold. If you believe other players will take incorrect risks, this increases the value of folding for you. Your Last Chips Are The Most Valuable There’s an old saying that all you need to win a tournament is a chip and a chair. As long as you remain in the tournament, no matter how short your stack, there is a chance you will win a prize. There is even a chance you will win the whole thing – Greg Merson won the 2012 WSOP Main Event after being reduced to just a few big blinds on Day 5. Another way of conceptualizing this is that your last chip is the most valuable, and each subsequent chip added to your stack is worth somewhat less. Your last chip is the most valuable, and each subsequent chip added to your stack is worth somewhat less. In a cash game, if you have one hundred $5 chips, your stack is worth exactly $500. If you lose half of them, your stack will be worth $250. If you double up, your stack will be worth $1000. The value of these chips is linear. Not so in a tournament. If you bought into a tournament for $500 and received 500 chips, your stack would be worth $500 (ignoring rake). If you doubled up to 1000 chips, however, your stack would be worth less than $1000. The new chips you added are worth less than the ones you already had. Conversely, if you lost half your stack, your remaining 250 chips would be worth more than $250, because you still have the most valuable chips, which are the last ones. It follows from this that you should be especially conservative as a short stack . While it can be frustrating and boring to grind a short stack, especially if you ended up short as a result of a bad beat, it is important to recognize those last few chips still represent a lot of equity and should be invested with care. “Rounding to zero” or throwing the last of your chips all in on the first halfway decent hand you see is an expensive mistake . We have seen that short stacks enjoy an advantage over their opponents. That means you will find a profitable opportunity to invest the last of your chips if you are patient. There is no reason to take a subpar spot out of desperation. If you keep getting dealt bad cards, and someone raises in front of you whenever you get decent ones, you should keep folding 👐 Eventually, one of two things will happen: Either you will get a good opportunity (your next hand could always be Aces!) or You will blind down to the point where more and more hands become profitable investments. When you have just a few blinds left, you can play

almost any hand from any position profitably thanks to the antes. Of course, you hope a better opportunity will come along before that, but if it does not, the best thing you can do is fold and wait 👌⌚ Conclusion Tournaments may seem more fast-paced and action-oriented than cash games, but this is often due to the presence of short stacks and antes, which encourage players to contest more pots. If we were to compare cash games with comparable stack sizes and antes, we would see even more action because there would not be the same incentive for risk aversion and survival. Knowing when to take risks and when to let others take risks is what separates skilled tournament players from those who only understand the general principles of poker theory. GTO Wizard the #1 App for Poker players Study any spot imaginable Practice by playing vs. GTO Analyze your hands with 1-click START CRUSHING NOW JOIN DISCORD Author Andrew Brokos Andrew Brokos has been a professional poker player, coach, and author for over 15 years. He co-hosts the Thinking Poker Podcast and is the author of the Play Optimal Poker books, among others. Latest article Preflop Raise Sizing: Examining 2 Key Factors It amazes me that, after nearly twenty years of playing no-limit hold ‘em professionally, I… How to Handle Loose-Passive Limpers Solver charts and presolved solutions do not offer much in the way of explicit guidance… Top 5 Mistakes in Spin & Gos As a Spin and Go poker coach, I regularly encounter common mistakes that players make,… An Introduction to Spin & Gos I was playing Tournaments for the first decade of my career. But after my first… Relationships and Poker In my more than 15 years of poker coaching, I’ve helped hundreds of clients improve… Do Multiple Sizes Matter? Should I work out the other tools or just stick to the crowbar? Solver results… The Science of Learning Applied to GTO Wizard The way we were taught to study in schools was flawed and has negatively impacted… Check-Raising a Single Pair In this article, I will address a question raised by Twitter/X user ’Matt Riley’, who… The Turn Probe Bet Imagine yourself defending as the BB caller vs BTN preflop raiser in a 100bb cash… When To Encourage Multiway Pots in PKOs I was recently shown this fascinating PKO hand from the GTO Wizard PKO library. Somebody… Protect Equity and Prosper When we think about the best hands to bet in a given situation, we tend… Do Solvers Have Targets? Targeting has long been a staple of exploitative poker thinking. When you’re value betting against… Disciplining Big Blind in Limped Pots When the BTN open-limps off a short stack, the postflop play against the BB should… I’d Rather Be Drawing Which is the better hand on a K♥8♦5♦ flop: K♠T♣ or 7♥6♥? OK, I’ll admit… The Curious Case of Open-Limping Buttons Before the advent of solvers, open-limping was considered the province of passive, gambley recreational players… Cleaning Out Sticky IP Callers A “sticky” player on your left, one

who calls your preflop raises too often and… Defending Against Tiny 3-Bets Tournament poker is about precision. Cash games, where stacks typically run into the hundreds of… Heads up! Exploiting SB’s Preflop Mistakes Heads up (HU) tournament play presents unique challenges to the average player. Many tournament players,… C-Betting As the OOP Preflop Raiser Position is an extremely valuable advantage in poker. Most players would describe the comfort zone… Overchoice: Making Sense of Multiple Sizings Solver solutions with multiple bet sizes often involve a lot of mixing between those sizes,… River Refinements: When Your Opponent Won’t Check-Raise One of the biggest strategic differences between playing in versus out of position involves betting… Turn Barreling in 3-Bet Pots There are two articles on the GTO Wizard blog that make good prerequisites to this… The Right Way To Think About Protection Suppose Paul the Protector is in a 200bb cash game and opens A♠A♣ in the… The Importance of Board Coverage The first public version of the GTO Wizard announced AI upgrade already has some useful… How To Adjust When Villain Has No Bluffs “They always have it!” is a common, semi-joking expression in poker to describe the tendency… Adjusting on Later Streets After Exploiting Flop The key to exploiting opponents profitably is knowing when to stop. I’m not referring to… C-Betting IP vs Passive Poker Players A preflop raiser enjoys a significant range advantage over a BB caller, enabling them to… C-Betting Against ICM Preflop Ranges You raise from early position (EP) in a multi-table tournament and the BB calls. Both… The Art of Bluff Catching Bluff catching—calling a bet with a modest hand which you expect to win only if… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by IP On some flops, it is simply not possible for the preflop raiser to continuation bet… Is Limping Pimping? In a past Discord post, one of our members noted that an upside of implementing… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by OOP A preflop raiser who continuation bets too often is always a potential target for exploitation,… Preflop Button Mastery in PKOs Playing from the Button presents many unique opportunities in any tournament format, especially in PKOs.… The Worst Turn Card Greetings from GTO land. In today’s article, we will use the Turn Reports feature to… Navigating Range Disadvantage as the 3-Bettor Picture this: We’re playing a NL500 6-max cash game, and we’ve won a few pots,… Mastering Three-Bet Pots In Position in MTTs Playing in position against a three-better is a lesson in playing to your advantages. As… Mastering Three-Bet Pots Out of Position in MTTs Three-bet pots are scary. Playing out of position is scary. Put them together, and you’ve… The Greatest Final Table in Triton History Today, we’ll examine one of the most epic final table battles I’ve ever witnessed! Our… Mastering Thin Value Bets in Checked-Down Pots Valuing your hand appropriately—determining whether it’s strong enough to value bet or so weak you… Maximizing Value on Monotone Flops Monotone flops tend to provoke great anxiety among poker players. It’s easy to imagine that… How to Defend Against Turn

Donk Bets Responding effectively to donk bets on the turn is tricky;, there’s no getting around that.… How and Why You Should Use Turn Donk Bets Donk betting–taking the betting lead away from the previous street’s aggressor–on the flop is rarely… How Stack Sizes Change Your Range In this series, we have looked at factors that can influence ranges in otherwise identical… How to Leverage GTO Wizard’s EV Comparison Tool With the advent of solvers, some troubling new turns of phrase have entered the poker… Should You Ever Cold Call a 3-Bet? When there’s been a raise and re-raise before the action is on you, you will… When ICM Breaks Down If you have read my previous GTO Wizard articles and my books, you’ll know I… When Is It Correct To Fold AA Preflop? One of the criticisms of ICM is that it is boring and robotic. In my… OOP C-betting vs Loose Cold-callers In a previous GTO Wizard article, I asserted that “Playing against an in-position cold-caller is… Short-Stacked Play in MTTs Playing a short stack well is an essential tournament skill. It is extremely rare to… When To Ladder in Tournaments In my last two articles, I wrote about the effect field size and payout structure… How Payout Structures Impact ICM Last time we discussed the ICM considerations in game selection, we looked at field size,… C-Betting IP in 3-Bet Pots When you three-bet before the flop and the original raiser calls from out of position,… C-Betting OOP in 3-Bet Pots Continuation betting from out of position can be a dicey proposition in single-raised pots. Cold… Dynamic Sizing: A GTO Breakthrough Dynamic Sizing is a revolutionary new poker algorithm that automatically simplifies your strategy with the… Dynamic Sizing Benchmarks Dynamic Sizing is a revolutionary new poker algorithm that automatically simplifies your strategy with the… Understanding The Impact Of Field Size On ICM In Poker When people talk about game selection in multi-table tournaments (MTTs), they invariably talk about the… Defending vs BB Check-Raise on Paired Flops This is a companion piece to Attacking Paired Flops from the BB; you will get… Mastering PKO Final Tables Final tables can be the most exciting and rewarding phase of a tournament, and being… Attacking Paired Flops From the BB Paired flops present unique challenges to both a preflop raiser and a BB caller. The… KK vs QQ vs JJ at WSOP Main Event With only fourteen players remaining in the 2023 WSOP Main Event and blinds of 400K/800K/800K,… Responding to BB Squeezes You open raise, someone calls, and the BB squeezes. How should you construct your strategy?… Crushing a Top HUNL Poker Bot In 2022, Philippe Beardsell and Marc-Antoine Provost, a team of Canadian programmers from Quebec, developed… GTO Wizard AI Explained We are excited to introduce GTO Wizard AI, formerly known as Ruse, the world’s best… GTO Wizard AI Benchmarks GTO Wizard has combined the power of artificial intelligence with traditional solving methods to bring… Table Management in PKOs Perhaps the most important strategic consideration in Progressive Knockout Tournaments (PKOs) is making

sure you… Overcalling From the BB In poker, overcalling refers to calling a bet or raise after another player has also… Understanding Which Mistakes Cost You the Most Money I am fortunate enough to have worked for many years with the mental game coach… Overbetting The Flop in Cash Games Although most commonly analyzed on turns and rivers, flop overbetting can be a devastating weapon… Using New Skills at the Poker Table How many times has it happened to you that you make a mistake only to… Flatting Ace-X Hands Shortstacked Playing out of position is tricky, but it’s an essential part of tournament play. With… Playing Limped Pots as the BB in MTTs Success as the BB in limped pots begins before the flop. The BB’s equilibrium strategy… The Absurd Game Theory of Chopped Boards A “chopped board” in poker is one where the community cards make up the best… Playing Limped Pots as the SB in MTTs MTT confrontations between the small blind and big blind force no-limit players into uncomfortable situations,… The Art of Learning Poker In his book The Art of Learning, chess and Push Hands champion Josh Waitzkin describes… Is Donk Betting for Donkeys? “Donk betting”, or betting from out of position into the player who was the aggressor… Delayed C-Betting This is a companion piece to Probe Betting. It stands on its own, but understanding… Probe Betting As far as rules of thumb go in poker, “check to the raiser” is a… ICM and Blind Battles: The Big Blind This is a companion piece to this article on the SB’s strategy for blind vs… ICM and Blind Battles: The Small Blind ICM incentivizes more conservative play, which means that at stages of the tournament where risk… The Initial Bettor’s Advantage The mathematics of poker holds a little-known secret: the first bettor enjoys better bluffing odds… Mastering the Chiplead: The Scalpel and the Sledgehammer When you have a lot of chips at a final table or in another situation… Flop Heuristics: IP C-Betting in Cash Games Our never-ending quest for money and fame leads us to the flop. We open the… How ICM Impacts Restealing From The Blinds When I first started working with preflop solves, one of the features I found most… The ICM Benefits of Late Registration in Poker Tournaments Why do so many professional poker players register late for tournaments when they clearly would… Flop Heuristics: OOP C-Betting in MTTs Playing against an in-position cold-caller is dramatically different–and dramatically more difficult–than playing against a caller… Counterintuitive Calls Solver outputs such as those provided by GTO Wizard are models of no-limit hold ‘em,… How To Negotiate Final Table Deals Most people’s first introduction to the Independent Chip Model (ICM) is not from studying bubble… How does ICM impact PKO strategy? If you have read The Theory of Progressive Knockout Tournaments you already know why we… Understanding Blockers in Poker Often when looking through a solver’s meticulously crafted grid of deception, one of the following… Flop Heuristics: IP Cold-Caller in MTTs A Cold-call refers to the

act of calling a preflop raise when you don’t close… Flop Heuristics: IP C-Betting in MTTs In the world of poker, the flop is a crucial stage of the game that… Flop Heuristics for Defending the Blinds in MTTs The field of Game Theoretically Optimal poker is extensive, and thus, to simplify our strategy,… Multiway strategy in Progressive Knockout Tournaments Progressive Knockout (PKO) tournaments are much more complex than traditional MTTs. The fact that players… How To Calculate Raises In Poker One of the most frequently asked questions in poker is how to calculate the size… Principles of River Play The river offers the least complicated strategy of any betting street. With no further cards… Exploitative Dynamics GTO solutions are designed to be unexploitable, performing reasonably well no matter how your opponents… How ICM Impacts Postflop Strategy Most players understand how the Independent Chip Model (ICM) in poker impacts their strategy preflop,… 10 Tips for Multiway Pots in Poker While lots of work has been placed into research and explanation of heads-up pot strategy,… What is the Bubble Factor in poker tournaments? The Independent Chip Model (ICM) shows us the real money implications of tournament chip decisions.… The Theory of Progressive Knockout Tournaments In poker, a PKO (Progressive Knockout) tournament is a type of tournament where a portion… How To Analyze Turn Textures In Poker Master the art of turn analysis in poker. Understand how the turn card changes the… Principles of Turn Strategy Learn the principles of turn strategy in poker and discover what makes the turn unique.… Poker Strategies: Tournaments vs. Cash Games Tournament poker is not as different from cash game poker as people sometimes assume. Most… How Solvers Work A Game Theory Optimal solver is an algorithm that calculates the best possible poker strategy.… The Most Powerful Play in Poker The central strategic implication of stack depth is the question of how much equity a… When does ICM become significant in MTTs? The Independent Chip Model (ICM) was invented in 1987 by M. Malmuth and is one… How to Study GTO Solutions Tools like GTO Wizard and other solvers should not be used to memorize specific strategies.… Principles of GTO Game theory, or GTO (for Game Theoretically Optimal), is best understood not as a rigid… Interpreting Equity Distributions GTO Wizard’s range vs range equity distribution graphs are an excellent tool for visualizing which… What is Leverage in poker? Leverage refers to the risk of future betting. When you call a bet on the… Reasons for value betting in poker You’re probably accustomed to thinking of bets as either value or bluff. In this taxonomy,… The Science of Poker Performance Poker is a game of small edges and big swings. Every hand is an investment… What is Valor in poker? Can a poker hand be courageous? How does your ability to value bet future streets… Pot Geometry “Pot Geometry” refers to betting an equal fraction of the pot on each street, such… A Beginner’s Guide to Poker Combinatorics Combinatorics is a fancy term for evaluating the number of possible

“combinations” (combos) of any… Stack-to-pot ratio Stack-to-pot ratio, or SPR, is a way of measuring how deep the effective stack is… Equity Realization In poker jargon, equity expresses how much of the pot a hand will win, on… Variance and Bankroll Management Variance and Bankroll Management. Vital Soft Skills for Every Poker Player. How to Become a GTO Wizard Welcome to the wonderful world of game theory optimal poker! This article will serve as… The Three Laws of Indifference Indifference in poker is one of the most misunderstood concepts. The word “indifference” means that… Poker subsets and abstractions An “abstraction” is a way to simplify the game of poker. This game is so… Mathematical Misconceptions in Poker Pot Odds and MDF are foundational mathematical formulas in poker. How to solve toy games Poker is a complicated game. It’s impossible to calculate GTO strategies on the fly. By… The Value of Fold Equity – Experiment The term “fold equity” is ambiguous in the poker community. Firstly, it’s an EV equation,… MDF & Alpha MDF & Alpha. Minimum Defence Frequency and Alpha are metrics on poker that determine how… What are Pot Odds in poker? Pot odds are a fundamental calculation in poker. In the simplest terms, pot odds tell… Does your range affect your strategy? Advanced players will often tell you that your range affects your strategy. Visualizing implied odds Implied odds are the value you expect to gain over and above your raw equity.… ICM Basics As a tournament player, you may have heard about the concept of “ICM”, but what… What is Equity in Poker? The term “Equity” is ubiquitous throughout poker theory. Equity refers to your chances of winning… Range Morphology “Morphology” is the study of form or structure. You’ve probably heard terms thrown around such… What is Expected Value in Poker? Expected value (EV) is the most fundamental metric in poker. Every decision you make is… Why doesn’t my solution match GTO Wizard? So, you’ve got your own solutions to some spot, compared it to GTO Wizard, and… Understanding Nash Distance Understanding Nash Distance. One of the most common questions when studying with solvers is “Why… Combinatorics Poker Puzzle Today we have a special puzzle for you that will test your intuition as a… The 10 Most Important Concepts for New Poker Players The 10 Most Important Concepts for New Poker Players. Fundamentals are one of the most… What is GTO in Poker? The meaning of GTO in poker is Game Theory Optimal. Game theory is a study… What does GTO aim to achieve? So what exactly is a GTO strategy? What makes it “unexploitable”? What does it try…

Building Exploits From Showdown CASH , Exploit Understanding how and when to exploit opponents at a live poker table is a delicate affair. It’s… 08/04/2024 13 min. / 30 sec.

Stack-to-pot ratio Stack-to-pot ratio, or SPR, is a way of measuring how deep the effective stack is and thus how strong of a hand will be required to risk that stack for a shot at winning the money already in the pot. It is, in other words, a calculation of risk and reward: the money in the effective stack is the most any player could be required to risk in order to win the reward, the pot. Sometimes, especially before the flop, you may see the size of the stack expressed in big blinds rather than SPR, but this is a less useful metric. It can be downright misleading to talk about risk without considering reward. SPR is defined as the effective stack (how much you can risk) divided by the pot: Equity and SPR With $100 in the pot, you see the flop against a single opponent, who promptly moves all-in for $100. What was the SPR at the moment you saw the flop, before your opponent bet? How much equity do you need to call the bet? With $100 in the effective stack and $100 in the pot, the SPR was $100/$100 = 1. Calling this bet requires contributing $100 to a final pot of $300, so you would need $100/$300 = 33% equity. If the SPR were 2, the bet would be $200, and you would need $200/$500 = 40% equity. At SPR 3, you would need $300/$700 = 43% equity to call a $300 bet. The more money you risk relative to what is already in the pot, the stronger a hand you must have to profit on the wager , (If you don’t understand these calculations, read this Pot Odds article first). This has a compounding effect, because your opponents need stronger hands to risk their stacks as the SPR gets higher. At SPR 1, your opponent could go all-in with a flush draw, which typically has about 35% equity, even if she knew you were never going to fold. Because her range can contain relatively weak hands, your own relatively weak hands will more easily reach the 33% threshold. At a higher SPR, you should expect your opponent’s hand to be stronger when her entire stack goes into the pot. That means not only do you need more equity to justify risking more money relative to the pot, but also that you are less likely to have that equity because your opponent’s range will be stronger. Equity Required to Breakeven By SPR The above chart reflects a scenario where all the money goes in at once, with no chance of a fold from either player. Breakeven Equity is defined as the pot odds required to call . At very low SPRs, that’s realistic. As stacks get deeper, the betting usually happens in more complex ways. One player bets a combination of hands with good equity plus some that just want the opponent to fold. Then the opponent raises ⇪, constructing her raising range with the same criteria, although she may not anticipate as much fold equity

and must expect to be against a stronger range if her raise is called. Then the original player may go all-in, again banking on a mix of folds plus pot equity and taking into account that if his all-in bet is called, his opponent will probably have a strong hand. Robustness Some hands hold their equity better than others as the opponent’s range gets stronger . This attribute is often called “equity retention” or “robustness”. Against a range of any pair and any draw—the sort of range with which an opponent might stack off at SPR 1—middle pair has pretty good equity. Against a range of top pair or better and only the strongest draws—a stack off range we might see at SPR 4—middle pair does not perform nearly so well. Bottom set has great equity against that SPR 4 stack off range, but at SPR 100 it should expect to be up against only higher sets, in which case it has just one out and so very poor equity. The magic of draws is that, while they are rarely dominating favorites in the way that a set can be, their equity is robust . It does not drop off precipitously as the opposing range gets stronger. Consequently, at high SPRs, draws are often better hands for building pots via betting and check-raising than marginal hands like middle pair. This is most true when the draw is to the nuts. Draws to weaker hands may still have robust equity against made hands, but they stack up poorly against stronger draws. As an opponent’s range gets stronger, draws to the nuts make up a larger part of it, increasing the likelihood that you lose the pot even if you complete your weaker draw and therefore reducing the equity of such hands. Stacking Off at Low SPR The chart below is from a BTN vs BB single raised pot, 14BB deep in an MTT , on a J ♥ 8 ♦ 5 ♥ flop. After the pre-flop action, there are 5.5BB in the pot and 12BB in the effective stacks, for an SPR just over 2 . Let’s examine BB’s response to BTN shoving the flop. Note that although the BTN rarely makes this bet at equilibrium, the solver strategy for responding to it is still valid. Any top pair or better is good enough to stack off, even with no fold equity, as are most second pairs and even a few lower pairs (some third pair calls if it also has a backdoor flush draw). Most flush draws can call, though the very weakest fold. While nine outs alone would not yield the requisite 40% equity to call, most of these draws have some chance of winning by making a pair as well, or, in the case of the nut flush draw, by already having the best hand. Open-ended straight draws can call if they also have a backdoor flush draw, but even the best gutshots fold. Stacking Off at Medium SPR Let’s compare that result to the same situation with 30BB effective

stacks , which yields an SPR of nearly 5 : At this higher SPR, stacking off with top pair starts to get a bit dicey, as does the nut flush draw. Open-ended straight draws are pure folds now, unless they also have a ♥ draw–backdoor ♦ no longer cuts it. In real-game situations, you are unlikely to face a 5x pot shove. It can be correct to stack off with some of these hands by calling several smaller bets or by raising, so that you can also benefit from fold equity. But this chart provides a nice demonstration of how stacking off standards get higher along with the SPR . Stacking Off With Deep Stacks Finally, we’ll look at the same scenario with an SPR of 16: All top pairs and all nut flush draws are now indifferent between calling and folding: even A ♥ Jx is not a pure call. Many combo draws remain pure, however: 9 ♥ 7 ♥ , 7 ♥ 6 ♥ , and any second pair with a flush draw are profitable calls. This is a good example of robustness. These hands retain more of their equity as the opponent’s range grows stronger, whereas made hands with little chance to improve start to drop off in value. An opponent putting in 16x the pot will often have sets, overpairs, or two pairs against which top pair fares poorly. Range Construction This is not a perfect, apples-to-apples comparison. Both players’ ranges for seeing the flop are slightly different at each SPR, as is the pot size (because the BTN uses slightly larger pre-flop raises with deeper stacks). But there is a lesson here as well: pre-flop ranges should be constructed with an eye toward post-flop play . The goal of NLHE is always to make a hand good enough to play for your entire stack, so it’s important to consider what “your entire stack” will mean in comparison to the pot. At 14BB, for instance, the BB sometimes slowplays the biggest pocket pairs by just calling pre-flop. This is because she can anticipate a very low SPR even in a single raised pot, and overpairs can comfortably stack off at that depth. As the stacks get deeper, the BB purely three-bets these hands pre-flop. Above SPR 4, stacking off with a single pair, no matter how strong, starts to get dicey. Thus, hands like KK, AA, and AK, which are very good at making one strong pair but rarely make anything stronger, prefer three-betting in part to ensure a lower SPR should they see a flop. GTO Wizard the #1 App for Poker players Study any spot imaginable Practice by playing vs. GTO Analyze your hands with 1-click START CRUSHING NOW JOIN DISCORD Author Andrew Brokos Andrew Brokos has been a professional poker player, coach, and author for over 15 years. He co-hosts the Thinking Poker Podcast and is the author of the Play Optimal Poker books, among others. Latest article Preflop Raise Sizing: Examining 2 Key Factors It amazes me that, after nearly twenty years of playing

no-limit hold ‘em professionally, I… How to Handle Loose-Passive Limpers Solver charts and presolved solutions do not offer much in the way of explicit guidance… Top 5 Mistakes in Spin & Gos As a Spin and Go poker coach, I regularly encounter common mistakes that players make,… An Introduction to Spin & Gos I was playing Tournaments for the first decade of my career. But after my first… Relationships and Poker In my more than 15 years of poker coaching, I’ve helped hundreds of clients improve… Do Multiple Sizes Matter? Should I work out the other tools or just stick to the crowbar? Solver results… The Science of Learning Applied to GTO Wizard The way we were taught to study in schools was flawed and has negatively impacted… Check-Raising a Single Pair In this article, I will address a question raised by Twitter/X user ’Matt Riley’, who… The Turn Probe Bet Imagine yourself defending as the BB caller vs BTN preflop raiser in a 100bb cash… When To Encourage Multiway Pots in PKOs I was recently shown this fascinating PKO hand from the GTO Wizard PKO library. Somebody… Protect Equity and Prosper When we think about the best hands to bet in a given situation, we tend… Do Solvers Have Targets? Targeting has long been a staple of exploitative poker thinking. When you’re value betting against… Disciplining Big Blind in Limped Pots When the BTN open-limps off a short stack, the postflop play against the BB should… I’d Rather Be Drawing Which is the better hand on a K♥8♦5♦ flop: K♠T♣ or 7♥6♥? OK, I’ll admit… The Curious Case of Open-Limping Buttons Before the advent of solvers, open-limping was considered the province of passive, gambley recreational players… Cleaning Out Sticky IP Callers A “sticky” player on your left, one who calls your preflop raises too often and… Defending Against Tiny 3-Bets Tournament poker is about precision. Cash games, where stacks typically run into the hundreds of… Heads up! Exploiting SB’s Preflop Mistakes Heads up (HU) tournament play presents unique challenges to the average player. Many tournament players,… C-Betting As the OOP Preflop Raiser Position is an extremely valuable advantage in poker. Most players would describe the comfort zone… Overchoice: Making Sense of Multiple Sizings Solver solutions with multiple bet sizes often involve a lot of mixing between those sizes,… River Refinements: When Your Opponent Won’t Check-Raise One of the biggest strategic differences between playing in versus out of position involves betting… Turn Barreling in 3-Bet Pots There are two articles on the GTO Wizard blog that make good prerequisites to this… The Right Way To Think About Protection Suppose Paul the Protector is in a 200bb cash game and opens A♠A♣ in the… The Importance of Board Coverage The first public version of the GTO Wizard announced AI upgrade already has some useful… How To Adjust When Villain Has No Bluffs “They always have it!” is a common, semi-joking expression in poker to describe the tendency… Adjusting on Later Streets After Exploiting Flop The key to exploiting opponents profitably is knowing when

to stop. I’m not referring to… C-Betting IP vs Passive Poker Players A preflop raiser enjoys a significant range advantage over a BB caller, enabling them to… C-Betting Against ICM Preflop Ranges You raise from early position (EP) in a multi-table tournament and the BB calls. Both… The Art of Bluff Catching Bluff catching—calling a bet with a modest hand which you expect to win only if… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by IP On some flops, it is simply not possible for the preflop raiser to continuation bet… Is Limping Pimping? In a past Discord post, one of our members noted that an upside of implementing… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by OOP A preflop raiser who continuation bets too often is always a potential target for exploitation,… Preflop Button Mastery in PKOs Playing from the Button presents many unique opportunities in any tournament format, especially in PKOs.… The Worst Turn Card Greetings from GTO land. In today’s article, we will use the Turn Reports feature to… Navigating Range Disadvantage as the 3-Bettor Picture this: We’re playing a NL500 6-max cash game, and we’ve won a few pots,… Mastering Three-Bet Pots In Position in MTTs Playing in position against a three-better is a lesson in playing to your advantages. As… Mastering Three-Bet Pots Out of Position in MTTs Three-bet pots are scary. Playing out of position is scary. Put them together, and you’ve… The Greatest Final Table in Triton History Today, we’ll examine one of the most epic final table battles I’ve ever witnessed! Our… Mastering Thin Value Bets in Checked-Down Pots Valuing your hand appropriately—determining whether it’s strong enough to value bet or so weak you… Maximizing Value on Monotone Flops Monotone flops tend to provoke great anxiety among poker players. It’s easy to imagine that… How to Defend Against Turn Donk Bets Responding effectively to donk bets on the turn is tricky;, there’s no getting around that.… How and Why You Should Use Turn Donk Bets Donk betting–taking the betting lead away from the previous street’s aggressor–on the flop is rarely… How Stack Sizes Change Your Range In this series, we have looked at factors that can influence ranges in otherwise identical… How to Leverage GTO Wizard’s EV Comparison Tool With the advent of solvers, some troubling new turns of phrase have entered the poker… Should You Ever Cold Call a 3-Bet? When there’s been a raise and re-raise before the action is on you, you will… When ICM Breaks Down If you have read my previous GTO Wizard articles and my books, you’ll know I… When Is It Correct To Fold AA Preflop? One of the criticisms of ICM is that it is boring and robotic. In my… OOP C-betting vs Loose Cold-callers In a previous GTO Wizard article, I asserted that “Playing against an in-position cold-caller is… Short-Stacked Play in MTTs Playing a short stack well is an essential tournament skill. It is extremely rare to… When To Ladder in Tournaments In my last two articles, I wrote about the effect field size and payout structure… How Payout Structures Impact ICM

Last time we discussed the ICM considerations in game selection, we looked at field size,… C-Betting IP in 3-Bet Pots When you three-bet before the flop and the original raiser calls from out of position,… C-Betting OOP in 3-Bet Pots Continuation betting from out of position can be a dicey proposition in single-raised pots. Cold… Dynamic Sizing: A GTO Breakthrough Dynamic Sizing is a revolutionary new poker algorithm that automatically simplifies your strategy with the… Dynamic Sizing Benchmarks Dynamic Sizing is a revolutionary new poker algorithm that automatically simplifies your strategy with the… Understanding The Impact Of Field Size On ICM In Poker When people talk about game selection in multi-table tournaments (MTTs), they invariably talk about the… Defending vs BB Check-Raise on Paired Flops This is a companion piece to Attacking Paired Flops from the BB; you will get… Mastering PKO Final Tables Final tables can be the most exciting and rewarding phase of a tournament, and being… Attacking Paired Flops From the BB Paired flops present unique challenges to both a preflop raiser and a BB caller. The… KK vs QQ vs JJ at WSOP Main Event With only fourteen players remaining in the 2023 WSOP Main Event and blinds of 400K/800K/800K,… Responding to BB Squeezes You open raise, someone calls, and the BB squeezes. How should you construct your strategy?… Crushing a Top HUNL Poker Bot In 2022, Philippe Beardsell and Marc-Antoine Provost, a team of Canadian programmers from Quebec, developed… GTO Wizard AI Explained We are excited to introduce GTO Wizard AI, formerly known as Ruse, the world’s best… GTO Wizard AI Benchmarks GTO Wizard has combined the power of artificial intelligence with traditional solving methods to bring… Table Management in PKOs Perhaps the most important strategic consideration in Progressive Knockout Tournaments (PKOs) is making sure you… Overcalling From the BB In poker, overcalling refers to calling a bet or raise after another player has also… Understanding Which Mistakes Cost You the Most Money I am fortunate enough to have worked for many years with the mental game coach… Overbetting The Flop in Cash Games Although most commonly analyzed on turns and rivers, flop overbetting can be a devastating weapon… Using New Skills at the Poker Table How many times has it happened to you that you make a mistake only to… Flatting Ace-X Hands Shortstacked Playing out of position is tricky, but it’s an essential part of tournament play. With… Playing Limped Pots as the BB in MTTs Success as the BB in limped pots begins before the flop. The BB’s equilibrium strategy… The Absurd Game Theory of Chopped Boards A “chopped board” in poker is one where the community cards make up the best… Playing Limped Pots as the SB in MTTs MTT confrontations between the small blind and big blind force no-limit players into uncomfortable situations,… The Art of Learning Poker In his book The Art of Learning, chess and Push Hands champion Josh Waitzkin describes… Is Donk Betting for Donkeys? “Donk betting”, or betting from out of position into the player who was the

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of tournament where a portion… How To Analyze Turn Textures In Poker Master the art of turn analysis in poker. Understand how the turn card changes the… Principles of Turn Strategy Learn the principles of turn strategy in poker and discover what makes the turn unique.… Poker Strategies: Tournaments vs. Cash Games Tournament poker is not as different from cash game poker as people sometimes assume. Most… How Solvers Work A Game Theory Optimal solver is an algorithm that calculates the best possible poker strategy.… The Most Powerful Play in Poker The central strategic implication of stack depth is the question of how much equity a… When does ICM become significant in MTTs? The Independent Chip Model (ICM) was invented in 1987 by M. Malmuth and is one… How to Study GTO Solutions Tools like GTO Wizard and other solvers should not be used to memorize specific strategies.… Principles of GTO Game theory, or GTO (for Game Theoretically Optimal), is best understood not as a rigid… Interpreting Equity Distributions GTO Wizard’s range vs range equity distribution graphs are an excellent tool for visualizing which… What is Leverage in poker? Leverage refers to the risk of future betting. When you call a bet on the… Reasons for value betting in poker You’re probably accustomed to thinking of bets as either value or bluff. In this taxonomy,… The Science of Poker Performance Poker is a game of small edges and big swings. Every hand is an investment… What is Valor in poker? Can a poker hand be courageous? How does your ability to value bet future streets… Pot Geometry “Pot Geometry” refers to betting an equal fraction of the pot on each street, such… A Beginner’s Guide to Poker Combinatorics Combinatorics is a fancy term for evaluating the number of possible “combinations” (combos) of any… Stack-to-pot ratio Stack-to-pot ratio, or SPR, is a way of measuring how deep the effective stack is… Equity Realization In poker jargon, equity expresses how much of the pot a hand will win, on… Variance and Bankroll Management Variance and Bankroll Management. Vital Soft Skills for Every Poker Player. How to Become a GTO Wizard Welcome to the wonderful world of game theory optimal poker! This article will serve as… The Three Laws of Indifference Indifference in poker is one of the most misunderstood concepts. The word “indifference” means that… Poker subsets and abstractions An “abstraction” is a way to simplify the game of poker. This game is so… Mathematical Misconceptions in Poker Pot Odds and MDF are foundational mathematical formulas in poker. How to solve toy games Poker is a complicated game. It’s impossible to calculate GTO strategies on the fly. By… The Value of Fold Equity – Experiment The term “fold equity” is ambiguous in the poker community. Firstly, it’s an EV equation,… MDF & Alpha MDF & Alpha. Minimum Defence Frequency and Alpha are metrics on poker that determine how… What are Pot Odds in poker? Pot odds are a fundamental calculation in poker. In the simplest terms, pot odds tell… Does your range affect your

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The Art of Bluff Catching Bluff catching—calling a bet with a modest hand which you expect to win only if your opponent is bluffing—is not a significant source of profit in most situations. It is often a roughly breakeven proposition against a well-constructed betting range, and even when it is profitable, it tends to be only by a slim margin. Bluff catching is not a significant source of profit. Much of the strategy in big bet poker games like No-Limit Hold’em and Pot Limit Omaha revolves around not ending up in spots where you’re making decisions about whether to call or fold with a bluff catcher in the first place. If you’re torn between calling and folding, then the EV of both options must be similar, which means your hand is basically worthless no matter which you choose. In this article, we will investigate why bluff catching is so unappealing , how to handle bluff catching decisions when you end up in a tough spot, and how to avoid ending up in that tough spot in the first place. When Bluff Catching is Worthless Perhaps you’ve heard of the AKQ game (sometimes called the Clairvoyance Clairvoyant A player that is clairvoyant knows their opponents exact range and strategy at all times. This term is commonly used in reference to solvers and toy games. Game). In this toy game , both players are dealt a single card from a deck containing one Ace, one King, and one Queen. They ante and are allowed to bet as they could in a real poker game. If the hand goes to showdown, the player with the highest card wins. Because hands never change value in this game, it is analogous to playing the river in hold ‘em. By analyzing how bluff catching works in this game and how much it is (not) worth, we can better understand bluff catching on the river in real poker situations. Then we can work backwards to think about bluff catching on earlier streets. Perhaps you’ve heard of the AKQ game (sometimes called the Clairvoyance Clairvoyant A player that is clairvoyant knows their opponents exact range and strategy at all times. This term is commonly used in reference to solvers and toy games. Game). In this toy game , both players are dealt a single card from a deck containing one Ace, one King, and one Queen. They ante and are allowed to bet as they could in a real poker game. If the hand goes to showdown, the player with the highest card wins. Because hands never change value in this game, it is analogous to playing the river in hold ‘em. By analyzing how bluff catching works in this game and how much it is (not) worth, we can better understand bluff catching on the river in real poker situations. Then we can work backwards to think about bluff catching on earlier streets. First, let’s think about the decisions you could face holding each card in the AKQ game : Queen – This is the nut low . It

will never win at showdown. You would never call a bet with this hopeless hand. The only decision is whether to bluff or resign yourself to losing at showdown. Ace – This is the nuts . When in position, you always bet . But even with the nuts, you can face a tricky decision when out of position. You could bet, hoping your opponent will call with a bluff catcher, or check, hoping they will bluff. King – This is your bluff catcher . That doesn’t mean you should definitely call bets with it, but calling is a legitimate option with a chance of winning the pot. What you should never do with this hand, however, is bet it. Unless your opponent fundamentally misunderstands the game, they will never fold the nuts nor call with the nut low, so betting accomplishes nothing. So, you get one easy decision with a bluff catcher (King): you always check it. If you are last to act, there’s nothing to worry about. You go straight to showdown and find out whether your hand is good. If not, you may have a tough decision if your opponent bets, but they are not necessarily going to bet, so you sometimes get a free showdown even after checking (and always win since your opponent would never check an Ace). If you’re interested in the details, the GTO Wizard blog has an entire article dedicated to solving variations of this game. The bottom line is that there is no correct answer whether to bluff with a Queen or bluff catch with a King. The GTO/unexploitable strategy for both hands is a mix Mixed Strategy To mix between different actions with the same hand. For example, if AK always bets 1/3 pot on K 9 6 in a BTN vs BB SRP scenario, this would be considered a pure action. If that same hand sometimes bets 1/3, sometimes bets 2/3 and sometimes checks, that would be a mixed strategy.. See indifference. of both options. With a King, the strategy is to always check and to call bets to reach Minimum Defense Frequency —a frequency of calls that makes your opponent indifferent Indifference Sometimes called the indifference principle, this game theory term means two or more actions have the same expected value. For example, a specific bluff-catcher might mix between calling and folding in a GTO solution – that bluffcatcher is said to be indifferent between calling and folding. See mixed strategy. to bluffing. An unexploitable GTO strategy is not intrinsically profitable. It could even be money-losing! It is essential to understand that these calls are not intrinsically profitable. They could even be money-losing! These calls’ profitability —or lack thereof— depends on your opponent’s bluffing frequency . If they bluff too much, your calls are profitable. If they don’t bluff enough, these calls lose money (but you make up the difference elsewhere by sometimes winning at showdown when you would have folded to a bluff). This unexploitable calling frequency is the optimal strategy only when you have no insight into how your

opponent will play. The fact that you are mixing between calls and folds means the two must have the same EV, which must be $0 since that is always the EV of folding (in a Chip EV environment). This is why bluff catching is worthless : even if your opponent bluffs when they’re supposed to, and you get your calling frequency precisely right, you still don’t make any more money than you would have if you had folded. Bluff Catching on the River In real hold ‘em situations, this dynamic is easiest to see on the river. Here’s an example where BB calls a raise from UTG in a 100bb cash game, checks and calls 76% pot on the A ♥ T ♦ 6 ♥ flop and 125% pot on the 4 ♠ turn, then checks and faces an all-in bet for just over 200% pot on the 2 ♥ river. Boxes appear on this grid as either fully green for hands which always call , fully blue for hands which always fold , or a mix of blue and green for hands which sometimes call and sometimes fold . That “sometimes” can mean one of two things: it may be that the hand either purely calls or purely folds depending on suits, or it may be that the hand is indifferent between calling and folding—the equivalent of a K in the AKQ game . The pure calls—the ones that are profitable rather than breakeven bluff catchers—are mostly flushes. The T9 s and T8 s that call are flushes, not second pair. T6 s, which makes two pair, is a pure fold. There are some pure calls from other hands, though it’s tough to tell from the grid. A9 and AT always fold without a heart but always call when they have one: This is not true for all the Ace-x, however. AQ always folds without the Q ♥ but is indifferent with it: The above grid shows Call with an EV of .01, but that’s just a convergence error . If calling were actually more profitable than folding, even by a tiny fraction, the solver would call every time. Not even all flushes are profitable bluff catchers. Check out the strategy for 5 ♥ 3 ♥ : Not even all flushes are profitable bluff catchers. What’s going on here? Why is the solver folding some two pair and sometimes even a flush but calling with some top pair? When Bluffcatching is Worthwhile Three factors could make calling this river shove profitable rather than breakeven: You expect to beat some of UTG’s value bets . In this case, your hand is not even technically a bluff catcher because the value of the call doesn’t only come from beating bluffs. With a pure bluff catcher, the sort that’s indifferent to calling, the money you expect to win from bluffs is exactly equal to the money you expect to lose to value bets. When you call with J ♥ 4 ♥ , you aren’t a lock to win, but you will win more, on

average, than you lose because you beat all the bluffs plus the occasional lower flush. You block more value hands than bluffs . When UTG shoves, they either have a flush or they are bluffing. This is why top pair is not necessarily worse for calling than two pair, a set or even a low flush. All these hands beat bluffs equally well and lose to all the same flushes. When you hold the T ♥ , however, you have secret information . You know your opponent does not hold T ♥ 8 ♥ , but they do not know you know that. They therefore bluff at a higher frequency, as if they could have T ♥ 8 ♥ and similar hands. You profit from all those bluffs while knowing you won’t be shown the value hands as often as you would with a worse bluff catcher. You expect your opponent to bluff too often . To make your bluff catchers indifferent to calling, your opponent must bluff exactly in proportion to the pot odds their bet offers. If they bluff too much, all your bluff catches become (slightly) profitable. If they bluff too little, then you lose money by bluff catching. This third point is exploitative in nature. It requires you to wager on a belief about your opponent’s strategy . If your belief is correct, you do better than you would with an unexploitable calling strategy. If it is incorrect, you do worse. You won’t always be able to make such a prediction, but when you are, it can easily override the first two points. If your opponent does not bluff enough, you could lose money not only by calling with pure bluff catchers, but even by calling with hands that have good blocking effects or that beat a few hands they thought they were betting for value. This is because bluff catching , even when you have the ideal catcher against an opponent who bluffs perfectly, is just not that profitable . The best-case scenario usually gains EV equal to only a tiny fraction of what you risk on the call. You also are not guaranteed profitable bluff catches , even at equilibrium, just because you meet the above criteria. Remember that AQ with the Q ♥ , in our example, mixed calls and folds despite blocking some value hands. This was partly because it also blocked some bluffs—the Q ♥ is also a good blocker for UTG to hold when they bluff. Blockers are often easy enough to come by and have a marginal enough effect that an equilibrium bluffing strategy makes you indifferent to calling when you have them and strictly prefer folding when you don’t. Bluff Catching Before the River The biggest difference between real poker and the AKQ game is that hands can change value from street to street . Before the river, this is often the most important factor when considering whether to call with a bluff catcher: could this hand improve to something nutty? This comes back to the idea that you want

to avoid ending up in a marginal spot where you’re making decisions about whether to call or fold with a bluff catcher. You don’t want a K in the AKQ game ; you want an A . Sometimes, in pursuit of an A , you end up with a K . When that happens, you must make the best of it. But the chance of improving to an A is worth a lot. Could this hand improve to something nutty? Here is BB’s turn strategy facing a 125% pot bet on A ♥ T ♦ 6 ♥ 4 ♠ : With the exception of AQ and AK , which beat some value hands, top pair is indifferent between calling and folding. Nut flush draws always fold unless they have a straight draw as well. Yet lower flush draws with a pair like 5 ♥ 4 ♥ and Q ♥ T ♥ never fold . Despite being lower ranked and having worse blockers than A9 , these hands always call (or raise). Neither the draw nor the bluff catching value alone is enough to make calling profitable. It is the combination of improving to a flush or showing down the best hand unimproved that gets these hands over the line. In fact, BB starts folding top pair as early as the flop when they don’t have a significant redraw Redraw To have a made hand but also a draw to a better hand. to go along with it. Notice that A5 is indifferent to calling the 76% pot continuation bet unless it also has a backdoor flush draw: You may be more familiar with this concept than you realize. Suppose you’re on the button preflop, facing a raise from UTG. Would you rather call with 87 s or K7 o? It could go the other way if the bet were all-in, but with money behind, you probably prefer the 87 s. K7 o is a (slightly) above-average hand preflop, but it rarely turns into anything nutty. It often misses the flop entirely, and when it does hit, it makes tough-to-play hands like bottom pair or top pair with a bad kicker. 87 s may be the lower-ranked hand, but its potential to turn into a straight or flush makes it a better candidate for playing after the flop. It is never too soon to fold top pair. The same principle applies when you’re facing flop and turn bets. The more money remaining to be wagered, the more you should concern yourself with what the hand could turn into on later streets rather than its current rank. Contrary to popular belief, there is no prize for being ahead on the flop , nor is it “too soon” to fold top pair. Practical Bluff Catching What makes these two cards good for calling? Start with a rough sense of how often you ought to continue . This is primarily a function of the bet size relative to the pot—you should be more stubborn facing smaller bets—and range dynamics. If you started with a weaker range

than your opponent because of the action on earlier streets, then it is correct to fold more often. You may wish to factor in exploitative assumptions here as well. If you think your opponent will rarely bluff, then you should fold more often. Identify your never-folds . These are mostly either hands strong enough to beat some of your opponent’s value bets, or draws to nutty hands, though as we have seen, the draws alone may not be sufficient when facing large bets. You may call or raise with these hands—both “punish” your opponent’s bluffs—but you know you are not folding them. Identify additional bluff catching candidates as needed . If (and only if) the hands you identified in Step Two do not get you up to the point you wanted to be in Step One, then you search for additional bluff catchers. Look for hands with good blocking effects or potential to improve on future streets. Ideally, a combination of both. Gut check . Before you click ‘call‘ or push chips into the pot, articulate to yourself why you are calling with this hand. Your answer should not be something generic like “my opponent could be bluffing” because that’s got nothing to do with your cards. It’s a reason you should have a calling range, but it doesn’t tell you anything about whether your current hand belongs in that range. What makes these two cards good for calling? Planning Ahead The “gut check” described in Step Four above is especially valuable because it can help with future bluff catching decisions. For instance, when you articulate why you are calling the turn, you also plan ahead for the river. When you articulate why you are calling the turn, you also plan ahead for the river. Let’s return to that A ♥ T ♦ 6 ♥ 4 ♠ board again. When you call the turn with Q ♥ T ♥ , you are looking for one of two things. First, you are looking for a river card that helps you. A flush would be ideal, but even a Queen or Ten would give you enough equity to call a river bet. Second, you are looking for your opponent to check behind. If they do, you will occasionally win unimproved. If neither of those things happens—if you whiff the river and your opponent bets again—then you fold. Sure, it’s possible your opponent could be bluffing. But remember that you have different hands in your range to choose from, hands that did improve on this river or have better blockers, to pick off those bluffs. This hand’s job is not to catch those bluffs. This hand’s job is to dodge value bets by folding. Or, consider A ♦ 5 ♦ on the flop. Why are you calling the flop bet with this hand? “Because I have top pair” is not a helpful answer. It tells you nothing about what you will do on later streets. You’re calling because you might pick up a diamond draw on the turn, or your opponent might check the turn,

or they might bet small enough for your blocker to be relevant. If none of those things happens—if you whiff and your opponent overbets—then you fold even though they could easily be bluffing. Or, consider A ♦ 5 ♦ on the flop. Why are you calling the flop bet with this hand? “Because I have top pair” is not a helpful answer. It tells you nothing about what you will do on later streets. You’re calling because you might pick up a diamond draw on the turn, or your opponent might check the turn, or they might bet small enough for your blocker to be relevant. If none of those things happens—if you whiff and your opponent overbets—then you fold even though they could easily be bluffing. One of the ways you catch bluffs is by re-bluffing. Let’s try one more. Why is J ♥ 8 ♥ calling the flop? First and foremost, it’s hoping for some improvement on the turn. A heart would be ideal, but picking up a pair or even a straight draw will probably be enough to call another bet. Failing those things, it’s hoping for a check so it can either improve on the river or bluff. That’s right: one of the ways you “catch” bluffs is by re-bluffing . That could mean raising the current street or calling and bluffing later, should the right circumstances occur. Bluffing is not especially profitable, but then again, neither is bluff catching. This is yet another reason why a good draw with a backup plan of bluffing is better than a marginal made hand that will rarely be useful for anything but bluff catching on later streets. Either way, your backup plan isn’t worth much. At least the draw has the potential to turn into something valuable. Conclusion Bluff catching is not primarily about the rank of your hand . The only reason a hand would be “too strong to fold” would be if it beats hands your opponent could be value betting. If your opponent’s range is polarized around your hand—if you lose to all their value bets and beat all their bluffs—then your top pair catches bluffs just as well as sets do. On the river, bluff catching decisions mostly come down to what you block or unblock . Before the river, a hand’s potential to improve is a major factor, to such a degree that draws are sometimes better calling candidates than top pair! But reads can trump all of these considerations . Before you worry about blockers Blocker The card removal effect of holding a hole card that blocks a relevant portion of your opponent’s range. For example, holding the ace of spaces on a 3-spade board blocks the nut-flush and the nut-flush draw. See unblockers. and Minimum Defense Frequency Minimum Defense Frequency (MDF) The minimum percentage of your range that must be defended against a bet to prevent the opponent from profitably bluffing a 0% equity hand. Conversely related to alpha, MDF = 1 – alpha. MDF = 1/(s+1) where ‘s’ is the percentage of

the pot that is bet. For example, if villain bets half-pot, hero needs to defend 1/(0.5+1) = 66% of their range in order to remain unexploitable against a pure bluff. , consider whether you even want to bluff catch against this player in this spot. The best-case scenarios are rarely very profitable, and in the worst-case scenarios, calling big river bets with bluff catchers is lighting money on fire. If you’re not careful, everything you learn about game theory, blockers, and exploitability can be twisted into excuses for fishy calls. You should be at least as worried about whether calling is exploitable, as you are about whether folding is exploitable . GTO Wizard the #1 App for Poker players Study any spot imaginable Practice by playing vs. GTO Analyze your hands with 1-click START CRUSHING NOW JOIN DISCORD Author Andrew Brokos Andrew Brokos has been a professional poker player, coach, and author for over 15 years. He co-hosts the Thinking Poker Podcast and is the author of the Play Optimal Poker books, among others. Latest article Preflop Raise Sizing: Examining 2 Key Factors It amazes me that, after nearly twenty years of playing no-limit hold ‘em professionally, I… How to Handle Loose-Passive Limpers Solver charts and presolved solutions do not offer much in the way of explicit guidance… Top 5 Mistakes in Spin & Gos As a Spin and Go poker coach, I regularly encounter common mistakes that players make,… An Introduction to Spin & Gos I was playing Tournaments for the first decade of my career. But after my first… Relationships and Poker In my more than 15 years of poker coaching, I’ve helped hundreds of clients improve… Do Multiple Sizes Matter? Should I work out the other tools or just stick to the crowbar? Solver results… The Science of Learning Applied to GTO Wizard The way we were taught to study in schools was flawed and has negatively impacted… Check-Raising a Single Pair In this article, I will address a question raised by Twitter/X user ’Matt Riley’, who… The Turn Probe Bet Imagine yourself defending as the BB caller vs BTN preflop raiser in a 100bb cash… When To Encourage Multiway Pots in PKOs I was recently shown this fascinating PKO hand from the GTO Wizard PKO library. Somebody… Protect Equity and Prosper When we think about the best hands to bet in a given situation, we tend… Do Solvers Have Targets? Targeting has long been a staple of exploitative poker thinking. When you’re value betting against… Disciplining Big Blind in Limped Pots When the BTN open-limps off a short stack, the postflop play against the BB should… I’d Rather Be Drawing Which is the better hand on a K♥8♦5♦ flop: K♠T♣ or 7♥6♥? OK, I’ll admit… The Curious Case of Open-Limping Buttons Before the advent of solvers, open-limping was considered the province of passive, gambley recreational players… Cleaning Out Sticky IP Callers A “sticky” player on your left, one who calls your preflop raises too often and… Defending Against Tiny 3-Bets Tournament poker is about precision. Cash games, where

stacks typically run into the hundreds of… Heads up! Exploiting SB’s Preflop Mistakes Heads up (HU) tournament play presents unique challenges to the average player. Many tournament players,… C-Betting As the OOP Preflop Raiser Position is an extremely valuable advantage in poker. Most players would describe the comfort zone… Overchoice: Making Sense of Multiple Sizings Solver solutions with multiple bet sizes often involve a lot of mixing between those sizes,… River Refinements: When Your Opponent Won’t Check-Raise One of the biggest strategic differences between playing in versus out of position involves betting… Turn Barreling in 3-Bet Pots There are two articles on the GTO Wizard blog that make good prerequisites to this… The Right Way To Think About Protection Suppose Paul the Protector is in a 200bb cash game and opens A♠A♣ in the… The Importance of Board Coverage The first public version of the GTO Wizard announced AI upgrade already has some useful… How To Adjust When Villain Has No Bluffs “They always have it!” is a common, semi-joking expression in poker to describe the tendency… Adjusting on Later Streets After Exploiting Flop The key to exploiting opponents profitably is knowing when to stop. I’m not referring to… C-Betting IP vs Passive Poker Players A preflop raiser enjoys a significant range advantage over a BB caller, enabling them to… C-Betting Against ICM Preflop Ranges You raise from early position (EP) in a multi-table tournament and the BB calls. Both… The Art of Bluff Catching Bluff catching—calling a bet with a modest hand which you expect to win only if… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by IP On some flops, it is simply not possible for the preflop raiser to continuation bet… Is Limping Pimping? In a past Discord post, one of our members noted that an upside of implementing… Exploiting Excessive C-Betting by OOP A preflop raiser who continuation bets too often is always a potential target for exploitation,… Preflop Button Mastery in PKOs Playing from the Button presents many unique opportunities in any tournament format, especially in PKOs.… The Worst Turn Card Greetings from GTO land. In today’s article, we will use the Turn Reports feature to… Navigating Range Disadvantage as the 3-Bettor Picture this: We’re playing a NL500 6-max cash game, and we’ve won a few pots,… Mastering Three-Bet Pots In Position in MTTs Playing in position against a three-better is a lesson in playing to your advantages. As… Mastering Three-Bet Pots Out of Position in MTTs Three-bet pots are scary. Playing out of position is scary. Put them together, and you’ve… The Greatest Final Table in Triton History Today, we’ll examine one of the most epic final table battles I’ve ever witnessed! Our… Mastering Thin Value Bets in Checked-Down Pots Valuing your hand appropriately—determining whether it’s strong enough to value bet or so weak you… Maximizing Value on Monotone Flops Monotone flops tend to provoke great anxiety among poker players. It’s easy to imagine that… How to Defend Against Turn Donk Bets Responding effectively to donk bets on the turn is tricky;, there’s no getting around that.… How and Why

You Should Use Turn Donk Bets Donk betting–taking the betting lead away from the previous street’s aggressor–on the flop is rarely… How Stack Sizes Change Your Range In this series, we have looked at factors that can influence ranges in otherwise identical… How to Leverage GTO Wizard’s EV Comparison Tool With the advent of solvers, some troubling new turns of phrase have entered the poker… Should You Ever Cold Call a 3-Bet? When there’s been a raise and re-raise before the action is on you, you will… When ICM Breaks Down If you have read my previous GTO Wizard articles and my books, you’ll know I… When Is It Correct To Fold AA Preflop? One of the criticisms of ICM is that it is boring and robotic. In my… OOP C-betting vs Loose Cold-callers In a previous GTO Wizard article, I asserted that “Playing against an in-position cold-caller is… Short-Stacked Play in MTTs Playing a short stack well is an essential tournament skill. It is extremely rare to… When To Ladder in Tournaments In my last two articles, I wrote about the effect field size and payout structure… How Payout Structures Impact ICM Last time we discussed the ICM considerations in game selection, we looked at field size,… C-Betting IP in 3-Bet Pots When you three-bet before the flop and the original raiser calls from out of position,… C-Betting OOP in 3-Bet Pots Continuation betting from out of position can be a dicey proposition in single-raised pots. Cold… Dynamic Sizing: A GTO Breakthrough Dynamic Sizing is a revolutionary new poker algorithm that automatically simplifies your strategy with the… Dynamic Sizing Benchmarks Dynamic Sizing is a revolutionary new poker algorithm that automatically simplifies your strategy with the… Understanding The Impact Of Field Size On ICM In Poker When people talk about game selection in multi-table tournaments (MTTs), they invariably talk about the… Defending vs BB Check-Raise on Paired Flops This is a companion piece to Attacking Paired Flops from the BB; you will get… Mastering PKO Final Tables Final tables can be the most exciting and rewarding phase of a tournament, and being… Attacking Paired Flops From the BB Paired flops present unique challenges to both a preflop raiser and a BB caller. The… KK vs QQ vs JJ at WSOP Main Event With only fourteen players remaining in the 2023 WSOP Main Event and blinds of 400K/800K/800K,… Responding to BB Squeezes You open raise, someone calls, and the BB squeezes. How should you construct your strategy?… Crushing a Top HUNL Poker Bot In 2022, Philippe Beardsell and Marc-Antoine Provost, a team of Canadian programmers from Quebec, developed… GTO Wizard AI Explained We are excited to introduce GTO Wizard AI, formerly known as Ruse, the world’s best… GTO Wizard AI Benchmarks GTO Wizard has combined the power of artificial intelligence with traditional solving methods to bring… Table Management in PKOs Perhaps the most important strategic consideration in Progressive Knockout Tournaments (PKOs) is making sure you… Overcalling From the BB In poker, overcalling refers to calling a bet or raise after another player has

also… Understanding Which Mistakes Cost You the Most Money I am fortunate enough to have worked for many years with the mental game coach… Overbetting The Flop in Cash Games Although most commonly analyzed on turns and rivers, flop overbetting can be a devastating weapon… Using New Skills at the Poker Table How many times has it happened to you that you make a mistake only to… Flatting Ace-X Hands Shortstacked Playing out of position is tricky, but it’s an essential part of tournament play. With… Playing Limped Pots as the BB in MTTs Success as the BB in limped pots begins before the flop. The BB’s equilibrium strategy… The Absurd Game Theory of Chopped Boards A “chopped board” in poker is one where the community cards make up the best… Playing Limped Pots as the SB in MTTs MTT confrontations between the small blind and big blind force no-limit players into uncomfortable situations,… The Art of Learning Poker In his book The Art of Learning, chess and Push Hands champion Josh Waitzkin describes… Is Donk Betting for Donkeys? “Donk betting”, or betting from out of position into the player who was the aggressor… Delayed C-Betting This is a companion piece to Probe Betting. It stands on its own, but understanding… Probe Betting As far as rules of thumb go in poker, “check to the raiser” is a… ICM and Blind Battles: The Big Blind This is a companion piece to this article on the SB’s strategy for blind vs… ICM and Blind Battles: The Small Blind ICM incentivizes more conservative play, which means that at stages of the tournament where risk… The Initial Bettor’s Advantage The mathematics of poker holds a little-known secret: the first bettor enjoys better bluffing odds… Mastering the Chiplead: The Scalpel and the Sledgehammer When you have a lot of chips at a final table or in another situation… Flop Heuristics: IP C-Betting in Cash Games Our never-ending quest for money and fame leads us to the flop. We open the… How ICM Impacts Restealing From The Blinds When I first started working with preflop solves, one of the features I found most… The ICM Benefits of Late Registration in Poker Tournaments Why do so many professional poker players register late for tournaments when they clearly would… Flop Heuristics: OOP C-Betting in MTTs Playing against an in-position cold-caller is dramatically different–and dramatically more difficult–than playing against a caller… Counterintuitive Calls Solver outputs such as those provided by GTO Wizard are models of no-limit hold ‘em,… How To Negotiate Final Table Deals Most people’s first introduction to the Independent Chip Model (ICM) is not from studying bubble… How does ICM impact PKO strategy? If you have read The Theory of Progressive Knockout Tournaments you already know why we… Understanding Blockers in Poker Often when looking through a solver’s meticulously crafted grid of deception, one of the following… Flop Heuristics: IP Cold-Caller in MTTs A Cold-call refers to the act of calling a preflop raise when you don’t close… Flop Heuristics: IP C-Betting in MTTs In the world of

poker, the flop is a crucial stage of the game that… Flop Heuristics for Defending the Blinds in MTTs The field of Game Theoretically Optimal poker is extensive, and thus, to simplify our strategy,… Multiway strategy in Progressive Knockout Tournaments Progressive Knockout (PKO) tournaments are much more complex than traditional MTTs. The fact that players… How To Calculate Raises In Poker One of the most frequently asked questions in poker is how to calculate the size… Principles of River Play The river offers the least complicated strategy of any betting street. With no further cards… Exploitative Dynamics GTO solutions are designed to be unexploitable, performing reasonably well no matter how your opponents… How ICM Impacts Postflop Strategy Most players understand how the Independent Chip Model (ICM) in poker impacts their strategy preflop,… 10 Tips for Multiway Pots in Poker While lots of work has been placed into research and explanation of heads-up pot strategy,… What is the Bubble Factor in poker tournaments? The Independent Chip Model (ICM) shows us the real money implications of tournament chip decisions.… The Theory of Progressive Knockout Tournaments In poker, a PKO (Progressive Knockout) tournament is a type of tournament where a portion… How To Analyze Turn Textures In Poker Master the art of turn analysis in poker. Understand how the turn card changes the… Principles of Turn Strategy Learn the principles of turn strategy in poker and discover what makes the turn unique.… Poker Strategies: Tournaments vs. Cash Games Tournament poker is not as different from cash game poker as people sometimes assume. Most… How Solvers Work A Game Theory Optimal solver is an algorithm that calculates the best possible poker strategy.… The Most Powerful Play in Poker The central strategic implication of stack depth is the question of how much equity a… When does ICM become significant in MTTs? The Independent Chip Model (ICM) was invented in 1987 by M. Malmuth and is one… How to Study GTO Solutions Tools like GTO Wizard and other solvers should not be used to memorize specific strategies.… Principles of GTO Game theory, or GTO (for Game Theoretically Optimal), is best understood not as a rigid… Interpreting Equity Distributions GTO Wizard’s range vs range equity distribution graphs are an excellent tool for visualizing which… What is Leverage in poker? Leverage refers to the risk of future betting. When you call a bet on the… Reasons for value betting in poker You’re probably accustomed to thinking of bets as either value or bluff. In this taxonomy,… The Science of Poker Performance Poker is a game of small edges and big swings. Every hand is an investment… What is Valor in poker? Can a poker hand be courageous? How does your ability to value bet future streets… Pot Geometry “Pot Geometry” refers to betting an equal fraction of the pot on each street, such… A Beginner’s Guide to Poker Combinatorics Combinatorics is a fancy term for evaluating the number of possible “combinations” (combos) of any… Stack-to-pot ratio Stack-to-pot ratio, or SPR, is a way of measuring how deep the effective stack

is… Equity Realization In poker jargon, equity expresses how much of the pot a hand will win, on… Variance and Bankroll Management Variance and Bankroll Management. Vital Soft Skills for Every Poker Player. How to Become a GTO Wizard Welcome to the wonderful world of game theory optimal poker! This article will serve as… The Three Laws of Indifference Indifference in poker is one of the most misunderstood concepts. The word “indifference” means that… Poker subsets and abstractions An “abstraction” is a way to simplify the game of poker. This game is so… Mathematical Misconceptions in Poker Pot Odds and MDF are foundational mathematical formulas in poker. How to solve toy games Poker is a complicated game. It’s impossible to calculate GTO strategies on the fly. By… The Value of Fold Equity – Experiment The term “fold equity” is ambiguous in the poker community. Firstly, it’s an EV equation,… MDF & Alpha MDF & Alpha. Minimum Defence Frequency and Alpha are metrics on poker that determine how… What are Pot Odds in poker? Pot odds are a fundamental calculation in poker. In the simplest terms, pot odds tell… Does your range affect your strategy? Advanced players will often tell you that your range affects your strategy. Visualizing implied odds Implied odds are the value you expect to gain over and above your raw equity.… ICM Basics As a tournament player, you may have heard about the concept of “ICM”, but what… What is Equity in Poker? The term “Equity” is ubiquitous throughout poker theory. Equity refers to your chances of winning… Range Morphology “Morphology” is the study of form or structure. You’ve probably heard terms thrown around such… What is Expected Value in Poker? Expected value (EV) is the most fundamental metric in poker. Every decision you make is… Why doesn’t my solution match GTO Wizard? So, you’ve got your own solutions to some spot, compared it to GTO Wizard, and… Understanding Nash Distance Understanding Nash Distance. One of the most common questions when studying with solvers is “Why… Combinatorics Poker Puzzle Today we have a special puzzle for you that will test your intuition as a… The 10 Most Important Concepts for New Poker Players The 10 Most Important Concepts for New Poker Players. Fundamentals are one of the most… What is GTO in Poker? The meaning of GTO in poker is Game Theory Optimal. Game theory is a study… What does GTO aim to achieve? So what exactly is a GTO strategy? What makes it “unexploitable”? What does it try…

How to Leverage GTO Wizard’s EV Comparison Tool With the advent of solvers, some troubling new turns of phrase have entered the poker lexicon. In strategy discussions, I now routinely hear claims like: “The solver says you have to call here” or “GTO says you have to fold this”. Though I’ve been guilty of using similar language myself, I believe it represents a fundamental misunderstanding of what solvers are and how to use them. GTO Wizard provides strategic guidelines, not ironclad rules. Solvers and solver-based tools like GTO Wizard provide strategic guidelines, not ironclad rules. You don’t have to follow their solutions to a tee, nor should you. Their purpose is to help you make your decisions by providing insight into which strategic options you should consider and what the pros and cons of each might be. When working with solver solutions, you should take them as a starting point which you then filter through your own judgment, considering variables such as your opponent’s tendencies and your own strengths and weaknesses as a player. The default manner in which most solvers display strategy grids contributes to this misunderstanding. While most users recognize that mixed strategies represent close decisions, even pure strategies may be quite sensitive to small changes in the details of a situation, and this can be difficult to determine from a standard strategy grid where all the boxes are one of three or four colors. In this article, we will look at how GTO Wizard’s Compare EV view provides a more nuanced display of how close various decisions are. We will practice using it to make better decisions about defending the big blind when short-stacked in an MTT, but the methods described here will be helpful in many other situations as well. Do You Have to Defend Your BB? When facing a small raise in an MTT, a solver’s BB calling range can be intimidating. Thanks to the ante, you are getting very good odds to call, and your opponent should be opening a wider range. Consequently, it can be profitable to call with some quite weak hands, despite the fact that you will have to play postflop out of position. Understandably, many players are uncomfortable contesting the pot with hands like K5 o and 73 s. Do you really have to play these “ garbage hands ”? No, you don’t have to do anything. Remember, the solver is there to advise you, not to handcuff you. Better questions to ask are: How much would I be giving up, in theory, if I just folded? Is there a better option than folding that avoids the difficulties of calling? What would I need to do to make calling profitable? When facing a small raise in an MTT, a solver’s BB calling range can be intimidating. Thanks to the ante, you are getting very good odds to call, and your opponent should be opening a wider range. Consequently, it can be profitable to call with some quite weak hands, despite the fact that you will have to play postflop out of position.

Understandably, many players are uncomfortable contesting the pot with hands like K5 o and 73 s. Do you really have to play these “ garbage hands ”? No, you don’t have to do anything. Remember, the solver is there to advise you, not to handcuff you. Better questions to ask are: How much would I be giving up, in theory, if I just folded? Is there a better option than folding that avoids the difficulties of calling? What would I need to do to make calling profitable? Learning From the EV Comparison View The default ‘Strategy’ view displayed in GTO Wizard is of limited utility in determining just how exploitable folding a specific hand would be. It just shows which hands are profitable calls and which are not, but it does not provide much insight into how profitable or unprofitable those calls are, in theory. Perhaps you know that hands that mix call and fold have an equilibrium EV of 0, and that other hands toward the margins of your calling range are, well, marginal . But this kind of hierarchy is not apparent on the Strategy grid, where all your calling hands have the same color. For example, take a look at this response to a raise from a big stack on the BTN when you are a 25bb stack in the BB with 25% of the field remaining: All your calls are green, and it’s not immediately apparent which are more or less valuable or by how much . And more practically speaking, it’s not clear how to adapt this strategy to make it more useful to you. There are several ways to view the profitability of decisions. One is to select ‘Strategy+EV’ from the Strategy dropdown menu . Another method is to select ‘EV’ from that same menu. However, in this article, we’ll display a much more powerful way to examine values – GTO Wizard’s EV comparison tool . By changing the display to ‘Compare EV’ and comparing Fold to the Best Action , we get a clearer idea of what folding various hands would cost you: The dark red boxes are the most costly, the hands where folding would be a significant mistake . The numbers in the bottom right-hand corner of each box indicate exactly how much of the prize pool the solver expects these hands to earn by taking the best action. Some hands are so profitable in theory that you don’t have to play them anywhere near perfectly to make money with them. Another way of thinking about this is that these (dark red) hands are so profitable in theory that you don’t have to play them anywhere near perfectly to make money with them. If you make mistakes after the flop, you may not profit as much as the solver predicts, but you’ll make more than $0, which is what folding would get you. As you move into the lighter shades of red, the value gets harder to realize . And if the expected value was already only marginally profitable then it can quickly

turn into a losing defend. For example, if the raiser is a very good player or it isn’t clear to you how calling will make money, it may be correct to just fold these hands. Ultimately, your goal should be to improve your postflop skills so that you can play these hands profitably. Such folds are only “mistakes” in the theoretical sense. For you, an imperfect human player, folding may be the best option given your current skill level. Ultimately, your goal should be to improve your postflop skills so that you can play these hands profitably. But, you probably have many leaks–we all do–and the lighter the shade of red, the less you should be concerned with those particular hands. Is There a Third Way? There is another option besides calling and folding, which requires no postflop skill or decision-making whatsoever. By changing the EV comparison to All-in and Fold , we can see which hands you could profitably shove: Shoving is not necessarily the most profitable way to play these hands; this chart only indicates whether it’s better than folding, and by how much. But if you don’t feel comfortable calling against a tough opponent, you can shove any hand that is even the slightest bit green and expect to do better than if you folded it. For a more nuanced view, we can change the comparison to be between Allin and Best Action. The darker the red, the bigger a mistake it would be to shove rather than take the solver’s preferred action: Shoving AA would be a bigger mistake than shoving 72o! A “mistake” in this context does not necessarily mean that shoving is -EV, only that a more profitable option exists , in theory. That is why AA is actually one of the worst hands to shove. It’s better than folding, of course, but not nearly as good as a smaller three-bet. In fact, shoving AA would be a bigger mistake than shoving 72 o! Shoving 72 o loses 0.27% table equity Table equity Table equity represents the percentage of prize money (among players at your table) that your stack would win according to an ICM calculation. For example, if your stack is worth $200, and the players on your table have a combined ICM value of $1000, then your table equity is 20%. relative to folding it, which would be the best play for 72 o. Shoving AA loses 0.36% table equity Table equity Table equity represents the percentage of prize money (among players at your table) that your stack would win according to an ICM calculation. For example, if your stack is worth $200, and the players on your table have a combined ICM value of $1000, then your table equity is 20%. relative to a smaller reraise (best action for AA ). Shoving 72 o loses 0.27% table equity Table equity Table equity represents the percentage of prize money (among players at your table) that your stack would win according to an ICM calculation. For example, if your stack is worth $200, and the

players on your table have a combined ICM value of $1000, then your table equity is 20%. relative to folding it, which would be the best play for 72 o. Shoving AA loses 0.36% table equity Table equity Table equity represents the percentage of prize money (among players at your table) that your stack would win according to an ICM calculation. For example, if your stack is worth $200, and the players on your table have a combined ICM value of $1000, then your table equity is 20%. relative to a smaller reraise (best action for AA ). Exploiting Tight Opponents The above charts are best applied in cases where the reason you are reluctant to call is that the person raising your blind is a tough opponent. Such a player can be expected to have an appropriately aggressive opening range (and if they open too aggressively in an attempt to pick on your big blind, these shoves only go up in value). A tighter opener is more likely to have strong hands that can call your shove. If your reluctance to call is based on your opponent having an overly strong opening range, that’s a different story. The best exploit here will involve more folding , less calling , and less three-betting/shoving . The Fold chart given by setting the EV comparison between Fold and Best Action is still useful to tell you how exploitative a given fold would be, how much you’d be giving up if your read were wrong. But the Allin charts will not be so useful, because a tighter opener is more likely to have strong hands that can call your shove. This does not mean they are exploiting you if you do follow the GTO Wizard guidelines. You may lose some EV relative to what a maximally exploitative strategy Maximally Exploitative Strategy (MES) A strategy that will perfectly maximize value to take advantage of all your opponent’s mistakes. See Nemesis strategy. would earn, but you make that EV back, with interest, in other ways. Mostly, you benefit from your opponent’s tightness in subtle ways you won’t even see, like when you win a pot from the big blind with a hand you would have folded to a raise they failed to make. You benefit from your opponent’s tightness in subtle ways that aren’t obvious, because they are related to an action that did not take place. The Fold chart given by setting the EV comparison between Fold and Best Action is still useful to tell you how exploitative a given fold would be, how much you’d be giving up if your read were wrong. But the Allin charts will not be so useful, because a tighter opener is more likely to have strong hands that can call your shove. This does not mean they are exploiting you if you do follow the GTO Wizard guidelines. You may lose some EV relative to what a maximally exploitative strategy Maximally Exploitative Strategy (MES) A strategy that will perfectly maximize value to take advantage of all your opponent’s mistakes.

See Nemesis strategy. would earn, but you make that EV back, with interest, in other ways. Mostly, you benefit from your opponent’s tightness in subtle ways you won’t even see, like when you win a pot from the big blind with a hand you would have folded to a raise they failed to make. You benefit from your opponent’s tightness in subtle ways that aren’t obvious, because they are related to an action that did not take place. How Do I Make These Calls Profitable? Much of the discomfort around defending with “garbage hands” stems from not knowing how to capture the EV of solver-advised calls. There are two solutions to this dilemma: Much of the discomfort around defending with “garbage hands” stems from not knowing how to capture the EV of solver-advised calls. There are two solutions to this dilemma: Call anyway, accepting you won’t realize the full value anticipated by the solver. This is a good solution when calling promises a substantially higher EV than shoving or folding. In those cases, calling may be the best option even if you make some small mistakes after the flop. Luckily, the bulk of a call’s EV often comes from fairly obvious plays like calling a continuation bet when you flop a pair or draw. The less obvious lines also tend to be the less profitable ones , so it’s not the end of the world if you miss them. Shove or fold , depending on which is more profitable, and plan to study the spot later . This is the correct approach when calling is barely better, in theory, than the best alternative. In regards to studying the spot later, the “later” might mean quite a while later. Because the EV you’re giving up is minimal, improving your play in these situations should not be a priority. Your efforts would be more profitably spent elsewhere. However, if you’re eager to tackle those types of close spots and become better at capturing value with more marginal hands, there are some articles here on the GTO Wizard blog that can aid you in these studies. Counterintuitive Calls and Flatting Ace-x Hands Shortstacked both address this subject. Learn More GTO Wizard offers an enormous, potentially overwhelming amount of information. Fortunately, it also offers a wide variety of tools for visualizing that information. Learning to use those tools well will help you make practical use of this valuable information. Check out this video to learn more about how to use the EV comparison tool! GTO Wizard the #1 App for Poker players Study any spot imaginable Practice by playing vs. GTO Analyze your hands with 1-click START CRUSHING NOW JOIN DISCORD Author Andrew Brokos Andrew Brokos has been a professional poker player, coach, and author for over 15 years. He co-hosts the Thinking Poker Podcast and is the author of the Play Optimal Poker books, among others. Latest article Preflop Raise Sizing: Examining 2 Key Factors It amazes me that, after nearly twenty years of playing no-limit hold ‘em professionally, I… How to Handle Loose-Passive Limpers

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