[SplawnDarts]

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I agree in general, see my response to the original poster. In fact I sort of contradicted myself with my response to you, I wasn't really trying to show that raising is in fact better, I was just trying to give an example of where theoretically your implied odds ratio is worse but your overall +EV is better.

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Sure - that's a good point. With sufficiently bad opponents I absolutely believe that can happen. Especially if they underbet made hands and then the rest of them gang-call with air after the flop.

It's just that it's very hard already to draw profitably in NL against a tough lineup. Hell, you could go your whole life and never try to do it except on a semi-bluff and be a winner. But anyways, it's so hard that I think you need every edge you can get including maximal implied odds.