Show HN: Learn Game Theory Optimal Poker Preflop with Spaced-Repetition
Hi HN,

Sharing my poker preflop trainer product, a subset of my Live Poker Theory project.

https://www.livepokertheory.com/trainer

Live Poker Theory helps translate complex poker solver strategy to actionable strategies while playing and aims to make studying poker more efficient and more fun. While I usually try to focus on sharing it in poker communities, I saw a few poker articles frontpage this site so I figure it doesn't hurt to share it here.

In case you don't know, before 2015 most poker software could only calculate "all-in equity" - if there was no game tree and players could only go all-in or fold. These days, solvers can calculate the full game tree, with a lot of assumptions, and we can use them to generate preflop charts. Sometimes people call this GTO (game-theory optimal) though I prefer the term "theory-based" to recognize how frequently you want to diverge from equilibrium even if you've studied it.

Preflop refers to the first two cards you're dealt and the first round of betting which is a very fundamental street. Preflop is a good example of where I find it useful to study equilbrium even if you might diverge in practice - for example, once you understand how often a player should be 3-betting you (re-raising you after you've raised), if you know someone doesn't do it with hands like Ace-Five suited, you can fold hands you'd otherwise continue with. But it's helpful to understand a strong player should frequently be 3-betting Ace-Five suited.

Some other info that might be helpful:

1) Rake refers to whether the "house" removes money from the pot which happens at most low-stakes games. Higher stakes games tend to be "time" games where the players simply pay an hourly fee so there's no effect of rake on the game itself. That also may be true at an unraked home game.

2) A straddle is an optional third blind that's often strongly encouraged as something everyone at the table does, and of course the charts are different with that third blind

Spaced-repetition is something that only my trainer does, while it's a well understood concept on places like Hacker News, it's not well understood by the poker community.

Even if you plan to make adjustments against certain players, there's good reasons to memorize a preflop chart. It helps you stay disciplined if you're "tilted" if you know what a reasonable baseline strategy is. It also helps you clearly define your postflop strategy, both while doing solver work and while playing. For examlpe, frequently the best river bluffs are the "bottom of our range", since our worst hands beneift the most from our opponent folding. But the "bottom of our range" is only clearly defined if our range is clearly defined, so if you've memorized your preflop range, you'll have a better understanding of your overall strategy postflop.

One last important note, the charts are based on a 2.5x raise, so in a 2/5 game, a raise to $12, which is fairly rare to see in practice. If you have the solver raise 3x or 4x, the overall strategy is much much tighter. While this is more correct against perfect opponents, in practice frequently we're against weaker opponents and we'd rather play a looser range since we'll have an advantage postflop. By studying 2.5x, we keep a more reasonable loose range but still let the solver give us a reasonable baseline of hands to play.

Currently, you can try out Tournament, 50 Big Blind stack depth, Raise First In without an account. With an account and for free, you can study cash or tournament "Raise First In" (whether to raise or fold if it folds to you), "Vs Open" (whether you raise, fold, or call if someone raises before you act), for free, for cash or tournaments. I have paywalled only cash game BB defend (if someone raises when you're in the big blind) for $10/mo or $59/year.

I'm also actively adding more preflop charts, developing postflop content with spaced-repetition and a native mobile app.