Anyone here a HU player?

[JohnBoyWWFC]

skill? like raise everytime?

Having good shove/fold ranges mostly. I mean I don't know cos I don't play them, but there's people who make great money off them, even at the highest levels. Edges are smaller but there is definitely skill.

 

[hackmeplz]

Yeah it means that 1) he's probably awesome at playing postflop to play that high and 2) he's not getting raked worth shit, so he has like zero problem opening every button and probably hasn't even thought playing tighter would have any value.

I on the other hand am not quite that good, and the rake at the levels I play is crushing. So, playing a range that flops non-garbage most of the time makes it easier for me to play postflop. And there's no way opening a range that's tight but isn't tight enough to exploit is a leak.

The thing is the math you're doing on "tight enough to exploit" is trying to figure out how to not get automatically exploited. By doing so you become incredibly easy to play against though and you're going to be losing money postflop to make it such that against anyone with a clue you'll be getting destroyed regardless of rake.

Your comments about rake are correct though, in higher-rake spots you definitely can't take what would be small edges pre-rake so like higher I minraise 100% but if I were playing 50nl HU I'd probably prefer to 3x like 75% or something instead.

 

[Aleksei]

The thing is the math you're doing on "tight enough to exploit" is trying to figure out how to not get automatically exploited. By doing so you become incredibly easy to play against though and you're going to be losing money postflop to make it such that against anyone with a clue you'll be getting destroyed regardless of rake.

That's a fair point. Although I did some more math work today, and I came to two interesting conclusions:

1) a near-unexploitable range when you minraise seems to be confined to about 66%.

2) You become pretty difficult to exploit (though no button open range is actually unexploitable) when you 3x anywhere between 40 and 66%. The difference is that the tighter end of that flops well more frequently, but flops in a narrower range of boards; and vice-versa for the looser end. So as a default you should probably do 66%, but then when your villain is just not giving you credit you can revert to 40% and play a more straightforward/nitty range until your image is restored. Or you can randomly switch between ranges in that band to **** with people.

 

[JohnBoyWWFC]

Can we play and I won't look at hole cards?

 

[acky100]

...

 

[Aleksei]

Can we play and I won't look at hole cards?

Suit yourself but right now I can't play for money.

 

[hackmeplz]

3xing 66% probably isn't super terrible, it's still too tight but you might be able to beat fish with it. 40% is just way too tight though and here's why.

No matter how you play in the BB, you're going to lose. To make up for that you need to win more than you'd lose in the BB when you get the button, it's not enough to just breakeven. At 40% if your villain folds 100% to your opens, you are winning 0.4*1 - 0.6*0.5 = 0.1bb/hand. So when you have the button and you're HU, what normally would be the biggest winning spot in any poker game, you're only winning 5 ptbb against one of the dumbest strategies of all time? Like seriously think about this. You will be winning 5ptbb when you're on the button in a HU game and your opponent is folding AA preflop. If all they do is play like top 5% of hands they probably end up beating this strategy lol.

 

[Aleksei]

3xing 66% probably isn't super terrible, it's still too tight but you might be able to beat fish with it. 40% is just way too tight though and here's why.

No matter how you play in the BB, you're going to lose. To make up for that you need to win more than you'd lose in the BB when you get the button, it's not enough to just breakeven. At 40% if your villain folds 100% to your opens, you are winning 0.4*1 - 0.6*0.5 = 0.1bb/hand. So when you have the button and you're HU, what normally would be the biggest winning spot in any poker game, you're only winning 5 ptbb against one of the dumbest strategies of all time? Like seriously think about this. You will be winning 5ptbb when you're on the button in a HU game and your opponent is folding AA preflop. If all they do is play like top 5% of hands they probably end up beating this strategy lol.

hmm... honestly I'd have to think about it further.

 

[pocketehs]

Suit yourself but right now I can't play for money.

you go busto?

 

[Poker Orifice]

skill? like raise everytime?

Having good shove/fold ranges mostly. I mean I don't know cos I don't play them, but there's people who make great money off them, even at the highest levels. Edges are smaller but there is definitely skill.

what he ^ said.
If you were to check the stats. of some of the higher stakes HU Hyper SNG players you might be surprised at the amount of money they're making.
In the micros there are soooo many bad players playing in them it is pretty easy to have a decent winrate.

 

[Aleksei]

you go busto?

Had a tiny roll, and now I have literally no $$$ to redeposit.

 

[DunningKruger]

No matter how you play in the BB, you're going to lose.

Unless you're playing someone who's open folding 60% of the time on the button... in which case you have a decent shot of coming out ahead.

But yeah seriously your post was basically exactly what I was going to say except I ended up not bothering. The goal for a HU player is always to try and maximize what they make otb and minimize what they lose oop. To be essentially break even or a little better in position isn't going to cut it because you're certainly going to lose more than that from the bb against anyone with a clue what they're doing.

 

[JohnBoyWWFC]

Busto player trying to tell everyone how to play. This gets more and more absurd.

 

[RodneyC86]

Had a tiny roll, and now I have literally no $$$ to redeposit.

I hate to be judgmental but surely you cannot be serious?

 

[runnerx289]

HU is awesome.

Also you CAN beat the rake; you're just paying 5% rake on flops seen same as any 6max or FR player. It's just everyone insists on seeing flops too wide HU so that you end up flopping garbage all the time, and playing just above breakeven EV even if you're good. YOU DON'T HAVE TO OPEN EVERY ****ING BUTTON.

A balanced preflop range HU would be 33% open, 33% defend vs minraise, and 25% defend vs 3x (just enough that villain cannot autoprofit from raising every button or folding every BB). I would actually recommend 3xing 40% of buttons, because it actually gives you room to make some money when villain folds (when you open 33% you're breaking exactly even on every BB fold) so that if he's actually tightening up to adjust you can have some more maneuvering room postflop since you're actually paying less to see the flop than he is.

Also there's literally no excuse for playing looser than that preflop. It's not like 6max where if you play nitty the only way to get proper volume is to add more tables; you're the only other guy at table. If you decline to see a flop the flop's just not gonna get dealt, and open-folding just adds 4 seconds of play time. It's one thing to get laggy and **** with people postflop, but seeing flops too wide is just costing yourself money, for no reason.

So, in a vacuum, my recommended preflop ranges are as follows,

IP:

-40% open
-14% flat 3bet (depending on 3bet sizing, if Villain is opening big you can defend less)
-6% 4bet
-3% call 5bet jam (basically just QQ+/AKs)

OOP:

-34%/25% defend (Minraise/3x)
-16% 3bet
-4% 5bet jam (TT+/AQ)

Flatting 4bet is not recommended. Playing OOP against a range that tight gets ugly fast.

Depending on ranges and dynamics you can 3bet/4bet/flat 3bet/etc. wider or tighter, but I don't recommend deviating from the standard open/defend range.

BIG +1 great stuff

 

[duggs]

BIG +1 great stuff

no dude, read the rest of the thread

 

[Zorba]

Busto player trying to tell everyone how to play. This gets more and more absurd.