what time is it? time to change it up.

was thinking about posting this in "beginners," but thought it better here because its pure strategy and i dont want to confuse the newest of players anyway.

this is based on Harrington's timing philosophy, too, so its basically "stolen material." assuming we've all read the section where he talks about changing his bet sizes based on the minute hand of a clock.

i used to be a big proponent of "keeping all my cbets, semibluffs, and valuebets" the same size for "deception." but, have lately changed my mind. (someone who loves the math can back this up quite easily, i think.)

when we all know that micro-grinders and small stakes players dont pay attention very well, why arent we changing our sizing accordingly?

say you like to cbet at 2/3 pot. it does basically the same as psb, but has a lot more margin for error...profitablilty wise. you hold KQs, raise it up. flop comes A 4 8 r. you are pretty much always cbetting here, i assume. your villain is rather loose and capable of playing any A, but its still not likely. so, you fire out 2/3. it needs to work about 20-30% of the time, if i remember right.

lets say you fire out psb instead. your psb needs to work about 50+%, if i remember. (again, someone correct me if i am grossly incorrect here) thats a HUGE difference at microstakes where these idiots will call psb's with draws and/or middle pair.

i am seeing a lot of players calling cbet situations "lighter." its almost a float, but they dont get aggressive until they hit their card. they are really just calling you down for the time being. and, they DO NOT notice when your bet size changes.

so, why not take the spew out of it? bet 2/3 on your cbets and 3/4 to psb's on your direct hits? to me, that just minimizes your losses a bit.

but, lets say you DO run across someone who notices. eventually, you will. there are players out there who actually pay attention, and most of the time, you dont spot them anyway because you have 6+ tables up. but, anyway, just HOW do you combat this guy to keep him from getting his "read" on your cbets and valuebets?

you flip-flop those bet sizes ala HOH. maybe for the first 45 minutes of the hour you cbet 2/3 and for the last 15 minutes, you cbet psb. you value bet psb for 45 minutes and 2/3 for the last 15 minutes. your astute villains dont get accurate reads on your sizing anymore because they see you bet both ways...on occasion. you use the clock to keep yourself disciplined, though. that way you always know where you stand, and know that 75% of the time, you are betting the size that minimizes damage on your "bluffs."

just an "adjustment" i have made that i thought i'd share. granted, my timing on the clock is different. or, maybe its not. i guess you will have to find out for yourselves. lol

yea, it's a leak to always do any one thing in poker, you should adjust to your opponents like you wrote.

like if i am playing heads up vs a loose passive, i will bet 1/2 or even 1/3 pot on the A93 type flop when i have nothing, and when i have a good hand then i bet full pot.

but against deeper thinkers i don' think it's worth randomizing based on the minute of a clock. just mix up the bet sizes enough where they can't say "oh he bet pot, must be TPTK"

Originally Posted by benny999

yea, it's a leak to always do any one thing in poker, you should adjust to your opponents like you wrote.

True, except at NL10 and lower, where (as Chopper mentions) hardly anyone notices.

Chopper, good post. I will toss this in the ring. I'm becoming convinced of this read on villain's TAF (total aggression factor postflop): ALWAYS c-bet if TAF is greater than 2.5 or less than 1.5.

Villains with TAF > 2.5 can fold, and will trap less. If they want the pot, they'll often rr. Villains with TAF < 1.5 have weak-tight tendencies postflop, and tend to be stations. But in my experience, they can be driven off the pot. Against both, I'm two barreling my c-bets, and I'm avoiding villains in the 1.5 - 2.5 range where no specific read seems plausible, sometimes c-betting, sometimes not (default is to bet :P ).

I use this against up to three villains as long as all three meet the crieria. Then, regardless of c-bet size (usually 2/3 or so, depending on how many villains still in), I can usually 2-barrel my way to their chips. This has been profitable, but I've been using it for less than 2.5k hands. So maybe I've just been lucky.

My ABC 9-tabling style for NL10 grinding pretty much ducks any action postflop, which obviously would be a HUGE leak at higher limits. It's probably a small leak at NL10, but bets down here do seem to mean what they say. For those who don't know me well, I play NL10, but I'm trying to add some read dependent moves to my postflop play for a LAST move up to NL25 when I'm properly rolled (1k this time, so I can be like Drew!!).