Spoony Exercise 3: Thinking About Your Own Range (Part 3)

Originally Posted by spoonitnow

You should complete Exercise 1 and Exercise 2 before you do this exercise.


Exercise 1 was sort of a warm-up to get you used to the idea of thinking about your own range and how it progresses over time. Exercise 2 was to get you used to thinking about how you're playing your entire range on one street. Both of these exercises are leading up to this exercise where we are going to think about the implications of our flop continuation betting range. Answer the following questions about your flop c-betting range, breaking down your range and proving the answers with some 6th grade math:

1. Are you vulnerable to a flop pot-sized raise against your flop c-betting range from Exercise 2 if Villain has KQ?
2. Are you vulnerable to Villain calling the flop with KQ and betting 2/3 pot whenever you check the turn?
3. What is your flop c-betting range trying to exploit in Villain's play?

so from last time i posted::

Here was my range from the previous exercise:
Face cards, 45s-9Ts, AXs, PP, 57s-8Ts

To be clear vs fit/fold I'm betting my entire range here.

Bet/fold - Anything that completely misses this board or hit far too lightly: 22-44, 77-99, Random face cards, 45s, 57s, 79s, 98s, 9Js (note this depends on his sizing) (anything that doesn't fit the other 2 categories)

Bet/call - 56s, 78s, TJ+, JJ+

bet/3bet - TT, 66, 55

1. Are you vulnerable to a flop pot-sized raise against your flop c-betting range from Exercise 2 if Villain has KQ?

the hands that aren't vulnerable here the way I'm playing: 56s, 78s, TJ+, JJ+, TT, 66, 55
This makes up a total of about 33% of my hands

The rest are vulnerable.
So I'm folding about 66% of my hands to a pot sized raise (and some of the weaker tens probably, I put them in bet call, but regardless I'm vulnerable to a pot sized bet from KQ.

2. Are you vulnerable to Villain calling the flop with KQ and betting 2/3 pot whenever you check the turn?

My ranges are slightly changed, but I am still vulnerable to a pot sized raise, as not any of the suited cards with straight draws, but rather flush+straight draws will be calling the turn, in fact now I am folding about 70% of my range to a pot sized bet.

3. What is your flop c-betting range trying to exploit in Villain's play?

If the villain is a fit/fold type player, I am assuming that the villain will be folding many moderate hands, I am c-betting ATC to try to get better hands to fold, while still having equity versus hands that are ahead of me, so the hands that call a raise still have decent equity versus his range, and the hands that I 3-bet are likely ahead of his range. He is likely folding, and if he continues, he is likely committing himself to the pot (goes with fit or fold), so if my draws hit I will likely get paid off.

Alright, so I ran through this exercise and here is a (perceived?) problem I am having.

Like everyone else, since we are 'pfr'ing wide and c-betting fairly wide, I found that I am exploitable to a flop pot-sized raise as I would be folding all but 12% or so of my holdings.

For question #2, however, I found that I was still marginally exploitable if the villain would flat my cbet and bet 2/3 the pot when checked to. Here's the justification:

(bet)/(pot+bet) = (0.666) / (1 + 0.666) = 40%

I have found that I am check/folding about 46% of my combinations at this juncture. Now, I know that the '40%' above represents how often his bluff needs to work for it to be profitable. I am having trouble understanding how this would relate to the 46% of the time we are taking a c/f line on this turn. Basically, 46% of the time, his bluff, that needs to work 40% of the time, is working 100% of the time. This of course assumes that I am not 'c/c'ing with anything (I assumed a bet/fold line instead). Am I understanding this correctly, and, if so, how do I handle this discrepancy?

Would it help to balance out some of the hands I'd b/f with (say, AT for instance) by 'c/c'ing instead? Obviously, I'm not sure this is the solution, as it would seem to only cause a shift between the 46% of the time I'm checking and the 100% of the time I'm check/folding (it may end up 50% / 96%, for example).

Am I wrong in not splitting up my hands between b/f and c/c more clearly? I have recently taken to splitting up my (and my opponent's) ranges into A, B, C and D groups, where A would bet and continue to a raise, B we'd bet/fold or call behind for pot control, etc. The B range seems to be where the divide between b/f and c/c occurs, and while these lines are probably somewhat interchangeable and situation (and villain) dependent, it's not always obvious how these should be split.

If I'm way off on everything I just wrote... physician, heal me.