River semi-bluff (yes, river) vs. Heisenb3rg
 

I thought this was a pretty interesting hand.

PokerStars $10/$20 Limit Hold'em - 6 players
Hand Converter Tool from DeucesCracked.com

Preflop: Hero is BB with J[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img], K[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]
UTG folds, MP calls, CO folds, Button folds, <font color="#FF0000">SB raises</font>, Hero calls, MP calls.

Flop: (6.00 SB) J[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img], 6[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img], 4[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] <font color="#0000FF">(3 players)</font>
<font color="#FF0000">SB bets</font>, <font color="#FF0000">Hero raises</font>, MP folds, SB calls.

Turn: (5.00 BB) 3[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] <font color="#0000FF">(2 players)</font>
SB checks, <font color="#FF0000">Hero bets</font>, <font color="#FF0000">SB raises</font>, Hero calls.

River: (9.00 BB) 7[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] <font color="#0000FF">(2 players)</font>
<font color="#FF0000">SB bets</font>, <font color="#FF0000">Hero raises</font>, SB folds.

Final Pot: 11.00 BB


Board: Jc 6d 4s 3d 7d
Dead:

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 31.250% 25.00% 06.25% 12 3.00 { KcJd }
Hand 1: 68.750% 62.50% 06.25% 30 3.00 { JJ+, 66, 44, AJs, KJs, QJs, J9s+, AJo, KJo, QJo }

So on the river against (what I think is) his range, I obviously don't have enough equity to raise for value. Its also a pretty easy call getting 10:1. What I'm wondering is if it is more profitable to raise this river.

Heisenb3rg is a very disciplined player from what I've seen, so he can definitely make correct, tough folds. I can credibly represent a number of hands that are beating an overpair or AJ. J[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]X[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] is definitely in my range, as is J7s, J5s, 55, 77, 57s, etc. If I'm wrong and he calls his entire range, its not a 1BB mistake, as I still have 31% equity. Hence, semi-bluff. What do you think? Comments on rest of hand are also welcome (preflop 3bet?), but it seems pretty standard.

Re: River semi-bluff (yes, river) vs. Heisenb3rg
 

i'm sorry but this is just madness. you are throwing basic principles of game theory out the window.

Re: River semi-bluff (yes, river) vs. Heisenb3rg
 

Doesn't Heisenberg have a WtSD% of like 41?

Re: River semi-bluff (yes, river) vs. Heisenb3rg
 

yea heisenberg isnt reraise bluffing this blank turn much at all IMO, i am proly folding to his turn raise

either way, if i decide to play on i am not reraising the river

u got him to fold so ur looking at it in hindsight, it wasnt a good play

Re: River semi-bluff (yes, river) vs. Heisenb3rg
 

I personally love your thought process here. Whether it's misapplied or not, I am not sure, but I'm convinced that if you continually approach every hand with this kind of intensity you will be a big winner over your poker lifetime.

I think raising rivers with calling hands is an art that very few players have perfected. Naturally this type of play should be done against players who can make somewhat big folds, and those type of players are most likely to be tags.

Here's an ad hoc list I have concocted to help evaluate the merits to this value/bluff river raise:

1) Does it appear that you picked your victim wisely? Yes, Heisen is a tag.

2) Is the river card unlikely to help your opponent? Yes.

3) Can you logically represent this river card? Yes, since you called from the BB, it is certainly possible for you to have 5x or XdXd and your opponent still has the additional worry that you 5 outed him.

4) Is the river card scary enough to get your opponent to possibly fold? A somewhat subjective question, but a good river card for you is a card that completes atleast two possible draws you could have, and this river card satisfies that requirement. When two possible draws hit and a tag knows that you can logically have both and he also knows you couldve just 5 outed him, then your river raise has a chance of getting a better one pair hand to fold.

5) Is the tag significantly more likely to have one pair here instead of 2pair+? IMO, the answer is yes. Given the way Heisen played this hand I believe he is much more likely to have a one pair hand becuz most tags IMO would 3bet/lead with a set OOP and Heisen cant have 2 pair for obvious reasons.

6) Is Heisen capable of bet/folding or making expert laydowns? I have never played with Heisen so Im not sure.

7) Do you have the proper image to pull this play off?

8) Do you already have a calling hand on the river? Yes, you beat JTs/QJs/ and you tie KJ. Thats enough to call.

If the answer to each one of these questions is yes, then you have a very compelling case supporting a river value/bluff raise. Also it is worth noting that we need Heisen to fold a better hand more than 1/12 times to make raising the river better than calling. Folding the same hand would be coup also.

Again, I would like to reiterate that I love the way you played this hand whether the river raise is correct or not.

Re: River semi-bluff (yes, river) vs. Heisenb3rg
 

ILP,
FPS much? This is the kind of thing that can give you a very marginal additional edge when you apply it correctly, but will cost you a lot more if you misapply it.

Btw, I'd never fold a showdownable hand if I was Heis in this spot because of the "f*** him" factor (unless there was a ton of history).

Re: River semi-bluff (yes, river) vs. Heisenb3rg
 

"ILP,
FPS much?"

The answer is no, when I play poker I am genuinely trying to make the best play I can each stage of every street. I do not always succeed in this effort but thats my overall goal.

"This is the kind of thing that can give you a very marginal additional edge when you apply it correctly, but will cost you a lot more if you misapply it."

Even if this statement is true it doesnt add any insight to this dicussion. What youve just said can apply to many decisions in poker.

Obviously knowing when to execute this type of play will not add that much to our edge beucuz the right spot to deploy this play doesnt come up that often but doesnt this kind of thinking lead to a slippery slope? In other words, isn't it possible that this approach, of passing up several potentially profitable plays simply becuz our edge is small in each isolated case, can lead to a non-insignificant decrease in our overall winrate?

Shouldnt we all have an extensive playbook that covers all contingencies no matter how rare they may occur?

"Btw, I'd never fold a showdownable hand if I was Heis in this spot because f-villain (unless there was a ton of history)."

Well then that proves that this play should not be run against you.

BTW your statement that this play can cost you alot if you misapply it is not really true if one is putting the requisite thought process into making this play. Mistakes will be made cuz were human but this spot will not come up often enough for these mistakes to be costly.

It should be quite rare when it's correct to value/bluff raise the river after being check/raised on the turn. IMO, given that were playing from the BB, we have the right board to make this play. Can Heisen bet/fold here? Do we have the right image? Those are the questions I am not sure about, but I still love the OP's thought process. If there's ever a time to run this play. This could be it.

Re: River semi-bluff (yes, river) vs. Heisenb3rg
 

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Btw, I'd never fold a showdownable hand if I was Heis in this spot because of the "f*** him" factor (unless there was a ton of history).

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I would never even think of pulling this play off against anyone except an expert player like Heisenb3rg. I would never fold in his spot here either, but I am nowhere near the player that Heis is.

[ QUOTE ]
FPS much? This is the kind of thing that can give you a very marginal additional edge when you apply it correctly, but will cost you a lot more if you misapply it.

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Even if he calls 100% of the time, I'm only losing .7BB. Not a small number, I know, but this situation probably comes up once every couple thousand hands.

Oh, and at the time of this hand, I don't think I'd been caught bluffing at all by Heisenb3rg, so my image was probably solid/decent.

Re: River semi-bluff (yes, river) vs. Heisenb3rg
 

ILP, i disagree on so many counts.
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Here's an ad hoc list I have concocted to help evaluate the merits to this value/bluff river raise:

1) Does it appear that you picked your victim wisely? Yes, Heisen is a tag.


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disagree. heisen is very showdown bound. it's unlikely that he folds less than an optimal amount.

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2) Is the river card unlikely to help your opponent? Yes.


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disagree. heisen could have picked up a flush draw. if he had tptk why didn't he just 3-bet the flop?

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4) Is the river card scary enough to get your opponent to possibly fold?


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the question is not whether he can fold but whether he can fold a better hand.

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6) Is Heisen capable of bet/folding or making expert laydowns? I have never played with Heisen so Im not sure.


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b/f'ing this river wouldn't be an expert laydown, but rather a very exploitable play. heis (and other good players) tries very hard to avoid being exploitable.


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8) Do you already have a calling hand on the river? Yes, you beat JTs/QJs/ and you tie KJ. Thats enough to call.


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having a calling hand should make you less inclined to raise, not more.

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Also it is worth noting that we need Heisen to fold a better hand more than 1/12 times to make raising the river better than calling.

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yes. so if our equity is indeed 31%, he should fold 31%+1/12=39% of his hands. this would be a very exploitable strategy.

in general, it is game-theoretically suboptimal to raise with calling hands. whenever you are considering such a big deviation from optimal strategy, you better make sure your opponent is exploitable.

Re: River semi-bluff (yes, river) vs. Heisenb3rg
 

ILP,

Sorry if I came off as rude. That was not my intention.

It just seemed to me that if I need a 9-point plan to make this play where every factor has to fall into place I'd be much more likely to just botch it up. This is especially true in online poker where the action is so fast and you have 10-30 seconds to make the play.

It's probably theoretically sound though.

I disagree however with your conclusion that this would be a good play vs me because you are not a favorite vs my showdown range in that spot and therefore the raise is -EV if I'm never folding a better hand.