My "rule of thumb" for that situation is to go 35-40% value combos and 60-65% bluff combos or approximately 16 value combos to 24-30 bluff combos. But if the value part of this range is more or less fixed (AA,KK,AKs) the bluffing part is not, meaning there is not any combo that I will 3-bet bluff 100% of the time. I tried before to have a fixed strategy of certain combos that I always 3-bet bluff with but I found out that its very hard to have the discipline to strictly stick to it while actually playing, plus its unclear if its the best to go anyways. So instead there is a set of hands (mostly suited connectors slightly too weak to cold call with and some suited Ax) that I sometimes 3-bet with and sometimes not. I am aware that by doing this I will at times be a little off with frequencies, but I think that overall I do a good job with this. Also I dont think that with current knowledge anybody knows the perfect frequencies there, i mean for some given x value combos I dont think anybody knows how to calculate the "correct" y number of bluffing combos, we can only derive an interval(or whatever the english word is for the french one I have in mind!) of plausible values. I guess it also applies to many other preflop situations.

What are the merits on having a 3bet range on that spot ? The GT anaylsis probably applies for the 80% of the mid-high satkes pool. Everybody plays very exploitable when they choose to 3bet this spot.

What are the merits on having a 3bet range on that spot ?

So..

Merits on 3b strategy..

a) Get value from the top 1% of our range

b) Add a few 3bets bluffs

I would say that most 3bets bluffs have very marginal profit, because all the tables is defending against my 3bet, plus the openraiser. Its very though that you exploit too much this spot. Also there are just a very few combos to bluff that we can add. 

And what if the EV of KK+ is the same when you 3bet than when you just flat.. Would you still 3betting ? 

Also, whe you say a ton of 4bets, how wide are we talking ? 2-3% 4bets ? 

@GameTheory, I guess my standard strategy might be slightly too bluff heavy and a vacuum 4-bet with blockers from UTG is immediately profitable but I think I am quick to adjust if somebody goes overboard there. The way I see it, UTG value range for 4-betting should be very very narrow in the first place so if he starts 4-betting with any kind of frequency I get to profitably shove all my Axs. Or if somebody goes nanonoko style and 4-bets calls it off with 88 there (no kidding) I will obviously add some more value combos to the 3-betting range. There are also regulars that fold like 25% to 3-bets there and against who I wont be bluffing much. It is hard to come up with a definitive universal answer there because UTG players have vastly different strategies facing a 3-bet.

@Juancopani: "What are the merits on having a 3bet range on that spot ?" it kind of applies for any preflop 3-bet spot, in my mind this one is not so different than others. As I stated in the video I have a very hard time thinking that 3-betting AA and such is not more profitable than just calling them.

"Everybody plays very exploitable when they choose to 3bet this spot", I dont see why "everybody" would play a more exploitable strategy 3-betting this spot than 3-betting other spots, again and to the risk of repeating myself I dont get why many people think this situation is so different than other preflop 3-bet situations.

@Juancopani 2nd post:

In my eyes when you say that bluffing is not that good because you wont get many folds it directly implies that you get great value by 3-betting super premiums.

" Also there are just a very few combos to bluff that we can add" how is it a problem?

"And what if the EV of KK+ is the same when you 3bet than when you just flat.. Would you still 3betting ?" here I think the answer is in the question, whenever the value of 2 strategic options is the same, you are indifferent between them. But how did you derive that "the EV of KK+ is the same when you 3bet than when you just flat"? I may be wrong but I think the EV of 3-betting is definitely higher.

@Alpha

I dont get why many people think this situation is so different than other preflop 3-bet situations.

Because when you get 3betted, the MDF% is a sharing responsability by all the players left to act, there is no the same responsability if there are 4 players left to act than if is just one or two of them. All the tables is defending the UTG range in this spot if you decide to 3bet. That is why this spot is different than if you are the Cutoff and get 3beted by the big blind or button. 

" Also there are just a very few combos to bluff that we can add" how is it a problem?

So, would you split your preflop range into 2 actions ( 3bet and coldcalls ) just for the sake to bluff a very small portion of your overall range ? 

"And what if the EV of KK+ is the same when you 3bet than when you just flat.. Would you still 3betting ?" here I think the answer is in the question, whenever the value of 2 strategic options is the same, you are indifferent between them.

That is not entirely true if your coldcallrange start to suffer because you never have hands that can go broke pre. Or you become capped in some boards. When you decide to have a 3bet range you decide to become exploitable against squezes when you coldcall.

"the EV of KK+ is the same when you 3bet than when you just flat"? I may be wrong but I think the EV of 3-betting is definitely higher.

I maybe wrong with that, but i checked my DB and get those numbers, but maybe was just variance. And also you are missing some new dynamics that would be intresting to see how the average pool react against.. For example.. UTG raises, Hero call, BTN squezes, UTG folds, Hero now can have a 4bet/fold range. 

@Juancopani:

"Because when you get 3betted, the MDF% is a sharing responsability by all the players left to act, there is no the same responsability if there are 4 players left to act than if is just one or two of them. All the tables is defending the UTG range in this spot if you decide to 3bet. That is why this spot is different than if you are the Cutoff and get 3beted by the big blind or button. " So what? It doesnt change much from the 3-bettor perspective. It mostly mean that the original raiser doesnt have to defend nearly as often as if the pot was HU.

"So, would you split your preflop range into 2 actions ( 3bet and coldcalls ) just for the sake to bluff a very small portion of your overall range ? "

No, I split my preflop range into 2 strategic options for the sake of making more money with the super premiums, as there are few of those I will 3-bet few bluff combos.

"That is not entirely true if your coldcallrange start to suffer because you never have hands that can go broke pre. Or you become capped in some boards. When you decide to have a 3bet range you decide to become exploitable against squezes when you coldcall"

As stated in the video, I think mostly 3-betting AA and KK doesnt make me that vulnerable to suqeezes when I cold call as I still have plenty of AK,QQ,JJ,TT in there. In the same vein I think can have strong hands on most boards after calling a squeeze. Sure when it comes 223 Im now capped at QQ instead of AA but there is nothing he can do to exploit it anyways.

"I maybe wrong with that, but i checked my DB and get those numbers, but maybe was just variance. "

I definitely wouldnt trust that. Having AA or KK in MP and facing an UTG open happens very infrequently and you would need a incredibly large number of hands to get a statistically relevant sample for a high variance situation like this.

Can you explain why you have 35-40% value and 60-65% bluff? And how does this ratio apply in other spots? Also what is mdf?

@prisonmike: starting out with 35-40% value and 60-65% bluffs usually works well as a way of constructing 3-betting ranges assuming you are willing to call some 4-bets. In that exact spot maybe I need to bluff a little less as I dont plan on calling much 4-bets with the bluff part of the 3-betting range. MDF stands for minimum defence frequency and in 4-bet situations is usually about 40-45% facing common 4-bet sizes, meaning if you straight fold over 45% to 4-bets your 3-betting strategy is most likely wrong.

Am not sure I understand correctly your 1st paragraph, obviously I dont want to stop bluffing! But if an opponent can 4-bet bluff blockers and show a big profit in a vacuum doesnt it mean that my frequencies are slightly off and that I should be bluffing a little less combos? To my understanding, what I want to accomplish is making his 4-bet bluffs slightly +EV with blockers and -EV without any, I think that would be a better starting point.

I think your math for 4-bet calling a shove with 88 99 ot TT is mostly irrelevant since you assume that I still 3-bet the same set of hands but only change my action when facing a 4-bet with some of them. Thats definitely not how I will adjust once I see this. In my mind the correct adjustment to make is to just 3-bet JJ+,AQs+ 100% of the time vs a player this wide and shoving all of those over his 4-bet. Shoving the Axs in that case doesnt make much sense to me with little fold equity (its a lot better vs people who still value 4-bet very narrow but bluff way too much, as stated in my precedent post). That would make 4-bet calling medium pairs pretty terrible I think.

And yes you are right, that is what Im trying to accomplish and am overall pretty happy to see people going nuts vs my 3-bets.

"type player 4-bets get it in with AA-88,AK here that is a 4% range, so assuming a normal 6-max table, you will be UTG+1 vs UTG versus this player while facing a 4-bet only once every 5000 hands, the times that you will observe his hand will be even lower (since you fold over half of your range to his 4-bet), and the times that you will see him get it in light will be even lower (since half of his range is AA-QQ,AK). And besides that, this is zoom hand so you will be UTG+1 vs UTG versus him almost never. You probably become SNE before you get to see him get out of line in this spot."

I think there are several ways in which this whole paragraph fails. When you are up against someone who 4-bets over 30% of the time from any position, who open much wider than your average regular from any position, who routinely 4-bets get in KJo BTN vs blinds (again, no kidding) and overall gets it preflop wider than 99% of the field, etc etc you can derive a lot of bayesian information on how he will play UTGvsMP 3-bet spots without actually playing that exact spot that often. If you happen to check your HUD and see a 30% raise first in range from UTG and still a 35% 4-bet frequency, well, I have to think 3-betting a wider value range is the way to go. The zoom point is irrelevant, I was speaking on more general grounds. I am describing the type of opponent that is way overboard with his preflop aggression and I dont think you can isolate one specific preflop situation from the way he plays most over preflop situations.

"With that all said, you are still in the hand now with your 3-bet range and you can't assume anything about your opponents 4-bet range before you observe his hand. You play with the 5-bet ranges that you have right now, and if 88 or TT can exploit you since you fold to 4-bets too much he will be making a profit right now."

Again, doesnt that mean that I should be bluffing slightly combos in the first place? In my mind there is no way that 4-bet calling medium pairs can be good there so it sounds like my core 3-betting strategy should make sure that this is -EV.

"And AQ:xx only has 37% vs a range of AA-88,AK, so you would need a read that he is 4-bet folding too much, rather than a read that he is stacking off light."

Before you suggested 3-bet 5-bet shoving A5s, doesnt it make more sense to be 3-bet 5-betting stronger hands like AQs if you already know you will be shoving over a 4-bet? Especially since I will be up against some weaker hands sometimes.

"Also putting in 9bb with a somewhat weak range against 5 players will put you in some bad spots"

Sure this an exploitative strategy vs some very specific opponents that you dont encounter very often and am well aware that this counter-strategy is potentially very exploitable. But I would say that in my experience at those stakes it is extremely rare that one of the guys behind you starts cold 4-betting a lot so i dont worry much about this.

Gametheory, at what kind of frequency would you be bluffing if this were BTN vs CO, or SB vs BB? I'm a little confused as to which math to use.

You can't just pull bluffing frequencies out of thin air, you should construct ranges and then extract them. Since I don't know the GTO openrange for the CO, I would suggest that you construct your range based on the typical raise size and range that you see in your games.

If Villian on the BTN were to jam 91BB to win 32.5BB and have 30% equity vs COs 4-bet/call range, CO should be bluffing roughly 50% of the time to break even.

CO should be bluffing rougly 50% of the time under the following condition:

1) BTN will only defend by way of shoving, folding all other hands.

2) There are no game flow consideration (for instance CO trying to 4-bet a ton to set a dynamic), and both players are trying to play balanced.

If Villian on the BTN were to jam 91BB to win 32.5BB and have 30% equity vs COs 4-bet/call range, CO should be bluffing roughly 50% of the time to break even.

In general, with calling 4-bets you try to make money, this money comes mostly from CO's 4-bet bluffs, so he will make less profit on his bluffs, so he should make his range stronger, so he should bluff less. But the opposite could be true aswell: if CO makes more by 4-betting than by calling or folding, he could 4-bet his entire range, giving him much more bluffs. The fact that he loses to all your light 5-bets isn't enough to counter this, since you might simply be folding too much, or let him realize enough equity when you flat.

Say we open CO 3BB and BTN makes it 9BB, and we 4-bet to 22BB. We'd be risking 19BB to win 13.5BB, so it need to work 1.4:1 times to be profitable. So IP should be value 3-betting at 1.4:1, again assuming there is no pre-flop flatting.

No, he could still shove some or all of his non-value hands, just like the A5s.

I learned 90% of my poker math from you. :)

I should charge you for that!

You can't just pull bluffing frequencies out of thin air, you should construct ranges and then extract them. Since I don't know the GTO openrange for the CO, I would suggest that you construct your range based on the typical raise size and range that you see in your games.

The only information I have is rough CO opening ranges, BTN 3-betting ranges, and the math I provided.
So how do I turn that into a proper frequency, without just guessing?

I know what my value range would be as CO, so I could figure out that amount of combos.
I can also figure out good hands to 4-bet bluff with, but I don't know how often I should be doing it, if using the math I know isn't sufficient.

My sizing is fine, but the good regs have vastly different frequencies, and I also don't play at a level where I know the best ones 'get it right'. 2K hand samples are too small to figure out these things.

I should charge you for that!

You could, if you were a RIO coach! :)

I fully agree with that, but it's hard/impossible to solve the 4-bet/flats mathematically, whereas the jam/fold spots can be.

Thanks, at least not everyone is rebuffed by my poor english skills!

I think his river raise with K6 is perfectly fine, raise shoving might even be better. He should have a lot more 86 in his range than me because 100% of his 86 combos will play preflop/flop/turn like he did pretty much 100% of the time while a good chunk of my own 86 combos will play differently on either preflop, flop or turn. For the same reason shoving the river over his raise would be a very clear mistake imo. Nobody is ever raise folding a bare 6 with those stacks and he still has every single 86 combo playing this way.

Yes this is the HUD I usually play with, both for NLHE and PLO. I prefer to have a very simple HUD since I tend to play a lot of tables and with overlap so a more detailed HUD would take a lot of screen-space which I find very counterproductive in my case. I still use a lot of other stats, its just that I need to click on the popups for them to appear.

Dont worry, RIO has a system of notifications such that I always know when there is a new reply on a video thread.

I might be value value betting too wide on the T9ss hand, its definitely a possibility, I think Im OK bluffing 100% of bluff combos that got there this way. However, with my image, Im confident nobody is ever folding a set or 2 pairs on the river versus me there, and I get herocalled by AA or Kx surprisingly often in similar situations. Im not sure about your combos count, people tend to play quite differently on the turn with those hands, some will shove FD over my turn raise pretty often, especially if it has a gutshot to go with it, some would always call, and the same goes for sets, some would fastplay turn very often and some would mostly slowplay.

Whenever he gets there with AhX, which is not very often in the first place, I think he has a mandatory bluffshove. It's probably good to bluffshove some other big hearts too.