Kyyberi

PLO2 has 6,25% rake and 25bb cap, lol.
If opponent is bad enough, those are beatable. But as the rake is quite high, you need to have quite an edge over your opponent.

Is this still valid?

I was quite surprised by the BB calling frequencies (at 11:30). But as I run a sim with PLO25 zoom rake (no rakeback) they actually are that tight in solver. Interesting for rake is that at PLO25 the cap is twice as high as at PLO50. And at PLO10 it's almost twice as much as at PLO25.

At PLO10 and PLO25, rake is 4,25% but the caps are following:
PLO10: cap 15bb
PLO25: cap 8bb

If you play mostly 100bb deep, that doesn't matter THAT much, as at PLO25 the cap is met at around 190bb. So even all-ins have full rake. But at PLO50 the cap is met at 80bb, which means that in 100bb all-in the rake is following:

PLO10: 8,5bb
PLO25: 8bb
PLO50: 4bb

Then average VPIP in PLO25 zoom is around 25, no wonder people are struggling to beat that game. :)

I posted that same method, with even random.org thing back in 2017 at pokerstrategy and made an Youtube video of it 2019.

I would add that PJ RFI ranges are VERY close to solver ranges, they have just slightly different thresholds. But as all hands near the threshold are virtually breakeven, it's as good as you can get with free stuff.

I would add that for learning, finding those thresholds is probably quite helpful. Like how low do we go on suited KKxx, what ss/ds rundowns we open at lowest from different positions etc.

Nice to see the exact way to use Oracle and PJ ranges to practice preflop, that I created and shared for years (based on an old video from someone I can't remember here at RIO many many years ago). :)

Great minds etc. ;)

I've missed that "hey guys" part for Essential members. Could we get another one during 2021? :)

Funny thing about AT98ss, I looked a sim where there is no FE for 3bets and solver still likes to 3bet that vs CO. Call vs MP. But either way, very marginal hand which could be played in every way (fold, call, raise) depending on opponents.

Agree with Ben, as that stat doesn't really tell you that much. If you bet flop in srp, the pot is often 18-19bb if opponent calls. Then if there are bets on the turn, either someone wins that under 20bb pot or both players have a hand and pot goes to 20-40bb category. The thing is that often when you have a strong hand, there is some action on the turn and the hand goes to river, and if there is action on the river the pot is over 60bb.

Focusing on certain sized pots and making assumption based on the winrate is deceiving. The number doesn't tell you where it came from. If you think you are playing medium sized pots wrong, then filter those pots (start from the ones where you call turn and fold river, or bet turn and get raised etc.) and see what is going on in there.

My advice to all people is that never change anything in your strategy based only on tracker stat. Always dig deeper until you get to actual hands, and see what you need to change.

It's like when someone says that his 3bet in tracker is 15,4 people tell him to 3bet less. If he starts to 3bet less (because that's the advice) it doesn't do him any good. He doesn't know what to take away from his 3bet range, so he starts guessing. Or someone sees that his redline is diving. That doesn't tell why it's diving, and how to fix the problem.

Merry Christmas! Ben, can you pinpoint a moment in your learning curve (for poker), that you realized something spectacular about the strategy and consider that as a huge leap in becoming better poker player? Sort of an aha-moment?

Phil, you didnt like 9754ds call from BTN vs MP open. Neither do I, but solver likes it. So let's give Nut a break there. :)

At good old Full Tilt, played PLO25 for one evening. EV winnings +1$, real winnings -$1000. That was a nasty few hour session.

Last year I had a project of playing PLO2 among normal games. I had a feeling that I haven't won many flips, and when I checked the Tracker it was 60 buyins under EV in about 10K hands or so. My feeling was quite correct. :D

Splashed pots are not a fair way to give "rakeback", as it favors a lot aggressive players and those who understand how the dead money in the pot affects the strategy. I would assume that in the long run most of the splashed money goes to the pockets of good players.

PJ and Monker do different things, so it's weird to compare them. For beginners, PJ is better tool imo to learn the EV of certain actions, how to define range, range distribution, EV of peels, shoves etc.
When one learns those basics, it's better time to jump into solver world.

I think I have seen ads where they say "we can't discuss it here, but contact us for more details. This is really good" few times. My question is what is the reason for not explaining the method here? Cos there has to be a reason, otherwise you would have explained it.

For preflop RFI ranges you have two ways to go, unless you want to do the work yourself that others have already done.
1) use solver ranges
2) use PokerJuice ranges

First one is harder (as the ranges are not linear and precise), second one is quite easy. Hand charts don't work for PLO, you need to understand what makes a hand strong or weak, and what suits for different situations (like multiway or HU pots, deep or shallow stacks). That way you can adjust the basic ranges when needed.

For PokerJuice ranges it's easy to practice them with Odds Oracle. https://pokerjuice.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/categories/200116138-PokerJuice-Preflop-Ranges

If you bet the river, you are repping really narrow range. Your value range should be high flushes mostly. And to have a hand that raises flop, check turns and has that flush on the river would be quite a specific hand. When you raise flop and check turn, do you have anything else than bluffs in your range? Maybe some sets, but that's it. So on the river you are repping a bluff/set on the flop, that picked a flush draw on the turn and made the backdoor flush. You should be called there quite often with Ax two pairs and sets if you bet the river.

But on the other hand opponent called your raise on the flop, which doesn't make sense with naked AAxx. Might be QJTx type of hands. And you beat all of those missed draws with your 2 pairs.

What is opponents range after flop call? That gives you a good starting point.

If he is 41/5, his c-raise range is weighted to sets, maybe Q7 or an overpair that he overplays (they do it quite often). If he was more of a reg and his sizing would be smaller, his c-raise range can be up to 100%.

3bet preflop and make your life a bit easier. His flop bet looks more of a semibluff/bluff, as why would he pot it if he had the 3?

In general, passive lines oop with semistrong hands against aggros isn't the greatest spot to be.

When you bet the flop and check a blank turn, it's hard to put you on a value hand on the river. Expect to be called by an overpair often, if the opponent can think.

What 7+ hands you have in your range that bets the flop and checks the turn?

I have created ~10 topics plan to get good fundamentals for micros. If your plan is to work for micros, I think your preflop topics are way too precise. You can have good RFI ranges from all positions, and it takes 30min to set them up for practising.

In your sheet you have both default strategy topics (overall RFI) and adjustment strategies (RFI against certain opp). My advice is to focus on the standard strategy that you use against unknowns as a default. Learn that first. In poker we should have our standard strategy that we use, and deviate from that only when we have a good reason to justify that the deviated strategy is more +EV than the standard strategy. Focus on the basement before you start to plan the chimney. :)

I took the poll before reading the post. Damn. So I missed the bot deterrent part. And now I can't change it. I should have selected 4 instead of 6. :(

So if one can't beat micros, he should go to midstakes? :)

I wouldn't raise flop. Problem is that BTN cbets against two players on drawy board, and SB calls. You won't get that many folds and when called you don't have that many good turns.

If you get a call on the flop, on what turns you are happy to barrel and estimate good FE? On how many turns you would like to check-fold?

Profits is all about mistakes. If everyone plays mistake-free poker (perfect GTO), then no one wins money in the long run. But as soon one starts to make mistakes, someone wins. In a way we can say that
PROFIT=Opponents mistakes - Our mistakes
If opponents make more mistakes (in terms of EV) than we, we make profit (without rake).

To make money, we need to force our opponents to make mistakes.

Take a hand, and imagine the seats are changed with your opponent. Would you play the hand in opponents shoes exactly the same way? If not, then one of you is making money in the long run. So as long as you can see opponents doing mistakes that you wouldn't do, you have an edge.

And you think collusion doesn't happen at higher limits? I would say that the reason why people don't win at small stakes is because they have leaks in their strategy and/or mental game.

3betting is pretty big and a bit complicated concept. It's impossible to give you short answers. First thing is that you don't HAVE to 3bet Aces preflop. In videos most players do, but they have the skills to make good decisions postflop. Without those skills, 3betting crappy Aces will create hard spots where the chance for mistake goes up.

Especially at micros, you should always assume that everyone who has put money into the pot (limped, raised or called) will not fold to your 3bet. And a lot of players cold call 3bets a lot at micros.

Concept of "premium hand" is also subjective.

With Aces, it helps a lot when you start to learn more about your equities vs. opponents ranges and therefore figure out when to stack off and when to give up. As a rule of thumb, against one player and SPR<4 you shouldn't be folding a lot, and in multiway pots when you totally miss the dynamic board you shouldn't be stacking off a lot.

mason88, I don't get it.