blame someone in irc for suggesting this, here's some sorta post on planning hands. I'll add some to the end of it later, but for now, here goes:
also, i note that i missed out any mention of bet-sizing, and that's fairly key in any plan. I'll write something on that to add to this already tldr rave
Ok, plan your hand...
Common advice, but what does it mean? At it's most basic level perfect planning and consideration of every permutation of possible actions from villain/board cards (which is about impossible) it means that you should rarely, if ever, encounter a situation where you are lost. Approaching this impossible state is going to obviously pay dividends.
Planning your hand - preflop.
This is fairly simple. You look down and see your hole-cards. If it's folded to you then it's raise or fold time. Fold and you can stop your planning. Raise and you should have a feel for villains behind and their calling, raising and squeezing tendencies - when you have a small sample size it's fine to err on the side of caution/pessimism here. 17-13 and 7% 3b over 30 hands of full ring is not sufficient read to be 4-b shoving JJ when your ep open is raised on up. What is often overlooked is that your pre-flop action should involve a sketch of what you plan to do post-flop according to board texture, position, and villains to the flop. And now for some examples cos i like examples, and they hopefully illustrate how hand planning helps to to explain a few 'standard' pre-flop actions.
hand example 1: FR 10nl - folded to you in MP and you hold 83o. Fold. Why? How does planning help here? Well, what's a good plan if you limp or raise? Your plan is to flop bottom pair or worse most of the time, your plan is then to either bluff with a hand that has only a miniscule chance of improving and then give up, or your plan could be to give up on the flop. So most of the time your plan is to lose money if you see a flop. Sounds like a good plan? so, you can't see any chance of a decent plan. In a more general sense, folding pre is probably decent advice if you can't think of a decent plan for your holding. Planning on flopping 888 doesn't really cut it.
hand example 2: FR 50nl, 44 under the gun. If you limp, you plan on playing a weak hand out of position and without initiative on about 90% of flops. And you plan on trying to extract huge value out of position the 10% of times you flop a set. Sound like a crap plan? Ok, how about raising? Do you plan on c-betting as bluff on most boards, with only 2 outs when called? Do you plan on somehow stacking a set-miner when you hit your bottom set? Sounds like plans that involve a lot of shitty spots and this is why most winning FR regs evolve to open folding 44 from ep most of the time.
hand example 3: FR 25nl, you iso two MP fish lijmpers with QJs from the button. What is your plan? if you haven't already read spoon's post on isolating limpers, do so now http://www.flopturnriver.com/pokerfo...rs-152850.html. Your plan has already considered whether the fish are stations who call down middle pair 3 streets, or flop fit-folders. This is because you aren't simply isolating blindly, right? So once the flop comes down you already know your play when checked to, and you know that you can play in a fairly straightforward fashion if donked into. This is a classic situation where players flop Jxx or 9xx and have no idea what to do cos they raised it up pre with not even a gem of a plan...
Planning your hand - preflop and 3bets.
so, you've 3bet. Here is a spot where people get lost. Before 3-betting you should think about why, and how you will react vs a 4bet. It should be clear that identifying whether you're 3-betting for value or bluff is key in your planning (i actually object some to this black-white classification when 3-betting, but it's fine for the purposes of this post). If you 3bet xx from the button vs a CO iso from a 14-12 with 85% fold to 3bet and you should be comfortable if faced with a 4bet. If not, you fucked up. Absence of a plan = more difficult spots than are necessary.
Planning your hand - calling preflop.
Something huge to consider when calling a raise pre-flop is whether you are calling in the hope of winning a big pot at showdown (villain overplays hands, typically has a fairly strong range) = you're planning on hitting a nut holding or folding, or winning a small/medium pot without showdown (villain is weaktight, high W$WSD, eager to fold) = you're planning to bluff-a-lot.
hand example 4: FR 50nl and an aware tag-wannabe 14-11-3 (vpip/pfr/3b) isos a 70-3 mp limper from the cutoff. You hold 55 on the button. Before auto-calling you should think. How often are blinds squeezing -> you gotta fold? What is CO's fold to 3b/how strong is his range in this spot vs his typical range (ez)? how often does CO have a hand strong enough to pay us off if we magic our set? How obliging is the 70-3 when it comes to getting chips in the middle with weak hands in big pots? WTF is your plan if you call?!? What is interesting in a spot like this is that when you try to consider/plan your play in response to most actions it becomes pretty clear that this is a pretty standard spot where 3-betting or folding are your two best options, rather the oh-so-obvious play of calling that most reg-fish will make about always.
A common concept - 'only need one plan on this street'
I'm not sure where i first came across this, but it's fairly widely written about, and fairly widely ignored!, that you only have to make one short-term plan after you bet or raise on any street. (Obviously you should consider why you are raising beforehand ) This plan is how to deal with a raise. Facing a fold and you don't really need too much of a plan, it's next hand. Facing a call and your plan continues on the next street and informed by another card.
Planning your hand - post-flop time.
Your hand is fairly well defined once the flop comes, your hand has a value, you should have a fair idea of where it fits into your range (top/middle/bottom). At this point it is worth pointing out that you can easily out-level yourself if you start spending way too much time bluffing vs fish just because your range is strong. Remember that the two keys to crushing micro no-limit are pre-flop hand selection and value betting. One of the first things to consider when forming your plan on the flop is whether you are happy to get stacks in. JJ on J72 rainbow and it's fairly clear, 99 on T63tt and it's less obvious. In he first example the only question to ask is how to best get max-value. 350bb and it should be clear there is going to have to be some betting. 35bb effective with a pot of 10bb and you have a lot of leeway. Bet-sizing needs to factor in implied odds - if you're barrelling a turn vs a likely turn and know you won't be folding river when the draw hits cos of lol-pot-odds means that you have to bet enough to deny implied odds. If you hadn't realised tht your turn bet sizing would lead to a spot where you feel pot-committed on a river scare card it is clear that you messed up your planning on the turn. And now this lack of a decent plan is going to cost you money.
Betting flop for value, turn? classic planning mistake time.
So, you decided to bet flop for value. Time to consider what that means. It means that you bet the flop expecting to be ahead more often than not when called. So, what are you doing on the turn? Surely not check-folding. What about another value-bet? Life is definitely a lot easier if you had already planned to try to get two streets of value and on which streets to try and get them. Either bet turn, c-decide/block river, or check turn bet river, or whatever really. Deciding in advance, or at least consider the alternatives, leads you to make a whole lot less dumb mistakes. It's super common at micros for TAG-nit-wannabes to bet flop 'for value' and then check turn and river cos they're scared of being behind. But, by definition, villain's range after the call is behind hero's. Whether villain will call a second street is moot, but note that perhaps the biggest leak among players 400nl and below is calling too much.
Now for a few hand examples, cos i think that thinking about them will help to understand how to plan hands.
hand example 5: bet-folding. Remember the fold part of this ;). You have AA super-deep on AQ8hh, turn 7c and both streets a fairly straightforward player calls your value bets and you expect his range is full of flush draws, sets and two pair hands. River comes the flush 2h and your read is that you're never good if raised but that villain will call all his non flush range. Classic bet-fold spot (we're gonna assume your read is watertight here). So, you bet, villain raises 3x, you had a plan so stick to it! Planning to bet-fold and then forgetting the fold part is a fairly common leak, and is definitely a leak.
hand example 6 (cf hand example 4):
utg is 39-3, CO is 13-11-2 with low fold to 3b.
Full Tilt No-Limit Hold'em, $0.50 BB (8 handed) - Full-Tilt Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com
SB ($17)
BB ($59.10)
UTG ($25.45)
UTG+1 ($40.95)
MP1 ($99)
MP2 ($74.60)
CO ($50)
Hero (Button) ($51.65)
Preflop: Hero is Button with 4:spade:, 4:club:
UTG calls $0.50, 3 folds, CO bets $2, hero folds.
hand example 7:
villain is fairly fishy 25-12 with 80% cbet and low W$WSD over mid-sized sample.
Full Tilt No-Limit Hold'em, $0.50 BB (9 handed) - Full-Tilt Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com
MP3 ($50)
CO ($62.10)
Hero (Button) ($53.95)
SB ($17.75)
BB ($50.75)
UTG ($46.25)
UTG+1 ($50)
MP1 ($38.95)
MP2 ($49.25)
Preflop: Hero is Button with 8:spade:, 8:club:
3 folds, MP2 bets $1, 1 fold, CO calls $1, Hero calls $1, SB calls $0.75, BB calls $0.50
ok, blinds and button aren't the squeezing type here and pfr is a heavy station. We can squeeze for value here, but we're gonna end up in a lot of weird spots and get limited value post if we get called and don't magic a set. Set-mining is fine - we plan to win a big pot, or bluff at a small pot if flop checks around and it feels good to do so.
Flop: ($5) 8:heart:, Q:spade:, 7:heart: (5 players)
ok, we have a fairly wet flop and we want to stack off. How best to do so, we can't call as we give crazy odds to the draws on this kind of flop, and there's a reasonable chance that draws are going to call even if we raise. We raise planning to get it in on most turns if we go HU to the turn - and we're going to 4b if someone 3bets us on this flop. So we raise the min c-bet, and we have a plan.
SB checks, BB checks, MP2 bets $0.50, 1 fold, Hero raises to $4.50, 2 folds, MP2 calls $4
Turn: ($14) J:spade: (2 players)
well, turn is pretty blank cos 9T/JJ is a tiny/unlikely part of villain's range. We're ahead of most of his range, and his c-spew range could easily include flush draws + tp, QJ/AQ/KK+ so we're going to call a c-raise.
MP2 checks, Hero bets $13, MP2 raises to $43.75 (All-In), Hero calls $30.75
hand example 8:
pfr is perhaps the biggest winner at these stakes, 15-12-3 and 68% fold to 3b, 18% 4b. CO is maniac fish 67-24 who is pretty keen to get it in with middle pair or better. SB is 15-12-4 with a 4% squeeze, bb is ubernit.
Full Tilt No-Limit Hold'em, $0.50 BB (7 handed) - Full-Tilt Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com
Hero (Button) ($124.15)
SB ($110.65)
BB ($50)
UTG ($21.95)
MP1 ($115.90)
MP2 ($59.15)
CO ($61.25)
Preflop: Hero is Button with Q:heart:, Q:spade:
2 folds, MP2 bets $1.50, CO calls $1.50, Hero calls $1.50, SB raises to $6.50, 1 fold, MP2 calls $5, CO calls $5, Hero calls $5
ok, calling and 3-betting are both options. PFR is capable of 4-b bluffing and sb is capable of squeezing, so 3b-folding is a possibility and the 3-bet may get us HU vs the fish. Downside is that we don't really want to be getting it in vs a 4b here as pfr isn't going to be 4betting as bluff too often with the maniac fish in the mix. And we get squeezed. PFR's flat is pretty much 22+/AK/various suited connectors, 4-betting for value isn't going to work, and we're getting almost direct odds to set mine plus we're deep and have position. Plan is to flop a set and get max value, flop an overpair and tread carefully, flop K/A high and pretty much run away.
Flop: ($26.50) 8:club:, Q:diamond:, 6:spade: (4 players)
SB checks, MP2 checks, CO bets $26.50,
bingo. Our plan was to flop a set and get max value. So, now we're looking for max value. Being scared of two outers is weak sauce. We are donked into by the fish and we hold the nuts. Calling reps all sorts of hands, but mostly hands that beat JJ. Calling also reps some weakness like scared AQ and may get either of the other two players to continue, and we plan to get it in on any turn. Calling is obviously the only play here as it is the best way to get max-value.
wrap up to come! any comments welcome.
