WHYCHECK

Like the software abut especially like your in depth reasoning about flop turn and river play. I'd like more of this in depth reasoning vids. That is what good poker is all about.

Cheers, Tom

Hey Henry, Thank you for your answer.

If we talk about a standardised 4 bet range. Are we talking about AA, KK, AKs, A5s, A4s and half the time something like AKo, QQ, KQo and KTo, or are we talking wider?

Hello Henry,

Thanks for your great content. It pleases me, while most other coaches hammering on GTO concepts, you are very realistic about the pool and use a lot of exploitive plays becausse it works better a lot of the time and, at the same time explain why you differentiate from gto. I think for most games, apart from the really high stakes, thats the way to go.

I have a question about the JTs at 33:50. You 3b (ip) and villan 4bts and you call. You get about 1 to 9 on your call. I have mer a live background and to call these hands I am in the assumption you will at least shoot for 1 to 15 implied, maybe 1 to 12 against a weak opp. I have seen more gto wise coaches call hands like these with such low implied odds. Can you explain why you think this call is profitable? And with which hands would you make the same call in the same situation?

Kind regards, Tom

P.s. Don't put to much effort in comments of haters ;)

Hello Ben,

18:45 you call bttn 99 vs hj open. You say sometimes call sometimes raise against a good reg it's neutral ev and call is better with weak players in the blinds. What would you do with 22-66 there against a good reg and what would you do against a weaker player in that spot? And would you take the same lines when the open was utg?
The reason for this question is that I hear contradictional answers in this spot. Some say against a reg you should never call witth small to middle pairs only raise or fold. But then again to fold pairs against a raise from a reg when on the button seems to me like overfolding a hand with potential. But raise it everytime against a reg would be to much too. But calling against a reg you probably never will get paid off enough when you hit a good hand with it.

Gr. Tom

Hey Juan,

Table 2 upper right on 30:39, you call 76dd (7 hit and oe) 2 times and on the river the flush of clubs completes and you announce "easy check". Isn't this the perfect overbet bluff spot?
If he can't beat your 7 he is folding anyway but now you loose from all better hands. Your call 2 times on f and t will have that flushdraw in your range and the K on the turn is a perfect card for him to follow through so a lot of the time he will not have a K to hero call your overbet bluff on the river. And he even might fold a K against your overbet there.

Gr. Tom

Hello Serge,

You mention in this video that you had played live for a while and that you had to change your thought proces and balancing when play online again. As we all know live games are (much) softer and are more an exploitive game. I am more a live player but I watch your full ring video's to get better in my live game (which is obviously mostly full ring). Can you tell me what different approche you take on live games and which things you do online, you don't do live or do different? What had you to readjust when you went back playing online?

Gr. Tom

Thanks for your extensive answer Serge. It was the last thing I needed to move to LAG play in my live game.

GR. Tom

Hey Serge,

Thank you for your answer. I am one of the nitty guys that does very well in live games. In the long run I beat the good regs but they are the ones who stack the RP's and make the most $$$ becausse of that so I need to change something in my game. I just wasn't comvinced the loose approche was correct over the long run, ala especially rake concerned.
I play a 2/4 live game. Average stacks are 100 bb but rake is 5% cap 20. With these rake conditions, would you still call a raise from a RP with JTs/98s or raise his limp with these hands (knowing most of the time you don't get a squeeze or 3-bet behind you)? And say, with theae rake conditions, you would tighten up, what kinda preflop range would you use then?
And if stacks would start to get 250bb deep half way the session, would you then neglate the rake and start playing more loose again or regardles the 250bb stacks the rake struture is still to high to play LAG?

Hey Serge,

I see you open T8s utg+1 and J9s mp (first in). Do you open these hands always/mostly in FR games in these early positions? Or do you open them because you play mostly with tighties regs? Would you tighten up in a loose game?
In loose games with sometimes very loos recreative players, I see two camps. The first camp says, tighten up and wait for good multiway hands and that doesn't includes JTs or KJs in a 5 multiway raised pot. Another group says, you have to loosen up and call KJs and JTs in a multiway pot or open them, knowing there will be 4 calls behind you with 2/3 of the recreational players.
I also see good players isolate a loose recreational player with a hand like QJo in emp while there are still 6 players behind him. In my opinion, this is bad but it seems they get away with it and when hit there hand hard, walk away with the stack of the RP.
In my opinion, they are lucky to hit their hand hard but at the other hand, if you play more loose ip against a RP, then you will hit ofcourse your hand hard sometimes so you create more opportunity to get the stack of the RP. Still, I cannot get my mind to the point to say that it is good to isloate a RP in mp with a hand like QJo or JTs while you still have 4/6 players behind you with some good regs between them. But I have also the feeling I miss out here and shouldn't play tighter in loose games (like for instance 'old schooler' Mason Malmuth advocates).
I am curious how your opinion is about this.

Gr. Tom

Hello Serge,

Great answer. ' I feel like now the math has pushed to a new level, its about ranges, hand strengths, implied odds, frequencies, whats our raise % here and our call % etc... balancing out all these mathematical solutions is key'

"what im saying is, sometimes we ask ourselves if the pot is giving us the correct odds to call but sometimes we are actually way ahead of villains range. I would also not discredit bluffing capabilities postflop vs players that have weak ranges, yes they call preflop, yes they will call flop but it will be hard for them to bring their weak range to the river all the time when you barrel you semi bluffs with good equity"

Very true. I kinda felt like this about the games these day's but was uncertain about it. Your total packing and somming up here is what I needed. Thanks!

Thank you for your answer Serge. Related to your answer it sounds like a big 'It depends'... . I am (and was) aware of it. The suggestion to 3bet them didn't occure to me in live play but is shure a valueble one. I am curious about the math behind your explanation though becausse I still doubt if they can be played profitable although it's a multiway pot. I think we have to rely more on 3bets pre and/or semiblufs postflop to make them profitable (when not 1sth in). The hitting frequence of the hand alone is not enough imo and making toppair can get you in trouble or let you reluctant call one flopbet with your toppair ace weak kicker having to fold when the turn get's bet again making it more expensive. But in multiway pots it is hard to (semi)bluf post becausse of to many people in the hand, especially with loose post callers in live play.
As you said, we can go on for hours about this.

Gr. Tom

Hey Serge,

I have a question not related to this vid but related to loose full ring games.
Years ago, when I played full ring limit games, it was very profitable to play suited aces in multiway pots. When I crossed over to NL full ring, the old books said that it was not profitable to call raises with suited aces in NL although it was a multiway pot and people where playing 100 bb. Becausse, in limit, you could go to the river and make your flush voor a small bet (in relation to the pot) and in NL most of the time you would have to fold becausse of a big 3/4 pot bet..
Now what I see is in some vids, when some one raises and there is one caller or two, the vid pro, calls behind with suited aces or calls from the blinds with the suited ace when it will become a multiway pot.
Sometimes I miss out on a big pot by folding preflop with bad suited aces and I still can't get see it as a good call voor 3/3.5bb raise in a multiway pot with 100bb stacks, becausse you only flop your draw 1:11 times and then you still have to make it which happens 33% of the time but most of the time the betting doesn't give you the odds to call to get there. Ofcoursse you can also flop your trips and two pair but that combined is a change that's merely 2%. Still, I see in these vids the (pro)instructor calls (these days) with a bad suited ace when it's a multiway pot (3 or more). Am I missing out here?

Thanks Serge, makes sense.
Looking forward to see your next vid.

Grts. Tom

Hello Serge,

Thank you for taking the effort to search for the hand and answering my question. I particulair like the flat with SC's and 4b them when squeezed. Although, I asume, the times that you see the flop (IP) for one raise, you still are behind the openers range so we have to use board coverage to bluf him of his hand a reasonable amount otherwise this will be a loosing call with the SC's.(?)

Hello Serge,

Table 1 38minutes and table 3 also 38 minutes you call a 3bet with K7s and AQs. I find it hard to call 3bets with these hands (although the situations are different and the handstrength). 2/3ts of the time you miss the flop and when you hit it can still be a very bad flop. In my experience my opp is betting the flop most of the time and a lot of the time the turn as well so I have to fold a lot making me very exploitable. To counter that, I have to float or blufraise a lot to make that indifferent. But you are playing for a big part of your stake counter it that way which can't be a good thing as is folding. So I prefer to 4bet or fold to avoid those situations. Can you elaborate a bit more about how you can make these 3bet calls profitable?

Hey Serge,

Table 1 at 9:55, you fold QTo in sb against 2.2bb bttn open. Was that a mistake or is that a standard fold for you there? Normally you are way ahead of his buttonopeningsrange. It's one of those hands, together with A9o, KTo etc, that I have difficulties with in this situation. I know I am ahead of his openingsrange but it's not a strong hand. Most of the time when a buttonsteal has a wide range and folds a lot against a re-steal, I 3bet. I f he doesn't fold that much against a resteal, I still have a hard time to fold becausse I know I am ahead of his openingrange there. Would like to hear some thoughts from you when being in this situation.

Greets,

Tom

Hello Serge,

Thank you for making these full ring vids. Most of the vids these days are about 6-max. Though full ring is still a game that get's played by a lot of people, it's a bit under represented on trainings sites.

I've a question about the 66 hand you fold against a 2.5 ep opener. I seem to cannot find back were it was in the vid. I believe it was somewhere at the end on table 4 but can't find it back. Anyway; you are behind the 2.5bb ep opener, you have both 100bb but you fold the 66.
I can understand that it is hard to get a stack in with your set against a good reg and there is the change that you get squeezed behind you, but, isn't it still profitable to set-mine against a minimum stack of 100bb in position? (You can protect against a possible squeeze to cold call sometimes with AA/KK ).

Cheers!

Tom)

Hey Ben,

About the 66 hand, table 3 at 2:35. You mentioned that with sixes it's a better call (against the utg raiser) then with two's becausse it's a higher pair when he has opend with a smaller pair. But does it really matter? I mean, you have to lay down against his cb on a ton of flops or you will make a play, so sixes or two's don't matter that much, and you almost never get to the river with this hand together with your opponent where you'll win the showdown with your higher 6-pair. Can you highlight your explanation a bit more on this becausse five's to two's play the same there as sixes in my opinion.

Grts. Tom

Hello gael,

Thank you voor your replie and explanation. I am happy you gave me the math. This way I can calculate it when I have other questions about calculate these changes.

Thanks again!

Gr. Tom

16:15 upperleft table with AcKhQcJs, we semibluf bet the flop and get called by the preflop raiser. We turn the nutflushdraw and then check while the checkcall of the preflopraiser indicates that he is weak. We expect to be stil behind on the turn but against a weak hand so in my opinion a potsized barrel on the turn should have been a better play and we still have the nutfd and some top 2 pair outs if get called?

@jonna112

True. Most of it ís speculation but as you said, it's a closed market so it's hard to get facts. And becausse the stakes are high and most of these sites have their headquarters on tax- paradise islands, it will probably stay closed.
And although we have not too many facts, I still think some smart people with logical reasoning who are good poker players, can see that some things are not correct.
You are supposed to be a very good player if you win 3bb/100 online. Why is everyone taking that as a fact? While you can win live 7-12bb an hour in juicy games (25-35 hands/hour). Now that's a hughe difference. And the cliché that online games are more difficult are just taking you sofar. I have encountered, and still, a lot of times very juicy online games. Still, the money seems to be lost by bad players in live situations much faster then online. Online they win more 'lucky' pots keeping them in the game while the regs also stay in the game to win their money back and then try to win the recreational players money. In the meanwhile the same money is going back and forth between the recreational players and the regs and gets raked over and over again floating into the pocket of the pokersite more then into the pockets of the better players.
Yeah, it is speculation again but I have encountered it so many times, so what are you gonna do. Tell yourself you are crazy becausse you can't get the evidence or take yourself seriously and realize what you see is a correct assumption?

I haven't banned online poker. I still play it becausse I am still at the winning side (and it is also educational and good training) but related to my experience at winning in live games, I know I should win online much more then I do... .

I am not IT-educated so I can't do my own analysis, but I think people who can, should look at how many times after a good solid turnbet and a call from a weak player, the rivercard is dealed positive for the weaker player. A lot of the times you know that you are beat on that rivercard so you fold to his riverbet and in some situations you will call and see that you are beat. In both cases, HH and PT will not notice it as missed EV so your EV chart looks nice. But if you take all those situations (where you were ahaed on the turn and lost on the river or had to fold for a river bet and therefore lost the pot) on the turn when the pot is build with another big size bet and you were ahead and then calculate your EV there, what you should win regarding the river runout, I am pretty shure you are running firmly under EV.

I'd like to comment on the edge casing supossed to be in the rng of Bovada.
These big hands winnings that occure and being won lots of times by 'bad'players in a short time, I've seen on several pokersites.
I've been playing professional live poker for more then 10 years, still trying to beat the online games but still 'feel' that I get outdrawn to often against players with some very strange holdings and overly bad and aggressive playing styles but still winning most of these big hands.

I think it is worth considering a question related to what amount of money a pokersite can make with a totally fair rng or one with an edge case which favors loosing players and or bots playing for the site.
A pokersite makes the most money if they have as much tables running as possible and the money is going back and forth between the players and nobody is cashing out.
If there is a small group of very good winning players, they will win and cash out an enormeous amount of money that will never return to the site and will never be racked again. If they could come up with a likely trusted rng, that in fact has buildin algorithms that favor bad players or bots owned by the site, good players will win far more less then they should. I think considering the money that is going on on large online pokersites, you could talk about ten times (maybe more) profit for the site in the same time length with an fixed rng then with a fair rng. In fact, EVERY POKER SITE WOULD BE CRAZY NOT TO FIX THEIR RNG TO KEEP THAT MONEY FROM BEING OUTCASHED BECAUSSE THE DIFFERENCE IS THAT HUGE!

Maybe a lot of you find the above argument to simplistic, but most of the time..., it is... .
Before becoming a professional player I've been manager of a casino for almost 20 years and I have seen a lot of things what people will do for money.
If a pokersite can make two million profit a year with a fair RNG or 20 million with a fixed one, they will not care about the long run... . Just my 2 cents.

Thank you for you replie and calculations Hinuttaja. I believe this is right.

Thanks!

Gr. Tom

Hello Jonna,

Thank you so much for your extended answer. I am a winning poker player for a long time and I am capable of university level thinking.
As I said, I never did get into GTO or other deeper theoratical approches but I want to evolve and understand the game better on a theoretic level so I can play even better and enjoy it even more becausse I then not only know out of intuition (experience of playing many hands) to make the best descision but also becausse of a good theoretic knowledge foundation. I also enjoy math challenges/puzzles so thank you for pointing me to study combinatorics and probability. I will delve into that.

Hello GaneTheory and Jonna12,

Thank you for your replies.

@Gametheory, I am smart, well, at least IQ tests say I am. Unfortunately I never did study. I understand That i can copy all these possibilities and then put them in some kind of program that will sort it all out. But I don't know such a program and have not learned to write it.

@Jonna102

Very interesting article Jonna. I always shied away from GTO but I am actually very interested. I am very analitic and good with numbers but as said above, I lack a study about probability calculation and stuff like that.
I have to read your article a couple of times over becausse there is interesting stuff in there that needs some time to sink in.
About 2/3th of your article you write you maybe wil write a article how to calculate these chards. I understand you didn't yet?
I can try to come up with a formula for that, but as a non graduaded guy, I then have to invent a formula that mathematic people have invent before me and put into books to learn students. I think it is a bit optimistic for me to think that I can come up with such a formula by myself without study of (high school) mathametics :).
I will try though but if you could point me a bit more to the right direction it would be very helpfull.

Kind regards, Tom

Hey Phil,

At 35:35 you 3b a utgrs with T986ds. At the same time you tell that when it had been ss, it is close to a fold against most utg openers.
But say, everybody folds and you ofcourse open raise this hand ss from the button but then get 3b by the bb say with a 12% 3bt. I am pretty sure you'll always call.
So, most of the time, you fold against a 12% utg opener with this hand but you call a 3bt from the bb with a 12% 3bt. (I think a estimation of 12% in boths cases is pretty commen. Or when you give the utgrsr a 14% open and the bb a 10% 3bt, the case of this question becomes even more stronger)
That's actually almost the same. And both times you are in position with the same hand. Actually, against the 3bt you are putting more money in the pot with a hand that is likely behind. So you should expect to fold that hand more often in that situation and call the utgrs more. But wath I see you do (and a lot of other people too) is the other way around.

Can you explain that?

Tom

Cool!