I wish that were true. I'm tied up with WSOP stuff at the moment but I'll double-check these when I get a chance, thanks for bringing to my attention.

I just watched Andrew's "Getting off on the right foot - Part 2". It was a really informative video and allowed me to revisit topics that I was probably misconceiving so thank you. However, I was attempting to do the EV calculations using the scenario of semibluffing AJ from the video and I was stuggling to get the same answers as Andrew did. Below are his results/calculations and mine.

Firstly, he listed the equation for semibluffing EV as follows:
0.5*11648 + 0.5*(0.16*32282-10317) =
5824 - 4896 = 928

However, when I calculate it I get the following:
0.5*11648 + 0.5*(0.16*32282-10317) =
5824 - 2575 = 3249

Also, when solving for the fold percentage equal to checkEV, he gives the equation and solution:
1864 = F*11648 + (1-F)*(0.16*32282-10317)
1864 = 11648F - 9792 + 9792F
%F = 0.54

However, when I solve it (thinking back to highschool maths), I get:
1864 = F*11648 + (1-F)*(0.16*32282-10317)
1864 = F11648 + 5165.12 - 10317 - F5165.12 + F10317
7015.88 = 16799F
i.e. %F = 0.42

logically this result makes some sense because if semibluffing EV at 50% yields 3249 chips, then the %F that will equal check EV of 1864 has to be less than 50%.

It is highly unlikely that Andrew has errors in his calculations. What is probably a lock is that I misunderstand how to calculate it properly. Can anyone who has seen this video assist by steering me through the calculations as I would really like to get my head around EV and for that to happen I need to be able to calculate it properly.

Thanks guys,

I think it's unlikely that 44 gets to the river at all. Even 22 and 33 probably raise before the river, though they're more likely than 44. Still, even if you can shoehorn a few worse hands into his raising range, that doesn't necessarily mean that you should call. You need to consider the pot odds and the likelihood that you are beat, as well.

I am sorry, I didn't mean Hero, Meant Villain holding KK you explicitly said villain can't be holding KK, but yes it is on hero's range... So many times on the very early levels I decide to flat call KK from an UTG raiser and see the flop... is unlikely I will get him off a hand like AQs with a 3bet (Again, early levels don't create big pots preflop) the hands that AA or KK could beat but can't beat AK are 22,33,44 which are included on the villian range. 

My logic behind flat calling KK as UTG raiser on the first or second level goes that if he actually has AQ, QQ, JJ I won't make him lay down his hand... if the flop comes with no ace I may win some chips after villain's cbet and win a medium sized pot, if it comes Axx I will lose less chips that if I raise pre, get called, and get checked to me, when I am facing the decision to cbet and an A is on board. I am just asking exclusively for the first two levels... is this logic wrong? What would be a better play and how to get more chips into the pot?

Back to my previous post: Is pretty clear to me that bet-fold is the best option (Is clear NOW thanks to your video) I actually made that kind of bet on a draw heavy board today ready to fold, got called and took a nice pot, certainly I would have checked called 1 day ago...

My question is just that considering villain probable holdings on 22,33,44 I would call a bet (If I checked as hero did) with AA or KK as a hero... would you consider that to be a mistake? Is it at all possible that a good villain would value bet 22,33,44,55 on a flush draw board that just got there?

I don't think the question of whether Hero could hold KK has much bearing on whether he can value bet AK.

As for whether you'd call a raise with AA or KK, if you think that AK is an easy fold to a raise, what makes AA or KK different? Which hands do you think Villain will raise that beat AK but not KK?

I have a question on Hand reading part 2 video... At around min 42. Andrew suggests Hero should bet AKxx on Kd2s3sAc4s. He says there are no draw/air hands on villains range therefore we should bet AK....

I beleive there is some chance Hero holds KK (I can't see why Andrew thinks is unlikely enough to discount it from Hero's range).

Andres says AK should bet... I understand, getting raised should be a snap fold since there is NOTHING we can beat... Am I correct? What if hero has AA or KK.... snap fold as well, or worth a call? 

1. I have trouble thinking of opponents agaisnt whom betting the flop would be better than checking. I guess the type who try to win every pot and just contest way too many c-bets with very weak hands. But in general it's good to beef up your checking range (think how great it is for you to get a free card here if you have AK - checking hands like this makes it harder for people to bet you off of your checking range), and I think most people are just going to fold the flop really really often if you bet and also will bet at least some of the hands that would have called a bet.

2. The most significant thing about the Th on the turn is that it turns AK into a strong hand, and that was a big part of my checking range. However, it also creates a lot of draws, so I think a large bet is in order and will be called often. I'd expect to be raised very rarely and for Villain to have an extremly strong hand if he did raise, so I'd plan to call and check-fold the river unless I boated up or V bet very small. Check-calling the turn would be a big mistake mostly because I think V will check back very often with many hands that would call a bet, and not a lot of good things can happen for you on the river.

Brokos has QQ in the SB, hijack opens, CO calls, Brokos raises and gets a call from the opener, and the flop comes QhJh3d.

You describe well the reasons slowplaying works here – larger stack sizes relative to pot, villain possible 2nd best hands are few and Jacks will only be worth one bet, etc.  But you also mention that this flop would be a "controversial" one to slowplay and you describe that the free card could be costly.  This seems very clear. 

My questios are:

-do you consider betting the flop a genuine mistake or is there a size that appropriately gets some weak hands to come over the top (like draws or air) or that gets jacks to call along and maybe turn two pair with a larger pot?

-If you slow play and the turn is Th, what would you do? Would you check/call the turn?  What about a blank river after the scary turn like 5s?

Thanks again.

Getting Paid is an excellent series.  Thanks Andrew.

I have a question about something you touched on in the first video, but didn't really get into.  It was when you have TT on a K8X board and you want to get value out of 99 or 8X, etc.  You did mention that we have to be careful not to put too much money in the pot because somebody might be value betting us.

Well, I was wondering if this subject warrants a longer discussion?  It doesn't seem that the K8X board holding TT is a lone situation in that there are many other possible value hands that can want value from worse but can get destroyed by better. (AJ on an ATX board, KJ on a KQJ board .. there are probably better examples that I'm not thinking of).

Has there been a video on this matter – balancing value targeting with avoiding being value targeted?  Or is the answer: don't worry about it because by identifying proper value hands and hand reading you avoid getting value targeted?

Good question. I suppose I could have talked more about this when it comes to recognizing whether you have a value hand at all. I mean, when you have 33 on AKQJ8 you'd like to get value from 22 but probably you can't because even if your super-loose opponent will call with it he'll call with too many hands you're behind. Value betting requires being ahead of the whole range of hands that will call a bet, not just a specific target. The target only comes into play once you've decided you have a value hand.

Sometimes you have to aim lower than the most immediate choice to insure that you will be ahead. Your on AJ on ATx is a good example. If you are up against a range that contains AK/AQ/AT, it's not good enough to set A9 as your value target. You need to draw in a lot of weaker Aces and maybe even KK or Tx in order to be ahead of your opponent's range. That may require playing the hand differently than if you knew for a fact that Villain had A9.

That said, if you know your opponent will call with any pair when you have AJ on ATx, then there's no avoiding paying off AK. All you can do is keep his range wide enough that you are on-balance ahead when money goes in and suck it up that you are going to pay off better hands sometimes. You can write it off as a cooler as long as you haven't played your hand in a way that allows enough worse hands to fold.

Are you suggesting that you should have something like a "big overbet with the nuts" range, a "big overbet bluff" range, a "smaller thin(ner) value-bet range", and a "smaller bluff range"? (plus presumably a "passive give up or pot control or bluff-catch" range)  I guess you're capping your range with the smaller bets but that's OK if you strongly believe that villain's range is capped too (ie you can call a raise with your smaller value bets and fold or 3-bet your small bluffs)

I feel like there's a better way to express or ask about the issues I'm grappling with around balancing - I'll keep working on it.  Thanks for your replies, here and on TP.

Yes, although the bit about Villain being capped is very important. This is more dangerous (though still not necessarily wrong) in an instance where Villain has some nut hands, because now he has the opportunity to check-raise your small bet which has capped your range.

I just blogged about a hand where this came up: .....t-results/

I have a question about something you touched on in the first video, but didn't really get into.  It was when you have TT on a K8X board and you want to get value out of 99 or 8X, etc.  You did mention that we have to be careful not to put too much money in the pot because somebody might be value betting us.

Well, I was wondering if this subject warrants a longer discussion?  It doesn't seem that the K8X board holding TT is a lone situation in that there are many other possible value hands that can want value from worse but can get destroyed by better. (AJ on an ATX board, KJ on a KQJ board .. there are probably better examples that I'm not thinking of).

Has there been a video on this matter – balancing value targeting with avoiding being value targeted?  Or is the answer: don't worry about it because by identifying proper value hands and hand reading you avoid getting value targeted?

huge said:

[I think from Carlos' comment above that this is the right place to post this, but if I'm wrong and I should put it in the Value-Targeting video comments or even in the general strategy forum, let me know]

 

Let's say you've watched all of Andrew's Hand Reading and Value Targeting vids, and you've mastered the concepts therein (half of those characteristics are true of me)…

 

You are last to act holding the nuts on the river, and you believe that the best hand to target in villain's range is strong enough to call a 2xPot overbet. Most of your opponents at the table, including villain, are very strong observant players, who have presumably noted that you are a thinking player who seems balance-aware. Would you ever consider betting a lesser amount because in a similar spot with a good bluffing hand you don't want to risk 2xPot on a bluff?  And then the obvious more general followup question: in a less crystal-clear example, do you ever/often give up some EV from a value-bet in order to balance (protect?) your *future* bluffs by making them less expensive/risky?  

 

My answer is no, I'm never going to leave significant immediate money on the table now just to possibly give me a more profitable or less risky opportunity later.  I might make my value-bet size bigger or smaller "to make it look more bluffy", and that might or might not relate to hands villain has seen me play in the past, but it is still an attempt to maximize immediate EV.  

 

I think I'm grappling (awkwardly) with the concept of "protecting another part of my range", which is not generally part of my thinking process at the table.  Maybe I've just cooked up an unlikely/unhelpful outlier case in which a desire to protect future hand ranges' balance has a clear-cut and immediate cost, whereas "you should 4-bet Aces to protect your light 4-bets" is more fuzzy because 4-betting AA has some pluses and some minuses and it's hard to quantify how much (if anything) you're giving up by not slowplaying them.

 

[Andrew if you read this, "huge" @ TPE is one and the same as "Luckbox Larry", recent TP podcast correspondent. Knowing that I'm sure you'll see the sideways connection between this post and our email exchange - though I don't think it's the same question]

The very straightforward answer to this specific question is no, I wouldn't worry about that exactly. But in future spots against opponents where you are concerned with being balance, the best way to play a nut hand vs a capped range on the river is to shove and to balance with an appropriately wide bluffing range. This doesn't have to preclude having a smaller value bet size for your weaker hands, as long as you have enough bluff candidates to balance both. The thing to see, though, is that it's not about what you risk with your bluffs, it's about what you make with your entire range. In a bluff-catching game where you are going to bet a balanced mix of value bets and bluffs, your EV is a function of the size of your bet, so you'd want to make the largest bet that you can with that range.

 

In a situation where you're concerned with balance, you'd want to 4bet AA. If you think they are going to fold way too much to 4bs and therefore you choose not to 4bet AA, then you are into exploitive territory and you don't need to worry about 4betting weak hands. Basically, you have to decide whether you're confident in your ability to make a good prediction about whether your opponents will respond to a bet and exploit it or not. When you aren't, then the balanced play IS the best way to play the hand. When you are, then you don't need to worry about being balanced.

That's a great response (which I'll need to chew on for a while) "that it's not about what you risk with your bluffs, it's about what you make with your entire range".

Are you suggesting that you should have something like a "big overbet with the nuts" range, a "big overbet bluff" range, a "smaller thin(ner) value-bet range", and a "smaller bluff range"? (plus presumably a "passive give up or pot control or bluff-catch" range)  I guess you're capping your range with the smaller bets but that's OK if you strongly believe that villain's range is capped too (ie you can call a raise with your smaller value bets and fold or 3-bet your small bluffs)

I feel like there's a better way to express or ask about the issues I'm grappling with around balancing - I'll keep working on it.  Thanks for your replies, here and on TP.

  After taking a week or so away from the tables in order to learn and improve my game. Andrews hand reading videos helped me immensly in my first night back to the tables. 4 tournies 3 cashes and bankroll increased by nealry 10 percent in 5 hours. If variance hadnt of gotten me so deep into these fields I think I could have at least final tabled two of them and had a real chance at a win.

Have to be honest here. I have tried many different training sites over the last 3 years.  Lot of good pros on this site that make a lot of good vids.  Andrew is in a different class. His "Theory Videos" have allowed me to play many spots and not just my cards.  Thanks Andrew.

Thanks, that's really great to hear (well, read)!