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Diagram 27 With stack depths between 30-40bb, the BB wants to bet strong hands 73% of the time, good hands 64%, weak hands 59%, and trash hands are bet 49%. The most used donk bet-size is 1/4- pot, with 2/3-pot size bets used on average 5% (Diagram 27). If we allow bigger bet-sizes in the simulations, the BB will even choose to overbet the pot with a small frequency, but the overall range composition on this type of high donk bet board seems to favor the small donk bet (Diagram 28).

vulnerable from a number of different directions. In fact, if a low club comes on the turn, you may have to fold your hand. Therefore, with boards like the one above, you might want to wait until after the turn card comes before betting the hand aggressively. This way, you can cheaply fold if disaster 191 strikes. Also, if you catch a good card, you may gain extra action by not telegraphing your hand on the flop. Raising might be correct though, if the player to your immediate right is the bettor. A raise might succeed in eliminating some of the draws posing a threat to your hand, thus enhancing your chances of winning. You won’t eliminate the nut flush draw or a low straight draw such as A-4-5, but you might induce smaller flush draws to fold, enabling your hand to hold up as long as none of your opponents was drawing to the nut flush. (5) The best time to flop a set is when the board comes with either two or three high cards, because high boards mean that no low is possible; therefore, you’re playing for the whole pot. This has a significant impact on your pot odds, as the pot is essentially laying you double the price as when the board contains a low hand. As a result, it is generally correct to go to the river when you flop a set with a high board. (6) The drawback with hands such as A-3-K-K when the flop comes K-Q-J is that you frequently need to fill up to win the pot. In Omaha eight-or-better, with several players in the hand, someone will have A-10 more often than you might think. Even though you may be trailing, it is okay to play aggressively here. For one thing, your hand may be good. Also, if you are behind, you will improve to a full house about 35 percent of the time. This means a bet is only unprofitable when you’re up against precisely one player who has the straight. (7) However, with the same flop of K-Q-J, you will have to consider folding your set if you have three jacks instead of three kings, particularly if several players remain in the hand. Against only one opponent who is likely to have a straight, it is correct to draw. But if you’re facing a bet, a raise, and a call, it is likely that you’re up against a larger set or top two pair, as well as the straight. Either way, this doesn’t leave you with very many wins. Fold. Playing Wraparound Straight Draws. Although there may not be an official definition of a wrap, it’s really a straight draw with more outs than a common open-ender. For example, a hand such as 8-9-10-K and a board of A-6-7 192 provides thirteen cards to make the straight (four fives, three eights, three nines, and three tens). In Omaha eight-or-better, the vulnerability of straights and the frequent problem of running into an opponent with the same straight means that wrap draws

much betting happens after the flop. You’re not really risking $10 to win $50. You’re risking 54Of course, the blind money isn’t entirely insignificant. If it were, players could simply play extremely tightly and reraise only with top notch hands. Though the blind money is a small portion of the total money at stake, it’s still required to keep the action going. 55If, however, limps like this entice raises from the blinds that you don’t want to call, an alternative might be to raise the minimum.

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:

with an overly wide range and all the positions between these positions so say we're in the cutoff you see the hijack and then the button right so the cutoff is between these two players you would raise somewhere in the middle between these two ranges and you can extrapolate to figure out roughly what that is or you can go to pokercoaching.com in our app we have all of the ranges available for premium members so that's what you do when they followed you nothing fancy rates two big blinds with these hands fold everything else what about when they fold you in the small blind this is where it gets slightly tricky because now you're only playing against one player but you're out of position and you're getting amazing odds you have to put in half a big line to try to win a total pot of three big blinds remember the small blind the big blind and the auntie so you don't need to realize much Equity at all and whenever that's the case you're gonna find that you should be doing a lot of limping whenever you're getting excellent odds you just want to try to find a way to see the Flop with as many hands as possible so here is the game theory optimal strategy um usually from the small blind you'll do something like this when you're playing medium or deep sack you'll raise the best hands we see like pocket sixes and better is Raising most of the time lots of good asex is Raising lots of suited High cards are raising and then you raise with a lot of junky hands usually asex soft suit King X offsuit Queen X offset suit jackets offsuit and junkie suited hands and then you limp everything else you do see that all these hands are using a mixed strategy meaning sometimes you learn sometimes you raise you got to mix it up you do need to mix it up and you especially need to mix it up out of position because you want to make sure that when you limp your age is not all garbage and you want to make sure when you raise your age is not all strong because then you become super duper easy to play against notice we have this dark red color introduced now these hands are shoved all in we see Force threes and twos open shove as do Ace 9 and Ace 8 sometimes I don't think you need to have these in your range for Simplicity it's only 1.8 percent of hands but if you're trying to strictly follow the charts they are shoved um you may wonder why we're not raising stuff like Queen Jack suited King 9 suited Queen 8 Suited stuff like that it's pretty good right if you raise and then your opponent goes all in you have to fold those hands or make a loose call and that's not what you want you might try either a limp and then have your

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that level of handicap? One scenario would be when you become too passive. The fire in the belly is just not there, you are just looking at cards waiting for one more big hand, and you get pushed around. Then when you get tired of being pushed around and decide to make a stand you do it at the wrong time and lose big. You didn’t notice that the person you were raising was the tight aggressive player that has not played a hand for the past 30 minutes since he sat down and he made it three bets pre-flop. Stay alert to how you are feeling. Notice your level of concentration and if you are playing that patient, tight aggressive poker still. Some warning signals may be: Not being able to follow the play of the hands as quickly, your mind drifts off, and you stop looking at the other players starting hands after the showdowns. You start playing looser starting hands for no reason other than boredom. You stop noticing when players have left the table and new ones have sat down which change the character of the table. You just forced a K 2off suite from the blind, holding Top Pair against someone who raised from UTG and he keeps calling you raises. Oops, should have laid that one down. The Meta Game of Poker I consider the meta-game as the game within the game. To start let me give you a framework to build around. There are four levels of play that you can consider when playing poker. As you go higher in stakes the skill level of your opponents should go up which means the level of thinking goes up. The four elements are or questions players consider during a hand are: What cards do I hold? What cards does my opponent hold? What does my opponent think I have? What does my opponent think I think he has? As I mentioned, the larger the stakes the higher up on the strategic scale most players think. If you are playing against a group of low stake novices you are not going to try and out think them because they are more worried about what their cards make, how many outs they have and what to bet. They rarely consider what cards you may have and definitely never think on level three. Play any hand that you have Straight forward when playing against beginners. They are calling stations that bet/call down to the River just to see what the outcome of the hand will be. They are like a child that is learning to walk and they just want to practice putting one foot in front of the other. They do not think about how fast they are walking or even where they are walking. If you are playing against better poker players then you have to start thinking at a higher level. When you are last in the betting you have the advantage of letting the action come to you. In terms of starting hands, this has

the small blind you have to put in one and a half big lines to try to win the small blind the big blind the initial raise that's four and the ante four and a half four and a half right now so you have to put in one and a half to try to win a total of six so you only need to realize 25 equity there's gonna be three ways a lot of the time but it's not hard to realize 25 Equity with all these hands in green these hands and green all flop very well right notice we are still re-raising mostly our best hands plus some of those blocker Bluffs like we discussed and we are still shoving a relatively similar range to a base King Ace Queen some good strong hike suited connected hands middle Pairs and some asex students common stuff you'll see these patterns repeat over and over as the Rays comes from later and later position you're going to find that you don't really get to play all that many more hands notice against under the gun we're folding 73 against hijacker folding 74 and against Butler folding 73. so we're just playing a slightly looser range but our re-raising and our shoving ranges are going to get substantially wider so small line versus hydrac you see we're shoving way more often with a lot of pairs now still three betting small with the knots Aces kings queens Jacks Ace track suited and better and then some blocker Bluffs A Sign Ace eights A7 Queen Jack stuff like that and then we're calling decently wide right we're calling with with all sorts of hands that have decent Equity that flop well enough again if you wanted to fold out some of these hands that are using mixed strategies on the bottom I think that's probably fine and especially in a tournament if you are in a scenario where there are payout implications at all like if you're getting near the bubble you definitely will want to fold out these hands at the bottom of playability because these hands at the bottom of playability are barely profitable and if hand is barely profitable and you want to make sure you don't take small edges or find yourself in dicey spots a good way to avoid that is to not play those hands small blind versus button again way more shoving right we're against the widest range we're going to be against on the button and now we are shoving a much wider Range 14 of hands we do still have a little bit of a calling range we definitely have a re-raise not all in range right of the best hands plus blockers in this region but now a lot of shoving with tens and lower lots of weak a-sex suited lots of asex off suits and some good Strong high suited connected type hands you definitely see the same patterns repeat over and over again with the Rangers just getting wider and

people just won't move from a table they know is bad and I don't know if it's just a loss of face they just don't want to admit I don't want to play with these players but uh if you can locate loose passive tables in cash games that that is 90 of your job and the way you'll identify it is just with the classic signs people limping quite a bit people limb calling quite a bit uh people calling out of position quite often people calling down often with really weak hands people raising with really goofy hands and constantly calling three bats out of position that kind of stuff will really set you up for good situations these players can turn hands into Bluffs this is one of the biggest differences you will see between the two formats this is a major point that tournament Players Miss constantly when they move to cash tournament Players are used to playing shorter Stacks when you're playing with shorter Stacks you can go to the felt with a variety of your top Pairs and even second pairs defending yourself with your best pairs on a short stack is not a bad strategy because tournament Players get used to this they generally don't fold their decent pairs when they're playing with larger Stacks they don't want to fold them but they don't want to rip their chips in with them either they end up calling down with most of their Pairs and allowing their opponents to dictate terms since your opponent are in I mean this is just something uh this is a general thing that should be discussed you will see a lot of guys in who are used to tournament poker are used to 30 40 big lines maybe they play Mega hide at the beginning and then it gets to 30 to 40 big blind poker or they're just massively multi-tabling and they start really paying attention when they're deep and it's like 50 big lines or something like that a lot of times when those players are playing cash they they do tend to call down quite a bit with top Pairs and second Pairs and maybe one of the there's a lot of times you have a second pair that you should just turn into a bluff but you won't see that happen as often as it should be done if you're just used to calling down with your 27x stack in your weak pair in whatever it is so anyway since your opponents are not used to playing deep Stacks in a creative manner you can value that thinly in many tournaments your opponents will see their decision as binary do I call or fold here so there's uh one of the most this is something I see I I've taught a lot of different students in private lessons this is something I see with tournament Players quite often which is they just don't consider turning their hands into Bluffs nearly as much just because that situation

there was a small blind was short he started limping so his ranges are a little different because he was limping and this hand he raised to 20,000 on the button small blindfolds and it's on me with the King six of diamonds in the big blind so King six of diamonds big blind facing him in raised we're never folding but I didn't know if it was best to go all-in preflop here or to just call and I think it's really close and in real time I remember thinking it was close so like I say the beginning first we have some questions and the first question that I have in this hand should I be calling or calling preflop and we can kind of use hold them resources calculator again to figure this out so this is whole this hand and holding resources calculator basically we go to advance hand I have another hand in there so basically when you input everything you can put in that so the button raises to 20,000 right here it's raised to 20,000 and we have two options call 10,000 right here or three that all-in for 150,000 these are our two options so this is the range that it says the button should be raising so first we're gonna go through theory because that's what I do in these pots so in theory it says you the button should be raising 34.4% of hands and this is a key part that I've talked about in short stacks pot look at this key part calling and three betting we should be defending a hundred percent of hands so 81 point 9 percent call and 18.1% shove and that seems very reasonable because we are getting a very good price and in general you're always gonna have the odds to call on men raise but there's a key part to it which I will get into so it's a good well first let's look at look at the numbers first so these are the hands saying I should call the 10k with and their values so what we're gonna do is we want to compare the value of the expected value of calling the 10k with King six diamonds and three betting 250 K so this is the call table and what all these numbers are this is important is this is the expected value when you call and so hold the resources calculator doesn't do anything post flop it's all preflop so what it's assuming here is that you call and the hand is checked down to the river so that's obviously not the case the hand is never checked down to the river but when you're you're very short stacked we're almost always going to like we can realize all our equity almost in a way we're gonna realize a lot of our equity when we're short stack because we can just hit a pair and then go all-in or if we flop a flush draw we're always gonna see the river

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the check are gonna be hands like under Pairs and middle Pairs and bottom pairs so we see like Queen nine king nine ten nine Queen Jack these hands are checking a large portion of the time when we do that we're gonna be somewhat polarized with good ASX and better and some Bluffs what are bluffs in this spot looks like uh some junky Bluffs or like Queen eight King eight King seven these are these are aggressive so look we were finding some pretty bad Bluffs here King 10 king queen kind of cool to see these are the hands that opt to Bluff notice you don't necessarily want to bet the queen 10 every time because if you've got Queen tend to get shoved you have to fold and that's a bummer under pairs are used as Bluffs it's kind of hard to find Bluffs here again because our range is pretty good so when we do that we're going to be betting like uh five big lines into the 8.3 blind pot so you know call it two-thirds pot so say we do bet what should the opponent do well again they should fold a lot they should fold a lot because now all their gut shots are no good right a lot of their nines are in in bad shape and we see only some Jacks with live kickers and some aces are continuing Jacksonville live kickers are back with the best kickers are continuing lots and lots and lots of folds let's suppose they call now I can put in whatever River we want let's say the river is just a blank like a two they have to check everything then we're betting just a good strong polarized range again hands are almost always good right the ASX is almost always good and then some Bluffs what are bluffs on Ace Jack nine four two well well looks like the solver uses pocket eights and pocket sevens and pocket sixes and pocket fives as Bluffs here eight seven when we have it ten eight when we have it Queen ten when we have it Queen eight when we have it right kind of cool to see those are the hands that are opting to be used notice King High usually is not going to be bluffing in a lot of spots so say we do go all in what does the opponent do they call it off for the Races they called off with some Jacks and they fold everything else again a whole lot of folding because the initial razors range that bets the Flop and the turn down the river is very very strong okay that's a lot that's a lot to go through and we only went through like half of the ways the hand can go let's say we BET 14 on the Flop or bet 1.4 would be blinds on the flop big blind calls let's say the turn is an interesting card like uh jack of diamonds now interestingly enough

blind bet around 75 pot and i called the river was a seven of clubs and a small blind over bet around 1.5 x pot and after a long tank i called and got shown a seven for two pair according to gto my call was a pretty clear error although it didn't result in a huge ev loss the solver is showing some frequency of calling with queen jack off but it's doing so minimally and the eb for calling all of these hands is negative so you can assume that they are just pure folds one of the factors that i considered in my decision making process was that i thought this particular opponent may have been over bluffing now obviously in this instance i ended up guessing wrong but for the sake of discussion what would have been the most profitable play on average if my assumption about my opponent overbluffing turned out to be true well we can use node locking to find out now you can't node lock within the gto check browser but what you can do is download the file for your solved hands and explore the full game tree and load lock turns and rivers with the free version of simple post flop so here we're looking at the small blinds perfectly balanced gto betting strategy on the river and to node lock all we have to do is right click on the action where we think the player has a leak select edit strategy and then a pop-up will appear which will allow us to modify the small appliance strategy so since we want to see how my strategy should change if my opponent is over bluffing let's isolate the small blind's trash hands and let's say for example that instead of betting 25 big blinds seven percent of the time on average with king six suited the small blind was betting 25 big blinds 15 of the time with this combo we just need to type 15 into this box click king 6 suited and then press apply and now we see these lock icons appear meaning the strategy has been fixed and then the last step is to recalculate the river to see how the solver shifts its strategy to exploit this over bluffing imbalance by the small blind and now we see that my calling frequency shoots up over 2x compared to the gto calling frequency when we alter the small blinds bluffing strategy just a tiny bit the impact of the big blind's calling range is quite substantial including turning queen jack off into a pure call so obviously node locking is a very powerful tool because it allows us to precisely calculate the optimal way to exploit a known leak but what about those caveats i mentioned earlier well the first caveat is that what we are doing when we node lock is we are essentially fixing our opponent's leak as a new rule in the game that our opponent must abide by indefinitely however in reality our

In position (IP) The player who acts last postflop is said to be in position.

BET-SIZING 34 force your opponents to play correctly. Put them to a decision; let them make mistakes. Bet more than your opponents can call prof- itably, but don’t bet so much that you blow your opponents offtheir hands. Bet an amount that entices them to make a bad call. How Big Do You Want Their Mistake to Be? We’ve limited your bet sizes to a range: Bet more than they can call prof- itably, but bet less than what would almost certainly blow them offtheir hand. Now we need to figure out what the right size is within that range. You want to choose the size that will maximize your expectation. Roughly speaking, your expectation is equal to the approximate value of the mistake times the chance that they’ll make the mistake. By “value of the mistake” we mean how much money, on average, your opponent loses to you by making the mistake. Say your opponent can break even by calling a $100 bet (and profit by calling a bet smaller than $100). If you bet $101, then your opponent is making a mistake by calling, but it’s a tiny mistake. The value of that mistake is less than $1 (less than because sometimes your opponent will draw out and win the extra dollar). On the other hand, if your opponent calls a $1,000 bet, then he’s made a huge mistake. Let’s do a little math to get a feel for exactly how big these mistakes are. Say you bet $100 into a $200 pot, and your opponent is a 3-to-1 dog. Ignore future betting for the moment. If your opponent calls, on average it will be break-even for him. $0 = (1 4 ) ($300) + (3 4 ) (−$100) Now say you bet $150, and your opponent calls. On average, your opponent expects to lose $25 on a call. −$25 = (1 4 ) ($350) + (3 4 ) (−$150) If you bet $200, and your opponent calls, on average he will lose $50. −$50 = (1 4 ) ($400) + (3 4 ) (−$200) If you bet $600, and your opponent calls, on average he will lose $250. −$250 = (1 4 ) ($800) + (3 4 ) (−$600) So when you bet $50 more than break-even, he loses $25. When you bet $100 more, he loses $50. When you bet $500 more, he loses $250.

avoid bets with negative expectations (bad bets). While this knowledge is necessary, it is not sufficient~to be a winner. What is often glossed over is the necessity of accumulating statistics. The reason for this omission is that accumulating statistics is work. The attraction of gambling is the possibility of wealth without work. But the truth is, successful gamblers must work hard for their winnings. To illustrate why all three conditions must be present, consider one form of gambling: selling life insurance. You start a company selling life insurance, and you sell your first policy to a 20-year old person in good health for $100. You agree to pay $1 00,000 if that person should die within a year. Since the odds of a person that age dying within a year are about 10,000 to 1, it is very unlikely that you will have to pay out any money. But suppose a freak accident befalls that person tomorrow. If you do not have a sufficient bankroll, you will be bankrupt before you have a chance to sell another policy. If you do have a sufficient bankroll, the bet you placed does have a positive expectation. You are offering to pay at a rate of 1000 to 1 for an event that has 10,000 to 1 odds against occurring. Suppose your customer refuses to pay $100 for the policy so you lower the price to $1. At this price, your customer will eagerly buy your policy, but you have just placed a bet with a negative expectation. You agreed to pay at a rate of 100,000 to 1 for an event that has 10,000 to 1 odds against occurring. However, there is a strong temptation on your part to sell the policy for $1, because the chances of the person dying have not changed. The odds are overwhelming that at the end of the year you will be $1 richer. Your sale is much easier and pocketing $1 is better than nothing. 106 THE INTELLIGENT GUIDE TO TEXAS HOLD'EM POKER The temptation to sell the policy for $1 illustrates a paradox associated with gambling. Whatever price the life insurance policy sells for, the odds are overwhelmingly in favor of you keeping the money. However $1 is a bad bet that should be avoided and $100 is a good bet that should be made. The diference between good and bad bets only becomes apparent when statistics are accumulated-after you do the work of selling many life insurance policies. If you sell 10,000 policies, it becomes a certainty that at least one person will die. If you charged $1 each, the $10,000 collected does not cover one loss. Your business is headed for bankruptcy. However, if you sell 10;000 policies at $100 each, the million dollars collected covers 10 deaths. While it is almost certain that at least one customer will die, it is extremely unlikely that 10 will die. Your business has to make money. Anything can happen to a single customer. Therefore, a good bet (the $100 policy) could lose and a bad bet

On the turn, enough of our flop calling range was Ax that we can now fold the rest of our range at this point without folding too much or too little to be balanced on this street. As an aside, most populations tend to underbluff the turn so being a bit tight here is not going to be the end of the world. So let's focus our attention on the river: the balance decision we're primarily concerned with. The balancing principle we met earlier can now be extended to cover the situation where Hero is facing a bet. In this hand Hero needs to calculate Villain's RFE in the usual fashion. He then proceeds by counting up all of his combos and calling exactly 100 minus Villain's RFE% of those combos deciding which ones are best to call. So Villain's RFE is (R / R + PG) = 55 / (55 + 89.5) = 38% Hero's range contains the suited aces: AQs, AJs, ATs, A9s, A5s, A4s, A3s and A2s and all of these are 24 combos combined (8 x 3) Hero's range contains the offsuit aces: AQo and AJo and these are 18 total (9 x 2). Hero's range contains the quads 88 (1 combo). Hero's total river range contains 43 combos. He needs to fold 38% of these and so needs to call 100 - 38 = 62% of those to make Villain indifferent to bluffing him. Hero needs to call 43 x 0.62 = 27 combos (rounded). Now to decide which ones are best to call. Well, here blockers aren't really an issue. There are no busted draws to consider and so while ATs and A4s might be as good as each other to call with, we may as well just revert to preferring the one with the most SDV . This spot is simple. Hero will just call the top 27 combos SDV wise.

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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

probably going to be higher at the higher stakes you need to be ready for that competition two your comfort level with the amount of money that you're playing for is very important because if you feel like you're playing outside your comfort zone you're not going to be able to play your best poker finally your bankroll must be big enough to handle the swings at the higher limits that you're playing and that's why bankroll management is so essential because of that variance that comes into play in the short run that is muted in the long run can negatively affect your bankroll if you don't have adequate buy-ins behind to play at the limit that you're playing so a good test is that if you're feeling bored with the limits that you're playing you're probably playing too low and if you're feeling overly excited or anxious or stressed then you're probably playing too high and that's a good natural way to check in if you're playing at appropriate limits remember this is a long run game this is a long run plan we don't need to move to the higher stakes as quickly as possible even the mid stakes as quickly as possible we want to be focused on focusing on improving our confidence so that we can confidently move to the next level and believe that when we do we'll be able to stay there so may a little note that steak should be the last thing that's considered because when you focus on improving your skill level you focus on finding games where the level of competition is weaker and you focus on keeping your state of mind and body in a peak state all those will naturally lead to you being able to move up stakes more effectively and more sustainably cool so that was the dollars per hand side of the equation next let's move on to the other variable in the equation which is hands plate now this is where most people make the mistake of thinking it's impossible to get the kind of earnings that they want from playing poker yes it's hard to make a hundred thousand dollars in a day playing poker or in a week or in a month for that matter but if you're putting in consistent hours following a schedule and getting lots of hands in you'll find that the large dollar numbers aren't so unattainable because when you are focusing on increasing the number of hands played you're increasing the variable on the right side of the equation which when multiplied by a modest win rate or dollars per hand is going to lead to a large number of total winnings we can increase any of the variables on the right side to increase that variable on the left side which is total winnings so let's look at the factors which affect the number of hands played so that you can start to strategize on how you can improve or increase the number of hands played per

perhaps this might not be the way i play so if i were teaching you in a training video based on the 55s and the 109s and the 215s i reply i was playing or whatever it was you might not see this move but this is why we have to do a specific video for you and your microsix games you guys gotta remember in microstakes games they're there to gamble they're there to play now a lot of those folks play home games primarily they'll play like charity poker tournaments they'll play uh things of that nature uh there's entire scenes in cities where people just go to bars and play like 10 20 buy-ins that's their thing that's the way they pass time you know some people some people like sports some people like hiking some people just very much love social relaxed poker now when they get that poker itch and there's not a game on a tuesday night or something and they go online they're going to be playing the two dollar binds the three dollar buyings the five dollar buy-ins and at some point you know it gets a little deeper in the tournament they go okay i should probably get back to hanging out with my spouse and kids uh let's try to get a let's try to rustle up a stack here or just call it and you move all in and they got a pair or they got like you know a suited ace and they'd go okay cool cool let's just go with it and they don't begrudge you for having the better hand they're gambling with you they're fine with that and you just got to remember that there's definitely a reason to get cute in higher buy-ins which is sometimes i'll do a smaller raise because one of the ways you can get people to over commit and say a 109 is sometimes the big one calls with way too many hands than they should and then they hit any pair and versus the short stack they're just not folding you'll see that more in high higher six tournaments uh if you can find the soft spot in the big line and whatnot that being said you just don't need to bother with a two dollar three dollar tournament because you can expect a lot of like if i moved all in in a 109 here i wouldn't expect villain 18 to just go get it in with my fives right with all these other players back behind but instead in micro stakes we can collect nicely right there so let's go back to this slide here where i'm keeping my non-fundamentals uh easier exploits listed out just so you have an easy way to remember them as you go play micro stakes so how to exploit micro six players we already discussed lim jamming 20 to 30 x more from the small blind but also jam those 14 to 22 x stacks more with big hands these players love

the previous example where you were in position against random hands in the blinds.

virtually impossible to steal the blinds. Consider the $10-$20 game with a straddler. Suppose you bring it in for $30. It is a rare player who would post a $20 blind and then not call for just $10 more. In fact, most players who post a straddle will call for an additional $20, no matter what they hold. (Remember, they came to gamble.) This means that you should raise only with legitimate raising hands. Semi-steal plays before the flop, which are normally so important to winning hold 'em, will not work in this situation. Moreover, you might not want to make the pot so large that it becomes correct to draw to gut shots, bottom pairs, and so forth. Consequently, it is generally correct to raise less frequently with big pairs and big unsuited cards than it would be if there were no live straddle. Also be aware that your implied odds will not be as good, since it will cost you more to play compared to what you can 218 Part Six: Playing in Other Non-Standard Games expect to win. As a result, you should call with fewer hands. ~~wificall~, throwaway hands like and unless you are in a late position. Notice that we have just recommended that you play tighter against a live straddle, even though there is more money in the pot. An example will show that this is correct. Suppose you are playing in a crazy $10-$20 hold 'em game, where there are not only the standard $5 and $10 blinds, but also straddlers of $20, $30, and $40. Clearly, if you played only the "nuts" (or extremely strong hands) in this game when you were not in one of the larger blinds, you would be a winner. This is because of the large overlay that you would be getting when you did enter the pot. However, if you played super tight in a standard game, you would not be in enough pots to show a profit. Playing in Spread Limit Games Some of the smaller limit games are structured differently from those that we have been discussing. These are known as spread limit games. Specifically, bets are not fixed at a particular size, and you can bet any amount between certain limits. Two common spread limit games are $1-$4, where any bet or raise can be $1, $2, $3, or $4, and $2-$10, where any bet or raise can be as small as $2, or as large as $10, or any dollar amount in between. Most of what has been covered already also applies to spread limit games. There are, however, a couple of differences that we would like to mention. First, you often can see the flop cheaply, meaning that your implied odds are much larger than in a game with a standard structure. Consequently, many (weak) drawing hands that you normally would not play become playable in a spread limit game, even from an early position. On the other hand, if you hold a big pair, you want to get as much money as possible

highly, and call with flush draws that have showdown value against BTN’s bluffs (high Ace-x of diamonds also pure calls). Playing Later Streets There are too many distinct later street scenarios to provide even an overview of them all here. The good news is that the same strategic principles that guide your play when playing from the BB against a preflop raiser will serve you well when out of position to a three-bettor. You’ll just need to keep in mind two important variables: The SPR Stack-to-pot ratio (SPR) The effective stack divided by the size of the pot. SPR is commonly used to gauge the value of implied odds and the relative value of made hands. will be low, so your threshold for stacking off should be low as well. Preflop ranges are substantially stronger and more concentrated around high cards. Following those familiar principles, if you checked and called the flop, you’ll mostly check the turn. If you raised the flop, you’ll mostly bet the turn. The major exceptions will be on cards that dramatically change the board texture . In a three-bet pot, that’s more likely to be an Ace or King than a board-pairing or straight-completing card as it would be in a single-raised pot. Conclusion The pots may be larger, but the principles remain the same: Avoid bad situations when you can. If you do call, recognize you are playing from a disadvantage and proceed defensively , with an emphasis on checking, calling, and folding. Assess the strength of your hands contextually, with an eye toward the SPR and the preflop ranges. Going on the offensive via raising is a lower frequency play but appropriate for strong hands that benefit from denying equity . Bluff only carefully selected weak hands that have the potential to improve. You can’t always avoid losses, but by sticking to these principles, you can avoid mistakes. Practice Ready to try it for yourself? These drills have you facing a three-bet from an in position player from various seats and stack sizes. They are all based on Chip EV simulations, so you can practice both preflop and postflop decision-making. If you want to practice incorporating ICM into your decisions, these ICM drills put you in similar preflop spots (postflop simulations based on ICM models are not yet available) with 50% of the field remaining. Once you’ve got the hang of that, you can tweak the parameters to practice other stages of the tournament, but you’ll likely get more out of focusing on one stage at a time rather than training on a set of drills that randomly draws from many different ICM models. Ready to try it for yourself? These drills have you facing a three-bet from an in position player from various seats and stack sizes. They are all based on Chip EV simulations, so you can practice both preflop and postflop decision-making. If you want to practice incorporating ICM into your decisions, these ICM drills put you in similar preflop spots (postflop simulations based on ICM models are not yet available) with

door straight draw that can bet or back door flush draws that can bet as the under the gun plus one player we do have some gut shots here we do have some pairs that are pretty good so even though this board looks kind of rough for us it's fine enough when we are the button versus the big blind now we have even more hands that are very likely good but vulnerable notice lots of top pairs are very likely good but vulnerable even fives are very likely good but vulnerable so we're blasting them we are using some small bets but mostly big bets and again a very polar ized range of best hands they're good but vulnerable some draws with a six or five and lots of other stuff is doing a whole lot of checking you may ask what do you do if you check that's going to be another video actually we have an entire tournament and cash game master class that goes through all these spots I'm going through right now today with you and more pre- flop on the Flop on the turn on the river and all sorts of ways the hand could possibly play out it's a very very long they're very very long courses it took forever to make they're over at pokercoaching.com for you right now what about out of position on 743 another interesting spot we have to check this one a ton though because all these hands are not in great shape kind of neat you're going to find that in general from out of position you have to do a decent amount of checking on the low card boards to some extent not always not always like this spot you see 975 we're checking about half the time uh 743 we're checking 78% of the time so we're doing a decent amount of checking we also haven't discussed multi-way pots today which is also discussed in the tournament n cash game master classes at poker coaching and in multi- white spots you have to check a ton on the low card boards let's take a look at a few common mistakes people make whenever you're structuring your range you can do all sorts of things wrong for example in this spot imagine you bet every overcard with back door flush draw like all the king T suiters all the queen tudents what's wrong with that what's the problem and alternatively how can you exploit people who make that mistake these are things you want to consider so let's take a look at mistakes people can make let's take a look at mistake number one too much junk slash not enough draws so let's say we're in a scenario this is our pre- flop range we're going to go through and categorize each of our hands we have premium made hands draws marginal made hands and junk okay what are premium hands on whatever board this is notice in this spot we're probably looking at a nine High

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the 47 unseen cards make a four-flush on fourth street, and then nine of the 46 remaining cards will produce the flush at the end. 52 Chapter Six just given, if either you or your opponent were all-in when the opponent bet $10 on the flop and you called, it would be worth drawing to your back-door flush since it would now be a case of getting 26-to-1 on a 24-to-1 shot. However, you must remember that the chances of making the hand you are drawing to are not the same as your chances of winding up with the best hand. You might make your hand and still lose to a better hand. There is a second case, similar to the first, when you might call in close situations even if your effective odds would indicate a fold. This comes up when you have good reason to think your opponent might check on the next round. If he does check, you are getting a free card just as though you or he were all-in. Once again all you need to consider are your immediate pot odds, since you expect to see two cards for the price of one. Such situations might come up when you suspect your opponent has a weak hand or when you think your opponent might fear to bet on the next round because he interprets your call to mean you're stronger than you really are, even when you don't catch the card you need. Finally, it may sometimes be correct to call to see one card only when your effective odds indicate a fold. If that card does not make your hand, you should not call any further bets. These circumstances usually occur in games where there is a large increase in the bet from one round to the next. You might, for example, be playing in a $ 10-$50 hold 'em game and catch a fourflush on the flop. Your opponent bets $ 10 into a $40 pot, and you expect he'll bet $50 on the next round. To call both bets would mean you were getting effective odds of 100-to-60, too low for you to contemplate going all the way with a flush draw. However, you are getting 5-to-1 on your opponent's first bet, which is greater than the odds against hitting on the next card (not to mention your potential profits on the last two betting rounds should you hit the flush). When deciding whether to call for one card only, all you need to consider are your immediate pot odds versus your chances of hitting on the next card only. In most cases, however, when you have a hand that needs to improve, you must realize that future bets cut down your apparent Effective Odds 53 pot odds substantially, frequently enough to make you throw the hand away. Therefore, before deciding to go all the way with a hand, you must calculate whether the effective odds you are getting by calling several rounds of betting justify a call now. Calculating Effective Odds Figuring effective

in late position and the bet is smaller than the bets on succeeding rounds. 16. When should raising to gain information be done? Only rarely, usually just in heads-up situations. 17. Is this raise worth it? Probably not, as you usually have to "pay" too much for the information. Heads-Up on Fifth Street 1. When is it correct to bluff? When your hand can't win by checking, and the odds you are getting from the pot compared to the chance your opponent will call are favorable. 2. Give an example if you have been calling all the way? A significant card that appears to help you but does not, such as a flush card on fifth street, may make a bluff correct. 3. Give an example if you have been betting all the way? You might try a bluff on the end regardless of the last card. 4. What else must you consider? Whether your opponent is capable of folding a decent hand. 5. When is it correct to bet a legitimate hand on the end in last position? When you think you will have the best hand at least 55 percent of the time that you are called. 6. If your opponent has come out betting, when should you call? You should call only if your chances compare favorably with the pot odds. 7. To raise, how much of a favorite must you be? Usually about 2-to-1. (Except for bluff-raises.) 8. What is another way to decide that a raise is generally correct? When you think you will have the best hand 55 percent of the time that your raise is called. Heads-Up on Fifth Street 281 9. What is an exception to this rule? If you think your opponent has the same hand as you and you believe that your raise will sometimes make him fold. 10. What options do you have in heads-up, last round situations? A. To bet. B. To check with the intention of folding. C. To check with the intention of calling. D. To check with the intention of raising. 11. When you have a good hand, whether to check-raise or come right out betting depends on what three probabilities? A. The chance that you will be called if you bet, assuming that you won't be raised. B. The chance that your opponent will bet if you check, but will not call your raise. C. The chance that he will bet and then call your raise. 12. When does going for a check-raise become the correct strategy? When the second probability added to twice the third probability exceeds the first probability. 13. What are some hints that should help you determine whether a check-raise is correct? A. Is the river card likely to give someone a second-best hand that he might think is the best hand? B. Is your opponent the type of player who would always try to pick up the pot if you check, but is not likely to call with a weak hand? C. Consider whether your opponent is afraid ofbeing checkraised. D.

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…

Pre-flop: First a bit of revision. Hero's call is totally fine with a hand which is both in decent shape vs. a likely wide stealing range and can flop a variety of decent non-made-hands to go along with the relatively strong pairs it can make. Of course, if Villain was opening from an earlier position and had a stronger range, this hand would become a fold, even though the pot odds are great and Hero is closing the action. Flop: Compare this spot to Hand 54. This time Hero has pair on the board instead of an underpair. This is monumentally better as we'll see. I always urge newer students to the game to rank their hand relative to Villain's range on the SDV Spectrum (see Figure 21). Doing this helps students understand whether the hand can call because the SDV is sufficient, whether it needs to bluff at some point in the hand if Hero is to win the pot (not that he always should) or is the hand perhaps so strong that it can and should be raised for value? I'd call this hand semi-vulnerable SDV . There are some bad turn cards for us and Villain can sometimes have decent equity when we're ahead, but the situation is much less bleak than in Hand 54.

up as often as possible so that if one over card does flop it will be less of a threat to you. Even if two over cards appear on the streets it still does not mean you have lost, it means put the brakes on. You did your best to maximize your chances to win and that is just poker. Here are some other considerations to look at before throwing your money around. All examples are for a ten-player table: If you hold KK the chances someone has AA are 19.5 to 1. If you hold QQ the chances someone holds AA or KK are 9.5 to 1. If you hold AKos the chances someone holds AA or KK are 19.7 to 1. If you hold JJ the chances someone holds AA, KK, QQ are 6.2 to 1. If you hold TT the chances someone has a better Pocket Pair are 4.5 to 1. If you hold AQos the chances someone has a better Pocket Pair are 4.4 to 1. If you hold 99 the chances someone has a better Pocket Pair are 3.5 to 1. If you hold KQos the chances someone has a TT and above are 2.7 to 1 Look at the Appendix II to see the win expectations for each hand compared to how many players are involved. Most Pocket Pairs increase in value when they are up against fewer players. All big cards increase in value but with Pocket Pairs from 10's and above, a raise is considered a good play if you can get less players to see the flop. Then again, nothing is set in stone when you consider a poker game. You must know your opponents and this is one of the x-factors. Look For Volume 2 at www.totalpokerpro.com Table Types and Starting Hands Look at the chart in Appendix II to see what your starting hands should be against a certain number of opponents. The chart gives the winning percentages of every two starting hands against up to nine opponents. I believe this chart should indicate when it is appropriate to make a pre-flop raise and in what position. Once again, big Pocket Pairs have the best chance against one or two opponents and goes down to almost a 50/50 gamble from there. I like having above a 60% chance of winning a hand, especially in no limit when my whole stack is in danger. Raising with big cards is optimal. In high stakes play you will not get as many people calling your raise (sometimes it is correct to slow play a big Pocket Pair if you are going to get only one or two callers or is it is at an extremely tight table), but in low stakes poker you will often have many opponents calling almost anything. This next section deals with game types since this will determine how you play your cards. You can look for two different situations. If the table is loose and players regularly call large pre-flop raises or tight and most players fold. Knowing your

usually Bluff with both strong and weaker bluffing candidates but if the bucket is small you should generally be more selective with the hands you Bluff with and prioritize your strongest bluffing candidates so for example let's go back to the turn but instead of the turn being the Queen of Diamonds let's say it's the deuce of diamonds in this case from our first stage of analysis it's not so clear that the button has the higher probability of holding the strongest hand and because in part it's much more likely that the big blind is holding a deuce as a pre-flop caller and with the big line much more likely to have trips it diminishes the strength of many of the buttons value combos which in turn means that we can't Bluff as much because our Bluffs need to be correlated to our value beds for purposes of balance accordingly on this turn the bedding slash bluffing bucket for the button is going to be significantly smaller compared to the queen turn which means that the threshold for the quality of hands that we will want to Bluff with generally should be higher so in this case maybe we decide to only Bluff our strongest flush draws but not our weaker ones even though we don't have any straight draws to pull from and what happens if the turn is Deuce of Hearts instead of the deuce of diamonds well this card is for the same reasons more favorable to villain so our overall level of aggression should be similarly depressed but here we have no draws available does it mean that we don't Bluff no in GTO if we have any value bets we must also have love so the fact that we don't have great bluffing hands just means that we need to dig down even deeper on our list of possible bluffing candidates this time relying principally on card removal so in this case maybe for example we choose to Bluff with a hand like a six of Hearts because we would not be blocking a hand that the big blind may have floated the Flop with against the small bet like 9 6 or 8-5 a space which had the double back doors now before we end this video we should note that the factors we just discussed aren't the only ones to consider when bluffing and therefore you will find that sometimes the GTO strategies produced by solvers will not neatly fit within our heuristics for example GTO will often spread out its Bluffs among many different types of hands instead of allocating Bluffs linearly based solely on incremental Equity because doing this provides better board coverage allowing hero to make a strong hand no matter how the run out goes also GTO May sometimes prioritize bluffing hands with lower incremental Equity over our hands with higher incremental Equity use usually when there's a significant risk of villain raising but for those that are new to GTO it probably isn't wise to get too caught

Hero folds. The increase in complexity throughout this chapter has been anything but gentle. We're about to move on and cover some mandatory poker mathematics that will set the groundwork for dealing with the complex beasts of 3-bet and 4-bet theory and then the rest of the manual. If your head is a bit of a muddled mess after slogging through all of the new material we've just covered, my advice is to re-read this chapter and take a break from the manual to play some poker, tag some hands in your tracking software that fit the bill of this chapter and have a go at analysing them using the material covered here. This is necessary to cement the theory in a way that it can be accessed and applied to good effect on the tables. Learning poker requires hands on application of concepts. Reading this book from cover to cover is not enough.

THINKING IN TERMS OF EXPECTATION 17 The expectation for the $150 bet is $60. $60 = (0.40)($150) Finally, the expectation for the $450 bet is $90. $90 = (0.20)($450) The small “don’t chase them away” raise works out to be the worst of these three options; moving in makes you the most money on average over the long run. And while we made up the percentage chances you’d get called for this ex- ample to make the mathematical process easy to understand, in practice moving in is likely to be the best play in this scenario. A one-card straight is possible, but you have that hand beaten because you hold the top card also. Anyone without a straight will be hard-pressed to call a decently-sized raise, and anyone with a straight will be hard-pressed to fold. Your only real decision is whether to make a tiny raise to try to get two pair and trips to call or to forget about those hands and try to get the most out of a trapped straight. Because you have so much money behind, your best play is to move in and hope your opponent has a seven. Final Thoughts Expectation is at the heart of every no limit decision. You shouldn’t bet a certain amount “because you want to make sure you get called,” or because “you’re trying to look weak.” You should bet that amount because it maximizes your expectation.3 Now your bet might maximize expectation because it’s likely to get called or it looks weak, but those factors are only a means to the end: making the most profit by maximizing expectation. Throughout the book, we’ll analyze many decisions by evaluating which option has the highest expectation. Thinking in these terms will make you a clearer thinker and a better player. 3On rare occasions you might choose a play that gives you a slightly less than maximum expectation because it significantly limits your risk. These occasions usually arise if you are on a limited bankroll or are in the end stages of a tournament. They can also arise when you want to avoid giving a “live one” any chance to win so much that he might be inclined to quit.

one street to win more bets, as opposed to two. 3. Most opponents won't bet as often. Not only does it cost more, but because you called him on the flop he will be afraid that you will call again. There are a lot of players who will automatically raise before the flop, automatically bet on the flop, but then give up on fourth street when they have nothing. The conclusion is that against all but the wildest players you don't have to call as much as on the flop. However, this does not mean that you revert to a tight strategy. When your opponent bets , on fourth street you will still have to do a fair amount of calling since he is usually getting about 3-to-1 from the pot. It's just that you don't need to call quite as frequently as you did on the flop. Here's an example. The player on the button raises and you call out of the blind with: Calling on Fourth Street 203 The flop comes: Your opponent bets and you call. The fourth street card is the: You check, and your opponent again bets. If this is a player who will not automatically bet again on fourth street, you should fold. Your call on the flop will scare many typical players into thinking that you have a calling hand. Slowplaying on the Flop When you are last to act and you are against an extremely aggressive player you should slowplay some hands that don't seem to merit this strategy. For example, suppose you start with and the flop is two people check, you are last to act, and one of your opponents is an extremely aggressive player. You should always check, whether you raised or just called preflop, because no matter what comes off, the extremely aggressive player will bet it on fourth street. Furthermore, with a pair of aces there is no overcard that can come to give an opponent a higher pair." What if the top card was not an ace? Should you still make this play? The answer is that it depends on how aggressive your I I We want to emphasize that for this play to be correct against two players the extremely aggressive player must be just that - extremely aggressive. However, against one player the requirement of "ex aggressive is not totally necessary. 204 Slowplaying on the Flop 205 opponent is. If he is super check your hand if the flop aggressive, was it might even be right to and you have Of course the lower the hand, the less likely this tricky play is worth it. That is because there are more ways to be outdrawn by a hand you could have knocked out on the flop. Still, against super aggressive players you should often check any top pair on the flop. The less aggressive your opponent is, the higher the card needs to be. Judgment coupled with experience will help you perceive when the time is right to check a questionable pair. In hold 'em, hands

technique is called bucketing and i've made a separate video covering this topic which i will link in the description below essentially bucketing just means that we create a class of hands with similar strength attributes and play them the same way instead of trying to individually reason about each combination that's within the class so for example this board generally favors the lojack caller because his range of likely hands is smashing this board with straights sets and two pairs so we generally don't want to build up a big pot particularly with our middling hands but instead of trying to devise a unique strategy for each of our middling hands like ace seven of clubs or king eight of diamonds we can just bucket them all together and play them the same way by checking the flop and this strategy will be generally consistent with the optimal strategy for each individual combination within this class and this encapsulates the central thesis of the gtl check solver dashboard it is a system of cross filtering charts which allows us to slice and dice a player's range to generate custom classes of hands with varying levels of abstraction and objectively measure whether grouping such hands in this manner retains fidelity to the optimal solution the default state of the dashboard is unfiltered which means it's showing data for all of the hand within both players ranges however chart by chart we can start to apply filters that break down these ranges across various categories such as by their equity or ev by hand segments by the presence or absence of various draws by card removal characteristics or by suits or specific card ranks our goal is to use these charts and filters to identify strategies that we can apply to the broadest group of hands possible because as we've discussed this simplifies the game and this concept of starting with the abstract and advancing towards the granular is natural to the human mind and it's how we tend to make sense of a complex world and also how we most efficiently learn intricate subject matters and this applies to poker strategy as well whether players are fully aware of it or not everyone actually uses bucketing outside of a few exceptions players devise strategies not for specific combinations but rather for categories of hand classes for example in this hand a player in the hijack isn't going to devise a unique strategy specifically for ace of clubs queen of hearts and then differentiate that strategy with how he would play asa club's queen of diamonds all players will bucket these hands together in a category for class of hands such as two overs without a backdoor flush draw or a strong ace or ace queen off etc etc each person has their own unique way of bucketing hands but all do it what distinguishes the top players from beginners is that just like every other skill or area of learning experts will understand and be able to execute on a more granular

back in sober and he might know what that means i'm never gonna see him again you have jax under the gun plus two what would you like to do here if you got loose players at the table you can go a little bit bigger another thing i like to do is let's say uh this wasn't the case but let's say the button was like a 50 15. you make it like 4x because loose players when they're on the button they go oh i'm on the button blah blah blah excuse to play oh he made it 4x4x doesn't look that big to a loose player but it looks big to everybody else so you get a nice big pot with the worst player at the table here we make it 2k marcelo silva goes ahead and calls from the small blind and the board come to jack six four gets checked to you this is another situation a lot of people tell me they have trouble with i got a set sometimes a bet they fold i don't know what to do or they say you know when i get a set and i'm bad and the guy folds i just get so pissed what should you do here should you check a bet should you slow play this time well since i don't think anybody has a pair anymore i don't try to trap seriously like if if you're trying to go for like the check race for value because you assume the guy is going to like bet top pair for value or second pair for value just watch every single time them check back every single time nobody value that's enough nobody bluffs enough people do a lot of calling every data set you ever look at people do a lot of calling so you need a big ass reason to not bet when you have a hand the question oftentimes is how much are you going to bat here you bet a little bit smaller why do you bet smaller if he's got big cards with a club you want him coming along because that's about all that's going to call you sevens eights nines tens we'll call you again you do have to fire if you did say check and i i would check if i'm playing with a guy a certain amount of the time i will check back here especially i like the club in my hand um i wish i could give you a hard and fast percentage i don't really have it it depends on the guy but i just hate checking here especially with anybody who could possibly be an american because i just find they call way too much and it really really is hard not to fire but there's a lot of times guys will like fire have you ever had a session where you had two sets and twice you fired and the guy both times the guy folded sometimes you'll be playing live and

it's really hard to pick up on it unless you've seen the guy bet really thin on the turn before that's why you should always be taking notes when you play but if the guy under bets he really gives it away it's really hard to find a person who will do that with a set or a draw that's usually a pair that's trying to get to a showdown really cheaply so if you have something like ace jack which is beating almost all those pairs you you have to lead out there he and just so you guys can see this the ranging side he see that's likely a hundred percent of his range versus a big blank flat or that is reality most guys do that a little too much we did say he was aggressive not a pot controller and if that's the case when he bets that small on the turn he gives away that he has a pair that he's trying to get to showdown we have 74% equity against that range even if he's doing that with over pairs which he's usually not that King of Hearts is not likely to have helped our opponent we still have the best hand seven times out of ten if we lead he's likely to call wide because he can always justify it to himself as a mess flush draw or straight draw at a hero call with if this is a live tournament the guy doesn't even have to show his hand in his mind you're polarized you have just the absolute best hand or you have a lot of miss draws in aggressive players like this guy is really wants to play all the time so that'll make him want to call with all the Miss drawers out there so this looks really good for us they'll usually muck something like this that wanted to check back the river that's why the third of the five post flop tricks you can use is lead the river for value versus opponents who are trying to buy the showdown all right guys I'm gonna keep them going fast it's more fun that way let's start with something I see a lot of you guys doing just calling out of the big blind 50 big blinds deep when your opponent raises the cutoff and you're in the big blind okay so your opponent raises here in the COFF to 2.5 X you're about 50 X deep you don't really know what to do when you threw that any for bets so you just go ahead and call you tell me the guy is aggressive indecent so you don't want to deal with that when you three bets so let's go with that he's aggressive indecent let's play pretend we're playing against bad guy all right so we call here we get this awesome flop what is your plan of action you want to Donnelly chef called and check the turn you want to check called and lead the turn

Now onto the hand:

good starting hand to match to large raise. Two big cards are gold and Pocket Pairs are power at the final table in shorthanded play. There will be a fair amount of pre-flop raising, heed the pre-flop betting; if there is a raise and a re-raise then your hand needs to be very good for you to join the dance. The person who bet out all-in may not have a good hand but usually someone who calls a big raise has something. You do not want to get in the way of two people who are intent on putting their chips at risk. If there is a chance that one person will get knocked out fold unless you hold one of the top five hands and feel like you can knock both of them out. For every battle that knocks an opponent out is one more money spot up the pay ladder. Right before the final table things will tighten up until the smallest chip count has to risk or be taken out by the blinds. Chip management and blind stealing are essential here. You cannot continue to leak chips waiting for the small stacks to bust out or you will become the small stack. I have been at the final table many times hovering between seventh and tenth place. I would win one key hand to keep me alive but not the level of chips the leaders have. I play conservative at this point looking to double up. Any one of those large stacks wants to take you out and get more chips for the final three-player showdown and the big money. However, an amazing thing can happen if you can hang around long enough. Players start to knock each other out in huge showdowns. All of a sudden, I am in sixth place, then I catch a key hand and I move up in the leader board. Then another person is knocked out and then I catch another big hand. Survival, accumulate, never say die. Usually the final table will quickly be short handed and then you should loosen up your starting hand requirements. For every person less than a full table the more powerful the over cards become. Wired Pairs become gold. This is when the battle between a made hand and an over card drawing hand really appears. I suggest reading up on shorthanded play and playing in some sit and go tables. These are excellent mini-tournaments to practice your later round play. In the beginning of a sit and go, it is about chip management and analyzing your opponents. When the first few players are knocked out then you can start to play strategy that is more shorthanded. You will not make the final table every time or even hit in the money. 1 out of 10 times hitting the money is a good percentage. You are always looking to make the final table but the opportunities (cards) might not always be there. At some point, you may have to make a decision to just survive and

don’t do well as min-raises. They have two reverse blockers (meaning they do not block playable hands) to the blinds’ rejamming ranges, so you will get re-shoved slightly more often than normal and will be forced to fold them pre-flop. If someone calls, small pairs also do not fare well. Most of the time they will be playing as an underpair and either be forced to play passively and be denied equity, or bluff and get into complicated situations where they invest way too many chips with a hand that won’t have many outs to improve. To make matters worse, implied odds are not so great at this stack depth. So, these hands should simply be folded. BN RFI Range at 40bb With 40bb, the BN gets to play a wider range than with 25bb, and hands with good post-flop playability, such as suited gappers, and hands with high implied odds, such as small pocket pairs, increase in value. The 4-bet frequency is lower than at 25bb because now the SPR will be higher and allow for more post-flop play, which benefits the BN’s post-flop equity realization (Hand Range 114).

Equity The percentage chance that a player will win a hand, assuming all players go to showdown. Equity also factors in ties. Equity can be calculated in multiple ways, such as: hand vs hand, hand vs range, or range vs range. Equity more loosely refers to the value of a hand, however, factors such as equity realization can influence the expected value of a hand.

the we bet the hands that beat the middle parts of their range that have enough equity and like we bet the big game we we win the big game as a general rule the caller of the previous Street normally wins the small game the better normally wins the big game why because the better has to bet Bluffs and they bet good hands too the caller tends to fold their bad hands and raise their good hands so this is really important this small Bame big game is really important on turns and rivers okay what happens now let's say we bet like what happens a lot here we bet 30 they call eight of Hearts comes check check do the clubs so when check check now on the turn who wins the small game the big blind does the big blind still wins the small game because the button can still have whatever random trash they bet on the Flop what happened in the big game though the big game now the big blind caught up let's make this like U three of Hearts the big blind wins kind of both games now they win the small game for sure but they also win the big game because now they have like A7 more than the button does they have 108 more they have um ace8 more they have ace3 more like because the button doesn't have as many big hands because they checked back so the value of a 10 went way up because the big blind the button didn't bet so they're less likely to have an ace so now you get into some River you know block betting games because they don't have much air so you see here they're checking they're betting a lot um all right I know this is like bet sizing is a topic that you can't really um you know you really can't cover it in one hour um and we didn't really get to specific hand examples I was just kind of using specific flops that I knew the bet sizings would be the way they are that I think people missplay in terms of this whole big game small game type of Mind Set and with betting this is helpful did you guys like this you know all right um I am glad you guys enjoyed um thank you very much awesome thanks guys

King Jack raising pretty frequently because King Jack has a lot of backwards straight draws right we also see some asex putting in the Rays immediately and stuff like five four five three and four two suited that have straight draws with the two notice also some of the bottom pairs raised too whenever you're check raising lots of trips usually the other card raises as well the other card on the board raises as well what about one more here is an interesting spot where the Flop comes Ace five five big blind checks almost everything they do actually lead every once in a while on this board because they have a lot of fives and we actually have a lot of Aces if you look at our range here we have a lot of Aces and we have a lot of fives which lets us lead some portion of the time that said we check most of the time logic bets about half the time using a tiny bet we're gonna again be raising very very polarized with some good Aces and better including all of our fives and then some draws and on ace55 we have a lot of logical draws you're gonna find this is a pretty common pattern when it comes with a flush draw you're usually going to be raising your flush draws then also some back door flush draws that can easily keep bluffing when that third Spade comes and on the ace55 another logical draw is the gut shots so we do see four three four two and three two suited raising basically every time we also we also other perhaps illogical draws that maybe you're not check raising like seven six check raising and six four but again these have back door straight draws right so backdoor straight draws in the spot usually go for a raise too I realize we've not covered every single flop that could possibly come but we've been through three very different types of boards we have the flops that are terrible for the big blind lots of generally cautious play then we have flops that are medium for the big blind we have slightly more aggressive plays slightly more loose play and then these interesting spots are definitely worth noting as well because they do come up a decent amount of the time we discussed this again at pokercoaching.com a ton we go through a lot more situations with different stack depths different opponent positions Etc but this is a very good framework to getting you started playing when you check the big blind and the opponent bets but now I want to discuss what happens when you check and the opponent checks it through what do we do then finally in this video let's discuss how to play When the Flop checks through we're gonna be discussing specifically low Jack raises big blind calls check check on the flop what are we looking at on the turn well when the Flop checks through it kind of

been talking about do not work well when you are against a lot of opponents. In fact, making some of these plays in multiway pots will cost you money in the long run. Specifically, against many opponents, you should slowplay less, if at all, semi-bluff less, avoid bluffing - especially on the end against more than two opponents - and avoid inducing bluffs with checks that give free cards. On the other hand, with many players in the pot, your implied odds usually have increased. This means that you are much more apt to play and even raise with small pairs, suited connectors, and hands like: Conversely, when you hold big unsuited cards, your opponents are getting implied odds from you. Therefore, it is wrong to raise with unsuited high cards in multiway pots, and it may be right to fold hands like AT, KT, and even AJ and KJ. Specifically, if you hold on the button, and five or six players have limped in, you should strongly consider folding. Raising with this hand - which is a Heads-Up Versus Multiway 93 mistake frequently made by beginning players - will cost you money in the long run. Even calling might be wrong for all but the best players. On the flop many hands play differently depending on the size of the pot and the number of players in the pot. Here's an example. Suppose you start with the flop is and the player on your right bets into you. If the pot is small you may only want to call. This is because the bettor may already have you beat and if you raise you won't lose someone who has flopped a four-flush. What you'will knock out is a hand like middle pair or a gut shot draw. If the pot is big, you would now want to make this raise since anyone holding these hands may now be getting the correct odds to call. You would also sometimes adjust your play if you flop a draw. Suppose in the above hand you held two small diamonds instead of the AH+. As previously discussed, if the pot is small and you are first to act you should usually bet right out in the hopes that you might win it right there. If the pot is big, it might be correct to check and hope that the bet comes on your left, then you can checkraise and build a big pot. (However, this play is not recommended in tough games. One reason is that you are now more likely to be 94 Part Two: Strategic Concepts up against a bigger flush draw. The other reason is that in tough games the original bettor is more likely to reraise.) Ifthe bet comes from a late position player you should probably just call and let the other players in behind you. Raising There are five basic reasons to raise in hold 'em: 1. To get more money in the pot. 2. To drive players out. 3. To bluff (or semi-bluff). 4. To get a free

Equally important in determining whether a hand that needs improvement is worth a call is the question of whether the hand will win even if you do make it. Your hand might lose in a variety of ways. It can happen because you are drawing dead — that is, the hand you are looking to make is already beaten by your opponent. For example, when that open pair bet into your fourflush and a possible straight earlier in this chapter, he might have been betting a full house, which you have no way of beating. It can also happen that you make your hand and your opponent makes an even better hand even though you weren't drawing dead. Your four-flush might, for example, be up against threeof-a-kind. You may make your flush, but your opponent may very well make a full house. Pot Odds 45 In such situations you must reduce your odds of winning and sometimes throw your hand away. For instance, a four-flush against three-of-a-kind in seven-card stud is a much greater underdog than a four-flush against two pair because threeof-a-kind is more than twice as likely to improve to a full house. The ability to fold correctly when you suspect you are drawing dead or drawing with too little chance of ending up with the best hand is one attribute that distinguishes a good player from an average one. On the other hand, poor players are likely to call thoughtlessly on the come no matter what. They do not consider that they may be drawing dead; and when they're not drawing dead, they do not adjust their chances of ending up with the best hand, taking into account the possibility of an opponent's making a bigger hand than their own. In hold 'em and other community card games, you can sometimes draw dead because the cards that will give you the hand you want will also give your opponent an even better hand. Suppose in hold 'em you are holding your opponent is holding 46 Chapter Five and the board is If a queen falls on the end, you make a straight, to be sure, and a straight beats three jacks. However, the queen also happens to give your opponent a full house. Similarly, if you hold Pot Odds 47 feel there is a 30 percent chance your opponent will make a hand that beats the one you are trying to make. Should you still call? As a 5-to-1 underdog you are going to make your hand one-sixth of the time, which is 16% percent. However, of that 16% percent of the time, you will be good only 70 percent of the time. All of a sudden, instead of winning 16 2 /3 percent of the time, you will win only about 11 2 /3 percent of the time. You go from a 5-to-1 shot to just about a 7 1 /2-to-1 shot. What appeared to be an easy call has become a fold. In general, you don't need to calculate your chances of winning so precisely; when there

hands raise, with smaller offsuit broadways and medium suited hands limping heavily to preserve their equity and avoid playing a big pot. The bluff portions of the raising range are a diverse mix of lower suited hands and higher offsuit hands . It may seem arbitrary at first, but there’s a method to the madness: the BB responds to this raise with a robust calling range and some polarized three-betting. This mix of calls and three-bets prevents the SB from following a simple heuristic of raising exclusively small suited hands or higher offsuit hands. When the BB calls, SB prefers to have the suited hands, as they realize equity better from out of position. When the BB raises, however, SB regrets having suited hands, as they give up more EV by folding. The resulting equilibrium is that the SB bluffs with a mix of offsuit hands that do reasonably well when called but don’t mind folding to three-bets and suited hands that have the least to lose by folding to three-bets . This is why the SB treats T3s as a better opening candidate than T6s: the latter performs slightly better when called but also gives up more when it folds to a three-bet. The BB’s mix of calls and three-bets prevents the SB from following a simple heuristic. BB Response to SB Open, 40bb stacks, 25% of Field Remaining The same patterns persist as the bubble approaches, but they are harder to discern as the SB raises so rarely. Shallower Stacks With shallower effective stacks, the SB has a new tool for avoiding big confrontations: open shoving. It’s a bit counter-intuitive, but this is actually a low-risk play because the BB’s own risk premium incentivizes them to fold quite often, even with hands that are well ahead of the SB’s shoving range. As the risk premium increases, the SB’s strategy shifts away from calls and smaller open raises and toward shoves and folds. The following chart shows how SB’s strategy changes as the tournament progresses, 20bb deep. This pattern persists even when the SB is covered. In this final table scenario , the BB has 30bb to SB’s 19, but SB shoves aggressively nevertheless, as calling remains a significant risk for the BB. The composition of these ranges also matches that of the symmetric stack simulations: the SB shoves a blocker-heavy range of medium-strength hands too strong to raise-fold but not so strong they want to induce action. Their 3bb raising range is more polar , with big pairs and suited Aces balanced by small suited hands and larger off-suit hands. SB’s limping range is also somewhat polar, with stronger hands limping to call or raise and weaker ones limping to fold. Note that AA is a poor candidate for limping as a trap because it blocks so much of the BB’s raising range. When the SB covers the BB , they mostly shove or fold, with just a narrow, polar raising range. They fold much more often than when covering with deeper stacks, as the BB will find more hands

turn card, after bet 33%-call line on K ♠ 8 ♥ 4 ♦ Several factors contribute to this contrast. On the flop, UTG enjoyed a large range advantage which enabled even their marginal hands to bet without great fear of running into better. They could include stronger hands in this small bet range because, with two streets still to play, there would be opportunities to build a big pot later. And with two cards to come and plenty of money behind, they could bet draws planning to call a check-raise if necessary. All that changes on the turn. BB has folded away their equity disadvantage and now has a stronger range on most turns. This means UTG can no longer bet with impunity. Their medium-strength hands have less incentive to bet : they already got some protection on the flop, and now, with just one card to come, there is less danger of getting drawn out on. UTG’s strong hands need to start aggressively growing the pot to make up for that small flop bet 💪 That means they can also bet big with weak hands for maximum fold equity . They bet flush draws consistently, but more marginal draws, along with marginal made hands, make up the bulk of the checking range . These hands are more at risk for getting blown off their equity and less excited about growing a large pot, as fewer river cards make them the functional nuts. Here’s that same K ♠ 8 ♥ 4 ♦ flop after a 33% pot continuation bet and a Qs turn . Pay particular attention to the pure strategies, the hands that show a strict preference for either betting or checking: UTG Strategy + EV on K ♠ 8 ♥ 4 ♦ Q ♠ UTG Strategy breakdown by handclass on K ♠ 8 ♥ 4 ♦ Q ♠ After betting small on the flop with their entire range, UTG bets barely 40% of their range on this turn, always for an amount larger > than pot 💰 UTG shows a clear preference for checking one-pair hands despite the draws . Third pair, second pair, and even most top pair strictly check. Meanwhile, two-pair and sets almost exclusively bet , with the only exceptions coming from KK and QQ. These hands both block the hands most likely to pay off big bets and are particularly resilient against getting drawn out on, as some spade rivers will make them a full house. Draws are trickier to categorize because their incentives are less clear . Flush draws with a pair or even just an Ace have some unimproved showdown value and so less incentive to bluff. But straight draws have bad blocking effects on BB’s folding range, which is heavy on pocket pairs like JJ, TT, and 99. We see the same pattern even on a very different turn card, the 8 ♠ , which is among the worst for UTG: UTG checks more hands overall, even after accounting for the fact that BB’s optimal strategy involves donk betting a range that is

OOP has on average 45% EQ when facing a turn c-bet, but will only be able to realize 77% of it, for a total EV of 21% of the pot. IP has an average EQ of 55%, and will over-realize it by a large margin with an EQR factor of 144%, capturing 79% of the pot. 14 GTO RIVER STRATEGIES In a sense, the river is the easiest street to play, yet most players struggle with it. In fact, the river is actually where the most mistakes are made and most of the money is won or lost. By the time we get to the river, the pot will generally be a lot bigger than it was on the previous streets. Bigger pots mean bigger bets (often all-in) and, with bigger bets, mistakes can get very costly. Calculating river equilibrium and exploitative strategies on a given runout from the players’ ranges, SPRs and betting abstractions in any decision point is relatively easy, especially with modern GTO solvers. The river calculations typically take a split second. What makes the river challenging is that it is the most difficult street on which to estimate players’ starting ranges. At the beginning of each hand, all players have the exact same range: 100% or 169 strategically unique hands. As the players take different actions, their pre-flop ranges become narrower, so the flop starting ranges aren’t too difficult to estimate either. During post-flop play, the players’ pre-flop ranges interact with the board in various ways and suits become relevant, forcing us to keep track of specific hand combinations. Post-flop play depends on the way the board runs out and the ranges derived from the previous street actions. All of this makes it significantly more difficult to figure out the players’ exact ranges the deeper we are in the hand. Also, since most poker hands are over before showdown, players are a lot less experienced playing the later streets. With all the possible runouts and ways to get to the river, it is no surprise that most players struggle with river play. Fortunately, we don’t have to memorize every single action line and range getting to the river. The river has some unique characteristics that simplify the calculations and make abstract models and toy games particularly useful to accurately represent river scenarios.

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This river bet-size is horrible. Hero's fear is that if he bets too big, his tight opponent will simply

did three about that in preflop I'd probably make a small bet on the flop against one person and then then go from there and probably just end up checking down the turn in the river all right we were raised to 700 I typically use a big array size when we're playing very deep we are playing 66 issue big blinds deep so I think raising to about 800 900 is fine whatever seven unders fine doesn't like that big of a difference they've lined three bets I would just call against the loose aggressive player in position with the suti connector hands great opponent best the flop we have a pair in a draw I would call some people think they always need to rage with their pairs and draws but the problem is if you raise here what's going to fold well under pairs are gonna fold which in Krush maybe hands like ace king would fold which you don't really mind if ace king folds but that's it ace king king queen and ace queen would fold but besides that a lot of hands that would fold you demolish and also you kind of know which cards are bad for you right like an ace is obviously bad at King is obviously bad every other cards kind of okay I mean I get that a queen makes a stainless trade but such is life and the thing is no better hands fold right like a stent probably isn't gonna fold king 10 probably isn't gonna fold queen 10 probably as I'm gonna fold a Jack's not gonna fold over pears not gonna fold there's really no point in raising raising for the most part makes your opponent play well and we're against a lag if we just randomly out of three outs right like a specs terms of nine which he didn't really want pony bets 5k well I would call here and they look to fold the river I would also call here with a queen so my range gonna be decently well protected here it's gonna be something like two pair and better maybe something like King Jack and better maybe maybe King tenon better for a gutshot right I'd also call some some diamond drawers if I had them probably all have a ton of diamond draws less is like Jack X of diamonds or eight X of diamonds so I like a call here and then just fold to a river bath there was a nine that's nice opponent bets I would jam exponent checks I would jam I think your phone's can have a lot of queens and just a whole lot of garbage in if your phone has garbage he's gonna fold to any bet guys a queen he's going to call any bad presumably if you thought your opponent was just done with the hand like obviously done instead of shoving I would bet something like 2,000 to try to make it look like I'm trying to get some thin value

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

Game: Heads-Up Sit N’ Go (Players can only push or fold) BN Stack: 100 chips BB Stack: 100 chips Blinds: (5/10) Pre-flop: BN is playing a strategy where he goes all-in with all of his hands. What is the BB’s MES vs the BN? Using the pot odds formula: BB can call all hands that have at least 45% equity vs Villain’s range, so BB’s MES vs BN is to call 66.21% hands and fold 33.79% (Hand Range 18).

it seemed to me the stakes were higher, though it might have been because the hands were bigger. The game progressed as usual and I was beginning to get bored when suddenly the German bet 5000 Chinese which at that time was $500 in United States currency. They were playing seven-card stud, Hi-Lo. Ling called, and the sailor said he was broke and would have to stay for just the pot. He was high with three kings exposed which looked like he would split the money in the pot, holding Hi. When the sailor said he was broke, the German put the money to one side, indicating his bet was a side bet. Ling called and placed his money beside the German's. The German held ? ? 2 4 7 with two more cards to come. He was doubtless going for low and if he held two cards below the 7 in the hole he should have a winning hand. Ling held ? ? 6 3 4, also with two more cards to come. The German was dealing and he dealt Ling the deuce, making ?? 6 3 4 2. He dealt himself the ace of diamonds, making ? ? 2 4 7 A. I think he dealt a queen to the sailor but he was going for high and I didn't notice. I was only interested in the low hands. When the German caught the ace of diamonds on the sixth card, making ? ? 2 4 7 A, I thought I detected a certain agitation reflected in Ling's eyes. It might have meant that he was disturbed over the German having made a four-card low hand. If the German had a trey unexposed he would have A 2 3 4 7 for low - very, very low indeed. Of course Ling could have a lower hand if one of his unexposed cards was an ace - namely, A 2 3 4 6, the lowest hand in the deck. Another possibility crossed my mind. I had seen Ling eyeing the exposed discards, making mental notes, I thought. He had a better photographic mind than I and if he had taken the trouble to remember the cards that were exposed, as I always did, he would know many sequences of cards -if the sequences had not been disturbed in the shuffle. The German shuffled overhand, which is no shuffle at all. Could it be that Ling knew, or thought he knew, the next card -the next one to the ace of diamonds? If it turned out to be another ace, Ling would make the lowest hand in the deck. But, if the dealer suddenly called for a cut, Ling would be lost. 'What's the Hong Kong rate of exchange?' asked the German in a low voice. 'About four Hong Kong to one US,' said the CNAC pilot. 'I bet one thousand US,' declared the German. 'Here's two thousand Hong Kong, which is five hundred US, and here's another five hundred gold,' he said, and taking a bulging wallet from his pocket he

range could well contain better overpairs even if he just flats the squeeze given his passivity thus far. An underpair is worthless in almost every post-flop branch that is likely to occur here and is also the most common thing Hero will flop. He'll quickly wish he hadn't bloated the pot in this branch too. So overall, squeezing is a severe error. My students will make mistakes here very commonly due to not thinking enough about what a squeeze would actually accomplish. This hand illustrates how important it is to get a handle on the right strategy for the situation instead of blindly 3-betting because "I have JJ". Calling on the other hand is hugely +EV and by far the best line. By calling, Hero gives himself an insanely profitable set mine for only 2BB, controls the size of the pot vs. a strong range and doesn't value own himself by building an enormous pot with a hand that will do poorly out of position vs. strong ranges multiway on the vast majority of boards. Hero calls 2BB.

and offsuit cards such as J? 5?, 10? 3?, 9? 4? are obviously garbage. But so are offsuit hands that a lot of people play because you can flop a straight with them, such as K-9, Q-8, J-7, 10-6, 9-5, 8-4, 7-3, and 6-2. I don’t play these hands because even if I got the best flop I could to them—other than a full house—I could get broke by running into a bigger straight. Consequently, I never play a hand when I have the top and bottom cards of a straight, except when I’m in position. I always make exceptions when I’m in position, even with the trash hands. For example, if I were on the button with a hand like A-8 offsuit, I might call a raise before the flop if enough people, say four, were in the pot in front of me and I didn’t think there’d be any more raises. I might call a small raise and take a flop with a trash hand because it’s a good percentage play. I’d be trying to make a full, trips, or two pair. But if I don’t get a real good flop to the hand, I’ll throw it away. I won’t get involved and burn up a bunch of money with one of those trash hands. I’m not going to call any bets on the flop. I’ll be raising or I’ll be gone. If I were in position, I might even raise with a trash hand. More than that, I might play it fast after the flop, too. Say the guys in the early positions threw their hands away, and someone in a middle position limped in. Well, if I were on the button, I’d be in position, and I’d raise it regardless of what two cards I have. And if it was checked to me on the flop, I’d bet regardless of what flopped. Obviously, I wouldn’t be playing my hand because of its value. Trash hands have no value. I might as well be playing with two blank cards in this 408 situation because all I’m doing is playing my position and my opponent. Since he limped in, I’d assume that he’s got a weak hand to begin with, and if he misses the flop, I’ll be able to pick the pot up. Other than the exceptional situations discussed above, trash hands are just not playable. SHORTHANDED PLAY A lot of times, you’ll be playing in a full or ring game, and before the night is over, you’ll find yourself playing shorthanded. As I already mentioned, you have to be able to change gears in this situation. You should play in the same basic style—aggressive—but you should realize that all the hands increase in value. This is particularly true of the big cards. And, in a shorthanded game, all the trouble hands become playable from almost any position. In a shorthanded game, position is probably the most important thing. The reason is that you get to look at more cards and have to play more hands than you would

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

reasons. There are occasions, though, when you cost yourself less by raising to gain information early than you would if you had not led your opponent into giving his hand away. These occasions usually occur in heads-up situations and only in early betting rounds. Furthermore, your opponent should be the type of player whose response to your raise is likely to reflect the hand he is holding. Otherwise your raise could very well give you wrong information. What can you learn by raising? Well, if your opponent calls, he probably has a good hand. If he reraises, he probably has a very good hand. (It's for this reason you cannot raise to gain information when your opponent is the sort of player who is capable of a semi-bluff reraise.) If your opponent folds, that, of course, tells you he's weak, and you take down the money. An added benefit to raising to gain information is that sometimes your opponent may fold marginal hands that he shouldn't have folded. You invest in an early raise to gain information in order to save yourself money later. If, for example, you call on fourth street in seven stud, you may continue to call three more bets only to discover in the showdown that you didn't have a chance from the beginning. But a raise on fourth street followed by a call or a reraise from your opponent allows you to play your hand knowing you're up against considerable strength. Depending upon your own strength, you can then decide whether and how long it's worth continuing in the hand. 132 Chapter Thirteen Let's say with a pair of kings on fourth street in seven-card stud you raise an open pair of 9s. Your opponent reraises. You decide that opponent has three 9s and fold. By risking one bet (your raise), you save as many as three bets you might otherwise have called on fifth street, sixth street, and on the end. Your savings is even greater when the bet doubles after fourth street. A trial-balloon raise on a $10 round could save you three $20 calls later. Nevertheless, raising just to gain information is tricky. For example, if that open pair of 9s just calls your raise, can you be sure that opponent doesn't have three 9s? What to do on the next round may still not be clear to you. That is why you should generally reserve your raises for other purposes and consider whatever information you gain from your opponents' responses as an added benefit. Raising to Drive Out Worse Hands When Your Own May Be Second Best Depending on the size of the pot and your assessment of your own and your opponents' hands, it may be correct to raise with what you believe may be the second-best hand if you can get the third-, fourth- and fifth-best hands out. The reasons for this play were suggested in an earlier chapter. If, for instance, the bettor has a 50 percent chance of winning the pot, you have a 30 percent chance, and two

The Pot Size Philosophy This will be a brief section, but don’t let that fool you. It’s one of the most important in the book. It’s a simple (and seemingly obvious) philosophy for playing deep stack no limit, but one that you ignore at your peril. We call it the pot size philosophy. Big pots and big bets are for big hands. For a moment, take a 30,000-foot view of no limit. Ignore specific hands, situations, and bluffs. Just think in general terms. On most hands you don’t bet much. On a few hands you bet a lot. If you want to win, you have to, on average, bet more on your good hands than you do on your bad ones. If you consistently get it backwards, if you build big pots with bad hands, but keep the pot small with good ones, you’ll get crushed over the long haul. Obvious, right? Except many players frequently get it backwards. They slowplay and milk with their good hands and make too many big, daring bluffs. Sometimes they do it in the name of deception. A little deception is good, but it’s only a balance to normal behavior. And normal behavior should be big pots and big bets for big hands. For instance, some no limit players opine that that they are more likely to call a big bet on the end than a small one if all they have is a bluff-catcher. They figure that, with a good hand, most players would try to “milk” them by making a reasonable-sized, callable bet. So a big bet must be a bluff. Sometimes these players are right. Against some rare opponents, they might have it close to exactly right. But, as a general principle, calling big “bluffs” but folding to small “value bets” is horrendous strategy. If you don’t understand why, think about how easy such a strategy would be to exploit. In principle, the most profitable general betting scheme against players like that is to bet small when bluffing and bet big when betting for value. That way, you risk little when bluffing, but you get the most value for your big hands. Naturally, a bettor has to mix that pattern up to avoid being too readable against most opponents, but he wouldn’t have to mix it up against someone who calls big bets and folds to small ones. It would be a double whammy for the perverse caller: He’d tend to lose both more money and more often to value bets, and he’d snap offbluffs for less money and less often. 18

Short stack In cash games, a short stack is any stack below 100 big blinds. In tournaments, a short stack is a small stack with few remaining big blinds, typically under 20bb is considered a short stack. However, the definition of what is a short stack in tournaments may vary from player to player.

they have their seat so locked up it is near impossible for them to lose it. There is almost no ICM pressure anymore between the players in the blinds because the chip leader is almost certainly going to win a seat, so what is left is a quasi heads-up match between the other two players. Nothing good happens when the BTN shoves, it just delays the end of the match. The more profitable thing to do is fold and let the other two players get it in wide against each other, to end the satellite sooner. Never Folding Ace-x in a Satellite One more for fun. This time we are on the bubble, with 5 seats to be awarded and 6 players left. These are the stacks: In GTO World, when action folds to HJ, they should shove 100% of the time . However, if we give them a min-raising range of TT + AJ s+ and AQ o+ (and they shove the rest), what range should the BTN reshove over the top of their open with? It’s probably better to show you the visual of the range: This is one of the weirdest ranges I have ever seen but I can assure you it’s correct and I have replicated across several solvers. The reshoving range is any Ace, and nothing else. KK is a fold, and A2 o is a profitable reshove. The strange EVs of Ace-x hands here are due to blocker effects. The reason for this is quite simple when you think about it. Once again the Bubble Factors show the way: The Bubble Factor for the HJ against the BTN is 4.08, meaning they would need 80% equity to call. The only hand that has more than 80% equity is Pocket Aces, so that is the only hand the HJ can call off the reshove with. Therefore, any hand with an Ace in it is much more effective in denying equity (by forcing folds). Having an Ace blocker is more valuable than holding a made hand like KK . This highlights an important lesson about ICM: When ICM pressure is extreme, fold equity is the most important form of equity. This is also why shoving is the best strategy late in a satellite, to avoid spots like this in the first place. Folding AA in a Mystery Bounty One final example from the fast-growing format of the Mystery Bounty Mystery Bounty Unlike regular bounty tournaments, in mystery bounty tournaments, a random bounty (from the bounty pool) is paid every time a K.O. is made. tournaments. As you will have seen from our PKO articles, ranges get much wider in bounty tournaments and we sometimes see Bubble Factors below 1! Unseen in other formats. The potential to win bounties widens players’ ranges. Mystery Bounty tournaments are no different and a lot of the same strategic adjustments apply. There is one notable difference however, which is when the bounties are available to win. In a Regular PKO you can win bounties from the very first hand. In a Mystery Bounty,

The first thing to note is that Hero has no burden to meet any kind of meaningful MDF in this spot. It is not his open that is being attacked but that of the BU. Strictly speaking, Hero has some mathematical duty to defend his 1BB a tiny amount of the time here against the 8.5BBs that are being risked to win it, but we'll ignore this side of things in these spots as the vast majority of the burden of defence rests with the BU. It is primarily his strategy and not Hero's that determines how profitable SB's light 3- bets will be. Hero will be folding the vast majority of his range facing this action; this is normal and not exploitable. That said, Hero is not stuck in fit-or-fold city. He should expect the average 3-bet range from a 7% 3- bettor to be quite wide, especially SB vs. BU and so should be able to claim some fold equity here. BU's range is wide and will have to fold very often in the light of a cold 4-bet. We can thus state our first guiding fact about how Hero should play this situation. Hero should have a 4-bet bluff range. Since we should be starting out balanced here barring some extreme population read about how people react to cold 4-bets, and given we have 4-bet bluffs in our range, we can assert: Hero should also have a 4-bet value range. Now what about having a cold calling range in this spot? There are some pretty big disadvantages to calling here:

bail out on the turn in some cases. If your opponent has bet the flop, and now bets again on the turn, this tends to indicate that he has a pretty good hand. Thus, it is generally correct to fold second pair at this point, particularly if the other player is tight. When playing against a maniac or very loose player, however, you just have to call him down and hope for the best. Another situation in which you can probably save money by folding most of the time is when you have bet the flop with top pair or an overpair, only to see a “scary” card come on the turn and your opponent fires in a bet. Here are two examples: Example 1 The board is 3-5-T and you bet the flop with your Q-T. A king comes on the turn, it makes three to a flush, and your opponent bets out. Although he might be semibluffing, it is very likely you are beat and drawing either slim or dead. So, fold and go on to the next hand, rather than spend two big bets trying to keep him honest. Example 2 The board is 2-7-J and you bet the flop with your K-K. An ace comes on the turn and your opponent bets out. If he has an ace, you are down to two outs. And it is likely that he does, as that is the card most commonly played in hold’em. Also, your opponent isn’t any more likely than you are to like that card if it didn’t help him (thus less apt to be betting without an ace). It hurts to throw away kings, but you are nearly always correct in doing so in this case. Only against players who play with a good deal of deception and creativity is calling the best option. Tip # 37 of 52 What to do when faced with calling a bet with less than top pair is the toughest decision you'll have to make on the turn in a heads-up pot. Although touched upon in the previous tip, this is an important and common enough situation to merit additional comments. Here are three considerations to help guide your decision: How Does Your Opponent Play? You can call with a much weaker hand against an overly aggressive player. This type of player bluffs frequently, and it is often a mistake to fold any pair against him. He will just have to show you the best hand. Against a player who is ordinarily very tight or passive, however, it’s a pretty safe bet that you are beaten, so you can confidently fold. In fact, you may even consider folding top pair with a marginal kicker against someone who is exceptionally tight. What Is the Texture of the Board? On a board such as 2-2-7-Q, it is highly unlikely that your opponent will bet both the flop and turn without at least a pair. There aren’t any draws present, and your call on the flop alerted him that you have some kind of

ti kuei-t'ou pi chiao wu-tnen chungkuo-jen-ti ta ma ?" ' 'You're a big help. What does it mean?' He said, 'It means something like this: "Do Foreign Devils have bigger turtleheads than we Chinese boys?" ' 'Jesus,' I said, 'no wonder she trembled.' He kissed his companion, and as I left I saw her, Chinese fashion, wiping her mouth. Three: Summary of Seven-Card Stud This will teach you to win at seven-card stud whether at limit poker or table stakes. What to stay on will be found on page 59. THE PLAY I have dealt three hands as exercises. 1ST DEAL The Deal Two Down One up 1st player is dealt 9 A A Two Aces 2nd ,, ,, ,, 7 8 9 Three Card Straight 3rd ,, ,, ,, K K J Two Kings Concealed 4th ,, ,, ,, a bust 5th ,, ,, ,, 7 2 2 Two Deuces 6th ,, ,, ,, a bust 7th ,, ,, ,, A K 8 Ace-King High The Betting 1st player is High with the Ace. He must bet. 2nd stays on a 3-Card Straight. 3rd stays on Two Concealed Kings. 4th folds on a bust. 5th makes a bad call and stays with Two Concealed Deuces. 6th and 7th fold. The Deal Two Down Two Up 1st player is dealt a Q, making Two Aces, no improvement. 9 A A Q 2nd player is dealt a 3, making Did not improve. 7 8 9 3 3rd player is dealt a 7, making Did not improve Two Kings K K J 7 5th player is dealt a 9, making Did not improve the Two Deuces 7 2 2 9 The Betting 1st player is High with the Ace. He bets on Two Aces. 2nd calls with a 3-Card Straight. 3rd calls with Two Kings, thinking 1st may have Two Aces. 5th calls with Two Deuces. I would personally throw this hand in the discards. The betting gets stiffer and since he did not improve the hand he should fold. In fact he should not have stayed in the first place. The Deal Two Down Three Up 1st player is dealt a J, making Did not improve Two Aces 9 A A Q J 2nd player is dealt a 6, making A 4-Card Straight. He still has two cards to make his hand. 7 8 9 3 6 3rd player is dealt a 7, making Kings Up K K J 7 7 5th player is dealt a 6, making Still Two Deuces. He has gone too far but suckers never learn and will take the sixth card. 7 2 2 9 6 The Betting It is 3rd player's bet with Two Sevens exposed. He bets on Kings Up. 5th player is still trying to make Three Deuces and stays. 1st player calls on Two Aces. 2nd also calls on a 4-Card Straight. The Deal Two Down Four Up 1st player is dealt a J, making Aces Up. 9 A A Q J J 2nd player is dealt a 3, making Still a 4-Card Straight

trips, a full house, or even quads. The point is, you’ve flopped huge and now you have to figure out how to maximize value and avoid pitfalls, if any. To start things off, we’ll say that you took the lead before the flop, you’re heads-up in position, and the board is fully dry: no straight or flush draws, nada. To help you visualize the situation, your hand is A♦9♣ and the flop comes A♣-9♦-3♥. Note that if you had pocket 9s, you’d be roughly equally strong. I ask you to note this because, again, I’m giving you guidelines for certainsituations that you can apply to analogous situations, even though the hands might not be precisely the same. The first question is: How did you get involved in this hand? The likeliest answer is that it was folded to you in late position, you raised, and thebig blind called. That’s typically how you get involved with the lead in position: You raise late and get one caller. Also, typically on the flop, our old friend “check to the raiser” shows up. So now you have two pair and the lead. Are you ready to act? Not quite yet. First, you have to set your goal for the hand. In this case, with a monster hand and a dry board, you have the luxury of focusing only on how to make the most money, with no need to protect against … well, anything. Understand that most people’s instinct here when they flop huge and their opponent checks to them is to be “tricky” and check, for the obviousreason that they think they’ve got a big fish on the hook and they’re reluctant to let it wriggle away. The problem is, that thinking is completely wrong (and this isn’t the last time you’ll hear me say it). Let’s talk about why. First, consider a situation where you’re up against someone who has absolutely nothing. If he checks and you check, all you’ve done is alert himthat something weird is going on; why would the pre-flop raiser fail to bet on the flop in position? That is a very unusual action and unusual actionstend to sound alarm bells. The continuation bet called for here will happen nearly 100% of the time, so your failure to make it is bizarre. Consider that if you had a semi-strong hand like Ax, you’d certainly be betting here. And even if you completely missed, you’d also be betting. After all, why did you buy the lead pre-flop if you don’t use it to try to pick up the pot after you miss the board? Therefore, when it’s “checked to the raiser” in aheads-up pot, you’re expected to bet and it’s highly unusual when you don’t. And an unusual action with an unusual holding gives your hand away. Look at the story you’re telling. Your pre-flop raise said, “Strong!” But your post-flop check is trying hard to say, “Weak!” And what does that bizarre sequence add up to? Aha! A strong hand played weakly! Your opponent with nothing is now easily

Figure 14 - Good and Bad Steal Factors Factor 1: Refers to the Starting Hand Attributes we considered at the start of this chapter. See Figure 4 for a reminder. The better the hand performs post-flop the less FE it needs to steal pre-flop. Factor 2: Light 3-bettors are much worse for us than Villains who just call. We might know how often the blinds fold, but we need to consider what form their non-folding normally takes. If they 3-bet us, the bottom of our range goes straight into the muck and we realise no EV from trying to connect with the flop or being able to c-bet selectively. Factor 3: If Villains play fit-or-fold post-flop, we need less fold equity and can open wider. This is due to our continuation bets working more and not needing to hit the flop as often as a result. Factor 4: Aware Villains are ones who are prone to adjust well to our strategy in the long term. It may be that for now we can get away with opening 72o, but if we open 100% of hands continuously against these players then we can expect them to stop folding enough for those weaker steals to remain profitable. Thus, when Villains are aware, we'll need to make sure our stealing range doesn't get too out of line as a solid long-term strategy. V acuum EV is a more blinkered view that neglects the possible ebb and flow of the game based on what players observe about each other's strategies. Long Term EV acknowledges this and takes into

THE CONCEPTS 194 to figure out even away from the table when you have hours and hours to think about it. At the table, solving these problems is usually impossible. But you don’t have to solve the problems to use game theory to your ad- vantage. A strategy that is relatively close to the game theoretically optimal one is, for all intents and purposes, good enough. For instance, if game theory says you should bet all your good hands and bluffan additional 22 percent of the time, you’ll do just fine if you bluff15 percent or 30 percent instead. You’ll even be fine at 10 percent. Just avoid 2 percent or 80 percent, and you’ll be a tough nut for anyone to crack. And remember that if you play better than your opponents, you rarely need to think along these lines at all. Rather, think about what your opponents put you on, and what they think you put them on. If you plan to make a play that will give away your hand, choose a different play occasionally and make the same play sometimes with a different holding. If you do this consistently as you play, you’ll usually do even better than the game theoretical strategy. Concept No. 59: Don’t help your opponents play correctly. Your job is to try to avoid difficult decisions for yourself, but to impose them on your opponents. Whenever you confront an opponent with a tough situation, you’ve created an opportunity for him to make a mistake. (Either that, or you’ve put him in a lose- lose situation which is even better.) You make money when your opponents make mistakes, so always try to entice them to make a mistake (given your hand). One obvious way that people make things easy on their opponents is they make bets on the river that no better hands will fold to and no worse hands will call. Less obvious situations occur when there are more cards to come. In a nutshell, the idea is to avoid betting so much that a hand you want to call won’t, or betting so little that a hand you don’t want to call will. Another error is to size a bet that would tend to entice a raise that is about the size you don’t want to face. Hopefully the text has shown you many examples of where we are coming from here. Concept No. 60: If someone bets into several players, and you have a hand that is somewhat likely to be best, but unlikely to improve, you often have to fold. For example, in a $5–$10 game with $2,000 stacks, three players limp, the small blind completes, and you check the big blind with Q♣8♠. ($50 in the pot.) The flop is 8♡7♡3♣. The small blind bets $50. You typically should fold. Your problem is that there are still several players yet to act, and you have a modest hand, unlikely to improve. If you raise now, you’re risking too many chips compared to the chance that you are already beaten. Even

Suck out A slang poker term to describe a situation where the villain hits a card to make a better hand when they were behind.

expect most of the aces to be in your opponents’ hands. The Most Important Decision of the Hand Of all the decisions made during the course of an Omaha eight-or-better hand, the choice of whether to initially play or fold is by far the most important. Seeing a flop with an inferior hand might seem like a relatively harmless decision, but it is a mistake that tends to lead to more costly mistakes. Make this your Omaha eight-or-better mantra: Play only hands that have obvious potential of developing into the nuts. A hold’em player might occasionally play an inferior hand or rags, but he will typically be hard pressed to continue after the flop. However, due to the four-card hands in Omaha eight-or-better, players seeing the flop with a raggy hand will frequently flop just enough of a draw to justify staying in— often incorrectly. As a result, instead of simply missing the flop and folding, a reckless player may find himself tied on until the river, chasing a draw that should not have been pursued. Omaha eight-or-better is a perfect example of that old computer maxim GIGO: “Garbage In, Garbage Out.” Starting with middle cards will produce lots of middle straights, which often either lose to better high hands or split with low hands. Starting with double-suited medium cards will produce flushes that often lose to bigger flushes. However, playing premium cards, such as suited aces with a deuce and/or a trey, allows you to make the nut low hand and gives you a chance to develop a high hand as well. Remember your mantra about only playing possible nut hands. If you find yourself uncertain about whether a hand should be played or folded, it’s generally best to fold. Being too creative with your starting hands is a liability in Omaha eight-or-better. 173 Raising Before the Flop A common misconception is that it’s wrong to raise before the flop. Many players—especially those that have played a lot of hold’em—feel that playing the flop is the key to the game and that only a minimal investment should be made prior to seeing the first three board cards. In hold’em, hands such as two aces are obvious raising hands, as they need not improve to win the pot. Omaha eight-or-better hands almost always need to improve to win, so many players consider this enough of a reason to avoid making a raise before the flop. Although flop play is crucial to success, there are numerous situations in which it is in fact correct to raise pre-flop. You will be making a mistake if you never raise before the flop in this game. There are two reasons to raise a pot before the flop: (1) To eliminate players and narrow the field; (2) To build a bigger pot. It is important to consider which of these effects your raise is likely to have. In the loose “no fold-em” games common at some of the lower limits, a raise might not narrow the field. If this is the case in your game, don’t raise.

the poker table and put in volume you have to play hands and then you have to keep a proper bankroll and what I want to talk about here is that you win or lose some amount of money each hand you are dealt in therefore in order to make good money from poker you want to be dealt in to a lot of hands right also your goal should be to make as much money as possible in each hand you are dealt in right that's it you should not really be concerned with winning each session because in reality the start and end of each session are artificial non-existent markers it does not matter especially in cash games if you win X amount of money on each individual day yet whenever people are getting close to ending their session very often players either play way too tightly to try to lock up a win to ensure they get to put a profitable mark on their records or if they're down they gamble like crazy to try to get up or even but you do not need to worry at all at all about trying to get up or even I think one of my greatest strengths is the poker players I literally don't care if I win or lose all I care about is showing up and playing great poker and if you play poker sub-optimally for some amount of time in your session that is either time that you're essentially going to break even with a lot of variants which is not good or perhaps even lose you have to play great poker all the time also you must put in volume when you do not play you do not extract equity assuming you are a profitable player this is very clear whenever you look at an online cash game players results because you'll see very clearly how many big blinds per 100 hands you make and let's say you do make I don't know five big blinds per 100 hands that is 0.05 big blinds per hand if a big blind is one dollar that means you make five cents per hand you play on average that's it grind it out you know you make five cents a hand and if you put in a lot of time at the table maybe online you play multiple tables assuming your win rate does not go down because you're distracted by playing too many tables you can make a very good living off of five cents a hand a lot of the best players make a dollar per hand or five dollars per hand even in live poker it is very possible to make something like four or five dollars per hand at medium Stakes live games because your opponents play so poorly but in order to get this money you have to actually be delved in you should not be taking long breaks you should not be playing short sessions because if you do that you are spending your

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

nan

Hand Range 324: BN 60bb (2.3x vs SB 3-bet) • All-in 2.4% / • 4-bet 6% / • Call 55.8% / • Fold 35.8%

way and bowling and letting other people go broke it's important to note that all the stacks remaining in the tournament matter and for that reason you cannot give easy default pre-flop bubble play charts like you can for scenarios when they're not pound applications like we have at pokercoaching.com in our app because the sacks are going to be all over the place for example on the bubble let's presume average stack is 25 big wines and you have five big lines this is actually fine if there are 300 players remaining in the tournament and 299 get in the money because if you just sit here and blind out for two or three hands someone at some table is gonna go broke before you and you can collect a free minimum cash your 5B line stack maybe only whatever two starting sacks or less but you can very easily sneak into the money in the spot because there are so many players remaining in the tournament if someone's gonna get set up or they're just going to get it in and lose right it's also fine to have five big wines if there are five players in the tournament with one big blind because one of them is going to go broke say you're playing in a tournament with I don't know 20 people and five of them have one be blind and you have five and everybody else has 40 or whatever it is that's fine sit there blind out collect your free cash because one of those one big blind sacks is gonna go broke however say there are 9 tournament and they all have 20 big blinds or more and you have five big blinds now it's kind of unlikely someone's gonna go broke because well they're all sitting there staring at you and realizing you're gonna be the one who goes broke next and no one's anywhere near as short as you so in this scenario you're probably gonna have to double up or bubble and that's okay but realize for that reason you cannot just give blind generic GTO pre-flop charts for bubble play but we can use some rules and strategies to roughly figure out what to do in a lot of common spots and that's where we're gonna discuss risk premium when You Face a bet for all or most of your chips when there are payout implications you need more than your required amount of equity based on the pot odds to call sometimes much more because like we just showed in that final table scenario you and your opponent are putting in money and some of it's going to go to the players who folded right so you have to make up for that right when you call and lose or when you get it all in and lose you are out or nearly out and if you win you do not double your Equity this is a very important point in tournaments so you want to play cautiously often very

game. In the Preface I mentioned briefly how I haunted the poker tables and tried to put in practice what I had seen by dealing to myself. I had played plenty of poker for small stakes with school kids, but this was big-league stuff. The first night I played I think my heart never left my mouth - in any case it all seemed like a bad dream the next morning. I didn't lose much, because to my way of thinking I played conservatively - but the going was rough. It is one thing to face eleven football opponents when you have ten men with you, but to face six hungry wolves alone is something else indeed. The next few days I watched the game to get over my fear, then I tried it again. And I lost. The alternate observation and play went on until I was down to my last fifty dollars. Then I made a discovery. It all happened one night when I suddenly woke up in a sweat. I had been playing cards in my nightmare but for the moment couldn't recover the details. I could see Monty, his face clouded in anger over some argument by the players, yelling, 'Deal! Goddammit, deal!' Then he pounded his right fist on the table. His right fist! That rang a bell. But what bell? Then quickly I knew. Monty was left-handed. When excited he pounded on the table with his right fist. Yes, I must be right. At times - it must have been because of tension - he bet with his right hand. Of course. When he was bluffing, he shifted his cards from the right hand to the left and bet with the right. I could see him now. When he bet he came charging like a wild buffalo. He grabbed just the right amount of chips from his stack, and bang! - he bet. If his opponent wasn't scared to death, he was at least confused. Monty had come at me like that every night I had played. No wonder I was afraid. I knew every move he made now. And why he made each move. Now I could see that he was dealing every time he made this fierce move at me. And every time he made this particular play he was dealing draw. What a sucker I had been! It was too late to do anything about what was done but I might just as well go to see if they were still playing, for I couldn't sleep. I tossed in bed for an hour or so and finally put on my clothes and got my remaining cash from its hiding place and went to the back of Monty's Place. The windows were shaded out but I could see a fringe of light around the drawn curtains and knew that a game was still in progress. I pounded on the back door and was let in by Runt. When I entered the poker room the game was at full tilt, with a half dozen loafers

I've stressed the importance of balance when Hero is void of information against Regs, but remember that he should always be on the lookout for reasons to do something unbalanced. As we saw earlier, where Villain's imbalances offer us a clear route to higher EV by adopting some exploitative strategy of our own, we should do that instead of being balanced. After all, balance is boring unless you're one of those math geeks that loves harmonious ratios of stuff. I think I might be one of those. So to summarise what we just learned in Hand 68, our hand falls into the small sub-range of hands that is good enough to ascend to the third tier of the pyramid (the turn), but no further. If this sub-range were disproportionately large, then Hero would be justified in feeling bad about calling flop and folding turn. Zooming out and remembering the balanced structure of his overall range should ease these worries. He does not have Tc7c on average here, he has lots of hands of varying strength and he's playing that collective body fine. Back to Vacuum EV Of course if Tc7c were actually -EV to call flop and fold turn with in a vacuum, then Hero would have to fold the flop, but this shouldn't be the case due to the amount of equity Hero can realise vs Villain's wide range on other turn cards and how many decent turns there are for Tc7c. Hero should never make awful calls just for the sake of making his pyramid neat. There will be spots in which the situation forces him to underdefend his range, but this hand is still a fine flop call. Thinking about a pyramidal strategy does not excuse us from considering whether a play is actually +EV in a vacuum, it just allows us to see the bigger picture and aim at a sensible overall strategy. We should never intentionally make -EV plays. It could be that we want to grossly overcall the river vs someone who bluffs too much; that doesn't mean that 9-high has enough SDV to call! Now we have the approach down, let's look at another turn spot.

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

Most of the time the solver is indifferent to similar bet-sizes. For example, there probably isn’t too much difference between betting 25% or 33% Pot, or 60% or 67% Pot. Most of the time it is good enough to know if the flop is a “big bet-size” flop or “small bet-size” flop. For MTTs, I recommend using two c-bet sizes: 1/3-pot, and 2/3-pot. If you want to play a more complex strategy, you could add min-bets and 120% overbets to the mix. If you want to simplify your strategy to only one bet-size, you could opt for the 1/3-pot across the board, which is in fact what most online MTT regulars are doing in modern games. This strategy works fine against the population as it simplifies the game tree, is really easy to implement, and it allows you to c-bet at a high frequency on most boards. This forces Villains into making a decision, revealing information about their range at a low cost. It also exploits population tendencies, as most people still overfold to small bets. My recommendation is to become proficient with at least a couple bet-sizes (a big one and a small one), and to understand how to implement them correctly. They you have a solid strategy you can play against tough opponents to keep them guessing while also being able to defend well when they are the ones using non-standard lines. Against weaker players, you can mix it up and play an exploitative strategy. Don’t be afraid of being counter-exploited when playing against unaware opponents because even if they knew what you are doing, chances are they won’t know how to properly adjust to counter you. Keep hammering on them until they start fighting back. If you think you can get away with c-betting at a higher frequency than optimal against a Villain or manipulate them into folding or calling with your bet-size, then go for it! Always be aware and mindful of the situation you are in. Bet-sizing and Modern Solvers Modern GTO solvers can be set up to solve for a specific spot with several bet-sizes, but it is up to the user to input those bet-sizes. A GTO solver cannot figure out the optimal bet-sizes by itself and build the game tree for us. That job is left to the user, so it is up to us to use our knowledge and expertise as poker players to input bet-sizes that we think are a good representation of the situation we want to model and solve the game tree within those parameters. When you choose the bet-sizes a player can use in any given spot, you are limiting their actions to only those options. For example, if you input flop bet-sizes of 1/2-pot and 2/3-pot, those are the only bet-sizes the player can use on the flop. As another example, if you don’t give the OOP player the option to x/r the flop, if they can only call or fold, that will have an effect on IP Betting strategy as IP now knows there is a 0%

two separate rooms, and allow a human to interrogate them unseen. If the interrogator, through a series of probing questions, can't distinguish the computer's answers from the human's, the computer is said to pass the "Turing Test" and, according to Turing, is actually thinking. Restrict interactions to the microcosm of chess, and computers today can almost pass the Turing Test. Based on chess moves alone, it is difficult for the expert to distinguish a human grandmaster from a computer. But when it comes to poker, is the Turing Test even meaningful? There is an insidious problem with programming computers to play poker that in my opinion raises the Turing test to a higher level. The problem is not whether people can figure out if they are up . against a computer. It is whether the computer can figure out people, especially the ever changing social dynamics in a randomly selected group of people. Nobody at a poker table would care whether or not the computer played poker like a person. In fact, people would welcome a computer, since computers tend to play predictably. Computers are, by definition, predictable, which is the meaning of the word "programmed." If you play a computer simulation for a short amount of time, you will learn the machine's betting patterns, adjust your play, and soon win consistently. But predictability doesn't mean the computer is distinguishable from a person. Many people play poker as predictably as a computer. They are welcomed at the table, too. If you find a predictable poker opponent and learn his or her patterns, you can exploit that knowledge for profit. 11 6 THE INTELLIGENT GUIDE TO TEXAS HOLD'EM POKER Most people, however, are unpredictable and human unpredictability is an advantage at poker. To play poker successfully, computers not only have to develop human unpredictability, they must learn to adjust to human unpredictability as well. Computers fail miserably at the problem of adjusting to ever-changing social conditions that result from human interactions. That is why beating a computer at poker is so easy. Of course, the same requirement, the ability to adjust to unpredictability, applies to poker-playing humans who want to be successful. Go back and study how I adjusted each hour in my poker session. However, as humans, we are more accustomed to human unpredictability, so weare far better at learning how to adjust. Part IV Where to Go from Here This book is intended to be both a beginning and a guide. After reading to this point, you shdbld be able to hold your own in the typical low-limit Hold'em games found in public cardrooms and casinos. However, since Hold'em is a rich, complex, and changing game, there is much more to learn. A number of valuable books exist on Hold'em and poker, in general. The strategic framework outlined in Chapter 6 is meant to guide both your approaches to playing poker and your comprehension of further readings on poker. This last section of the book contains information on further reading and places to play. In preparing this book, I read extensively

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

Hand Range 307: LJ 25bb (2x vs BN 2.75x 3-bet) • All-in 23.7% / • Call 44.7% / • Fold 31.7%

Odds Literally speaking, "odds" are the mathematical probability that a hand, cards or draws will occur. However, the term is frequently used as slang for the term "pot odds".

and are drawing at the other half, commonly referred to as a freeroll. You cannot lose the whole pot, and you have the potential to scoop. For example, say you are holding a hand such as A-2-3-10, and the board is 4-5-8-Q (two of your suit). Note that although you might get quartered, you are guaranteed to win the low side, and pairing up any of your low cards makes you a wheel, which might be good for a scoop. Plus, this hand features the nut flush draw. With a hand this strong, you should pump the pot, as there is plenty of upside with virtually no risk. Even if your hand is only good enough to win a quarter of the pot at this point, raising is the correct play due to the hand’s high potential. If three or more other players are in the pot, you won’t lose money if the pot gets quartered, unless it is one of those rare times that two of your opponents share the nut low with you. Against two other players, you should still be aggressive with your freeroll hands, even if you feel one of your opponents has the nut low as well. It’s a good low risk investment that can produce excellent returns if you make your high hand. Here’s an example from a $10/$20 limit game to illustrate: 203 Your hand: A-2-3-10 Board: 4-5-8-Q (two flush cards) One opponent, Player A, bets and another, Player B, calls. If you raise and get quartered, your raise costs you $5 (as all three players pay $20, totaling $60, of which you recoup $15). If you raise, make the flush, and get threequarters, your raise makes you $25 ($20 x 3 = $60, of which you get $45). Risking $5 for a chance to win $25 is a good investment in this spot, since the odds of your making a flush are better than 5 to 1 against—35 to 9, or about 4 to 1. However, in real life the odds are even better than that. Sometimes you will catch an ace or deuce and scoop the pot because an opponent with A-2 gets counterfeited. Also, a 3 or a 6 will make you a straight, which may be good for the high. So a 3 will get you half the pot, and a 6 is worth three quarters. Plus, there is always the possibility that you have the only low hand. Due to their limited liability and great upside, these types of hands should be played as aggressively as possible. Knocking Out the Competition When the turn comes and the size of the bet doubles, players might begin to develop a greater respect for their chips. At this point in the hand, the pots often are pretty large, so it is in your best interest to protect your hand as much as possible. Opponents are more willing to pass without a strong hand when faced with calling two bets cold. Marginal hands with which opponents will likely call one bet but fold for

disappoint them introduce them to several bets try to go for three streets at every opportunity you're not value-betting enough until you accidentally value bet the second best hand the entire point of Poker is to capture the other players chips the biggest bets in the limit No Limit Hold'em are river bets you can't win a river bat from another player with a bluff you'll need to Value bet them I guess you could if somebody bats the river as thinly and then you raise them okay yes you did capture a river bat with a bluff but those situations come up a lot less often than just value-betting someone who doesn't want to fall that that's going to come up a lot more often so you really want to make sure if you're trying to secure those nice big River Bats the biggest bats in element hold them that will frequently come from just value betting like we saw in the hypothetical we discussed today online cash games are great fun and if you use these three tips they will be even more enjoyable just remember to play your big pots in position and value bet thinly versus why big blind calling ranges don't get out of line when you're out of position or likely to be out of position conclusion if you're forced to play out of position have a clear plan of attack before you start calling huge bats on later streets follow all of these tips and you will win more alright guys that's it for today I hope you enjoyed this one I'll see you for the next one of these take care good luck to you if you're playing today

Hand Range 73: SB vs CO 4-bet • 5-bet All-in 18.6% / • Call 52.2% / • Fold 29.2% Against the BN, the SB can 3-bet 15% hands, adding hands such as ATo (43%), KTo (6%), QJo (3%), A7s, Q9s, T8s (71%), 98s (21%), 87s (9%), 76s (86%) as well as giving more weight to the threshold hands (Hand Range 74).

Making moves. In Volume II focused mostly on what are called value bets, where you bet either because you believe you have the best hand and want to get more money in the pot, or because you might have the best hand and think the pot odds justify playing. But there's another whole category of plays called moves, where you hope to win the pot (or a much bigger pot) by fundamentally misrepresenting the value of your hand. In this section we'll look at the types of moves available and the preconditions for making certain moves successful. Inflection points. When your stack is large relative to the blinds and antes, you're free to play more or less as you wish. As the blinds and antes increase relative to your stack, your approach must change. I call the places where your strategy changes inflection points. An understanding of these points, and how to adjust your play accordingly, is the most important skill in tournament no-limit hold ’em poker. Playing at short tables. As the number of players at your table shrinks, your strategy changes as well. I'll explain how to play at short tables (5-6 players), very short tables (3-4 players), and heads-up. If you feel you learned a lot in Volume I, you're going to love Volume 2. Until then, good luck! 173 Table of Contents About Dan Harrington About Bill Robertie Introduction • Organization • The Hands • Brief Glossary Part One: The Game of No-Limit Hold 'em • Introduction • The Cadillac of Poker • Information Availability • Controlling Pot Odds • What is a Hand? • Elements of a Hand • A Sample Hand • The Hidden Luck Factor in No-Limit Hold 'Em Part Two: Playing Styles and Starting Requirements • Introduction • Style 1: The Conservative Approach • Opening Requirements in Conservative Play • Style 2: The Aggressive Approach • Style 3: The Super-Aggressive Approach • Origins of the Aggressive Styles • The Art of Defense • The Hammer • The Rope-a-Dope • Showing Hands • Managing the Tournament • Varying Your Style • Pursuing a Balanced Strategy 174 • Tournament Types: A Quick Overview • Major Live Tournaments • Small-Stakes Multi-Table Online Tournaments • High-Stakes Multi-Table Online Tournaments • Single-Table Sit-and-Go Online Tournaments • Live Single-Table Satellites • The Problems Part Three: Reading the Table • Introduction • Physical Tells • Betting Patterns • Some Rules of Thumb for Beginners • Observing Yourself • The Problems Part Four: Pot Odds and Hand Analysis • Introduction • Analyzing a Poker Bet: The Two Parts • Pot Odds • Expressed Odds and Implied Odds • Hand Analysis • Some Standard Pre-Flop Winning Probabilities • Calculating Odds • The Problems Part Five: Betting Before the Flop • Introduction • Basic Strategy • Who is in the Pot? • Case No 1: No one has entered the pot yet • The Gap Concept and the Sandwich Effect • Case 2: The player in third position opened for three times the big blind. You are in fifth position • Case 3: A

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

straight if you had a flush I think you're going to bet more around seven or eight k at least if not betting like 10K so I think this is going to be more of like an ace um some random Bluff it might be a jack you know that might it might sound crazy to think he's betting a jack with this line but you know when you're playing a tournament like the main event you might be playing with someone who plays twice a year so they don't have really much Rhyme or Reason to be betting they just you know maybe he has a Jack and he doesn't want to check the river and face with other services so with all that being said I think he's fairly capped I have the King of Clubs I you know I can't win by calling and I'm blocking a lot of strong hands so I kind of a fairly easy shelf here and he ended up tanking for about two three minutes and he let it go folded in Ace and of course we had to show him you know it was it was the end of the day so weren't too worried about uh and been paying us back with that information later but um this is actually my favorite hand from the entire tournament believe it or not all nine days that I played because I didn't really consider myself to be a great player at the time so I struggled a lot with getting the job uh the desired result a lot of my Bluffs were inefficient because I was either making a sizing error or my line didn't make sense whatever it may be so you know momentum and confidence is really important in tournaments so just getting this one through and ended up bagging around 175k to end day one so three and a half X starting from there I never really looked back but yeah early momentum very important go on to the next hand uh this is from day two once again at the end of the day so same kind of thing where I was uh I guess so the the hand prior I was playing with that player all day and then the player in question here I was also playing with him all day it was a younger gentleman and he was pretty aggressive he raises from under the gun one and I'm in the cut off with Ace Kingo and I decided to go for a three bet I have two options I could of course three bet here which has the Merit of knocking the blinds out and the players behind out of the pot and I get to you know play in position with a strong hand against a an aggressive opponent I could also just flat with the hopes of people squeezing behind and then I disguise my hand you know if it comes ace high perhaps he will be betting into me three times and we'll

Hand Range 314: UTG 25bb (2x vs SB 3x 3-bet) • All-in 21.5% / • Call 42.2% / • Fold 36.3%

be doing this with perhaps something like a random Queen X that wants protection or some sort of draw like King Jack Jack nine or a flush drum the turn is a jack of clubs Dark Knight checks Bertucci bets a bit over half pot and then Dark Knight raises 3.4 x and Nick folds so what on Earth was Nick thinking here well he likely assumed that the probability of Dark Knight bluffing here was relatively low and that his line was probably value heavy with flushes if true from a purely exploitative standpoint it's conceivable that this fold could be profitable in the long run even though it was wrong in this particular instance and made him look like a fool think about what we perceived Dark Knights likely range to be on the Flop something like this with mostly Queen X straight and flush draws of this range on the turn we can reasonably carve out Queen X since it's not really strong enough to raise here given the action and the board even if it made two pair so what about straights if you thought that Dark Knight was Raising for value with a straight then calling with the nuts trade would appear to be a no-brainer but that intuitively seems unlikely given the prior action and the fact that the flush came in on the turn which Nick should have plenty of in his range also Nick is holding a king which potentially blocks some of Dark Knight straights like King Nine of Spades perhaps and the Jack likely pairs some of his other straight draws so if you assume that Dark Knight likely has a flush here and doesn't have enough Bluffs then Nick's straight even with the nut flush redraw is a mere Bluff catcher now if it sounds like we're grasping for straws with this rationalization it's because we are and at the end of the day this is just a bad fold but it is a good example of the perilous dangers of exploitative play of course there are plenty of players who have had very successful careers playing predominantly exploitatively so this isn't to say that it doesn't work but if you were to pull the bottom 50th percentile of all poker players in the world most likely 100 of them would think that GTO is a type of car in other words although playing exploitatively has a high ceiling the floor is a bottomless pit and this is primarily due to two significant flaws for one when you attempt to exploit someone by definition you you open yourself up to being counter exploited now some downplay this risk by arguing that it doesn't matter if you overfold in a specific spot because you'll never encounter it again while that may be true this dismissal ignores the risk of overfolding in the aggregate which can be easily identified and exploited you see most imbalanced players don't consciously make a decision to be imbalanced what's happening is that there is a systemic flaw

Flop: Hero's flop bet is not necessarily best. This hand does have a huge slab of equity and so building a bigger pot can never be a bad thing. That said, Hero also has a fine bluff catcher with SDV and one that loves a good amount of turn cards due to the flush draw. Don't rule out checking this flop back to protect our checking range on club turns and because it just makes a lot of sense with a versatile and strong hand, but one that's not miles ahead when its c-bet is called. Checking flop would be my first choice especially without a Fish in the pot against whom balance is unimportant and value more urgent. As it is, we will very often have the chance to get one to two streets of value unimproved on the turn/river anyway and it's not that common that we get three streets from a worse hand three way vs. two Regs, even on flush completing cards, though admittedly, it can happen. In any

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♦ Two pair are x/r about 18% of the time, with 98 and 84 being x/r more frequently than 94. Typically, the solver shows a slight preference to x/c top and bottom two pair when compared to top two and bottom two. Top two are the most nutted ones, so it makes sense to x/r them more frequently, and bottom two pair needs more protection and unblocks top pair, while top and bottom blocks top pair in the Villain’s range. ♦ Overpairs JJ-TT are the most x/r hands, as they have good equity but are vulnerable. JJ is x/r 100% and TT mostly x/r when having the T♥. ♦ Top, middle pair and bottom always get x/c. 77-55 are almost always folded except for 77 with a heart. ♦ Combo draws are x/r 1/3 of the time and x/c 2/3 of the time. Q♥J♥ and Q♥T♥ are x/r 100%. J♥T♥ and J♥7♥ are x/r about 1/3 and lower combo draws are mostly x/c. ♦ Flush draws are only x/r about 10% of the time. The most frequently x/r combos are ATs- A5s ~60% ♦ OESD are x/c every time. These combos have good equity vs IP’s c-bet range but are too weak against IP’s flop 3-betting range as they will often be dominated by overpairs or flush draws. ♦ Gutshots with two overcards or a BDFD are called, the rest get folded. ♦ A-high is mostly folded, except AJ+ plus BDFD that gets called about 40%. ♦ K-high is mostly folded except for a few KQ with the K♥ that occasionally gets called. ♦ Air is folded 100% of the time. Flop Strategy Example 4 BB vs Minbet: BB vs BN on J♠6♥6♦ (40bbs)

hey everybody this is Alexander Fitzgerald or assassinato and today we're going to be discussing adjusting from online tournaments to cash games we will also be discussing some of the differences between online tournaments and cash games let's get to work adjusting from online tournaments to cash games are you looking to transition from online tournaments to cash games you've come to the right place let's discuss some quick fixes that can help you transition effectively today now this is going to be a fun one to do guys because I I've been lucky enough to have had some success in both Fields I play a lot lower Stakes though generally than a lot of people so uh not to get too much into my credentials but I I do have W Coupe and scoop ones i i dub I do have WPT and EBT final tables my most recent win was the 250k guaranteed but I play mostly low to mid Stakes tournaments so I know the problems a lot of you are actually facing I also play a lot of low stakes cash I just like to multi-table and really grind it out like that so there are really key differences though between the two formats that you don't hear people discuss enough office maybe should be discussed because it really they're very different games and when I play those two different games they it's almost you have to become a different player in each of them so we'll discuss those today I'll give you what's worked for me over the years so here's the big thing in cash games this took me a really long time to learn but you have time in poker tournaments players are rewarded for firing their chips in constantly the Blind and Annie structure is severe picking up orphan pots is immensely important in this environment attacking and sometimes slightly Reckless poker is rewarded for these reasons many tournament Players get used to playing loose and aggressive constantly so let me give you an example of that so a lot of times my friends say oh I oh I want to watch you play past game poker I bet that'll be really fun just because this is my job and I I always tell them like dude it's not when you watch me play cash game poker it's not super fun to watch because I I just I get called quite a bit more often than perhaps I should be called I I guess I just look like the typical person that is running too many Bluffs at the table so a lot of the times when I'm playing cash I can just sit on my leather ass all day and chill there and actually get paid off on my big hands it doesn't have to be it doesn't have to be that elaborate and that's really different than poker tournaments where obviously you have to really pick up the pace when the blinds and Annie's are being raised quite a bit so when

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back calling off probably Maybe not maybe not then everything completes and I'm gonna have straights and flashes play the exact same so I think he played it good to check back there actually um but he would have got my stack had he but he bet but yeah he might be in the test spot and then forced to fold so yeah I think his check back is actually very good here I make a big exploit actually I don't think it's even that big of a split I I definitely want to call flop because if a diamond comes but I'm already very very very very very skeptical of a unknown player betting this big on the flop in the 20 game and when he goes his size on the turn I am out of here everything's just kind of got there I didn't actually see this hand come up I did and must be GTA approved because we've got okay it doesn't say yeah here fold 77 and so actually I thought it was exploit it's not an exploit um so yeah we played it good there and yeah just making sure we're not getting married just because we've got top pair we don't have to cool down you just see the silver folds because look um his range here's what order two pairs all the straights got all the sets uh we do not we don't need to defend our range that much and so like we literally just don't even need to defend even top pair we want to be defending hands like well King Jack wouldn't wanted to fold King Nine wouldn't want to fold uh hands that have some of this size B because he might bet the size of like King a um whereas he's not gonna put it with King free for example um four six this is the most interesting hand of the whole video four six we can probe here we can probably I think that's fine um and I think I should have probably probed but I also quite like exploiting people's delay because I don't think he's got many straight drawers we do block some straight so if you check back a straight draw we block and now we were just putting pressure on 8X uh that wants to bet turn maybe some 10-4 type hand with maybe some like nine seven type hand that did check the the Flop we don't interfere with that um so originally I was thinking we just have a bottom end um and then we decided to to raise it uh definitely going to be one of our best Bluff combos because when the top end fills in we fully represent it very very strong like all of our Bluffs filled in here other than four six and someone would really have to dig deep to think somebody's raising the term oh yeah also Spades but Spades probably would shut off always on us on a queen here and so pretty much most

end of action thought process, the concepts there are both good revision and good warm ups for what's to come in later chapters. Pre-flop: Hero wouldn't normally have a flatting range out of the SB as we discussed here in Section 6.3. In this spot, however, the Fish in the BB provides an exception to the rule and Hero happily flats KJs since the Fish will so often be in the pot making all of his horrible mistakes. KJs is of course also in fine shape vs. the opener's wide stealing range from the BU. Flop: Sadly, the Fish did not oblige and folded pre-flop. Hero now calls a c-bet in a heads-up pot with a flush draw and two overcards. Raising is another +EV option but Hero reasons that his hand is in such good shape and he can call on any turn card, so elects to use his weaker draws as check/raise bluffs, keeping this one in the calling range. He also notes that Villain could continue bluffing when he has air on the perceived scare card turns where Hero in fact makes top pair to go with his draw. Turn: This is exactly what happens. Hero picks up heaps of SDV to go with his flush draw and happily check/calls the turn, expecting to be miles ahead of Villain's betting range. River: Part one of our thought process tells us that we need just over 25% equity to call this half pot sized bet. Out of game we can calculate this to an exact 26% using ATC / (ATC +TP). Hero asks Q1. Can Villain value bet worse hands? It seems he can in this spot. Given that the turn is a K - a scare card on which Villain can be expected to bet a wide range. Hero could very easily feel obliged to call down with hands like TT, 98, A9 etc. and should quite rarely have a better hand than these. We already have an answer. Not only can we beat some value hands, but we only need to be good just over a quarter of the time to make calling better than folding. Villain can also have some air here given Hero's weak range and good perceived fold equity so this makes the call even more obvious. Hero calls 20BB. For the first time, our initial three questions have led us straight to an answer without having to scrutinise any reads. This call isn't close.

Hand Range 269: BN 25bb (2x vs BB All-in) • Call All-in 29.5% / • Fold 70.5%

you can definitely give player A credit for something. How big a something will be up to you. But in general, credit the early-position check-raiser with more strength than his late-position counterpart. Now, if there’s a check-raise from up front and so much as a single call in between, you fold your AQ and don’t lose any more money. You might have one liar out there, but you don’t have two (or more). Imean, there are no draws on board, so what’s someone calling that big check-raise with?Not nothing. Something. You’re dead. Either dead to the check-raiser or dead to the caller. Easy fold. Similarly, if you bet and get multiple callers, you can be sure that, with no obvious draws on the board, someone has something. If multiple playerscall on the flop, play with extreme caution on the turn. If it’s checked around to you on the turn, that’s a good time to check and see the river with theintention to call a bet, for all the reasons discussed in the heads-up section. To bet here is to get killed by a bigger hand and/or open yourself up to nasty bluffs. You clearly don’t want to open up the action. You can still call the river, using chips you didn’t barf off on the turn. If there’s a bet in front of you on the turn, treat it much like the heads-up situation when you have the opportunity. If no one calls between you and the bettor, this is a great opportunity to raise on the turn. This will sound familiar: You’ll probably call the river anyway, so why not use the river money to raise on the turn instead? You’ll look super-strong and maybe get a cageyAK or weak two pair to muck. In short, if player A bets the turn and B and C fold, raise. If A checks, B bets, and C folds, it’s even better to raise, because you can push A off the pot. Likewise, if A and B check and C bets, raise to drive out the checkers. You don’t just knee-jerk raise, though. You analyze, using the same principles to decide whether to raise the turn in a heads-up pot when the outof-position player leads into you. As in that circumstance, you need to believe three things: that you can get a better hand to fold; that the bet on the river won’t be meaningful enough that you could fold with the confidence that your hand is no good; and that the other player’s hand might beat yours, such that calling on the turn to induce a bet on the river wouldn’t make much sense. Let’s take the latter consideration first. If you believe the other player has the worse hand, you’d still probably raise the turn to knock out playersyet to act behind you. So if B or C bets into you, you’d tend toward raising, even if you thought you had them beat, to knock A and/or B out of the pot, thus reducing the outs against you. But if A bets