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Andrew and Nate field listener questions, inspired by Play Optimal Poker, about playing condensed ranges.
Strategy
Hand 1:
$22k stack at 600/1200/120 (9 handed).
K9o in the small blind, folds to me and I call. Big blind checks.
Flop is K4Qhsh (I have no heart). I check and villain bets min, 1200, and I call.
Pot is 5,880 and the turn is a 9 of clubs. I check to him, and he bets 2340 (40%) and I call.
River comes 10 of diamonds. Board is now K4Q9T rainbow. I bet 55% pot and he folded.
Hand 2
Ignition – $0.25 NL FAST (6 max) – Holdem – 6 players
Hero (BB): $23.76 (95 bb)
UTG: $29.93 (119.7 bb)
MP: $33.47 (133.9 bb)
CO: $25.42 (101.7 bb)
BTN: $12.60 (50.4 bb)
SB: $55.22 (220.9 bb)
SB posts $0.10, Hero posts BB $0.25
Pre Flop: (pot: $0.35) Hero has 9c Jc in BB. UTG raises to $0.75, 4 folds, Hero calls $0.50
Flop: ($1.60, 2 players) Ad 8s 7s
Hero checks, UTG bets $0.51, Hero calls $0.51
Turn: ($2.62, 2 players) 8d
Hero bets $2.00, UTG calls $2.00
River: ($6.62, 2 players) 7c
Hero bets $9.50, fold
Results: $6.62 pot ($0.33 rake)
Final Board: Ad 8s 7s 8d 7c
What if villain has suited Broadway spades (KQ KJ QJ K10) and has made it this far, our bigger bet has some percent chance of winning the pot out right when he folds & otherwise we split the pot.
Yep, see Danny’s comment if you haven’t already.
This is for hand 2
PIO has a very small donk range on hand 2, on the turn. It does have a reasonable amount of check raises on the flop, which take a lot of Hero’s 8x combinations out of his turn range. When I disallowed a flop check raise, it now donks 24% of the time, but prefers to have a flush draw when it does so with J9s.
On the river, as played, it does bluff our hand a significant amount of the time. It uses a smallish size a fair amount (trying to fold out Villain’s flush draws with no pair) but also does use a big sizing to target Ax.
The most important thing I have learned using PIO is to avoid the middling bet sizes. Either go small to target weak hands in Villains range, or go big to target modest showdown value.
That’s helpful, thanks!
What does hero’s PIO check raise range look like? Why does it leave us with too weak a range to donk turn on what is a good card for our range? As usual, PIO mixes every combo that it raises with. As a human, I’d think we’d be raising with our 88,77,A8,A7 for value, and some straight draws both gut shots and OESD. Those are the high frequency bluffs, but it also raises some AQ, AJ , AT for value. What is surprising to me is that it often raises 98 and 76. This last set of hands are not intuitive check raises, at least for me.
I am not sure what the point of check raising so many one pair hands is. I know they block sets, but they seem to play better as calls. They also make our turn range stronger when a 789 turns.