Spoony Exercise 9: Choosing a Bluffing Range

In Exercise 8 we continued our look at bluffing with a look at the basics of semi-bluffing and why it's so awesome to have equity against our opponents' calling ranges. Way back in Exercise 2 (which you should do before doing this exercise, along with Exercises 7 and 8) we looked at how to think about playing our range. Here we're going to look at one way to go about choosing your bluffing range which will hopefully get you started in the right direction.

We saw with Exercise 8 that semi-bluffing is better than pure bluffing when everything else is held equal, so for that reason we would rather bluff raise hands that have equity against our opponents' calling ranges than hands that don't. Since we'll have a bunch of hands in our own range to choose from, we should choose the favorable hands to maximize our EV.

For a quick example, suppose a Villain who is a little loose pre-flop c-bets 90% on the flop and you're deciding on a flop bluff-raising range after calling his bet in position with {AQ, AJs, KQs-65s, TT-22}. and seeing a heads-up flop of Qs8d5c. He c-bets, and you decide his range is weak and you want to bluff more than you would normally. Which would you rather bluff raise, JdTd or 22? 7s6s or AhJh? Th9h or 44? If you don't know, use PokerStove against a calling range on this flop and see which hands have the most equity.

Here is today's exercise. Go back to your hands from Exercise 7 and Exercise 8 and break down your bluffing range in each spot. Decide if the hand you bluffed with in those spots was actually a favorable hand to bluff with, or if you should have decided not to bluff instead. What percent of your range are you bluffing there?

This stuff is so good. I really am gonna start these from scratch as soon as I get any time to do it where I can concentrate & I'm not completely knackered.

If "all of the above" isn't an option, I'll take 6s7s.

edit: oh I just saw there's more to this. One sec.

edit2:

Villain is 82/74 over 40 hands. Has 3bet my 100% btn opens 8 out of 16 times, and has c-bet 50% of flops after a 3-bet. His 3-bet range is something like 22+, any broadway, Axs, Axo, K8s+, Q9s+, connectors, gap connectors, and dumb hands.

His c-betting range is any oesd, gutshot with overs, top pair, overpairs, sets, and overcards with pictures on them.
His calling/stackoff range to a flop raise should be any draw with 8+ outs against air, any pair that he would c-bet, and he'll fold everything else (not much).

So I want my bluffing range to have some equity against his drawing range: A6 would be the worst draw I would consider raising, It's even purty close just to call cuz of crap implied odds.

My bluff raising range is: A6(borderline), any pair with an oesd. Bluffing wider doesn't make a whole lot of sense because of terrible fold equity. And I would consider raising anything A5 or better for value.


$0.50/$1 Ante $0.20 No Limit Holdem
FullTiltPoker
2 Players
Hand Conversion Powered by weaktight.com

Stacks:
Hero ($231.70)
BB ($98.30)

Pre-Flop: ($1.90, 2 players) Hero is SB
Hero raises to $3, BB raises to $8, Hero calls $5

Flop: ($16.40, 2 players)
BB bets $8, Hero raises to $24, BB goes all-in $90.10, Hero calls $66.10

Turn: ($196.60, 2 players, 1 all-in)

River: ($196.60, 2 players, 1 all-in)

I think it'd be great if you created a sticky with a series of links to all of these so if one does fall off the first page newer people who haven't seen them can access them all in one place. As for this exercise I'll come back and redo all of them after I finish finals on Tuesday. Spring break is devoted to poker!

Bump a week later.

I'm done with these due to lack of anyone giving enough of a shit to do them.

i glossed through exercises 6-8 and did math in my head and didn't write a big post about it so i could catch up. for exercise 7, i used a hand where i cbet KQo on a T9xr board against a fit or fold fish who's a preflop station.

i'm not as interested in that hand for this exercise, though, so i'm gonna take some liberties and do a spot more similar to the one you mentioned--c/r'ing range when flatting an ATS OOP.

villain is a 19/13 but has an ATS of 34% and F23B of only 57% (and doesn't really seem to fold to my 3b's IP), but hasn't 4b yet and 65% cbet. i've already started adjusting by flatting more of his steals and have c/r'ed a flop or two, but he doesn't seem super eager to adjust. he doesn't seem super creative, and seems to give up after one street when bluffing (doesn't double barrel, hasn't 3b any flops or anything).

my plan is to widen my value range (TT+, AQ+, don't feel comfortable making it much much wider, since we can play AJ/KQ/99 profitably by flatting based on postflop reads), and widen my calling range and include a lot of hands i would've otherwise 3b as a semi-bluff (AT-AJ, Axs, 54s+, 97s+, J7s/Q8s, KJ+, QJ, KTs and 77-99).

now for the hand, lol. i don't have a donk leading range on this particular flop

PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em, $0.50 BB (5 handed) - Poker-Stars Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

MP ($51.35)
Button ($104.20)
SB ($10)
Hero (BB) ($62.15)
UTG ($73.05)

Preflop: Hero is BB with XxYy
2 folds, Button bets $2, 1 fold, Hero calls $1.50

Flop: ($4.25) 8, Q, 4 (2 players)
Hero checks, Button bets $2.50

i plan to c/r Q8s and 88 for value, and that's about it (AQ is in my perceived range). as a bluff, i expect to c/r any hand with 4+ outs. FD's, GSSD's and maybe some things with some backdoor possibility like AsTs/AsJs (don't know how good it is it c/r very bare GSSD's like J9hh in this spot if i've already c/r'ed a few times, would like to hear thoughts on this).

so FD's (without straight draws in them)= 5d4d, 9d7d, Jd7d, KdTd, KdJd, Ad2d, Ad3d, Ad4d, Ad5d, Ad6d, Ad7d, Ad9d, AdTd, AdJd= 14 combos

straight draws (including combo draws)= 65s, 76s, T9s, JTs, J9s= 20 combos

misc. hands with potential against Qx= KsTs, KsJs, AsTs, AsJs, As9s, As7s, As6s, As5s, Ad7x, Ad6x, Ad5x, AdJx, AdTx, Ad9x, KdTx, KdJx, 5s4s= 45 combos

so of my total range of 160 combos (i think?), we're c/r'ing 85 hand combos, 79 of which are as a bluff. so we are rebluffing with 49.4% of our total range.

heres the first part-


1. his calling range is 55, 88, aa, kk, qq, kq,aq,qt,qj, q9s, jj tt, j9s, t9s, jto,

against that range

a) jdtd (29.017) vs 22 (18.508)= jdtd
b) 7s6s vs ahjh- 35.518 vs 24.059= 7s6s
c) th9h or 44- 18.077 vs 19.712= 44

ok what i do not understand is why is the jdtd waaay more equitable than the th9h? is it just because the back door flush possibilities? or does it have to do with the fact that t9 is not beating anything in his range, JT is at least beating t9, and j9?

Originally Posted by philly and the phanatics

heres the first part-


1. his calling range is 55, 88, aa, kk, qq, kq,aq,qt,qj, q9s, jj tt, j9s, t9s, jto,

against that range

a) jdtd (29.017) vs 22 (18.508)= jdtd
b) 7s6s vs ahjh- 35.518 vs 24.059= 7s6s
c) th9h or 44- 18.077 vs 19.712= 44

ok what i do not understand is why is the jdtd waaay more equitable than the th9h? is it just because the back door flush possibilities? or does it have to do with the fact that t9 is not beating anything in his range, JT is at least beating t9, and j9?

anyone?

Originally Posted by philly and the phanatics

heres the first part-


1. his calling range is 55, 88, aa, kk, qq, kq,aq,qt,qj, q9s, jj tt, j9s, t9s, jto,

against that range

a) jdtd (29.017) vs 22 (18.508)= jdtd
b) 7s6s vs ahjh- 35.518 vs 24.059= 7s6s
c) th9h or 44- 18.077 vs 19.712= 44

ok what i do not understand is why is the jdtd waaay more equitable than the th9h? is it just because the back door flush possibilities? or does it have to do with the fact that t9 is not beating anything in his range, JT is at least beating t9, and j9?

There are more J's in his range than 9's , leaving the t9 GSSD fewer average outs . With jt we dominate t9s and j9, and, if were behind always have at least 4 outs to hit (except for q9). With t9 we're always behind his draws, leaving us drawing to 3 outs a lot of the time (against all the jx hands, against JJ we only have 2 outs)

I need poker-recording software to complete this, 7,8 and...5 I think. I don't have any yet, but I have some unfinished business with these threads.

@spoon: I am disappointed that more people haven't taken the time to do these lessons. Am also disappointed that lack of participation caused you to stop making them. For what its worth, they are much appreciated on my end. Cheers bud.

Ill be back.

I have compiled all of these exercises, and plan to complete them all here in the next day or two, i will start posting my answers to each in their threads.

thank you for all of this information spoon... you are one hell of a teacher...

^^omganotherguyfromwashington

Bump cause this rocks!