liuouhgkres
Visionary
Bronze Level
These days I'm spending more time learning poker and doing a lot of range vs range analysis. To make it more interesting for myself and to consolidate what I learned I want to share some interesting points with my fellow CC members. Plus, it will be fun to hear second thoughts from other poker players. I'm hoping to do series of analysis's of different spots. Obviously it won't be perfect analysis, since I'm learning too. So without further ado, let's start it.
When we choose bet sizing we need to have clear understanding of our range and villain's range. For bet sizing we need to think about middling part of villain's range, because that's what we are targeting, since top of villain's range won't fold regardless of our sizing, and similarly bottom of villain's range would fold to any sizing. We want to put middling part of villain's range in tough spot, so, we need to choose sizing accordingly. I personally prefer to have one bet sizing on any given flop, we choose one sizing and bet our entire betting range with that sizing. One bet sizing for given turn and usually two bet sizes for the river. On the river, if we have nuts in our range, we should have two bet sizes. One big sizing, typically around pot bet for most of our nuts and some pure bluffs. And then, we have a small bet size, 30%-40%, where we bet some of our nuts, all thin values and some bluffs. Having multiple bet sizes for flops and turns creates more range tree branches, complicates things to crazy levels and becomes counter-productive. On the river though, we have more defined ranges and it's much easier to divide our range.
As a side note, we also need to think if our range is capped or not. If we have all nuts in our range, it gives us freedom to choose whatever size we want. However, if our range is capped, if we don't have nuts in our range, we are obligated to bet small, because we can not afford to play huge pots.
Before going to spot breakdowns, let's have a small talk about pot odds and equity. We need to have enough equity to make a profitable call. And how to calculate how much equity we need to make a call? Suppose, pot is p and villain bets x amount. We need to put x to win p+2x. So equity we need to make a profitable call is eq=x/(p+2x). For example when villain bets pot, we need to have p/(p+2p)=33%. When villain bets half pot we need to have 0.5p/(p+p)=25% equity. Also, we need to remember that OOP we won't be able to realize all of our equity, so we should divide it by 0.7. We will use this later.
So, let's breakdown some hypothetical hands. Deep stacked, UTG opens, everybody folds, BB calls. Flop comes AdTc7s. Here is UTG range:
Here is BB flatting preflop range:
Clearly on this board UTG has a huge range advantage, they have so many value hands that they can fire their entire range on this board. Question is, with what sizing? Let's remove all easy calls/raises and easy folds from BB's range and see just middle part of BB's range:
Bottom pairs and straight draws, basically only hands with which BB have a decision to make. All weaker hands fold easily, all stronger hands call/raise for sure. If we put this in equilab against UTG betting range we see that it has 27%.
Since BB is OOP, multiply it by 0.7 and we get 27*0.7=19%. So practically, middling part of BB's range has 19%-20% against UTG c-bet. UTG needs to bet with such sizing, that BB would have just enough pot odds to call. So, let's use the formula we developed previously.
eq=x/(p+2x)
0.2=x/(p+2x)
x=0.2p+0.4x
0.6x=0.2p
x=0.33p
As a result we found out that UTG needs to bet 0.33, one third of pot, to put pressure on middling range of BB. Answer is kind of obvious, but I broke down this exact spot as a clear illustration on how we choose our bet sizes.
When we choose bet sizing we need to have clear understanding of our range and villain's range. For bet sizing we need to think about middling part of villain's range, because that's what we are targeting, since top of villain's range won't fold regardless of our sizing, and similarly bottom of villain's range would fold to any sizing. We want to put middling part of villain's range in tough spot, so, we need to choose sizing accordingly. I personally prefer to have one bet sizing on any given flop, we choose one sizing and bet our entire betting range with that sizing. One bet sizing for given turn and usually two bet sizes for the river. On the river, if we have nuts in our range, we should have two bet sizes. One big sizing, typically around pot bet for most of our nuts and some pure bluffs. And then, we have a small bet size, 30%-40%, where we bet some of our nuts, all thin values and some bluffs. Having multiple bet sizes for flops and turns creates more range tree branches, complicates things to crazy levels and becomes counter-productive. On the river though, we have more defined ranges and it's much easier to divide our range.
As a side note, we also need to think if our range is capped or not. If we have all nuts in our range, it gives us freedom to choose whatever size we want. However, if our range is capped, if we don't have nuts in our range, we are obligated to bet small, because we can not afford to play huge pots.
Before going to spot breakdowns, let's have a small talk about pot odds and equity. We need to have enough equity to make a profitable call. And how to calculate how much equity we need to make a call? Suppose, pot is p and villain bets x amount. We need to put x to win p+2x. So equity we need to make a profitable call is eq=x/(p+2x). For example when villain bets pot, we need to have p/(p+2p)=33%. When villain bets half pot we need to have 0.5p/(p+p)=25% equity. Also, we need to remember that OOP we won't be able to realize all of our equity, so we should divide it by 0.7. We will use this later.
So, let's breakdown some hypothetical hands. Deep stacked, UTG opens, everybody folds, BB calls. Flop comes AdTc7s. Here is UTG range:
Here is BB flatting preflop range:
Clearly on this board UTG has a huge range advantage, they have so many value hands that they can fire their entire range on this board. Question is, with what sizing? Let's remove all easy calls/raises and easy folds from BB's range and see just middle part of BB's range:
Bottom pairs and straight draws, basically only hands with which BB have a decision to make. All weaker hands fold easily, all stronger hands call/raise for sure. If we put this in equilab against UTG betting range we see that it has 27%.
Since BB is OOP, multiply it by 0.7 and we get 27*0.7=19%. So practically, middling part of BB's range has 19%-20% against UTG c-bet. UTG needs to bet with such sizing, that BB would have just enough pot odds to call. So, let's use the formula we developed previously.
eq=x/(p+2x)
0.2=x/(p+2x)
x=0.2p+0.4x
0.6x=0.2p
x=0.33p
As a result we found out that UTG needs to bet 0.33, one third of pot, to put pressure on middling range of BB. Answer is kind of obvious, but I broke down this exact spot as a clear illustration on how we choose our bet sizes.
