I wanted to ask about this hand; given that the solver plays no raising range here this flop raise from asianflushie is quite unconventional as you pointed out. What is the best way to exploit someone who raises on this type of board where they shouldn't? Is the main exploit to barrel them more often when they don't raise, because their calling range is more capped than it should be?

matlittle it depends if they are making a lot of protection raises with 7x 88 99 and bluffs. And they only call with Jx as a slow play. Then we just 3bet the flop more often because they should never have a Jack in their raising range. So I think its the opposite of what you said. We barrel less often and 3bet the flop more often. Each player is different though.

As RunItTw1ce pointed out, I think there are many ways to exploit this depending on how do we perceive the raising range to be constructed. FWIW, if we force raises in these spots where they shouldn't be any, the solver likes to continue the entire range by reraising and basically don't play any calls.

Yeah, solvers definitely go out the window in this match haha. I think asianflushie is just trying to get Linus out of his comfort zone by approaching the game this way.

Isn't 2E b50 here? linus will have like 32k left and the pot will be 66k on the river.

I have seen some other hands that don't make a lot of sense to me. I know Luke has tried to explain it to me before. As you mentioned the double two tone board is more dynamic, so we see a lot of bigger turn sizes. Given we have more bluffs and can go large for value. But some times these large turn sizes leave us with like 25-33% pot left on the river. This really goes over my head on having less than 1/2 pot SPR on the river.

Imagine this hand if Asianflushie B70 the turn for $23.2k Pot would be 79.5k and linus would only have 25k left. So we deny equity but the SPR is so weird to me! I still can't seem to grasp it or accept it.

Isn't 2E b50 here? linus will have like 32k left and the pot will be 66k on the river.

Yes you are right, I forgot to change my sim from 100bb stacks starting the hand I guess. They are a bit deeper here, thanks for pointing out my mistake!

That makes sense. I think the spot is so good for IP that they can size up significantly and they're just looking to deny as much equity as possible to the heavily capped range of the OOP player.

I'm curious about this as well. I see this all the time in low stakes cash where they over protect their hands. I cbet b33 with both my good and bad hands and they just see small bet as weak and think they need to protect their top pair. And I'm thinking did I just run into a set or 2 pair here? And they just have a hand they should never have. I end up leveling myself. Because in their mind they have a value hand and don't realize they are making a polarization error. They are just over reacting to small size.

Then they raise and get 3bet as Linus did hear and they just don't care. So the 3bet bluff even though we know they are not very strong isn't up being a punt against someone too rich to care. Very weird leveling war with yourself almost.

matlittle

FWIW there are some raises going on in these kind of textures in HUNL so I don't think this play is that weird in general.

The reraise strategy by Linus is pretty common here as well given that the raising range for IP is quite polarized and we get to punish a big part of their bluffing hands by doing this.

Another theory I have, as opposed to asianflushie trying to exploit Linus here, is that asianflushie either:

1. Assumes Linus has 2 cbet sizes here, thus allowing them to have a flop raising range as SB, or;

1. Uses sims that have 2 or more cbet sizes, which gives them the impression that they can have a raising range in these spots.

As I said, there are some raises here but for other situations where they shouldn't be my guess is that he just doesn't care and thinks that he will accomplish a lot more by deviating and forcing Linus into unknown parts of the game tree rather than just try to play close to equilibrium.

RunItTw1ce

In these cases it all comes down to how they perceive your bets and how you perceive what they are doing against them. If they think the small sizing is weak and they raise TP hands because of that you can definitely implement a reraise strategy and force more money into the pot against that range.

FWIW there are some raises going on in these kind of textures in HUNL so I don't think this play is that weird in general.

In my sim, there appears to be no raising at all. I am using standard GTOWizard HU 3BP ranges. The sim also assumes one cbet sizing. Did you mean that on this exact board there should be raises, or on board textures similar to this there can be raising ranges for IP?

thinks that he will accomplish a lot more by deviating and forcing Linus into unknown parts of the game tree rather than just try to play close to equilibrium.

Both players seemed to go off-piste a number of times in this match so its definitely a possibility. Is this becoming a more common theme for these high stakes HU matches these days; to use alternative strategies to what the solver would play in order to take your opponent to a scenario you have studied and they haven't?

Sorry for the late reply, I was traveling.

In my sim, there appears to be no raising at all. I am using standard GTOWizard HU 3BP ranges. The sim also assumes one cbet sizing. Did you mean that on this exact board there should be raises, or on board textures similar to this there can be raising ranges for IP?

You are right! My sim has pretty much no raises either but this is a product of this exact board. Take a look at A98r (single sizing cbet sim)

Both players seemed to go off-piste a number of times in this match so its definitely a possibility. Is this becoming a more common theme for these high stakes HU matches these days; to use alternative strategies to what the solver would play in order to take your opponent to a scenario you have studied and they haven't?

I would say so. Most highstakes players these days seem confident enough to make huge deviations in order to generate EV given that people at the top know the equilibrium well enough to defend against it.

Thanks mx! Glad you liked it.