Originally Posted by HarleyGuy13

Like a giant cork waiting to be stuck in my Titanic

Originally Posted by Monty3038

Another way of narrowing their range is to use their VPIP and PFR stats... though I rely on it others warn me not to.

Originally Posted by bigspenda73

Just PF for now Mr. 123

Originally Posted by angrystoc

As well as the points mentioned so far, we can also shrink or expand their range based on the action before them.

People opening the pot tend to have a larger range than someone calling a raise e.g. Many players would open on the BTN with ATo but wouldn't call a raise. Speculative hands such as SCs and small-PP love to call behind multiple callers..

Originally Posted by IhaveTopTop

Are we considering both cash and tournament hands?

Either way, we can often narrow or widen range based on the player's (and his opponent's) bet to stack ratio. In big stack NL ring games and earlier in tournaments, many players with try to see a flop with hands they would quickly fold later in tournaments or short stacked games.

Originally Posted by euphoricism

This is just not the right way to go about doing this. I don't like to rip on people trying to help, but this is like the most confusing way possible to approach the topic because there are so many 'what ifs' to account for.

The easiest way imho is start with a baseline read (aka, what would I have if I was him?) and adjust for player tendency from there.

Ex1: Unknown person opens 4x UTG. The only logical way to approach giving him a range is to assign him the same range you have when YOU open UTG.

Ex2: Unknown LIMPS utg. Slightly different because you never limp UTG. So draw upon your experience of what other people who DO limp UTG usually do it with.

As for KNOWNS, you simply adjust what YOU would do to what THEY would do. If you run say 12/10 at FR and open {range} UTG, then you can make perfectly good assumptions about what a 15/12 opens UTG with (Hint: its basically identical due to position).

Just note the following
1) you can't really go wrong assigning a slightly too tight of a range to an unknown.
2) peoples ranges get wider as they get closer to the button. A 20/15s open UTG range is probably not too different from a 14/10s open UTG range. Their late position range, as well as their limping and cold calling range is probably wider.

That all comes into play LONG before you consider whether he likes SOOOOTED cards too much or anything even remotely that specific. Get a good baseline, and adjust from there. And the best person to get that baseline from is yourself.

This is called level two thinking.

Originally Posted by euphoricism

This is just not the right way to go about doing this. I don't like to rip on people trying to help, but this is like the most confusing way possible to approach the topic because there are so many 'what ifs' to account for.

The easiest way imho is start with a baseline read (aka, what would I have if I was him?) and adjust for player tendency from there.

Ex1: Unknown person opens 4x UTG. The only logical way to approach giving him a range is to assign him the same range you have when YOU open UTG.

Ex2: Unknown LIMPS utg. Slightly different because you never limp UTG. So draw upon your experience of what other people who DO limp UTG usually do it with.

As for KNOWNS, you simply adjust what YOU would do to what THEY would do. If you run say 12/10 at FR and open {range} UTG, then you can make perfectly good assumptions about what a 15/12 opens UTG with (Hint: its basically identical due to position).

Just note the following
1) you can't really go wrong assigning a slightly too tight of a range to an unknown.
2) peoples ranges get wider as they get closer to the button. A 20/15s open UTG range is probably not too different from a 14/10s open UTG range. Their late position range, as well as their limping and cold calling range is probably wider.

That all comes into play LONG before you consider whether he likes SOOOOTED cards too much or anything even remotely that specific. Get a good baseline, and adjust from there. And the best person to get that baseline from is yourself.

This is called level two thinking.

Originally Posted by euphoricism

Of course he does, don't insult people's intelligence.

Originally Posted by Dueces88

What I wrote was "in general" including what bad players would do, which is why I included "SOOOOOOOOOTED"

I also find it funny you gave guidelines for reacting to an unknown player and than say that applies before considering whether he likes "SOOOOOOOOOTED cards."

But if you knew he like "SOOOOOOOOTED cards," then you know something about him and you'd probably saw him showdown before, so he wouldn't be a complete unknown to you, so you're not making sense.

Nice try, though.

Originally Posted by euphoricism

I take it back, Spenda, they really are retarded.
Carry on.

Originally Posted by bigspenda73

Interesting point, one which could help us read the ranges of short-stackers.

Originally Posted by bigspenda73

1. Opponent's stack-size
--20bb, 33bb, 50bb, 62bb, 100bb+. All of these stack-sizes could give us a lot of information on our opponent's PF tendencies. What are some generalizations we could infer from these stack-sizes?

If I'm up against a deep-stacked player I include a wider range of hands than I do if the player has a small-stack, giving the deep-stack more hands with drawing value. I've seen smaller stacks playing (gen. pushing) wide ranges though that's often through tilt. If they've been around a while, I'd tighten their range, excluding the lower end of drawing hands, including more higher card holdings, i.e. to a short-stacked player ATo is more in their raise to open than 87s, either in position or UTG.

For mid-stacks, 33bb-62bb I'd struggling to link their stack-size to their opening range much beyond a general range of solid hands OOP, getting wider with position.

2. Opponent's opening size
-limp,2bb,3bb,pot,4bb,5bb+. All of these initial PF raise sizes could tell us a lot about our opponents. What are some generalizations we could infer from these opening raise sizes?

It's rare I have good reads/stats available on the players at the tables I play, so without evidence I'm QQ+ limpers a tiny fraction of my range. If someone limps UTG I'm including small-mid PPs/mid-strong suited hands, still a wide range. In later position, players can open limp with a huge range.

I include a wider range of hands when a player raises 2BB than when they raise a bigger amount. Players generally know they need to be aggressive and look to steal, but they do so with a minimum raise with hands they are not comfortable with. I'd expect AA almost as often with an open limp than with a 2bb raise.

3bb/pot-sized raises I'm again unsure. It seems fairly standard so I cannot assign a specific range based specifically on their raise. I'd expect better hands to raise 4bb+ than 2bb+ without stats/evidence, so I have a tighter range of hands as my expectation.

3. Opponent's position
-EP,MP,LP,Blinds. All of these positions could affect our opponent's hand-range. How do we feel each spot affects their range?

EP I'm including a smaller range of hands, increasing from UTG to the BB. Players generally know about position and adjust, even if they do not realise they are doing so. If somebody open raises, I'm including a smaller range of hands than if they open-limp.

If I don't know anything about a player I'll err on the side of caution, but blinds can be very loose, playing almost any two cards, especially if there is a raise and/or a couple of limpers.

4. Re-raising and 3bet size
-An opponent's 3betting size could tell us a lot about them. What could we infer from different 3bet sizes?

Without any previous info. to go with a player, I tighen my range a lot when an opp. re-raises/3-bets. If I raise from EP and I'm called by the button, I can include a wide range of hands that the button is playing. If the button re-raises, even taking into account his position I'm still tightening up what I hands he can hold. I'm not suggesting I only see aces, but if it's the first time he's done it then I'm slowing up and looking at my next move carefully.

3-bet size is interesting. I'd put a large 3-bet on a tighter range than a smaller 3-bet, but I have no real reason to back this up.

Originally Posted by Keith_MM

should we make any allowance for whether the opponent had just taken a bad beat or won a big pot. Will either one put a person on tilt and open up there range or even narrow down there range and how long would this effect last for? In the past when i've taken a bad beat/big loss I will only play the real premium hands for the next couple of hands so that I can calm down , not spew off any chips and run through the hand in my head trying to work out where I went wrong. Other people go on tilt and try and win back there losses in the next hand.
.

Originally Posted by kb coolman

GAY, imo.

Originally Posted by euphoricism

The easiest way imho is start with a baseline read (aka, what would I have if I was him?) and adjust for player tendency from there.

Ex1: Unknown person opens 4x UTG. The only logical way to approach giving him a range is to assign him the same range you have when YOU open UTG.

Ex2: Unknown LIMPS utg. Slightly different because you never limp UTG. So draw upon your experience of what other people who DO limp UTG usually do it with.

As for KNOWNS, you simply adjust what YOU would do to what THEY would do. If you run say 12/10 at FR and open {range} UTG, then you can make perfectly good assumptions about what a 15/12 opens UTG with (Hint: its basically identical due to position).

Just note the following
1) you can't really go wrong assigning a slightly too tight of a range to an unknown.
2) peoples ranges get wider as they get closer to the button. A 20/15s open UTG range is probably not too different from a 14/10s open UTG range. Their late position range, as well as their limping and cold calling range is probably wider.

This is called level two thinking.

Originally Posted by mrhappy333

1. Opponents stack sizes:
20bb I am thinking SS piece of shit GTFO the table
33bb/50bb still short but but not terrible
62bb possible good player who lost some chips and hasn't reloaded
100bb+ these are the ones I need to be careful with, because I also am Full stacked all the time.

Originally Posted by Monty3038

First off, thanks to all who have replied, it has gotten me thinking, but now that we have a few replies, I'd like to hear Spenda's thoughts on narrowing the ranges based on the replies here... also any thoughts on effective ways of 'practicing' reading till you feel you get better at it, pouring over hand histories and applying reads doesn't seem to be making it more reasonable or quicker for me.

Originally Posted by spoonitnow

Here's an idea: Find three players with similar VP$IP/PFR stats in your database that you have a few thousand hands on. Look at what they each play from each position.

Originally Posted by TLR

I think we should narrow down what we are discussing, since this thread is going off in a lot of tangents, I would suggest to start with a basic scenario and expand it as we go along.

I think the most basic scenario is 1st hand of a tournament (everyone even stacked) when you have 0 reads on any player. Try to define a generic open range for different positions, and go from there