25nl: Turned top 2 after flop donk Axxxtt board

[daviddem]

I mean folding the 2nd nuts because we assume that villain has the nuts every time he raises is exceptionally exploitable.

Seems to me that all the balance thing is worth it 1) when the range of our opponent and ours are merged or at least significantly overlapping and 2) against an opponent who is going to exploit us if we do not play close enough to balance.

By 1) I mean how can we have a value range or a c/c range when we are facing a range that crushes us (for example against a nit who never bluffs and shoves into our strong line)? Why would we want to be balanced against such a player when we can exploit him to death by folding?

So now in your example if I understand correctly you are worried that villain can exploit us if we do not call his river shove sometimes on spade rivers. He can bluff shove profitably if we fold 43% of the time or more to his bluffs (bet/(bet+pot)). So obviously if we always fold to a shove he can very much bluff shove profitably. So to be balanced and zero his EV we should call his bluffs exactly 43% of the time.

When he shoves we are being offered 30% pot odds. The EV of our play will be zero if we win 30% of the time when we call. So for his range to be balanced he needs to have 30% bluffs in it and 70% value hands (this is assuming that his value range always wins against our calling range, which it does if we go by your assumptions that A8 is the top of our range).

So now we know he has 30% bluffs in his balanced shoving range, so we should call his shoves 0.43*0.3 = 12.9% of the time for a balanced strategy.

So keeping this balanced situation in mind, when I said above "I don't think that calling a river shove is +EV", this translates into "I think his range is not balanced and it is skewed towards value (more than 70% value and less than 30% bluffs). So I will exploit this imbalance in his play by folding more. In the extreme case, if his range is 100% value, my optimal exploitative strategy is to always fold. However playing this optimal exploitative strategy also makes me exploitable if villain adjusts: his optimal exploitative strategy is to move all the hands in his c/f range to his bluffing range.

So with this in mind, we should play a balanced strategy against players who are both 1) good enough that we cannot exploit them properly and 2) so good that if we even attempt to exploit them, they will successfully exploit us (or similarly: we cannot exploit them as good as they can exploit us once we stray from balance to try and play an exploitative strategy).

Now let's say that this is the case of our villain in this hand. And let's say we accept that A8 is the top of our range. So when he shoves a spade river, we have in hand the part of our range that we should call the shove with to be balanced. I agree with that. We made a balanced play vs a super-opponent who would otherwise exploit us.

However where your logic seems to break down is the turn: you don't want to pay the price of this river balanced play, not even the few times a spade will hit on the river and he will really have a flush. So you make a large turn raise to compensate for this. So in the end this turn raise is a glaringly obvious attempt at exploitation. Damn, we just opened our flank, and if villain is any good as assumed, he is never going to call or raise such a fat value bet with worse.

Another thing: you say that A8 is the top of our range when we raise the turn. But from what you said, it's also the bottom, since you said we are not allowed to have flush draws or other two pairs (would raise other two pairs and flopped sets OTF, would not flat OTF with flush draws and raise turn with them later etc). So now that we have raised the turn, we have practically turned our hand over on the table and allowed him to play perfectly against us. Not a very balanced strategy, uh? Looks like we could add a few bluffs in there to compensate? Maybe a few K, Q, J high flush draws?

Also if A8 is the only hand in my range, for a river balanced strategy I should fold A8 to a shove on a river spade 87.1% of the time, and only call with A8 12.9% of the time.

So in conclusion, I don't think I am being exceptionally exploited if I can get him to call even a 1/2 PSR OTT with a worse hand and I fold 100% on spade rivers facing a shove.

edit: actually, if you ask me, a much more interesting scenario is where Hero makes a 1/2 or 2/3 PSR OTT, villain flats and open shoves a non spade river that does not pair the board. Now it's much more interesting because his range is very possibly polarized with bluffs (busted flush draws, for example) and sets. Now there really are serious balance considerations at play.

[spoonitnow]

So now in your example if I understand correctly you are worried that villain can exploit us if we do not call his river shove sometimes on spade rivers. He can bluff shove profitably if we fold 43% of the time or more to his bluffs (bet/(bet+pot)). So obviously if we always fold to a shove he can very much bluff shove profitably. So to be balanced and zero his EV we should call his bluffs exactly 43% of the time.

So now we know he has 30% bluffs in his balanced shoving range, so we should call his shoves 0.43*0.3 = 12.9% of the time for a balanced strategy.

Logic fail @ the two bolded parts. You can't simultaneously call 43 percent of the time and 12.9 percent of the time.

Seems to me that all the balance thing is worth it 1) when the range of our opponent and ours are merged or at least significantly overlapping and 2) against an opponent who is going to exploit us if we do not play close enough to balance.

Point #1 here excludes times when either player has a polarized range, and that makes this argument invalid on its own. Point #2 assumes that your opponent in any given scenario always plays exactly like you believe he does which is questionable at best.

By 1) I mean how can we have a value range or a c/c range when we are facing a range that crushes us (for example against a nit who never bluffs and shoves into our strong line)? Why would we want to be balanced against such a player when we can exploit him to death by folding?

To the bold, if someone is shoving into your strongest line, and you are absolutely crushed, then you have balance issues. To the underlined portion, you could always exploit him by folding if you are clairvoyant. Since you're not, you don't know if you're the one getting exploited or not. When you are playing in an optimal exploitative manner (like the strategies you recommend here and elsewhere), your opponent only has to change his or her strategy a small amount to drastically change your EV.

So keeping this balanced situation in mind, when I said above "I don't think that calling a river shove is +EV", this translates into "I think his range is not balanced and it is skewed toward value (more than 70% value and less than 30% bluffs). So I will exploit this imbalance in his play by folding more. In the extreme case, if his range is 100% value, my optimal exploitative strategy is to always fold.

The bold here simultaneously shows a lack of understanding of what the optimal exploitative strategy is and proves my point. If his range is 100% value, your optimal exploitative strategy is not to fold your entire range. As regards this specific spot, a call with A8 can be part of the optimal exploitative strategy if Villain has a range of 100% value bets.

So with this in mind, we should play a balanced strategy against players who are both 1) good enough that we cannot exploit them properly and 2) so good that if we even attempt to exploit them, they will successfully exploit us

Both of these points are correct. However, neither of them have anything to do with calling A8 here because I am not advocating a balanced strategy in this river spot. Don't be misled by the above two points: They are not the only conditions under which playing with a balanced strategy can be favorable.

Another thing: you say that A8 is the top of our range when we raise the turn. But from what you said, it's also the bottom, since you said we are not allowed to have flush draws or other two pairs (would raise other two pairs and flopped sets OTF, would not flat OTF with flush draws and raise turn with them later etc). So now that we have raised the turn, we have practically turned our hand over on the table and allowed him to play perfectly against us. Not a very balanced strategy, uh?

The underlined combined with the bold shows that you misunderstand what balanced strategies are. Whether our opponent knows our range (even if it's a single hand) is irrelevant to having a balanced strategy. It also doesn't allow our opponent to play perfectly against us unless he wants to play balanced as well. If we did have a single hand in our range, and if our opponent did know that, then that would be a subcase of playing against a polarized range like I referenced earlier. In that case according to your quote a few blocks above, you don't believe that playing against a polarized range can have a balanced strategy (which is absurd).

Also if A8 is the only hand in my range, for a river balanced strategy I should fold A8 to a shove on a river spade 87.1% of the time, and only call with A8 12.9% of the time.

You immediately go from saying you couldn't have a balanced strategy to claiming to know what the balanced strategy is. The strategy that you propose also contradicts what you said earlier about needing to fold 43 percent of the time. This shows again that you don't understand what a balanced strategy would look like for Hero on a river -- the same strategy that you are arguing against using and that I never advocated that Hero should be using.

Overall, you don't seem to have a solid grasp of what balanced strategies or optimal exploitative strategies are or how to find them in given scenarios. You seem to have a problem with using exploitative bet sizing on the turn in the hand while simultaneously battling against any non-optimal exploitative strategy on the river. The result of all of this is that you don't seem to understand that there are strategies that lie between a balanced strategy and the optimal exploitative strategy. Put another way, you make a mistake about poker thinking that a lot of people do, and that mistake is that the correct way to play is to take every +EV spot you can and avoid every -EV spot you can.