bluffing the river at microstakes

first hand in a while, villain is pretty tight but only a couple of orbits i don't remember his exact stats at the time.
open seems standard as does c bet. my range for betting this turn is pretty strong a bunch of kings sets including 3s as id prolly bet this flop with my entire range 2 pair and then 57s 79s and mebbe T7s.
River; if i chose to be balanced on this river and not bet only for value, i have 12 possible bluff combos and id value bet all Kx from AKs-K2s and AK-K9o and boats and quads. i prolly chk back AA and 86s. does this look right? or should i be checking some of the weaker kings too?
if villain has a hand weaker than a king he can not bluff catch profitably vs this range. if i bet half pot he doesn't have the equity to call with A8s or TT. he has roughly 19% vs my range.
have i missed anything?

$0.02/$0.05 No Limit Holdem
PokerStars
4 Players
Hand Conversion Powered by WeakTight Poker Hand History Converter

Stacks:
CO ($9.08) 182bb
BTN Hero ($5) 100bb
SB ($5.12) 102bb
BB ($5.14) 103bb

Pre-Flop: (0.07, 4 players) Hero is BTN
1 fold, Hero raises to $0.10, SB calls $0.08, 1 fold
Flop: ($0.25, 2 players)

SB checks, Hero bets $0.16, SB calls $0.16

Turn: ($0.57, 2)
SB checks, Hero bets $0.38, SB calls $0.38
River: ($1.33, 2)

SB checks, Hero $4.36

You've missed the most important thing that villains call far too often in this spot so bluffing becomes very unprofitable.

missed out 45s so that'd be another 4 combos of bluffs


if the play is +ev its +ev maybe not having a bluffing range at all is more +ev but i cant be sure, as i dont really know the villain only the 5nl player pool

For a start being +EV isn't an excuse to do something you want to find the most +EV thing to do.

And it isn't +EV you'll lose a tonne of money bluffing in spots like this at this level no matter how good you think your bluff is. Understanding balance and all that is very important but you just aren't understanding poker if you don't realise that someone calling far too much in a spot (like here) makes almost all your bluffs -EV.

Thanks for replying, I do understand your point and as a default play at 5nl you're most likely right and i should just have a value range in this spot and no bluff range as villains have no fold button.

The exercise really is just theretical anyhow. I seem to have forgotten that because of my turn barrel villains range is heavily weighted towards Kx. How do i go about finding out if the bluff is +ev given that fact. Assuming villain never folds a King. Or should i be trying to fold out a king with my bluffs.

I dont bluff very much at all and im trying to better understand how to add them in
. Even if this isnt the spot to be doing it the exercise should be worthwhile.

Maybe my title has skewed your opinion on my question. I really only want to know how to work out if our bluffs are actually +ev. I saw this spot in a review session and wondered if a bluff would've been profitable.

There is plenty of information on FTR about how to calculate your EV in any poker situation.
Here's a link to the first article in a series of articles by spoonitnow, which are excellent.

I got that link from this FTR page.

Here's a link to a non-FTR source which has the benefit of a visualization tool. May help if you are a visual thinker.

thanks for the reply mmm, if you fancy looking over this telling me if i got anything wrong id appreciate it


A8s 3 combos
A8o 12 combos
99 6 combos
TT 6 combos
89s 1 combo

28 combos bluff catchers

K9s 1 combo
KTs 2 combos
KJs 2 combos
KQs 2 combos

KTo 12 combos
KJo 12 combos
KQo 12 combos

43 combos of Kx

88 3 combos
66 3 combos

6 combos of boats

77 combos total

Roughly 36% of the time villain has a bluff catcher




36% we win 133+67
64% we lose 67


(.36*133)+(.64*-67)=5

so a half pot bluff makes 5c if villain folds all his bluff catchers as he should do because he doesn't have the odds to call with the as he only has 15% equity vs my range. if he calls then i make more money with my value bets than i should.
i still feel like i'm missing something

I like the way you're going with this, but I think you'll want to underbluff this board in position. Villain is capped at KQ/KJ/KTs on this run out imo (unless we have reads he 3bets these pre), so really we're asking villain to fold Kx, which is a big ask. Therefore I'm ripping in KQ/AK and all my 2pr and boats and just not going to turn anything else into a bluff.

Would be interesting to work through your turn betting range. I'm guessing you check back a ton of weaker Kx and 8x on the turn, so we're going to be polarised in this spot.

At first glance, it looks like you're forgetting to account for board cards when you're counting Villain's combos.

E.g. You list { KTo, KJo, KQo } as having 12 combos.

There are 2 K's on the board, so 6 combos available to Villain.


I recommend using Equilab (free to use) or some other poker calculator when you're looking at this stuff.
There are tricks and things to memorize so that you can do this more quickly on the fly, but for a beginner, I say just use a calculator while you study, and feel free to explore it and use it to answer questions.

so the math is wrong cos i fucked up the combos of offsuit kings (really dont know how i did that). Ill blame that on 'ive been out of the game for a while'. But that leaves us in a better spot not worse. Villains range on the river is much more heavily weighted towards non Kx given that the river blocks a tonne of combos. Ill have to redo the maths when i get home.
I do use equilab but i did this work in a note pad.

Fucked up the A8o too which thinking about it, should probably be heavily discounted as villain is in the sb and not some big fish. He quite likely doesnt have the off suit variaty.

I kinda disagree with your thinking Bean but that might well be me being a fish. I am not checking back this turn with these positions with a weak K opting to chk those back on the river unimproved. On this river tho i would bet/fold all my weaker kings bet/call AK and bet/jam boats, i may choose to bet this range bigger and could possibly polarize this range with my bluffs if i was to try and make a villain fold a K, which i dont think anyone at 5nls can. So betting half to 3/4 with my entire range is prolly more balanced. Therefore as a bluff i can target the weaker part of villains range. The only issue i can see with this is how we weight it, we dont know with any degree of certainty villain has many bluff catchers on this river as my turn bet may have folded them out, which would also make betting weak kings bad. I dont think this is true btw.

A8s 3 combos
99 3 combos
TT 6 combos
89s 1 combo

13 combos bluff catchers

K9s 1 combo
KTs 2 combos
KJs 2 combos
KQs 2 combos

KTo 6 combos
KJo 6 combos
KQo 6 combos

31 combos of Kx

88 3 combos
66 3 combos

6 combos of boats

50 combos total

Roughly 26% of the time villain has a bluff catcher




26% we win 133+67
74% we lose 67


(.26*133)+(.74*-67)=-15.0 -15

NEW AND BETTER MATHS. even if villain folds all his bluff catchers and only calls with a king or better this play is still -15 cents or - -7.5bb.
thanks for the help guys, this was a fun discussion... for me at least.

I've found I've learned the most when playing around with these combos, which is what makes Janda's book so good. I really need to do a lot more of it, rather than button mashing rake back promos on Party all the time.

I think your analysis suggests that exploitably betting big for value and with barely any bluffs is best in this spot, but betting weak suited kings for three streets of value is too thin. Have to say I find a bet check bet line will more likely get looked up by the bluff catchers in this spot, whereas a a bet bet line defines villain almost exclusively as Kx. Even though most regs know bet check bet is a value line, they still can't help themselves on the river.

I think you bet the turn too hard to now run a river bluff of any sizing.

I would assume that your turn sizing is narrowing his range down quite strongly towards sets and Kx. I definitely wouldn't make a practice of trying to get ppl off of rivered trips.

Not to mention trying to rep a strong hand when you're on the btn and perceived to have so much garbage. If villain has Kx which is likely, then you're repping 10 combos total (AK-4, 666-3, 888-3).

Do I think he'll fold 8x? Probably. But that's only a small part of his range after his turn call to your sizing imo.

Thanks again, took me a lot of figuring out to come to that conclusion. Thanks for bothering to chip in.

I hope i didnt come across as too argumentative, just trying to get more betterist.

@bean. Thanks too, at 2nl i have been going for ridiculously thin value on turns cos people seem to want to see all the cards. River bets dont get looked up that often unless a huge pot has been created or they bink. I imagine im gonna have to change my play to beat 5nls and above. I lost my first 5bi shot at 5s but im rolled again now to go for another.

I do never bluff in a spot like yours. It is clearly -EV in the long distance