What is this journal about?

I am not sure how often I will be able to update it, but I decided to give it a try. Here I will write some of my strategy thoughts and post hands that I am unsure if they worth posting in a strategy forum. Often, there will be references to 'Mathematics of Poker' by Bill Chen. Actually this book was one of the reasons for starting this journal, as it approaches the game from a different angle and I feel that it is interesting to try and develop some of the ideas presented there. I am sorry if it poses a problem for a reader, but for simplicity I will assume that everyone read this book . (Which I highly recommend. You can buy it through livepokerforum and support the site.)

Later if I am still interested in the project I am going to discuss sessions of hundred or more hands . I am not sure how to post it yet. And how the discussion should look like.

Who is it for?

Anyone who feels like discussing poker strategy, providing specific examples etc, are welcome here! If you have a strategy idea feel free to PM me or post it here if you are really sure that it worth discussing.

How it is organised?

I will divide it into entries, which will focus on specific ideas, hands etc. After each entry there will be (hopefully) some discussion and I will post my thoughts on the responses. If a new entry come and you have a comment about a previous one, please refer to it by number and journal page.

Will there be any stories? Graphs, etc?
I specifically want to focus on strategy discussion here, so I won't keep track of results and won't post any terrific stories here.
I also want to add that I think about poker and post more than I actually play, I have quite good results in terms of PTBB/100, but I rarely play more than 20k hands per month.


P.S. That's an outline of the journal and I will try to update it if I have new ideas, so that people know what they should expect to find here.

1. First entry.

I thought a bit about the bet sizing that we use in no-limit cash games, normally it is about 2/3 pot - pot sized bet. With exception of dry/dangerous boards where half pot bets seem to be better.

The effect that this solid bet sizing has on our opponents, they will see a solid player who bluffs soometimes, but still they can understand it. It is normal, somewhat predictable.

Now I ponder an idea of underbetting and overbetting on regular basis, sure it is a deviation from (what I believe to be) optimal strategy, but I hope to gain in unpredicatbility and weirdness. Imagine that you are playing with opponent who fluctuates around making underbets and overbets in the strange places, it will be very difficult to figure what he does and even more difficult to adapt to this. In other words I want to design it in a way to throw them off their normal game.

And one important effect that I hope to create is a 'mystery'. Not sure how to explain it; when people deal with something normal they are ok, can adapt, etc; when they have to deal with something beyond their normal experience and understanding they often stop to think logically and instead of trying to find the logics behind such actions they just call it idiotic or something and FAIL to adapt.

P.S. I'll probably edit it later when I figure out how to better put the ideas into words. Nad probably I'll do some spell check later.


Some hands when I tried it:

Hand1.
Seat 3: -tegelsten- ($303.40 in chips)
Seat 5: zowl60 ($191.45 in chips)
Seat 7: doolitor ($388.00 in chips)
Seat 8: ZmejGorini4 ($777.40 in chips)
Seat 10: -Smiter- ($241.40 in chips)
ANTES/BLINDS
-Smiter- posts blind ($2), -tegelsten- posts blind ($4).

PRE-FLOP
zowl60 bets $15, doolitor folds, ZmejGorini4 calls $15, -Smiter- folds, -tegelsten- folds.

FLOP
zowl60 checks, ZmejGorini4 bets $44, zowl60 bets $176.45 and is all-in, ZmejGorini4 calls $132.45.

SHOWDOWN
zowl60 shows
ZmejGorini4 wins $385.90.

Hand2.

Seat 1: pancu11 ($108.00 in chips)
Seat 7: doolitor ($609.40 in chips)
Seat 8: ZmejGorini4 ($1,172.70 in chips)
Seat 10: -Smiter- ($351.60 in chips)
ANTES/BLINDS
ZmejGorini4 posts blind ($2), -Smiter- posts blind ($4).

PRE-FLOP
pancu11 folds, doolitor folds, ZmejGorini4 bets $12, -Smiter- calls $10.

FLOP
ZmejGorini4 bets $40, -Smiter- calls $40.

TURN
ZmejGorini4 checks, -Smiter- bets $100, ZmejGorini4 folds.

Hand3.

Seat 1: pancu11 ($103.00 in chips)
Seat 4: giorgiao ($183.40 in chips)
Seat 7: doolitor ($574.40 in chips)
Seat 8: ZmejGorini4 ($1,089.10 in chips)
Seat 10: -Smiter- ($427.80 in chips)
ANTES/BLINDS
pancu11 posts blind ($2), giorgiao posts blind ($4).

PRE-FLOP
doolitor folds, ZmejGorini4 bets $11, -Smiter- folds, pancu11 folds, giorgiao calls $7.

FLOP
giorgiao checks, ZmejGorini4 bets $8, giorgiao bets $28, ZmejGorini4 calls $20.

TURN
giorgiao bets $35, ZmejGorini4 bets $450, giorgiao calls $109.40 and is all-in.

RIVER

SHOWDOWN
giorgiao mucks cards
ZmejGorini4 wins $671.40.

Hand4.

There were some hands when I won pots bluffing by either underbetting or overbetting pots. Just instead of a normal CB I bet 1/3 or 4/3 pot. Well there were also some pots that I lost this way.

i think the idea of varying your bet-size is interesting, but i wonder about it's utility.

the overbet actually seems pretty decent, but i'd worry about getting floated like in hand 2. for example, if i'm going to float someone and rep a big flopped hand and/or scarecards on the turn, you're just bloating the pot for me. you're not really going to have a hand often enough to take the heat, and the overbet makes it look like you want to take it down early. i realize that you will have hands sometimes in your mix, but how often is that?

the underbet looks like a disaster waiting to happen. you have the potential of giving good pot odds to villains if they're drawing, or you tip off your hand strength if you have a big hand (kind of like in hand 3, but maybe on a different flop).

i dunno, i think the underbet is useful for high-level tight games with lots of subtle gamesmanship. the online ram and jam games just seem less appropriate for this kind of finesse.


anyway, looking forward to the journal.

I completely agree on mixing up under/over bets with a variety of hand strengths yet I think there will a good degree of boards were 3/4 and 2/3 pot bets will do just fine. Again much will depend on the player and their hand reading skills plus level of attentiveness. I also agree there is much to be said about bet sizing to manipulate your opponent into doing what you want them to do.

2nd entry.

Thanks for the support, didn't expect that there would be much interest in a purely strategic journal. A good way to keep me motivated though .

So, a new entry. A random hand that wasn't posted in NL forum, becuse I think I know where I did mistakes, but probably it still can be of interest.

But first a comment concerning Electrolux input.
From the optimal strategy view point (see 'Math' of poker' or may be one of my comments) there is no single CORRECT way of playing a hand. For every betting pattern that we choose (underbetting and overbetting included) there should be a variety of possible holdings that we can play this way. And as you correctly mention, we need to find proper frequencies making our overall strategy unexploitable (optimal).

What are these frquencies? Well, that's the main point of developing this strategy. My rough guess that I am going to use right now is a 70:20:10 strategy. It means that in 70% case I will use the line that I believe to be 'correct': making a CB of 2/3 of the pot, for example, then goes my second best choice in 20% cases, let say making an overbet of 5/4 of the pot, and then in 10% of cases my third choice, underbet of 1/4 of the pot. Depending on the flop and my holdings these choices can be changed, but right now I want to stick to 70/20/10.


Now the hand.

400NL, SH
Opponent in this hand is a fish, something like 70/10/1.5, don't remember exactly.
We all have full stacks, fish is in BB, I am OTB with . SB is a mediocre player.

Preflop:
I raise to 12 OTB, SB calls, BB calls.

Flop (36) :
SB bets 4, BB calls, I raise to 44, SB folds, BB calls.

Turn (128):
BB checks, I bet 111, BB calls.

River (350):
BB bets AI (230), I call 230.









Ok, now analysis of my mistakes. There I think that that's a case of compounding mistakes. First, a raise preflop led to a bigger pot on flop, this way it was likely that I'll be AI on the river with 3 pot sized bets on flop, turn and river.
( I am kidding about preflop of course. )
On the flop I should have called this tiny bet, in fact, when I saw this flop I was going to check behind, but I have a reflex of raising these tiny leads (I work on it now, though). Now if I bet flop there is even more reason to bet turn, as I suppose that a large part of BB holdings are draws (or weak Aces), so a turn bet follows from a flop bet.

On the river I thought that he tried to push me off a split with Ax, but now with some experience I think that a thought of pushing someone off a draw is to developed for such players. All in all river is closr to a fold than to call.

---------------------------------------------
Let's see how the hand would have played if I went with my original plan of checking the flop. So I call this tiny bet, pot is 48, if BB bets pot on turn I just call exercising pot control, as if he is on a draw I effectively charge it anyway. If it is checked to me I bet about pot charging draws, and what is important, that comparing to a flop bet turn bet has higher EV if opponent is on a draw (there is only one card to come). So on the river pot is 128, if he pushes I have an easy fold, if he bets pot I would use my judgement (hint: call on the table, fold in analysis). Anyway the outcome would be better.
---------------------------------------------

Someone can object saying that I propose flop lines basing on information that was not available at the moment. Well, I believe that flop check is a correct line here.The rest just shows how would the hand played out. Don't forget that on flop I am not a big favorite against a pair + a heart hand (with 2 cards to come), so flop bet has very small +EV against opponent calling range when he is behind, and it's a big -EV bet when I am behind (take into account a bet that will follow on a blank turn). What is interesting about this hand is the effect of compounding mistakes, flop mistake led to a bigger one on turn and finally to a bad river call.

P.S. I was kidding about preflop, read in white after that paragraph. Opponent floped immortal nuts.