Want to Win in Theory, or in Real Life?
Last time, we talked about how many people get the “bottom of their range” bluffs wrong because they don’t understand the theory.
Today, I want to discuss a more pervasive and dangerous phenomenon: Understanding theory and neglecting practice.
Bottom of Expected Outcomes
Let’s say you’ve gotten to the river in the perfect situation to bluff the bottom of your range.
You understand what types of scenarios do and don’t qualify because you read my last post and bought my most inexpensive course. You have a great idea of your range, and you know that this particular hand is at the bottom of it. You know that it’s a bluff in theory… that your range will be “unexploitable” if you bluff this hand. And you bluff.
You pick the right sizing, you don’t give off any tells, and you know you’d value bet the range that is roughly required here too. There’s nothing your opponent can do to take advantage of your range in this spot.
So, what’s the problem?
Well, the problem is that your opponent is someone who hates folding, and you know based on the way the hand was played and their tendencies from past history that they have a showdownable hand – a bluff-catcher, at least.
And when this player has a bluff-catcher, they usually call.
So you’re going to bet $80 into this $80 pot, and you’re going to get called 90% of the time.
10% of the time, you’ll win the $80 in the pot.
90% of the time, you’ll lose your $80 bet.
On average, your bet will lose you $64.
If poker is about winning money, your bet sucks.
It doesn’t matter how balanced or unexploitable you are. Right now, you have this hand, in this spot, against this opponent.
Why wouldn’t you make the most profitable play you can?
It’s Not Always That Obvious
Hopefully, most of you reading this would know not to make the bet above, but most situations in poker are less obvious.
What if this opponent only calls 60% of the time?
Should you take the bit of extra money by checking to exploit him, or should you sacrifice a little bit of money to remain unexploitable?
What if you are 80% sure that this opponent calls 60% of the time, but you might be wrong and he calls appropriately?
What if your read is less confident than that?
My answer: I’d usually go with the read and make the exploitative check.
First, I’ll tell you why, and then I’ll tell you when and why I might not.
GTO is Fragile AF
Imagine a house of cards – each card perfectly positioned, the perfect distribution of force applied by the others, leveraging the laws of physics to remain in place.
When we remove a card, the whole house comes crashing down.
This is GTO.
A strategy that is perfectly balanced. Every potential counterstrategy prepared for – from preflop, all the way through the hand. Taking into account every possible combination of flop, turn, and river cards. Considering every conceivable betting line. Approaching, for our human minds, a practically infinite number of potential scenarios that may unfold.
Every little thing an opponent does that strays from this mythical GTO blueprint incentivizes a massive shift in strategy to take advantage of.
If you:
Fold the turn too often, bringing a stronger-than-optimal range with you to the river
Play marginally too tight preflop
Bluff slightly too often, leaving your checking range stronger
…my optimal counterstrategy is to go from bluffing 33% of the time to 0%-5% of the time.
If you call 1% too often on the river, my optimal counterstrategy is to stop bluffing almost entirely.
This is why I look to play exploitatively.
This is why I trust and go with almost any read – even a gut feeling that you’re going to play slightly exploitably is enough to move the needle for me.
If my gut is right more often than not, that is. If my reads on you are to be trusted, on average.
Sometimes, that’s not the case...
When to Pump the Brakes
The fact of the matter is, some players will be a step behind you, and others will be a step ahead of you.
If the average person reading this thought they had a feeling about how Stephen Chidwick was unbalanced and tried to take advantage, there’s a very good chance that Stephen would be the one taking advantage of them.
Exploitative play is a dance. It’s an art and a science*. And it’s dynamic, not static.
If I see you making an adjustment to me, I can counteradjust to take advantage of it. Now you have cost yourself money by attempting to exploit me, making yourself more exploitable in the process.
Does this fly in the face of everything I said above?
No. Unless you’re outclassed.
That’s the bottom line:
If you’re a stronger player than your opponent, look to exploit them ruthlessly. Look to play defense (try to remain less exploitable) against players who are stronger than you. And if someone is close to your level, split the difference.
When I play a strong pro who I think is overbluffing in a certain spot, I will overcall. But I won’t go from calling 50% of the time to calling 100% of the time. Instead, I might call 85% of the time.
I’m making the exploit while doing three things:
1. Not opening myself up quite as much to a counterstrike
2. Making it harder to detect my adjustment
3. Calling often enough that I can gather some data to see if I’m being counter-exploited
If my opponent starts showing down a lot of bluffs when I find my 15% calls – especially if they are bluffs that I wouldn’t expect them to have – I need to immediately update my read and my strategy.
I don’t go for the maximally exploitative counterstrategy because I respect my opponent too much for that. I know that they’re capable of noticing and adjusting if I make it too obvious, and I want to be ready for that potential.
*If you haven't mastered the science behind exploitative play yet, you would almost certainly benefit from my 4.5-hour Foundations course.
Don’t Be Lazy: Using GTO as an Excuse
If you make a conscious decision to utilize your default gameplan against certain opponents, in certain spots, or on certain days (maybe you’re too unfocused to do better) – I can support that.
And studying GTO is awesome – I’m all for it, if you do it well. But don’t make the common mistake of using GTO to justify bad plays.
If you’re feeling lazy someday and you don’t want to make reads, it’s easy to default to calling hands that are “supposed to call” and folding hands that are “supposed to fold.” Or if you are someone who hates getting bluffed and has a tendency to be a bit of a calling station, you might know a fold is better, but use GTO to justify a bad call against someone who’s not bluffing nearly enough.
Or, the opposite. You might be risk-averse and find a GTO excuse not to make a big bluff or big hero call even though you find the perfect opponent and spot for it based on your reads.
Also, don’t use GTO to justify your plays after the fact.
I see so many players review a session, look at a few tough hands that they lost by running it through a solver, see that their play was solver-approved, pat themselves on the back and move on.
It doesn’t matter that your play was solver-approved if there was evidence out there that you should’ve done something different. This is soothing your ego after a losing session, or protecting yourself from questioning your own abilities.
Reverting to GTO may give you comfort during sessions and after them, but it won’t push your game to the next level.
Ask yourself this:
Do you want to feel better or do you want to get better?
