NLHE T&P - Week 2 Discussion p. 33-57

Another great section, imo, covering implied odds and bet sizing. It gets a little dense and there are a lot of EV equations, but it's well worth taking the time to understand it all. If anything doesn't make sense, post it and I'm sure someone here can help. A few questions to get things started...

1. From an implied odds and bet sizing perspective, why is it so important to a) improve your hand reading, and b) balance your own play?

2. How do the calculations on p. 37-39 change if villain's range includes hands he won't stack off with?

3. How does a board with multiple draws affect your bet sizing decisions?

And a great quote from this section:

1) a) hand reading is critical to implied odds, because if you put villian on a stronger/weaker hand than he actually has you will have worse/better implied odds than you think you do.
b) balance is important when you vary your bets because other wise you will be easy to read (big bets = you want big pot, and converse)

2) not looking at the book , but I am sure that your implied odds or lower. This is why I prefer more of a 20x rule with small pairs, unless I know my opp very well or it's a three bet (usually "face up" big pair at stakes I play at)

3) you have to sometimes give the "best" draws proper odds to draw in order to maximize EV (worse draws are more common).

BTW this is a great book, I have worn my copy out almost. One thing I notice is that it is difficult to adapt "big pots are for big hands" with aggressive 6max online tables.

amazingly simple concept that I keep thinking about:

I don't think that this section of the book really applies all that much at the level I'm currently at $25NL.

1) Hand reading is mostly impossible at this level, or at least the tables that I pick. I try to pick the fishiest tables and recently that's been working better than I can hope for on Stars. I don't know waht these guys are drinking, but I've basically given up on hand reading here. ABC poker is fine without having to consider opponents (like 90% of the time). When in doubt fold, because a better opportunity will be there on the next hand.

2) If villain's range includes those hands he isn't willing to stack off with, you need to decrease your bet a little bit. You still don't want to give odds to the most likely of draws.

3) You certainly don't want to deny odds of all draws, so the less likely of draws will be out there. You will need to give odds to draw to the 2 or 4 outters but not the 8 or 15 outters: bet accrodignly.

I think that you are going to have to learn to lay down your big hands when those less likely draws hit on later streets. They don't talk about that much, but is it implied in the reading?

So question 1 was a little general and isn't getting the responses I expected. A couple of quotes might help. From p. 37:

I meant that at $25NL, it's almost impossible to put anyone on a range (pre-flop or on the flop at least) to make the more advanced concepts of any importance.

Maybe I'm just not good at it, but when you have to throw in the guy calling down with 3rd pair on a As Tc 7h board, there are just too many variable at this level to really apply actual thought to bet sizing.

I guess inherently by making 3/4-pot sized bets we are actually doing a fairly loose job of properly sizing our bets, but we're really only getting called by complete donks. Which, at this level, there are plenty of without us having to really apply thought.

Granted, I only read this section once. I found it to be the most compacted and advanced theory about poker that I've ever read, so it would certainly benefit me to read it a few more times. I'm sure after I read and understand it some more I will find the value.

Just after the first go-through, it was very, very complicated stuff compared to other stuff I've read. Thanks for setting me straight with your correction.

I'm not saying that I'm not enjoying this book, I am most certainly gaining something from every page.

What if we try to put ourselves in the villains situations presented in this section?

Can we become more profitably by gaining a better understanding of implied odds and bet sizing? Do some bets that would normally have chased us now not look so scary when we keep the EV of implied odds in mind?

Get lots of money into the pot with your best hands. Tend not to bet three streets with lukewarm stuff (TPGK) and tend to take the card on the turn when you're drawing to lots of outs.

Everytime you bet, you're not just getting money into the pot with your current holding, you're also raising the effective stakes of the next street. The latter is a disaster if you're sitting on a marginal hand with showdown value and can't figure out which piece your opponent has. The folly of the guys who play really fast is that when draws complete on the river and they're bet into they have to play guessing games for a lot of money. This is great if you're really good at pegging people. Otherwise it's a lot of greif and variance.

This concept is more applicable in $25NL games where you passive opponents will tend to play pots on your terms and size their bets very poorly. Better big bet poker players will fustrate and see-through your attempts to manipulate the pot.

Related subject: Why would you ever raise pre-flop in Pot Limit Ohama? What sorts of hands should you be raising? Assume 100-200bb stacks.

Re: 3 betting PF/PF range/sizes:

I think this helps to stress the importance of a wide PFR range/3bet PFR range. For example, if you know that a guy only reraises PF with AA/KK (the vast majority of low stakes players), or you only reraise with AA/KK, it becomes that much easier for a caller to call with a low PP because they would be assured of your stack when they hit a set. They could call a reraise up to 12 BB of a 100 BB stack approx and still breakeven. However, if you expand a PF 3bet range to 56s on the button, and you get a caller, and the flop comes low, they can't be assured that you didn't hit a set to their two pair (if you have any history with them). It puts them to a tougher decsion and cuts their long term profitability because you get the best of it most of the time you play a pot with them. Conversely, if you know a guy's range is THAT tight, you have easier decisions postflop and can see many more hands vs their range and be much more likely to dump lukewarm holdings postflop.

RE: Betting against draws:

Too many times I assume that people are drawing against me. I have the "price the draw out" mentality and end up escalating the pot where I shouldn't. Or I blow the guy out of the pot instead of forcing a bad call. If I check, and the draw card comes, it makes it way too easy to bluff me off the pot. I allow people to play correctly against me because I try to win the pot too often before showdown.

The most effective tip here for me was to be reminded that the bets on the turn don't need to be as large proportionately to the pot as flop bets. Seems easy enough, but I get away from it at times.

I have really started to appreciate the power of the check and have been utilizing it more. Mostly because of pot control, but also because I took the limit approach of making a pair and betting it down. That led to larger river bets that cost much more when I was behind.

If a turn check will almost always draw a river bet from your opponent reguardless of his holding, is checking the turn a Skylansky mistake?

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NLHE T&P - Week 2 Discussion p. 33-57

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NLHE T&P - Week 2 Discussion p. 33-57