Hi Hakunamatata,

I have a lot to say on that subject, but that topic has so much depth that I think it will be better covered in a future video. The short answer is:

I have made a lot of these strategy graphs for myself to help review my play so I know what the shape of my strategy should be in each spot in theory. I then tie that knowledge to my stat based or observational reads and expand/contract the regions of the graph in my mind and craft my exploitive response based on those distortions in the optimal graph.

This seems complicated, but I think it will become much more clear when there are visuals to go along with it. Hold tight!

You owned me the rest of the video, so I'm glad I got 1 win.

You did these calcs using Monkersolve?

Yes, I reran just the river portion of the tree and compared the EVs with different bet sizes. The charts are all hand made though if that's what you were referring to.

The charts are nice :)

ZenFish thank you for posting the results! Much appreciated!

Hi @ZenFish. This analysis is very cool but how did you get the monker range into this program? I struggle to import the range because the format seems to be different. If you can give me a quick tip I would appreciate it a lot.

Thanks, Nick. Couldn't agree more!

Wow, thanks for the feedback Ben! I'm glad the "learning along with the viewer" aspect came across strongly in the video. Poker and life are just way more enjoyable when we approach each problem with curiosity instead of pretending to be experts.

Thanks, Ben! I really enjoy analyzing solver outputs, but I don't like the solver inputs part :)

Thanks, Cory, for allowing me to learn (and teach) from your hard work.

Fundamentally, IP strategies will always be more polar an OOP strategies. The reason for this is that when when we are OOP, we compare the EV of betting with the EV of checking and facing the summation of all of IP's decisions. When IP does bet, their range will often make hands in the OOP range that have 45-35% equity indifferent. Since indifference = 0EV, the bar for betting to be better is set pretty low.

The opposite is true for IP. IP compares the EV of a bet with the EV of a check back which is worth a lot especially in PLO. Since frequently bet/folding with hands in that 45-35% equity region would be tragic, checking back often performs better. We then need some bluffs so it's better to pick air which doesn't gain from checking back and doesn't mind b/f

This particular board is such a static board, however, that both strategies will be relatively polar (it's just hard to even have a merged, semibluffing type of hand on KQ9r). Another way of restating that point is that blockers > equity when the board is so dry and the flopped straight so highly available in each range

Depth should in fact make the IP strategy more "merged" than it would be at shallower stacks as board coverage matters more at deeper stacks (it matters even more in NL than PL). In this case, the static nature of the board seems to overwhelm a lot of these other factors.

After rereading your comment, I think I have a better idea of what you mean. What I said about OOP strategies will apply to our initial bet and less so when we face a bet from IP. At this stack depth and on this board, when either side bets, the raiser's range will be quite polar.

By polar we of course don't mean, the top and the bottom of our range, but rather the top of our range and hands with good blocker qualities and as much equity as possible that would otherwise consider folding. Maybe that clarifies things.

Hi Mr. Burrito,
Did you mean solver programs for beginning poker players or just solvers that are easier to use for pros that are not familiar with them?

If you meant the former, I would actually discourage solver use early in a poker career. This may go against the recommendations of others, but I feel strongly that it can be damaging. Basically, at the beginning of a poker career we need to cultivate a thought process and learn to articulate all of our decisions in clearly in terms of "value" or "bluffs". After this we probably want to move on to learning to read our opponents range and trying to make exploitive adjustments, followed by reading our own range and learning to represent different hands to an opponent who is somewhat capable of handreading (these were my first few steps in poker at least). All of this should come before solver work. In NL Easy Game and Applications of NLH are still the best presolver books in my opinion. In PLO, I'm not even sure what I would recommend. Probably trying to find a coach who can deliver the appropriate information to you when you need it (I've seen too many coaches on other sites throw out game theoretical information that they don't fully understand to students who are not ready).

If you meant "a solver program for players new to solvers", you're kind of stuck with Monkersolver if you play PLO. For NL I would recommend Pio as it allows you to visualize your strategies very naturally.

Just always remain conscious of why the solver is doing what it's doing and how it would exploit deviations. That's the most valuable thing you can gain from them.

That sounds like a great idea! Feel free to PM on here if you're inclined and we can set up a time to discuss a potential video.

It was a lot more work for Cory Mikesell than it was for me, so he's the guy to ask :)

I'm not sure how you would personally pay for these, but I'd definitely be happy to do another video like this with Phil any time