advoacted opening hand first hand readless...i got yoni calling me out on my bullshit range that has me open folding 92s but minraising 32s, im thinking the 85% region is optimal, what you think? you open fold anything suited?i'm raising 85% first hand readless too.i'm raising anything suited in that 85% range. if i'm raising 32s, i'm raising 92s though. my intuition is that 32s has slightly better postflop playability than a 92s, but i dunno - someone that i'm concerned with nitting up my range to hands that have good postflp playability...that range wouldn't contain either hand anyways. i'd ask Mers, maybe he can give you a more confident answer.

wtf chadders did you register to a 300$ by accident? =P

I rly like Xscwx, I used to like watching his vids the most back when I was playing the 20's, I haven't watched his vids in a while tho bcz I only watch Hokie and Mers now, but I did see the vid you're talking about and decided to give it a try but then I was like...wtf is he doing here? That Q5 c/r can't be good, if we c/r Q5 there it implies that we c/r almost our entire flatting range on that flop, bcz Q5 ranks among the worst equity-wide vs his continuing range when we c/r. And also, A78 is not A72, there are plenty more hands that can call a c/mr, and even of A72r where we have more fold equity I think we can argue about c/ring hands like 89 with the BD flushdraw and not about c/ring Q5o. I ended up watching another mers vid =P 

Just a question for you Chadders....Re the Q8o hand.What sort of tendencies does villain need to have for you to limp the button here with q8o.....or is this just your standard at this stack depth in general?

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showpost.php?p=29848514&postcount=2102curious as to your thought on this hand, wasnt zure myself, i thought bet/fold turn for 130ish, give up river if calledthoughts on c/raising flop, then lead lead if cked through?def 3bet bigger prei would just overbet shove the flop. pot on flop is 180, remaining eff 340. there should be very little (maybe 0) AX in villains range, so anything villain calls jam with we have decent equity against. i just don't think think it's a flop where cbetting and jamming turns really accomplishes more for us than an overbet shove. 

xscwx post in response to my criticism of his c/r q5 on a87 readless to cbet first hand, how can you argue against the "we only have to win x% of time to be prof", u can say that with any c/minr to justify.... yo holmes,  i bet one twentieth of the pot, what's that, im  donk? holmes it only has to work 5% of the time to be profitable (no flame intended) ya he's right basically. if someone is cbetting enough hands that c/r bluffing is profitable, then if the math lines up then just c/r. maybe i'm missing your real question here though?we're still concerned with making the play that has maximum expectation though. most of those 5% of the pot bets aren't going to be maxEV plays, that's why we hardly ever do it.example of a small riverbet i'd actually use frequently:playing a huge station, plays lots of hands, calls down v lighti raise 76hh pre villain callsi 2 barrel a 9h 8h 2 K board and villain calls both streetspot on river is 600river is a 3, villain checks...what does betting anything >140 accomplish? i expect him to call with virtually any 8X+, and fold the rest. he's a huge station, but bluffing 140 into 600 only needs to work 19%. there is definitely 19% of total air in his range that even he wouldn't call a 3rd barrel with.

oooh another question, so say i am deciding to c/r flops like in xscwx ex, does that mean if i play my range im c/r at leas tany hand with one over and one under to 78 part of the board, am i right in thinking its a mistake to have q5 but not j6 in my c/r range in this spot say i wanted to reduce my c/r freq after establishing range that inc q5, then natural choice for c/r range would be two overs to 78 or any gutshot type equity right?ya, i mean like i said all i mean by "playing your range" is just forget what you actually have - and determine what hands would be optimal to make X decision. so in this case, which hands are best to c/r - i obv don't mean build a balanced range, or anything like that. just want to make that clear.your thought process sounds fine though. use the EV calc i've been pimping recently to get an intuitive feel for what cbet frequency you would need to c/r different types of ranges.and just a reminder, if you c/r someone a few times with a wide range, i would probably narrow my c/r range a bit - even if you don't have clear evidence suggesting you need to yet. it's pretty rare that someone get's c/r'd a bunch, and they don't start checking back more or at least cbetting wide still but calling off a lot lighter. so if you are able to c/r real wide, i'm not saying cut out all bluffs - just bluff with more equity. make sense?

I rly like Xscwx, I used to like watching his vids the most back when I was playing the 20's, I haven't watched his vids in a while tho bcz I only watch Hokie and Mers now, but I did see the vid you're talking about and decided to give it a try but then I was like...wtf is he doing here? That Q5 c/r can't be good, if we c/r Q5 there it implies that we c/r almost our entire flatting range on that flop, bcz Q5 ranks among the worst equity-wide vs his continuing range when we c/r. And also, A78 is not A72, there are plenty more hands that can call a c/mr, and even of A72r where we have more fold equity I think we can argue about c/ring hands like 89 with the BD flushdraw and not about c/ring Q5o. c/r Q5 doesn't mean we are c/r ALL hands. we wouldn't c/r AX (since bluffing is so profitable, and villain can have a high barrel frequency w so much air in his range). 8X/7X would be c/c too.yes, that means our c/r range is crazy imbalanced, but so what? someone with a cbet range wide enough for us to be able to c/r bluff a hand like Q5o profitable is being very exploitive with their cbet frequency - so we need to exploit the shit out of it, not worry about balance or w/e.agree w u that A78 is not A72 for sure. to c/r a hand as light as Q5o here, i think it's important to have a pretttty clear idea of someones small blind pfr, cbet frequency, how they view  a c/r on A high boards, and how much they are willing to fold to a c/r. it doesn't mean i need ALL of that info, but at least a few pretty confident reads. c/r the average player on this board is terrible with Q5o. i doubt scw was c/r an unknown though?

86o:your 3bet bluff size is too small, villains will call wiht basically atc. i would make it t95 pre.postflop is really good. just remember: you didn't c/r bluff bc cbetting all boards was profitable. you c/r bluffed bc of preflop fe and postflop fold equity w ur cb on certain boards.84s: preflop sizing again is too small. villains just are not going to fodl to this much.just c/f the flop. considering all the QX and draws that are going to stack off, there is no way you are doing well against that range at all. i def don't expect villain to bluff much when checked to on this texture either.

J6o:i've seen Mers say this, and i completely agree. when the avg player mincbets, esp on dry boards, it is not with hands that want to fold to a c/r. 

62s hand can actually be +ev, let alone better than folding, given the right criteria. it's not the greatest hand for a nai 3b really fwiw - but definitely a lot better than the K3o that bustofish 3b nai in the other hand :) uh ohhhhhhhh, time for u to do an article on expanded 3b shove ranges @25bb, 3rd month on fasttrack and i was convinced that the 3bs 62s is lol bad 26bbcome on man, open up your mind a bit! there aren't rules and blanket statements in poker. there is a situation for most anything in poker.i'm not going through this in extensive detail. all you need to do is use the EV calc i've mentioned in that c/r article and plug in the proper variables for this situation. ev calc for this one:fwiw i've spoken to Phmerc and he said that villain in this hand was opening 100% over a decent sample at this stack depth. just for arguments sake though, let's call it 85% (and just to be safe that he isn't embellishing his read a bit).so 2600 stx facing a raise to t100, 62s in bb we jamvillain calls 3bet shoves with an approx range of: 44+,A7s+,KQs,A8o+,KQoso with an 85% pfr and 13.4% total hand calling range - we have 83.9% fold equity with our 3bet shove preflop.83.9% of the time we win t100.16.1% of the time we get called and have 30.7% equity. all the chips are 2600. 2600 * .307 = 798.2. that's like losing 1300 - 798.2 = 501.8 chips from the start of the hand. 83.9% of the time we win t100. 16.1% of the time we lose t501.8. (0.839)(100) + (.161)(-501.8) = 83.9 - 80.78 = +3.12 chips. So on average, we win 3.12 chips from the start of the hand. Considering folding is -50, and flatting is almost certainly worse than folding - shoving is clearly the most +ev option.With the right variables in place, a lot of different things can be profitable in this game.

regarding nai3b vs jamming 62s:good points, for sure. it just surprised me how bad everyone thought jamming 62s was.i'm sure this wasn't Phmerc's throught process, and he could prob do a little better w this strat but this is what i would do with my 3b bluffing range vs a thinking 100% opener...first: the very low suited connectors don't have as much postflop playability that most people think they do - 53s 52s 62s 73s. playing postflop with these hands in a nai3b pot when called is going to be slightly more difficult than with more playable hands like Q4s T4s 85s 95s.versus someone who is opening 80%+ at this stack depth, and esp in Phmerc's case a 100% opener, it's really important to have a 3bet bluffing range at all stack sizes - whether its nai or jams.the problem with just nai3b all of our bluffs vs a thinking player at 23-30bb stx (merge stacks ftw) is that vs a wide opener, there are a lottt of hands that are +ev 3bet bluffs - and until villain adjusts his opening range we want to be able to play all of them. if our 3bets are getting called a decent amount (maybe 40%ish or more) - as long as villain hasnt tighened his opening range, it would be best to just start jamming the 3bet bluffing hands with worse postflop playability.if we just jam all of our 3bet bluffs at 26 stx, like im assume Phmerc is doing, it's def +ev but almost certainly leaving some ev on the table as nai3b has a lower risk/reward and still lots of fe - if villain is folding >60% of the time, nai3b each hand worth bluffing is maxEV.if villain is calling 3bets somewhere between 35-50% of  the time (this would be slightly wide considering a 100% opening range), i would do something like this:i would 3bet jam the range that has less postflop playability: 52s 73s 63s J2s type stuff. i would nai 3bet the more playable bluffing range: 85s K4s Q5s T4s type stuff. if villain is calling nai3bets more than 50%ish, i would just start overbet shoving all the bluffs vs a 100% opener. just remember that someone who calls 60% of nai3bs w a 100% opening range is probably the time to call overbet shoves a little wider than the villain described in Phmerc's example.**the %s necessary for nai3b vs jamming fold equity i used are just my intuitive feel for it. i haven't attempted to work out the #s, but i'm sure it's a close assessment.the main point is that folding these type hands is worse than a nai3b or a jam. as long as our villain is opening this wide, we should never fold 62s.honestly i didn't  consider the nai3b when analyzing the hand. i just got so caught up in the 2p2 jam/fold debate haha. in-game, i would definitely nai3b as my standard, esp vs a thinking player - i'd expect thinking players to fold a good amount more than a fish to a nai3b obv. 

JTs:just c/f the flop. he has soo many combos that are continuing there, and you have hardly any good turn cards to barrel. you don't have to cbet all flops.as played, i like the river jam for sure.QJ:risking giving up free equity by checking the flop seems like a bad idea. you flopped pretty good equity, should have good amount of flop fold equity...i'd cbet here 100% of the time.on turn, jamming is fine. if you bet turn, it's to bet/call with so much equity and being so committed at that point. i think betting the turn, and if villain flats just c/f rivers unimproved is fine. i actually can't really think of any hands that will fold to a jam that beat us - so if we bet to bet/call and TX just flats and we can c/f rivers unimproved, that will have better expectation for us than just jamming turn. i dont expect any TX to fold to a turn jam there really. we beat some draws that might continue vs a turn bet but fold to a jam, so that increases our expectation too. Q8: ya your equity sucks vs the typical range that is leading t100 here. considering people don't cbet these flops that wide, i would probably just flat a half pot cbet and fold to turn barrels - i don't expect you to have much fold equity over really any cbet here, but still enough equity to flat depending on the sizing.

fkat qjhh flop comes 995 one heartthis is like the nut hand to have as part of my c/r bluff range right?87hh would be the nut hand on this board imo. QJhh is great too though.obv their frequencies and general spaziness/ability to fold matter a lot too. if villain cbets a lot, but is super stationy vs c/r - we dont need to c/r bluff that player ever. just have a low c/r frequency of pure value and just win lots of big pots when u pick up hands.

so also realising i should be 3betting bigger in genereal with prob all my range, i do 80-90 too much as standard; prob time to stick within the 90-100 region, what are your thoughts on 100+ (from open of 40) and the impact that has on our percieved rangeya 90-100 is good depending on stacks/your hand. 80-85 is basically never going to be +ev imo, can't imagine someone folding to it much but i dont play on stars so maybe im wrong haha. i just know on merge when i 3bet from 100 to 200 it gets called a ton more than 100 to 225 or 250.40-120 effects your perceived range by you appearing more committed to calling a jam. this doesn't mean it's good as a bluff, bc even if villain respects the size - the bigger size has to get more folds than a smaller size bc we risked more, so even if fold out some of villains range that would call t90 or 100 - villain is correctly folding those hands bc of our inc in sizing. 40-120 is good with hands like KQ/KJ bc it will still get flatted by the type hands that KQ/KJ dominate, so our postflop expectation with those hands will be maximized.

T8o: considering villain can't have any missed draws on this river. his range on the turn is basically weak pairs and AX. i'd expect any marginal sd value to just check back when checked to on the river. his betting range will be wayyyy too much AX for a call to be good imo.i'd probably bet a little smaller on the turn too to make sure we get value from stuff. it's great to protect our equity, but i think t66 into t80 is probably overkill on such a dry texture - we should hav ethe best hand a ton.99: i like a check or a minbet if you don't think he's the type to get induced into bluff-raising when you do that. it's really hard for you to get value from anything on this river like you said.i don't know why you rule out QX from his range so quickly. i def expect a lot of players to flat Q7o type stuff etc and play like this. 

i like leading boards that hit your perceived range that get checked through when readless a lot more.the textures you listed are ones that get cbet with a much higher freq on average, so when they are checked back readless im usually assuming its with marg sd value type stuff that will want to call at least a turn bet. i'm leading sd value (like the J3) and equity (like the 53) but checking most of my pure air in these spots, until i start finding that villain is really checking back these great cbet spots with total air.your thought process seems pretty solid overall to me

Hi Chadders, does your blog open yet? I'm interested in reading it

hihi kk, keep us updated then

JJ: looks good to me. on a non-diamond turn vs that bet sizing, i'd be more inclined to play/shove fold to protect equity (and bc i dont really expect bluffs to continue w that river stack depth). i think you can flat turn and fold rivers unimproved though - even tho we need to be right on a river call 24%, i don't think you see bluffs on this particular turn + a non-diamond river nearly that often. lol, what do you mean by "bacon oriented"?