Suited connectors (or sc) are cards of the same suite and connected. Example : 78
A couple of general thoughts:

There are different scs type. I’ll classify them in 3 categories :

- High sc, they go from QJs to AKs, their value mainly come from hitting pair, you obviousy will make the most profit with them, simply because a pair of ace if better than a pair of king which is better than a pair of queen aswell that a A high ace flush beats a K high flush. You see my point right ?

- Medium sc, 78s to JTs, those will be the gist of this CotW. They make good pairs and on a lot of boards, you’ll have decent equity.

- Low sc, 23s to 67s, those suck. Their playability mainly comes from hitting draws.

A couple of numbers :

- Suited connectors represent 4% of hands
- With any suited connector, you will be :

Flopping a flush - 118/1 (0.84%)
Flopping a flush draw - 8.1/1 (10.9%)
Flopping a Straight draw (8 outer) 8.6 to 1 10.45%
Flopping a Straight 75.3 to 1 1.31%
From : http://www.cardschat.com/f11/various-poker-odds-69737/

When we make a simple addition :

You’ll flop a solid draw (flushdraw / str8draw) or a nuts made hand 23.5%.
And you’ll hit a pair/2pairs/trips 35.75%

In today’s games, implied odds are not as good as they used to be. You can’t stack a nit when you make a flush on the turn every single time he has a big overpair. This is why draws go down in value whereas pairs go up, which is why high sc > medium sc >>>>>>>>>>> low sc.

Preflop :

When you are the pfr (everybody has folded)

Early position (EP) : Your gameplan must vary according to the table’s aggressiveness. I’ll open 78s utg all day long if : 1) BTN is a 12/8 nit, SB and/or BB are fishes. Otherwise, don’t play low and medium sc in EP. You can raise high sc.
It’d increase your EP pfr and you’ll get 3bet light, you’d hit bad pairs and don’t know what to do because you are out of position, you’d hit draws but they play terribly out of position. Just don’t.

Middle position (MP) : The table is now shorthanded. I usually raise the high end of the medium sc (89s+) but you can play tighter if : there are aggressive players left to act (especially in position), you have a crazy mother ****er image, you are not confortable playing postflop. Dump the low sc.

Late position (LP) : You now are 3 or 4 handed. Like before, it depends a lot of the blinds and btn if you are in the CO. I won’t get into details because this is pretty basic but the tighter blinds/btn plays, the looser you can open and vice versa. You can now start opening low sc’s.

In the small blind, I’ll usually open any sc’s there, I might fold low sc’s if the BB is loose.

When someone opens and you are in position :

Early Position: (utg opens, you are utg+1)
Fold. All of those, FOLD NOW. You’ll get squeezed a decent amount, this pot is probably going to be multiway and you’ll have to play more straightforward than not, your pairs might not be good and if they are, you still need to go to the showdown.

Midle Position:
I usually fold most of them except if bad players behind (preferably in the blinds).

Late Position :
this is the most interesting situation imo.

2 scenarios :

EP opens, he’s a standard regular (16/13, 10% opens utg). 10% opens utg = 22-AA, ATs+, AQo+, KJs.

You need to know what type of hands you can profitably play against that range.

Pokerstove tells us T9s up to KQs have 40.20% pure equity. But there is also time your opponent will check fold the best hand, cbet and give up on the turn the best hand which will happen way more than 10%.

On the other hand, 45s up to 89s only have 35% against that same utg range.

A couple of variable though :

- Our post flop skill (includes the fold equity we think we have on some boards against a specific opponent)

- His post flop skill

Don’t overestimate your fold equity. The intrasec value of sc’s (the time you’ll make 2pairs/str8/flush or anything that can beat AA) is generally not good enough so that you can play any sc profitably, even in position. You need to rely on fold equity.

Fold equity comes from aggression and your aggression should be based on your equity (the more equity you have in a pot, the more you can play a hand aggressively…). Here’s why I’d rather play JTs than 45s.

The better you know your opponent tendencies in specific spots, the more you can call with lower sc’s.

Against middle and late position opener (MP vs HJ vs CO vs BTN), most regulars don’t call 3bet out of position, therefore you want to polarize your 3betting range to premium hands and “trashy” hands and call everything between. Your calling range will include high and medium sc’s. You won’t make a profit by calling low sc’s against a wide range (cf. playing from the blinds, you’ll understand why). BUT, they are pretty much the top of your bottom range, you can include them in your 3bet bluffing range along with what you usually 3bet.

Against fishy opponent, you need to 3bet a merged range (only for value but wider), you need to include high sc’s and even some JTs for isolation/slight value purpose.

Playing from the blinds :

Again, you already know that but playing out of position sucks, especially drawing hands. You’ll fold against EP and MP. Now, let’s talk about late position play (the difference between a losing and a winning regular mostly comes from late position play).

In late position, ranges are wide. Your goal won’t be to crack aces anymore. When ranges are wide, pairs value go up and draws value go down (because of the lack of implied odds).

You’ll call (or 3bet if your opponent defends with worse but I won’t get into that, it’s already covered here by knn05) with your high and medium sc’s, and fold/3bet your low sc’s. No, you won’t make a profit calling with 5 high out of position but if your opponent folds a lot to 3bet, you can 3bet and still have a decent chance to flop gin.

Quick thoughts about post flop :

The more equity you have, the more aggressive you need to be.
Don’t be afraid of getting it in with a gutter and a flushdraw on the flop. It might not be SUPER +ev but it’ll increase your overall aggression and it’ll be a huge step from being the empty seat weak tight nit to becoming the crazy loose regular nobody wants to play with.

Also, if we think deeper about it : your opponent knows that you don’t play aggressively your fd+gutter on the flop. Therefore when you raise 5h6hTs, you only have 55/66/TT/56 in your value range. A standard player will think “okay, his range is polarized, I CALL or I RAISE (if he has air) .
When you do raise your fds+gutters/A high flushdraws on this flop, he won’t be able to call you down with 77/88/99/JT or even JJ because his equity just dropped down significantly against your range.

The best of you probably got my point and I’ll put an anti spoiler there because this information is so valuable

The wider you raise for value, the more you can bluff!

Conclusion :

I think this is hard to give a general plan on how to play suited connectors. The value of a given hand depends a lot of the situation/opponent and you’ll need to play a lot to get a feeling of what hand you can make a profit with.

Wow, only 1325 words. It looks short to me compared to the CotW relative to playing small pp’s. But I hope I covered everything to say about suited connector’s. If so, I’ll respond to your questions and edit the main post later.

To keep the discussion going, the best is, imo, to post hand histories to illustrate recurrent pre/post flop situations you feel you struggle with and we all talk together about why a line A is better than a line B.

If you notice any big grammar fault, please tell it on this thread or by PM asap. English isn’t my native language.

by babar86 for 2+2 Forums

1. What’s a valuebet? And what isn’t?
2. What’s a bluff? And what isn’t?
3. What is “showdown value”? And how can I tell I have any?
4. Piecing the puzzle together.
5. General rules at the microstakes.

Intro.

I wanted to make a very basic guide for beating microstakes poker (originally posted this as a sort of 1k post on another forum). I would have benefitted greatly from a strictly ABC guide to poker, concentrating on postflop play. I never found it, and it took me a long time to figure this stuff out, possibly because I’m somewhat dimwitted. I hope some of you will benefit from my stupidity. I present this guide in all modesty: I might be wrong about a lot of things, but I think if you think about the concepts here, you should be well on your way to beating µNL.

Please PM me with any remarks or examples. Maybe I can make a second edition or so after a while. I’m sure I make some fundamental mistakes, and that my examples aren’t always great. There’s spots where I have doubts myself. I’m just trying to offer a framework for thinking about when you should bet, and when you should check.

The advice here is pretty categoric sometimes. This is because I feel that at the micro’s there’s no need to be fancy or to bet thin. Just try to get your check/bet/fold decisions optimized, and don’t worry about being “exploitable”, or “vanilla” or “weaktight”. Just try to make money to move beyond 50NL. Also, please don’t tell me that all this advice sucks at 100nl and above. I know this already.

1. What’s a valuebet, and what isn’t?

You have heard a lot about valuebets (usually with the word “thin” in front of it). You should be valuebetting a lot and very “thin”. But what is a valuebet?

DEFINITION:
A valuebet is a bet that will be called by enough worse hands to make it a profitable (+EV) move.

Example 1
You raise in MP with A Q, you get a call from the CO.

Flop comes Q T 5

A bet here is clearly a valuebet, because there’s hardly any better hands in villain’s range to start with (he would probably 3bet AA, KK and QQ preflop).

Villain will call a bet here with: KQ,QJ,QT,JJ,J9 and maybe some stuff like KT,AT,JT if he thinks your just making a random c-bet with air. Note that we don’t beat every hand in his calling range: QT > AQ. It’s not important. A valuebet is not a bet that will never get called or raised by better hands. It’s a bet that’s profitable because *enough* worse hands will call to make it +EV.

Our range for betting here is at least: AA-QQ, AQ,KQ,QJ,AT,KT,55 and lots of broadway cards, gutshots and even air. Villain can easily assume that his second or third best hand is good enough to call here (KQ,QJ, JJ and even AT can easily assume it’s good; draws will obv call because of implied odds). So this is clearly a profitable situation, and a bet here is clearly a valuebet.

Note however that I said: *enough* worse hands. This isn’t the same as a bet that will be called by worse hands. Theoretically, every bet could be called by worse hands. What you want is to assign a range to villain with *enough* worse hands that will call, so that your bet is profitable.

Example 2
You raise in MP with A J, you get a call from the CO.

Flop comes Q 7 3

Here, you will and should probably bet your entire PFR range (let’s say AK-AT, all PP’s, all suited broadways and KQo+). But this is not a valuebet, because although you will be called by worse hands (this is the micro’s, they’ll call with ATC, right?), there won’t be enough of them in villain’s range. There’s hardly any draws that will peel here, there’s a lot of pocket pairs in villain’s range that he will call with (and that beat us), and there’s even a lot of AX hands that beat us (AK,AQ, A7, A3).

Turn comes J
Should you bet? Probably not at the micro’s (not sure myself tbh, but I’m inclined to think not). At this point, there is no value whatsoever left in betting. Again: there might be villains who will call here with TT-88, and even bottom pair, and it’s easy to think: “I have second pair top kicker kicker, no way he has a Q, I bet.” If that is what you regularly do, you have just found the reason why you are not beating microstakes.

This is not a valuebet, because it will never be called by any hand that is worse than yours. In fact, you are folding out every hand that is worse (because they see the Q and the J on board, and they think: ‘no way my 77 is good here’).

A common expression is that at the microstakes, “you can just take villains to valuetown”. I used to think that this meant that I should just keep firing with any piece of the board. It doesn’t.

It just means that you should hardly ever bluff (which is the opposite of a valuebet).

It means that, as long as villain’s range can reasonably have enough worse hands in it, you can usually keep betting without being afraid that you will be outplayed. It means that, usually, you can go for three streets of value with AT on a T hi board, as long as villain has a reason to believe that his worse hand is good. Also because mostly, villains will announce when they beat TPTK by raising the turn.

Ok, so we check the turn, and villain checks behind.

River comes 5

Can we valuebet? Yes.

By calling the flop but checking behind on the turn, villain let us know that he has showdown value, but he’s not strong enough to valuebet himself. He probably has some middle pocket pair, or A7 or something, or random air. By not betting the turn ourselves, we have announced pretty clearly that we don’t have a Q. Since we should bluff here fairly often, villain should call here with a very wide range. KJ,JT,TT-88, maybe A7. Yes, he will sometimes have a set, 2P, AQ, or the gutshot straight with 64. Yes, he will fold his club draws and all the backdoor draws like A5. But all in all, I think we can bet here for value, because villain can and probably should call with enough worse hands to make this a profitable bet.

Do we HAVE to valuebet here? No. If you are not entirely sure of your handreading skills, there is no need to valuebet here at the micro’s. This is a “thin” valuebet, but there is enough profit to be made by making “fat” valuebets at the micro’s.

Example 3
You raise in CO with Q T , BTN calls.

Flop comes 6 T 9

When we bet, villain can and should call with at least AT,KT,QT,JT,T9,T8, club draws, open ended straight draws and maybe some gutshots with overcards like KQ or so. Plus sets, two pairs, and made straights. Is this a valuebet? Yes. I think it’s not even thin, although there’s obviously more hands that beat us here than in example 1. You bet, villain calls.

Turn comes 8 , so the board now looks:

6 T 9 8

If we bet here, are there still worse hands in villains range that he will call us with? This is already a lot thinner. He will probably still call with all his TP hands (AT to T7, let’s say). Let’s assume his range was evenly distributed between TP hands and draws (FD and SD’s). OESD’s now came in, he probably won’t continue with his gutshots with overs (KQ).

But the chance is higher that he had a FD than a SD, because there’s more club draw combinations than combinations of QJ, and villain is somewhat less likely to call a bet with a mere 7X gutshot.

There’s only one TP hand we beat anymore (assuming he didn’t call with T5 and under), and we beat only the FD’s. Nevertheless, a bet here could still be a valuebet, but it will be thin. We bet to get value from FD’s and to prevent FD’s from getting a free card (”bet for protection”). We will be forced to fold if villain raises.

River comes Q so the board now looks

6 T 9 8 Q

We made two pair. What hands will still call us that we beat? The flush draws will fold anyway to a bet. AT and KT will probably fold to any bet, because it is so likely that we have either a J or a 7, based on our betting pattern. It is also very likely that villain has a J or a 7 based on his play. He would probably have raised a 2P like T9 on the flop, and T8 or 98 on the turn, because microstakes players horribly overplay their 2P (it’s strong against TP, but it gets outdrawn frequently, so they want to get the money in fast).

In short, there is NO value in a bet here, imo. This is the mistake most micro players make: they will bet here, because 2P is a “strong hand”. It might be, but not on this board, and not after how the play went. After they bet, the donk will call with 75o or something, and they will say: “how is it possible that this retard doesn’t put me on KJ or something?” Well, because he can’t handread.

Mind you: it’s not that he will not or can not call with worse hands. He might call with AQ. But: is AQ still in his range often enough? It shouldn’t, and you shouldn’t assume it still is. He might still call with T9/T8/98/T6o, in fact it’s perfectly possible that he’s a retard that will call with T6. But not often enough to make a bet here profitable.

I think this is probably the mistake I made when starting out. I was always thinking: well, he could still call with (fill in theoretical hand that could indeed call). This is not enough to make your bet a valuebet.

Until you can narrow ranges down accurately, it’s probably not a good idea to valuebet very thin. It’s very macho to say “I valuebet thin here”. But if you’re not sure that you’re actually valuebetting, you’re not valuebetting thin. You’re just giving money away to the donks.

2. What’s a bluff?

DEFINITION
A bluff is a bet that will get enough better hands to fold, or a bet that will fold out a better hand often enough to make it a profitable (+EV) move.

You should not be bluffing “thin” when you play microstakes NL. By this I mean: talking yourself into a bluff because “he’s a complete donk if he doesn’t fold TPTK here”. Most people cannot find the fold button if their life depended on it in µNL. Also, most people don’t handread well enough at µNL to realise that you are representing a strong hand. They think: I have a pair, so I will see a showdown. Generally, good spots to bluff (let’s call them “fat bluffs”) will be instantly recognisable.

Say you have 89o on a KT7ss board, and you are in position. Villain c-bets and you call. Turn brings another flushcard, and villain shuts down. This might be a good opportunity to bluff. Villain might have TP, 2P, second pair or a better draw than you (QJ) that he’s willing to fold here. He might even be weaktight enough to fold a set (µNL players don’t like monotone boards). Mind, he could also have complete air. But in general, a bluff here will fold out *enough better* hands (especially if it’s backed up with a read that he has weaktight tendencies) to make it profitable.

Before you bet, you should ask yourself: am I valuebetting, or bluffing? A lot of the time if you’re a struggling µNL player, you will have to admit that you don’t really know. You just feel that you should keep betting, because not betting is “weak”, and “this donk could have any piece of the board and he will call with it”. This is why you’re not beating the micro’s. As a beginning player, you should know exactly if you’re bluffing (and you shouldn’t do that often) or valuebetting (this is where your profit is).

So, when can you bluff? ONLY when villain has a range with hands that are better than your hand. This is necessary to call your bet a bluff. Before you bluff, then, you should

1. Know that villain actually has a better hand than you a lot of the time.
2. Know that the board and the action will convince him that your range > his hand.
3. Know which better hands in his range you want to fold out.

If you are a beginning player and your handreading sucks, this is only possible when villain shows obvious weakness, and you have absolute air. In most other case, when villain shows “a little bit of weakness” or is sending mixed signals (checkraising the flop big but checking the turn for instance) and you have a hand that’s “quite a lot better than air but quite a bit worse than the nuts”, it’s probably better to check to see a cheap showdown. This is called showdown value. Showdown value is your friend (see chapter 3).

If a bluff is designed to fold out better hands, it follows that at the micro’s, you should almost never bluff in big pots. Why? Because there is a lot of money already in the pot. This is only possible if villain has shown to you that he has no intention of folding, because he feels his hand is strong. This means that his range is probably made up of more nut type hands than air or marginal hands.

Also, there is a thing called pot odds that you probably know (I remember knowing advanced concepts like “rangemerging” before actually grasping what valuebetting was). The bigger the pot, the less scary a big bet is for villain, because he has great actual pot odds, and almost no reversed implied odds, because your stack is already partly or largely in the pot. You have no weapons left.

The pots where you should bluff are the small ones, where you can feel villains hesitation: “Am I behind or ahead? Is it worth it to call this for this smallish pot?” Villains will talk themselves into folding small pots a lot more often. Why? Because your stack is a weapon, and the pot is a shield. A bet is more threatening when there’s lots of money behind: your weapon looks dangerous compared to the shield. When the shield is big, your weapon doesn’t look so scary.

3. What is “showdown value”?

Example 1
You are on the BTN and raise 74o (don’t do this obviously until you know you can afford to) and you get a call from the BB.

Flop comes K 2 2
Villain checks, you make a standard c-bet and get called.

Turn comes 4
Villain checks. It’s probably best NOT to bet here. Why? Because paired flops are hard to hit, and villain probably realises this. Unfortunately, this also goes for him. He did not show a lot of strenght by c/c’ing the flop c-bet instead checkraising or leading it.

He probably feels he has showdown value, but not a great hand. Alternatively, he’s trapping and planning a checkraise. About the only hands that we beat here are A hi and 33. The rest of his range are PP > 44 and KX, 2X hands. There’s just no point in putting money into the pot, because he probably won’t call with the AX hands or 33 (he’ll now sigh and say: “ok, he has a K”), but I don’t think he’ll fold many better hands (maybe 55-77).

So what happened on the turn? Our air hand just got showdown value against A hi hands, which makes up a lot of his range. You can’t bet for value here because your hand is only marginally better than air, but you can’t bluff because you won’t fold out better hands.

DEFINITION
You have showdown value when there’s a chance that your hand will hold up at the showdown.

It’s usually used when you have nothing BUT showdown value, meaning that you could be ahead or behind, but you can’t valuebet because no worse hand will call, and you can’t bluff because no better hand will fold.

We have showdown value, so we try to see a cheap showdown. We check behind.

Suppose the turn came Q
Villain checks. Bet this probably. Why? Because we have no showdown value at all, but we can fold out hands like JJ-33. If you get called/raised here, you can be sure that your hand is worthless. How worthless? Not sure.

Now say you bet the Q turn and the river is a 7 or a 4. Villain checks to us. Here you either check back or bet. Mind you, if you check, it’s NOT because you have SD value. It’s because you think villain will never fold. You are just letting go of the hand, you have air now. If you bet, it’s because you think villain has a weakish hand that he’s willing to fold (you are bluffing).

!! You are not checking for showdown value here, and you are never betting for value!!

What I want to show is that showdown value on the turn is not necessarily SD value on the river and vice versa. And that a bet on the turn with second pair doesn’t necessarily mean the same thing as a bet on the river. Again, you should think very hard about why you are betting and why you are checking.

4. Piecing the puzzle together

This is by far the hardest part, but I’ll try to give you a decision tree that should serve you well at the microstakes. Whenever you are faced with a decision, aks yourself this question first:

1. Can I valuebet?
If the answer is YES, proceed to valuebet.

If the answer is NO, ask yourself

2. Do I have showdown value?
If the answer is YES, you should probably check (especially in position).

If the answer is NO, ask yourself

3. Do I have Fold Equity (can I fold out enough better hands than mine)?
If the answer is YES, you might (I SAID MIGHT) consider bluffing. You should be aware that bluffing is not a very useful tactic against calling stations.

So the decision tree looks like this

VBET POSSIBLE?
YES => BET
NO =>

DO I HAVE SD VALUE?
YES => CHECK /fold
NO =>
DO I HAVE FOLDING EQUITY?
YES =>
DO I REALLY REALLY HAVE FE?
YES => maybe maybe maybe bluff
NO => fold/check

5. General rules at the microstakes.

You noticed that I didn’t mention raising. This is because I think that you can probably AUTOFOLD every time a villain raises if you don’t hold the nuts or the second nuts and still make 5PTBB+ at the micro’s.

Your objective should be to valuebet/valuebet/valueshove your good hands. If you c-bet with air and you get called, you can probably give up, esp OOP. No use “second barreling” or “third barreling with air” at the micros. No use trying to put villain on AK when he checkraises you all in on a scary turn and you have an underpair. Just fold. Wait for the next hand, and bet/bet/shove.

Good luck at the tables.

By MonkE for 2+2 Forums

OK, what you have to realise is quite how +EV blind stealing is. Check you BB/100 when blind stealing in PT. I’m sure that for most of you it’s bigger than 60 PTBB/100, now that a hell of a lot of $$$$!!!! The reason for this is in a way, NLTH is a badly structured game in the way that when you play without antes, the blinds are at such a disadvantage, they have to post their blind without even seeing their hand. Now considering that a good TAG player will normally only play about 20% of their hands, this means that on the BB , they’re losing 4BB every 5 hands, that they normally wouldn’t put in.

OK, so lets say you’re on the button and MP limps to you. You have K 2 , what should you normally do? Well folding certainly doesn’t look too bad. We’ve got a poor hand after all. What do I think you should do? RAISE THAT [censored]!!!

Reasons:

1) now, yourblind steal doen’t even look like a blind steal, so it’s less likely the blinds will see it as that and play back at you.

2) It’s scary the amount of times that I’ve seen people limp/fold preflop, even from CO. It kinda baffles me realy!! What kind of hand can they have?

3) What do you opponents limp with? This is a very important consideration. Normally, either trash/SC/PP. These hands miss the flop very often. So even if you do get called, they won’t continue after your flop cbet very often.

4) When we take it down preflop, we now win 2.5BB. Thats over 100PTBB/100…..freakdaddy, we’ll catch you yet

5) We’ll get paid off more on our big hands.

6) Our oppponents are plays sub-optimally by open limping. So by raising, we are punishing that mistake.

Next, lets think about what will happen after we make this play a few times. Well, either you’re at a table of mega mega unobservant fish and you just keep raking in the money from their limps. Or maybe you’re sitting at a table of just mega unobservant fish, and they realise what you’re doing and they stop limping. Well, is this a good thing or a bad thing? I think in a way, its a VERY good thing. It means 1) they will be folding more, so you can steal the blinds more, which as we’ve already discussed is $$$$$$. 2) They will be raising more and will be out of their comfort zone. This means they will usually make even bigger mistakes than usual as they try to adjust

Next, what hands should you be doing this with? After how many limpers? After what sort of limpers.

IMO, you should do it with your normal blind stealing range, so SC, unsuited connectors, suited 1 gappers, Axs, Kxs, low PP etc etc.

No. of limpers: normally 1 or 2, but sometimes more if conditions allow
The type of limpers: the ones that like to fold, eihter preflop or 2 cbets.

Lastly, the problems with this:

1) If you do this too often, you’ll find that you open up your game tooo much and start raising poor hands OOP too and get into trouble.

2) watch out for LRR

3) You’ll be put in a lot more marginal situations post-flop, so you need to make sure your reasing skills are goot.

IMO, playing a huge range of hands from the button after 0 or 1 (and even 2 limpers), raising them all and then from all other positions just play pairs/big aces/KQ is a simpleish but very profitable strategy

By Dan Bitel for 2+2 Forums

I’m just trying to grow beyond basic TAG strategy and need a little help.

Not to be discouraging, but what you suggest isn’t beyond basic TAG strategy; it’s part of basic TAG strategy. As Ed Miller brilliantly put it in his recent 2+2 magazine article:

Total all the dollars you’ve ever bet playing poker. The large majority of those dollars should have been bet from late position. Only a small percentage of your total handle should have been bet from up front.

To implement this idea, you should be:

1. Playing more hands from LP.
2. Raising more hands from LP.

The concept is called "positional awareness," and it’s a fundamental building-block of good poker strategy. My general rule-of-thumb on positional play is that if I look at my VPIP from each position, it should be decreasing as I move farther from the button (blinds are a whole separate category — ignore them for now). I’d love to see my "VPIP from Button" at double my "VPIP from UTG" in a full-ring game, but if your Button VPIP isn’t at LEAST 50% larger than your UTG VPIP, you’re not playing a sufficiently positionally aware game.

My preflop aggression rule-of-thumb is that I want my PFR% to be at least half of my VPIP. If I’m not raising it up with at LEAST half the hands I pay to see, I’m either too passive or too loose preflop.

So; how can we implement this "positionally aware" strategy? Here are some suggestions:

1. From EP, play tighter-than-tight. I play any pocket pair, AK, AQ, maybe AJ and KQ (depending on the table and my image); that’s it. I’m raising with AA-TT and AK, AQ, AJ, and KQ (if I play them). Sometimes I’ll raise 99 and 88 as well.

2. From MP, I don’t open-limp. If the hand is good enough to play, it’s good enough to raise as the first player in. I’ll add suited connectors down to T9s into my lineup, and unsuited QJ or JT. I’ll also consider open-raising any two if my table image is tight and the players behind me are tight preflop and/or horrible (or even just weak-tight) postflop.

3. From LP, if it’s folded to me, I’m open-raising with any pair, any ace, any king, any two honors, any suited connectors down to 54s, any unsuited connectors down to 87o. I make steal attempts a bit over 1/3 of the time, and it’s wildly profitable. I also follow up ANY steal attempt with a continuation bet, regardless of the board or my hand. I will, however, quickly release a garbage hand if I’m reraised preflop or bet into on the flop; there’s no reason to stick around if you get caught stealing.

4. From LP after limpers, I tighten up a bit on my raising standards but still play very loose: I’ll raise any suited ace, any pair AA-TT, AK, AQ, AJ, KQ, and QJ; I’ll add in any other pair and suited or unsuited connectors if I’m feeling frisky and my image is tight. I’ll at least limp with suited connectors and any pair regardless.

Position is a powerful advantage in no-limit hold’em; if you don’t use it, you’re costing yourself money. The best way to use it is to play reasonably loose from LP (barring a preflop raise in front of you) and reasonably tight from EP. Just make sure you stay aggressive — you’ve got to raise at least half of these hands preflop. That means there are plenty of hands that you wouldn’t even play from EP that are worth a raise in LP, even after limpers.

By Pokey for 2+2 Forums

In the SSNL FAQ, Skeme has a section that recommends raising 3-4BBs + 1 per limper in order to "protect your hand" and some other mumbo jumbo.

It seems to me that raise size only works optimally when there are a ton of limpers already in the pot, or you have a hand that it is hard to get stacked with.

For other hands, like AK,AA,KK,and QQ, it seems to me like opening for 4BBs is a HORRIBLE opening size. Not only does it not get _much_ value out of the hands that call, but it also chases out hands that you WANT in the pot with you (other aces or hands like K8o) and encourages hands like 55 or 76s to try to stack you.

Can someone explain why 4BBs is a standard opener with your big hands and not something like 7 or 8 BBs, assuming you have at least 100BB?

I understand that you don’t need to raise SUPER big all of the time in order to give no one the correct implied odds because you’re not going to get stacked all of the time, but let’s face it, you are going to get stacked once in a while when you’ve got an overpair and someone has a set, especially against a very aggressive opponent.

4BBs just seems way too small to me for an opener. Thoughts?

By Pokey:

Conventional wisdom dictates that a 4xBB+1/limper raise is very good at getting the pot heads-up on the flop, which, for most hands, is the optimal number of opponents. The problem with preflop raising is that you want to do it often enough to disguise your holdings (raises from you shouldn’t automatically mean AA/KK/AK) and gain the initiative in the hand (it’s MUCH easier to win after raising than after limping).

If you make your standard raise bigger — say, 8xBB — then the opposition can defend against you EXTREMELY effectively by tightening up and only playing back when they have monsters of their own. You’re basically risking too much to win too little (blinds total only 1.5 BBs), and a savvy opponent can easily take advantage of that. On the other hand, if you raise less, like a minraise to 2xBB, you don’t exert enough pressure and wind up playing many hands multiway.

This is deadly, especially OOP, and it will cause you to lose many more hands than you otherwise would. Worse yet, you’ll commit much more money before you know you’re beaten by a stray two pair or some such holding.

Ideally, we’d like to vary our preflop raises to reflect the strength of our hand — raising more when we’ve got a super-premium hand, raising less when we’ve got mediocre holdings. Unfortunately, our opponents have this ridiculous idea that THEY want to win money at the game, and they have the unnerving habit of watching how we play and adjusting to it.

If our preflop raise size indicates the strength of our holdings, we’re giving away FAR too much information. As a result, all our preflop raises need to be the same size, whether they are blind steals with garbage or value bets with AA.

for 2+2 Forum

Not a week goes by that someone doesn’t ask if they are playing the game right. In that post, they include a dozen numbers from Poker Tracker and hope that the old-timers on SSNL can fix all their holes. While it’s true that Poker Tracker can help find problems, this is not the way to approach it.

I’m going to try to give you a rough guide for the things you can do to check on your game. These are all just my opinion; they’re all subject to interpretation, and other people may disagree with me strongly. The best way to play is usually player-specific, but these strike me as some things you can check on that are frequent flaws in the small-stakes player’s game.

1. Do you have sufficient preflop aggression? To answer this question, open up your ring game statistics and go to the "position stats" page. For each position other than the small blind, divide the "PF Raise %" by the "Vol. Put $ In Pot." If you get a number smaller than 0.5, you’re not aggressive enough out of that position. See, aggression is a relative term; it should be a function of your level of looseness. You can be a consistently winning player at SSNL with a VPIP of 12%, and you can be a consistently winning player at SSNL with a VPIP of 30%, but only if you are sufficiently aggressive. My general guideline is that you should raise at least half the hands you play, from every position on the table.

2. Are you positionally aware? Positional awareness means that you understand Ed Miller’s comment when he said:

Quote:

---

Total all the dollars you’ve ever bet playing poker. The large majority of those dollars should have been bet from late position. Only a small percentage of your total handle should have been bet from up front.

---

To test this, go to the Position Stats and look down the list of VPIP from Button to UTG. You should see that VPIP steadily dropping the farther you get from the button. I’d love to see my button VPIP at double my UTG VPIP, but if my Button VPIP is at least 50% larger than my UTG VPIP, I’m happy with the situation.

3. How’s my stealing? To check on your performance when trying a blind steal, go to the General Info. tab. Where it says "Att. To Steal Blinds" I’d like to see that number at LEAST 20%. (Personally, I like mine to be over 30%, but I’m very aggressive in these situations. If you’re trying to steal the blinds less than 20% of the time, you’re leaving lots of money on the table.) Now click on "Filters…" and under "Chance to Steal Blinds" click "Chance to Steal & Raised." Select OK and look at the numbers. This shows every time you’ve tried to steal the blinds, and how the attempt turned out for you. Under "Totals" see the "BB/Hand" statistic. That shows your per-hand winrate on blind steals. If you multiply this number by 100, it should be at least double your "PTBB/100" average winrate. If it’s much less than that and you have a decent sample size, you have a hole in your game when it comes to blind stealing. This should be an exceedingly profitable thing to do when you try it; if it’s not, you need to work on your strategy.

4. Defending the blinds. Click on "Turn Filter Off," and then click on "Filters…" again. Under "Blind Status" click on "Either Blind." Now under "Vol. Put $ In Pot" click on "Put Money In." This shows you if you’re bleeding money out of the blinds. A "BB/Hand" of about -0.375 would indicate that you were no better off putting money into the pot than if you had folded. If your "BB/Hand" is larger than that, then you typically win back some of your blind money when you put money into the pot from the blinds. That’s all you can really hope for. If you click on "Filters…" again and go under "Steal Attempted Against Your Blind" and click on "Steal Attempted." After you click "OK" you’ll now see how you did when you chose to defend against a blind steal. Again, the magic number is for your "BB/Hand" to be bigger than -0.375; that means you’re making back some of your blinds when you try to defend against a steal. If either of these numbers is lower than -0.375, you’d lose less money by always folding rather than doing what you’re doing.

5. Heads-up play. Click on “Turn Filter Off,” then click on “Filters…” again. Under “Hands With Between…Players Seeing The Flop” change the range from “0 to 10 players” to “2 to 2 players.” Hit “OK” and see what comes up. This shows you how you’ve done when you were heads-up preflop, but a flop was dealt. See how you’ve done in these situations. If things look OK, go back to “Filters…” and under “Pre-flop Raise” select “No Raise.” This will show you how you’ve done when you didn’t raise preflop, but the hand was heads-up on the flop (this includes pure limping and when someone ELSE raised preflop, but not when you were the preflop raiser). Is this number positive? If not, it could be an indicator that you have trouble when you are not the aggressor preflop, especially without padding in the pot.

6. Multiway pots. Clear the filter and go back under filters. Change “Hands With Between…Players Seeing The Flop” to “3 to 10 players.” This shows you how you do in multiway pots. If things look good, go back and select “No Raise” under “Pre-flop Raise.” Is it still positive? If so, you’re selecting good times to play/limp multiway pots, and you’re playing them well postflop.

7. Pocket pairs. Under “Filters…” change the “Type of Hole Cards” to “Pairs.” This will show you how you generally play and perform with pocket pairs. Your Total VPIP with these should be EXTREMELY high; unless you play at highly unusual tables, I’d be surprised to see this number below 85%. Pocket pairs make extremely powerful hands that are extremely well-hidden; if you’re not playing them almost all the time, you’re leaving money on the table. Also, your Total PFR% with these hands should be rather high — at least 1/3 of your VPIP, if not 1/2. Some people have this number higher still, and I don’t have a problem with that, especially at short-handed tables. If you have enough hands, I’d expect every one of these lines to be positive, and reasonably significantly so. If you have any glaringly negative numbers, especially AA-88, it may indicate bad play. Look over individual hands where you lose lots of money and see if you played too timidly early in the hand, or if you went too far unimproved in the face of resistance. Also, look at the hands where you won to see if you played too timidly, or if you routinely forced weaker hands out when you should have been milking them for profits.

8. Suited connectors. Under “Filters…” change “Type of Hole Cards” to “Suited Connectors.” I’m much less likely to play suited connectors than pocket pairs, but some people play them religiously. As a result, I don’t really have a good suggestion as to how high your VPIP or PFR should be. However, your BB/hand should be positive; if it’s not, you’re probably not playing your suited connectors well. Remember: these hands play best in a multiway, unraised pot, or as a steal move. In the “Filters…” change “Vol. Put $ In Pot” to “Cold-Called.” When you hit OK, you should have almost no entries to view. Of the times you cold-called, you should be able to come up with a specific explanation for why you did so in each and every one of them. Review the hand histories; if you can’t come up with a really good reason why you thought it better to cold-call, rather than raise or fold, you need to rethink your suited connector strategy. Good explanations: the raise was very small, villain is passive post-flop, I had position on villain, villain and I are both extremely deep-stacked, villain is incredibly aggressive preflop, my suited connectors are particularly strong, there are several cold-callers in front of me, etc. I’m not saying you shouldn’t ever cold-call with suited connectors; rather, I’m saying you shouldn’t AUTOMATICALLY do so. Your default play here should be to fold weak suited connectors and reraise strong ones.

9. Unsuited connectors. Clear the filter and then go back into it. Change “Type of Hole Cards” to “Off-Suited Connectors.” Your VPIP for these hands should be noticeably smaller than your VPIP for suited connectors. Check your winrate and make sure it’s positive. Filter for cold-calling and see if you had good reasons for doing so, keeping in mind that the reasons need to be even stronger than for suited connectors.

10. Postflop aggression. Clear the filter. Select the “More Detail…” button above the “Filters…” button. Scroll down. There is a section marked “First Action on Flop After A Pre-flop Raise.” This shows your likelihood of continuation betting. If you add Bet and Raise, the total should be at least 40%. If it’s not, you’re probably giving up too soon on your good hands, and that will cost you money in the long run. Remember: people who cold-call a preflop bet are often in fit-or-fold mode. If you don’t bet, you don’t give them a chance to fold. The pot is already decent-sized, and there’s no reason to give some donk a free look at a turn card that could sink you. If you raised preflop, you need a good reason NOT to raise the flop. Continuation betting should be your default play. Scroll down a bit farther to “Aggression Factor.” Your total aggression factor should be at LEAST 2. No-limit is not a game where you can call frequently and turn a profit. You should always be looking to see if you can raise or fold; only if you have a good reason why you CANNOT raise or fold should you call. As a result, calling should be an infrequent occurrence in your play, which gives you a large aggression factor.

11. Check-raising. Some people never check-raise; others check-raise infrequently. I personally like to check-raise at least once in awhile; 1% would be fine, 0.5% would be acceptable. The goal of the check-raise is to remind your opponents that just because you checked does NOT mean that you don’t have a hand. However, circumstances need to be very specific for a check-raise to be appropriate. Typically, I check-raise on the flop when OOP against a preflop raiser, or on the turn when OOP against a flop bettor/raiser who was clearly not on a draw (uncoordinated flop). If you are check raising much more than 2% of the time, you’re being entirely too tricky for a SSNL table, and straightforward play would probably be more profitable for you.

All of this is just an introduction to the kinds of self-analysis you can/should do with Poker Tracker statistics. Notice how much more in-depth it is than just glancing at a few VPIP numbers. Typically, the only person who can truly do a “check-up” on your playing style and ability is YOU. As always, if in your searching you find hands that indicate you may have a flaw in your poker reasoning, post them up (one at a time, of course). Tell us the problem you are worried you might have, and why you think this hand might indicate the problem. Then, open the discussion up to see if 2+2ers agree or disagree.

By Pokey for 2+2 Forums

Value - Villain will call with worse hands.
Protection - To make it incorrect for villain to chase draws.
Bluff - Villain will fold hands that beat us.
Semi-Bluff - Our hand has equity, however we’d be happy just to win the pot now.
Information - Villain’s reaction tells us where we are.
Deception - Merge your range, yo. Shania loves you.

VPBSID - Say it with me, VPBSID. Rolls right off the tongue, doesn’t it? Now that you have an easy, memorable acronym, you’ll never forget!

The post will deal primarily with betting for value. This is a key component of play in the micros. Being effective with your value bets is incredibly important against loose passive players (calling stations). The kinds of players that are very common in micro stakes.

What is a value bet?

A value bet is any bet where you expect to be called mostly by worse hands and the value gained from worse hands calling exceeds the loss incurred when you actually don’t have the best hand or you’re otherwise forced to fold before showdown.

When value betting with less than a monster, we often can’t call a raise. So when we value bet we do not want to see a raise. And when he does call we don’t want him to have a better hand. If he has a better hand then betting is just costing us money and we shouldn’t be betting.

We need to be enough ahead of his calling range to make up for the times he raises. If we’re in a situation where he’s going to raise our bet a lot (ie; an aggressive player, a board where he either has the nuts or air) then we have to be way ahead of his calling range in order to make betting profitable. When value betting, we don’t want to have to bet/fold very often.

When you value bet, you want your opponent to call. And when he does call you want it to be with a worse hand. If he doesn’t usually have a worse hand or if he’s not going to be able to call with a worse hand, you can’t bet.

Value betting and especially value betting thin often involves TPNK and middle pair type hands. Betting big hands, 2pairs, sets, straights, flushes is usually an easy decision. The ones we really have to think about are the more marginal hands. Especially against stations who will call with anything. Sometimes things get tricky with sets on coordinated boards, low straights or small flushes. But the majority of these situations are one pair hands.

Hand Reading

The fundamental theorem of poker states:

If you can read hands you can overcome the disadvantage of incomplete information. If you are able to deduce your opponent’s hand, you gain a tremendous advantage.

In order value bet effectively, you need to be good at hand reading. This also involves being able to evaluate board texture.

You may remember this scene from Rounders (yeah, I’m referencing Rounders, it’s called pandering. Deal with it!)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qv2C_m0D-gY

Yes, this is a typical Hollywood setup, and there’s some real BS (representing trips by checking? WTF?) but at it’s core you need to be like Mike.

You need to be able to put people on ranges and ideally hands. Eventually you should be doing this automatically for every hand.

What’s more, putting your opponent on a range isn’t enough. If you’re going to valuetown people you need to also put them on calling ranges.

If you can’t do this, you are going to spew. You’re going to miss bets a better player would make. And you’re going to be turning hands into bluffs when you should just be taking showdowns.

You need to practice. You need to learn the common patterns used by the various types of players. If you want to be a good player you need to be able to routinely put people on hands.

This is one of the fundamental skills in poker. You can get away with auto-betting in the micros, especially the nano-stakes where everyone is so bad it doesn’t matter. However, if you can’t hand read it’s going to catch up to you and you’re going to suffer as you try to climb out of the micros and you can’t just feast on donks all day while avoiding the other decent players.

Know your enemy

Value betting, especially thin value bets, are most useful against calling stations and other players who call too much (ie; TAGs who aren’t very good).

Value bets are not very useful against LAGs. LAGs don’t call down very much. They bet and raise when they have a hand (and when they don’t). The way to beat LAGs is to trap and sometimes call down a little light. Avoid value betting LAGs - They’re just going to raise you and then you’re screwed.

Against TAGs and good sLAGs you will want to use a combination of value betting and trapping along with other weapons in your arsenal (ie; bluffing).

Use position

Position is important in value betting because position is an important tool in hand reading. When we are able to act after our opponent we are much more able to judge when he doesn’t have a strong hand. When it is checked to us unless he’s slowplaying or intending to check/raise it usually means his hand doesn’t have a lot of value.

When out of position it is much more difficult to judge an opponent’s hand strength. It is also much more difficult to get value since our OOP bets will be perceived as much stronger. A positionally aware player will need a much stronger hand to call us down than when we are betting with position.

Be more inclined to make thin value bets when you have position and you can use the knowledge gained by position to your benefit. Be less inclined to value bet OOP. In particular, if a tight player has already called a bet be wary of continuing to bet into him unless you have a strong hand. You’re just not going to get more than one or two streets of value OOP from a tight player with less than a monster.

Use your image

Your image is very important in putting your opponent’s on a calling range. If you have a loose and/or aggressive image, your opponents will be much more inclined to call you down with their more marginal hands.

If you have a tight and/or passive image, your opponents will tighten up their calling range because they will tend to put you on better hands.

So if you are LAG or sLAG be more inclined to value bet thin. Which leads to a self-fulfilling cycle. The more LAG you are, the more you should value bet. The more you value bet, the more LAG you will appear.

If you are nitty or passive, be less inclined to value bet thing because you’re not going to get calls from weak hands. Consider instead starting to open up your play a little so you can start to get more value from marginal situations.

Bet size can influence calling range

The size of your bet can influence your opponent’s calling range. If your opponent is on the tight side and you think he’s going to fold too much of this range, try a 1/2 pot bet instead of a 3/4 pot bet. On the other hand, if your opponent is a serious station consider maximizing value you by making pot-sized bets all the way. Always remember you want worse hands to call. You’re not trying to force a fold when you value bet. When you’re value betting and your opponent folds it means you’ve made a mistake. You either made a mistake in their range/calling range or you bet too much and pushed them off their hand.

Don’t turn hands with showdown value into bluffs

If your opponent can’t call you with a worse hand then you’re not value betting. You are bluffing. This is where board texture really becomes important. Most players are not calling multiple streets on A-high boards without an ace. Many players shut down when obvious draws hit unless they were chasing. Most players aren’t calling down on very scary boards (four-flush, four to a straight) without a big hand. Keep this in mind. If the four-flush hits on the river and you don’t have a decent flush you’re not betting for value because your opponent is seldom calling with a worse hand. Bluffing there may be a good idea, but know that you are bluffing, not value betting. You’re often better off checking behind.

Beware of polarized ranges

Be aware of when your opponent’s range is polarized to the extent that he’s almost always either raising (or slowplaying) or folding. You want to value bet (thin) when your opponent’s hand is a bunch of squishy mid-range hands. Not when he either has a monster or air. When he has air, there’s no point in betting you’re not going to get any value. When he has a monster… Well, it should be obvious why you don’t want to be betting into monsters.

Beware of chasers

Many players, especially stations will chase draws. When these draws come in, you need to be able to assess the likelihood you’re still ahead or you’ve just been out-drawn. In many cases you’re no longer ahead of your opponent’s range let alone his calling range. This is particularly true against loose players who are good enough to fold hands like bottom pair but will chase draws. You may still be ahead of the ones who call with any pair but the ones who can fold will have polarized ranges if there aren’t many one pair/overpair type hands that you’re beating since the draw came in.

TAGs and LAGs are much less likely to chase draws without odds. They’ll usually either play these hands aggressively or fold. So you’re often still okay to value bet against these players when draws come in.

Think ahead

If we are value betting thin and getting called is going to get us into trouble on later streets because we’re not prepared to go after multiple streets of value consider checking this street instead of later streets. For example, if we’re going to value bet the flop thin and shut down if called we’re usually better off checking the flop, particularly OOP if we’re just going to give up when called. Especially against tricky opponents. That is, don’t give your opponents the opportunity to float you or call with a weak hand and then take the pot away from you on a later street when you obviously give up.

Part of a well balanced attack

Solid value betting is part of a well balanced attack. Go back to that list of reasons we bet. If your betting range is out of balance, you become easy to read. Easy to play against. If every time you bet it’s a value bet from a tight range then observant players will have an easy time adjusting to you. On the other hand, if you bluff much more than you value bet, people are going to start snapping off your bluffs with ace-high. Don’t become predictable, keep them guessing.

A aggressive move that is break-even is +EV

An aggressive move that is mathematically break-even (ie; A thin value bet where we are equally ahead and behind villain’s range) is actually +EV. When we bet, we give players an opportunity to make a mistake. An opponent may accidentally fold a hand he didn’t mean to (misclick). An opponent may misread the meaning of our aggression, especially if he doesn’t have a good read on us. In addition, aggressive players are much more difficult to play against, to adjust to. Players start wondering if maybe they shouldn’t be folding middle pair and they may start to make some bad calls. Or you may tilt someone as they get fed up with being run over even if we aren’t really being all that aggressive. Whenever you bet, there is a small Shania component. Bets and raises are much harder to read and play against than checks, calls and certainly folds.

What happens when we fail to value bet?

Otherwise known as, “I can’t win because they always suck out on me!”

First, the ideal situation. Three streets of value from a calling station:

Villain is 40/3/0.1 after 80 hands. His preflop limping range is huge. When he check/calls flop his range is something like A2/A3/A4/A6/A7/A8/AT/AJ/89/9T/56/45/67/78/55/99. AQ/A9/A5 are possible but you have to think even someone this passive is leading a lot of the time.

So we are well ahead of his calling range even though our kicker is marginal.

Full Tilt Poker $0.01/$0.02 No Limit Hold’em - 9 players

MP2: $1.32
CO: $3.78
BTN: $1.66
SB: $0.77
Hero (BB): $2.00
UTG: $2.04
UTG+1: $2.00
UTG+2: $0.71
MP1: $2.32

Pre Flop: ($0.03) Hero is BB with A 8
UTG calls $0.02, UTG+1 calls $0.02, UTG+2 calls $0.02, 1 fold, MP2 calls $0.02, CO calls $0.02, 2 folds, Hero checks

Flop: ($0.13) 5 A 9 (6 players)
Hero bets $0.10, UTG folds, UTG+1 calls $0.10, UTG+2 folds, MP2 folds, CO folds

Turn: ($0.33) 6 (2 players)
Hero bets $.25, UTG+1 calls

River: ($0.83) J (2 players)
Hero bets $0.75, UTG+1 calls

Final pot: $2.33 - $.12 rake

UTG+1 shows: A2
Hero wins: $2.21 ($1.09 in profit)

According to PokerStove, our equity on the flop is almost 71% but we only win 54.08% of the time:

Board: 5s Ah 9c
Dead:

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 70.859% 54.08% 16.78% 4283 1329.00 { As8c }
Hand 1: 29.141% 12.36% 16.78% 979 1329.00 { A2s, A2o }

Please read that again - Even though we have a dominating hand and appear to be way ahead, we’re actually only winning 54.08% because we wind up splitting the pot 16.78% of the time. What’s more, the calling station will outdraw us almost 30% of the time!

In a split pot, the worst case scenario is that stacks go in and we lose a full $.10 to the rake. For simplicity sake we’re just going to make this assumption that for any split pot we lose $.10.

54.08% of the time we win $1.09.
16.78% of the time we lose $.10.
29.14% of the time we lose ???.

So how much do we lose?

With TPNK against a calling station we are folding if he ever raises. He’s basically never raising with a worse hand and even when he has a monster he’s not always raising - Either because he’s slowplaying or just because he’s a station.

If he hits his 2pair on the turn and raises this hand costs us $.37.
If he hits his 2pair on the river and raises (or slowplays the turn) this hand costs us $1.12. Whether he raises river or just calls out third barrel doesn’t matter. We lose the hand either way - by folding or at showdown.

So how often are we folding the turn and how often are we folding the river/losing showdown?

When he hits his 2pair, half the time he’s going to hit it on the turn and half the time on the river. However, he’s just calling the turn with 2pair a significant amount of the time. So I’m going to estimate that he raises the turn 25% of the time and we see the river the other 75% of the time.

So when we lose, we lose ($.37x.25+$1.12x.75) $.93.

54.08% of the time we win $1.09.
16.78% of the time we lose $.10.
29.14% of the time we lose $.93.

Our expected value from this hand is ($1.09x.5408-$.10x.1678-$.93x.2914) $.30. On average we will make $.30 on this hand.

Except there’s one thing missing here. That’s when we both make 2pair. When this happens we’re going to win more than $1.09. But I’m not goign to go down this road because it requires a lot of assumptions about when a station will stack off. So instead just keep in mind that we actually average slightly more than $.30.

So that’s what happens when we keep our foot on the gas and that our opponent on a ride to valuetown.

What happens when we blink?

Full Tilt Poker $0.01/$0.02 No Limit Hold’em - 9 players

MP2: $1.32
CO: $3.78
BTN: $1.66
SB: $0.77
Hero (BB): $2.00
UTG: $2.04
UTG+1: $2.00
UTG+2: $0.71
MP1: $2.32

Pre Flop: ($0.03) Hero is BB with A 8
UTG calls $0.02, UTG+1 calls $0.02, UTG+2 calls $0.02, 1 fold, MP2 calls $0.02, CO calls $0.02, 2 folds, Hero checks

Flop: ($0.13) 5 A 9 (6 players)
Hero bets $0.10, UTG folds, UTG+1 calls $0.10, UTG+2 folds, MP2 folds, CO folds

Turn: ($0.33) 6 (2 players)
Hero checks, UTG+1 checks

River: ($0.33) J (2 players)
Hero checks, UTG+1 checks

Final pot: $.33 rake $.01

UTG+1 shows: A2
Hero wins: $.32 ($.20 in profit)

This is a really simplified case. We’ve assumed that villain checks it through here as well, even when he hits 2pair. Even the worst calling stations will bet there when they river 2pair. They’re also betting their one pair hands sometimes after we check two streets. And of course we will hit out 2pair sometimes too.

Even though villain cooperates by checking it down, we’re still only winning 54.08% of the time. However, because we’ve kept the pot small, I’m going to estimate that we only lose $.05 to a split pot as villain isn’t going to stack off nearly as often. And of course we still lose 29.14% of the time.

54.08% of the time we win $.20.
16.78% of the time we lose $.05.
29.14% of the time we lose $.12.

Our expected value from this hand is ($.20x.5408-$.05x.1678-$.12x.2914) $.06. On average we will make $.06 on this hand.

Again, we’ve basically ignored the effects of 2pair over 2pair. But we’re going to ignore it in all cases because it’s difficult to model accurately (how often do we play for stacks?) and they should (more or less) cancel each other out because they occur just as often in all these cases.

Full Tilt Poker $0.01/$0.02 No Limit Hold’em - 9 players

MP2: $1.32
CO: $3.78
BTN: $1.66
SB: $0.77
Hero (BB): $2.00
UTG: $2.04
UTG+1: $2.00
UTG+2: $0.71
MP1: $2.32

Pre Flop: ($0.03) Hero is BB with A 8
UTG calls $0.02, UTG+1 calls $0.02, UTG+2 calls $0.02, 1 fold, MP2 calls $0.02, CO calls $0.02, 2 folds, Hero checks

Flop: ($0.13) 5 A 9 (6 players)
Hero bets $0.10, UTG folds, UTG+1 calls $0.10, UTG+2 folds, MP2 folds, CO folds

Turn: ($0.33) 6 (2 players)
Hero bets $.25, UTG+1 calls

River: ($0.83) J (2 players)
Hero checks, UTG+1 checks

Final pot: $.83 rake $.04

UTG+1 shows: A2
Hero wins: $.79 ($.42 in profit)

This is a really simplified case. We’ve assumed that villain checks it through here as well, even when he hits 2pair. Even the worst calling stations will bet there when they river 2pair. They’re also betting their one pair hands sometimes after we check two streets. And of course we will hit out 2pair sometimes too.

Even though villain cooperates by checking it down, we’re still only winning 54.08% of the time. However, because we’ve kept the pot small, I’m going to estimate that we only lose $.07 to a split pot as villain isn’t going to stack off nearly as often. And of course we still lose 29.14% of the time.

54.08% of the time we win $.42.
16.78% of the time we lose $.07.
29.14% of the time we lose $.37.

Our expected value from this hand is ($.42x.5408-$.07x.1678-$.37x.2914) $.11. On average we will make $.11 on this hand.

In summary, our EV in these hands when we:
Bet all three streets: $.30
Bet two streets and check it through: $.11
Bet flop and then check it down: $.06

I’ve only analyzed three very simple cases. Obviously this hand is potentially much more complex. ie; when villain raises or bets somewhere after we take our foot off the gas. When we hit our two pair and get more value than checking it through two streets. However, I’m not going to delve into all these sub cases because I think I’ve made my point. That failing to value bet costs a ton of value and turns very profitable hands into marginal earners.

If you can’t win because the calling stations keep outdrawing you, it’s because you’re not making enough from the times they don’t out draw you. You’re actually usually not that big a favorite over the calling station so you need to squeeze every bit of profit out of them you can when your hands hold up. Otherwise these one pair hands turn into only marginal winners and you will have a hard time staying profitable.

There are some important things you should take away from all of this.

In all three cases, the amount of money we lose when we lose the hand is almost as much as the amount we win when our hand holds up. The real difference is in the frequency of wins versus the loses. We need to take advantage of when we are a favorite because otherwise the difference between winning and losing is not very big.

When we bet two streets instead of one, our EV only (about) doubles. However, when we go from two streets to three streets our EV almost triples. That’s the value of compound interest. That’s why we need to keep hammering these guys. Giving up a street of value is absolutely huge because that third street is by far the most profitable street.

The real key is that the kinds of valuetown hands happen extremely regularly. People like to post about folding KK preflop or folding sets but these situations are relatively uncommon. Marginal one pair hand type situations occur again and again and again. If you are not rigorously exploiting your opponents you are giving up tremendous value over many, many hands. Anyone can bet, bet, bet with a flopped set on a dry board. Anyone can get value from their monsters. It’s being able to capitalize on these very common situations that really distinguishes the marginal winners from the good players.

By Cry Me A River for 2+2 forums

UTG - Under the Gun, first player to act preflop
UTG+1 - Under the Gun plus one, second player to act preflop
EP - early position
MP - middle position
LP - late position
OTB - On The Button
CO - Cut off, player one seat to the right of button
HJ - Hijack, player two seats to the right of button
SB - small blind
BB - big blind

c/c - check/call
c/f - check/fold
c/r - check/raise
b/f - bet and fold to a raise
3-bet - a bet, a raise, and then another raise. The third action is a 3-bet.
b3b - Hero’s plan is to bet, and then 3-bet if raised.
reraise - raising the PFR

VB - value bet
CB - continuation bet
PSB - pot-sized bet
PSR - pot-sized raise
PFR - preflop raise or preflop raiser

overbet - a bet amount larger than the current pot
check behind - to check when it’s been checked to you, usually after betting action on previous street
donkbet - either to lead into the PFR on the flop, or a tiny bet made in relation to the pot
thin value bet - usually a river bet made when it’s unclear if you are ahead or not

Monotone - a flop of all the same suit
Rainbow - a flop of all different suits
Overpair - having a pair in your hand higher than the biggest card on the board
gutshot - an inside straight draw

TPTK - top pair top kicker
TPWK - top pair weak kicker
TPGK - top pair good kicker
TP2K - top pair 2nd best kicker–You have KQ, flop K72, you have top pair, 2nd best kicker (the Q)
TPCK - top pair crap kicker
TPBK - top pair bad kicker

9To - Nine Ten offsuit
KJs - King Jack suited
Ax - An Ace with any second card
Kxx - refers to a King high flop
Q73r - r = rainbow flop

OESD - open ended straight draw
OESFD - open ended straight flush draw
pp - pocket pair
sc - suited connector
EV - Expected Value
OOP - out of position
FE - fold equity
AI - all-in
ATC - any two cards
UI - unimproved

TAG - tight aggressive
LAG - loose aggressive
LAP - loose passive
sLAG - slightly loose aggressive

MHIG - my hand is good
MHING - my hand is no good
WA/WB - way ahead, way behind

IMO - In my opinion
IMHO - In my humble opinion
JMO - Just my opinion
FYP - fixed your post
OP - original post or poster

tl;dr - too long; didn’t read
QFT - quoted for truth
x-post - post made in more than one forum at one time
OT - off topic
lc - low content
nc - no content

goot - good
moran - moron
nh - nice hand
meh - the sound you make when you shrug your shoulders signaling indifference; not great, not terrible.
pwned - owned or pawned. Usually means you got outplayed.

BB/100 - # of bb’s won per 100 hands played
PTBB/100 - poker tracker big blinds won per 100 hands played. A PTBB is 2xBB.
~$7 - around $7 or about $7
FPS - fancy play syndrome
aggro - aggressive

SSNL - small stakes no limit
MSNL - mid stakes no limit
HSNL - high stakes no limit
NLHE - no limit hold ‘em
LHE - limit hold ‘em
BBV - the Beats, Brags, and Variance forum

PT - Pokertracker
VPIP - voluntarily put money in the pot
AF - aggression factor
Villian is 24/10/3(98)- Pokertracker stats indicating VPIP/PFR%/AF (with preflop aggression taken out) over 98 hands

GT+ - Gametime Plus
PA - PokerAce
PAHUD - PokerAce Heads Up Display
PP - Party Poker
PS, Stars - PokerStars
FT - Full Tilt
UB - Ultimate Bet

PL - pot limit
PF - pre-flop
HH - hand history
HU - heads up
FR - full ring
FT - full table
6m - 6-max
NL100 - number indicates the buy-in; this is No Limit, with $1 BB’s

Stop-n-Go - You bet, get raised, you call closing the action on that street, then lead out on the next street.
Float - You call a bet with a marginal hand or draw, usually on the flop while in position, with the intent of stealing the pot on a later street.
Semi-bluff - betting/raising when you have a draw.
Stealing blinds - openraising in late position with less than premium hands.
blocking bet - often a river bet made OOP when an obvious draw hits on the end, where you bet and fold to a raise
effective stack - the smallest stack amongst the players remaining in the hand.

trips - flop is JJ8, you hold KJ, you have trips
set - flop is K42, you hold 44, you have a set
pot control - attempting to keep the pot small with a marginal holding
minraise - raising the lowest amount possible

by ajmargarine for 2+2 Forums