a DERB hand

[catlover]

Party 50/100. DERB is SB with A /images/graemlins/heart.gif 4 /images/graemlins/heart.gif.

Folded to Hijack who openraises. DERB 3-bets and they take the flop heads up.

Q /images/graemlins/club.gif 6 /images/graemlins/heart.gif 5 /images/graemlins/club.gif
Check, bet, call.

Turn 4 /images/graemlins/diamond.gif
Check, bet, call.

River 8 /images/graemlins/diamond.gif
Bet, call.

DERB takes the pot as hijack shows 22.

Can anybody explain the river bet? To me, DERB's hand sure looks like "too good to bluff, not good enough to value bet."

[Paluka]

I think his flop check is the most baffling part of the hand.

[newhizzle]

[ QUOTE ]
Can anybody explain the river bet? To me, DERB's hand sure looks like "too good to bluff, not good enough to value bet."


[/ QUOTE ]

i like his river bet, ace high will call here but will not bet, i also dont get his flop check

[flawless_victory]

i like the way he played this hand

[bxpeter]

Since DERB 3-bet preflop and then went with check-call on the flop and turn (i have no clue what thats all about), he can't give his opponent credit for anything. I think he would have just check-called the river if it didn't put that 4-straight out there. But now, ace-high probably won't value bet and its very unlikely that the oppoenent will bluff raise him. Given Derb's image he probably expects that many players will call with ace high.

So, vs. checking the river, he gains a bet when ace-high calls and loses the same if opponent has a better hand. (I assume derb doesn't fold on the river if he checks)

[mike l.]

im pretty sure derb calls a river raise right? and that's why he's a donk and will be broke soon. if you all say he'll bet fold that river then im wrong and he's a genius. but in that one street lies the answer. that flop check could be hints of genius. talk about unreadable.

[newhizzle]

im almost positive hes calling a raise

[bxpeter]

i can't imagine that he would call a river raise... but who knows. Part of the reason why he makes those crazy calls on the end has got to be to prevent people from bluffing at him in a situation like this.

[mike l.]

"im almost positive hes calling a raise"

ok. play against him as much as possible then.

[mike l.]

right but that river call there is clearly -EV once derb bets and gets raised. the play then would be check-call, not bet-call. that's not a bet-call hand or board.

[sthief09]

[ QUOTE ]
right but that river call there is clearly -EV once derb bets and gets raised. the play then would be check-call, not bet-call. that's not a bet-call hand or board.

[/ QUOTE ]

the only problem is that he played his hand in a way that suggests he has nothing. his opponent can only put him on A7 or nothing pretty much. he 3-bet preflop then check-called twice. that is very weak. then he donks on the river. it's almost like he's inviting a bluff raise

[bxpeter]

Yeah, i'm saying that the reason why he would make seemingly retarded calls in other hands is so that he can play hands this way and safely bet-fold this river.

[tongni]

[ QUOTE ]
im pretty sure derb calls a river raise right? and that's why he's a donk and will be broke soon. if you all say he'll bet fold that river then im wrong and he's a genius. but in that one street lies the answer. that flop check could be hints of genius. talk about unreadable.

[/ QUOTE ]

I really don't think he gets raised very often on the river at all, and if he does he should probably pay off. When hands are played strangely often times weird things happen and of all rivers this is one of the most "bluffable" but one that probably didn't improve his opponents hand. If I got to the river in this fashion I would probably pay it off as well.

[bxpeter]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
right but that river call there is clearly -EV once derb bets and gets raised. the play then would be check-call, not bet-call. that's not a bet-call hand or board.

[/ QUOTE ]

the only problem is that he played his hand in a way that suggests he has nothing. his opponent can only put him on A7 or nothing pretty much. he 3-bet preflop then check-called twice. that is very weak. then he donks on the river. it's almost like he's inviting a bluff raise

[/ QUOTE ]

exactly, except that newhizzle won't bluff raise him because he is positive derb is calling with any pair (and I am assuming derb knows this)

[Lestat]

This is a common bet I see all the time on Party. The idea behind such a bet is that the scary board insures a bet for value won't get raised. FWIW- I often raise the river when faced with these bets for exactly this reason.

In DERB's case it is a pretty good two-way bet. Since he can have anything he's not likely to get raised, but will also get curiousity calls by worse hands.

I wonder what he does if raised? I'll bet he pays off.

[newhizzle]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
right but that river call there is clearly -EV once derb bets and gets raised. the play then would be check-call, not bet-call. that's not a bet-call hand or board.

[/ QUOTE ]

the only problem is that he played his hand in a way that suggests he has nothing. his opponent can only put him on A7 or nothing pretty much. he 3-bet preflop then check-called twice. that is very weak. then he donks on the river. it's almost like he's inviting a bluff raise

[/ QUOTE ]

exactly, except that newhizzle won't bluff raise him because he is positive derb is calling with any pair (and I am assuming derb knows this)

[/ QUOTE ]

i have nothing to do with this hand

[bxpeter]

obviously, i just mean anyone who thinks that derb will call with any pair which seems to be the majority.

[Paluka]

[ QUOTE ]
im pretty sure derb calls a river raise right? and that's why he's a donk and will be broke soon. if you all say he'll bet fold that river then im wrong and he's a genius. but in that one street lies the answer. that flop check could be hints of genius. talk about unreadable.


[/ QUOTE ]

How does the flop check make him unreadable? If he had pocket kings, he would have bet. He flopped nothing, so he checked. Is that what we are calling "unreadable" now? Sounds more like "readable".
And he absolutely calls the river raise.

[mike l.]

"it's almost like he's inviting a bluff raise"

donk bets oftentimes indicate a small pair, instead of a complete bluff. that Q on the flop makes the hand rather bluff free. even derb cant have KT that often here.

[mike l.]

"How does the flop check make him unreadable? If he had pocket kings, he would have bet. He flopped nothing, so he checked."

right except for the part where he 3 bet pf. if he would never check KK or TT, A5 or AK (all defendable as a varying your play weirdness) here than youre right his flop check is awful. but i was assuming he would sometimes check those hands, since youve all said he plays erratic.

"And he absolutely calls the river raise."

ok then he sucks. but he's so much in the head of some of you guys that calling a river raise there is getting defense on here lol. i was willing to give him some credit for the flop check being a strange change up, but the river bet-call is atrocious here.

[mike l.]

3 betting the river would be more correct if it was really right for him to call the river raise so much in this hand. which it cant be.

[newhizzle]

[ QUOTE ]
"How does the flop check make him unreadable? If he had pocket kings, he would have bet. He flopped nothing, so he checked."

right except for the part where he 3 bet pf. if he would never check KK or TT, A5 or AK (all defendable as a varying your play weirdness) here than youre right his flop check is awful. but i was assuming he would sometimes check those hands, since youve all said he plays erratic.


[/ QUOTE ]

i could see him checking QQ here, maybe, i dont know if DERB would, but his friend Kukavica is checking it close to 100% of the time

[Paluka]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
"How does the flop check make him unreadable? If he had pocket kings, he would have bet. He flopped nothing, so he checked."

right except for the part where he 3 bet pf. if he would never check KK or TT, A5 or AK (all defendable as a varying your play weirdness) here than youre right his flop check is awful. but i was assuming he would sometimes check those hands, since youve all said he plays erratic.


[/ QUOTE ]

i could see him checking QQ here, maybe, i dont know if DERB would, but his friend Kukavica is checking it close to 100% of the time

[/ QUOTE ]

Checking QQ here isn't that unusual.

[mikelow]

that's why he's running so well...he is so unreadable.

Heck, I thought you might value bet bottom pair. /images/graemlins/smirk.gif

[elindauer]

[ QUOTE ]
im pretty sure derb calls a river raise right? and that's why he's a donk and will be broke soon. if you all say he'll bet fold that river then im wrong and he's a genius. but in that one street lies the answer. that flop check could be hints of genius. talk about unreadable.


[/ QUOTE ]

I've been thinking a lot about these heads up metagame strategies recently, and have a few thoughts on your claim, mike.

First, we need to note that he doesn't have to handle the river the same against everyone. Maybe his default strategy is to bet and call a raise. Why? Well, to understand this you have to back up a bit and think about what the other guy is going to do.

Will the opponent call with ace high? Will he bluff raise? If so, how often? Will he fold a pair below queens? If so, how often? All pairs, or just the weaker ones? Will he call with 22?


By default, we really don't know the answers to these questions. A good default line is to bet / fold, as has been suggested here. But constantly bet / folding is an exploitable strategy, as I have said over and over on this board recently. So the ideal strategy is a mixed one, where we fold to a raise some of the time.

How would anyone know if DERB was using a mixed strategy here? We'd see him bet / call sometimes and might assume he was always calling, right? What effect would that have on our game? We'd be inclined to stop bluff-raising the river, right? Isn't it possible that he keeps notes on his opponents and sees starts folding more often to the river raise after he gets shown 3 winners in a row by a player? Perhaps after 3 straight folds, or when his opponent raises more than 3 rivers in 25, he goes back to calling again.

How would you recognize this kind of advanced strategy? Wouldn't it look just like a donk for the most part? You'd probably see the one bad call, and then assume that future folds were just missed club draws, right?


This is exactly why we need to start talking about mixed strategies on these boards. I think there's a great depth to the game that is being overlooked here. I suspect that the best players understand this intuitively and do mix their strategy but either don't conciously recognize what they are doing or don't discuss it here. The closest we come is to say something like "I was mixing up my play" and leave it at that. "I'd do that sometimes" is considered a complete answer here. Huh? How often is sometimes? How do you decide when? Why those percentages and not something else?

my 2 cents.
eric

great post. Wouldnt surprise me at all if DERB kept notes like this and thats why his play seem so strange at times. He is just testing his opponents like Maverick in the saloon.. /images/graemlins/smile.gif

[elindauer]

[ QUOTE ]
i was willing to give him some credit for the flop check being a strange change up, but the river bet-call is atrocious here.

[/ QUOTE ]

Atrocious? With no read given on the hijack, no idea of the history of heads up play between these two players, you are ready to condemn this play as definitely terrible? Seems to me that you may be jumping the gun here.

I mean, this is 50/100, so it's very reasonable to assume that these guys may know each other well. Perhaps villain usually calls with ace high and worse, but bluff raises often enough for a call to be good. Is this so hard to imagine?

my 2 cents.
Eric

[Paluka]

Who thinks DERB calls the turn even if it misses him completely?

[elindauer]

[ QUOTE ]
right but that river call there is clearly -EV once derb bets and gets raised. the play then would be check-call, not bet-call. that's not a bet-call hand or board.

[/ QUOTE ]

Mike, would you agree that if DERB always folds to a raise here, then calling might eventually become +EV? Can't he call and then fold the next 20 times in this situation, only to then call again?

-Eric

[Turning Stone Pro]

My experience with DERB (and it is extensive) leads me to believe he will fold to a river raise.

I like his river bet - no one except someone well-versed in PP (who is familiar with the turn and river donk-bet tendencies as another poster mentioned) will have the balls to raise him, so he perhaps gets paid off by high cards and he could possibly get a middle-pair type hand to muck. For sure, he has to call (or, more aptly put, is gonna call) a river bet if he checks, so why not bet?

TSP

[elindauer]

I find it interesting that many people think DERB will DEFINITELY call a raise, while at least one person believes he is probably going to fold to a raise.

This is exactly the kind of confusion a mixed strategy would cause in a field of players who believe there must be one right answer. To take this further, based on the number of players who think he'll call and the size of the pot, I'll guess that DERB's mixed strategy here about coincides with the size of the pot, ie, he's handling a raise with the triple:

{10, 90, 0}

-Eric

[Paluka]

[ QUOTE ]
I find it interesting that many people think DERB will DEFINITELY call a raise, while at least one person believes he is probably going to fold to a raise.

This is exactly the kind of confusion a mixed strategy would cause in a field of players who believe there must be one right answer. To take this further, based on the number of players who think he'll call and the size of the pot, I'll guess that DERB's mixed strategy here about coincides with the size of the pot, ie, he's handling a raise with the triple:

{10, 90, 0}

-Eric


[/ QUOTE ]

No way man, I bet it is 12,87,1.

[Nigel]

[ QUOTE ]
Who thinks DERB calls the turn even if it misses him completely?

[/ QUOTE ]

He calls turn and river, even if both miss him. He does not fold A high here. He also would never fold to a raise on the river. He should know that his opponents know this and therefore could safely fold 100% with his current image, but he doesn't.

His river play is not mixed strategy. He doesn't even care what his opponents have, he only cares what he has - see his flop check on this hand for further evidence of that point.

[mike l.]

"Perhaps villain usually calls with ace high and worse, but bluff raises often enough for a call to be good. Is this so hard to imagine?"

that's not at all hard to imagine but it's part of what makes a bet-call here awful. if derb bet-calls here it means he's playing by the seat of his pants: he doesnt have a plan for each street, he just reacts when presented with the consequences of his most recent decision. that's how donks play. because of the one card straight on board and the Q on the flop and the fact it went to 3 bets preflop it's correct for derb to bet if he gets called enough by A high or worse pair, OR it's correct for him to check and let cutoff bet if he's the type to bluff a lot. but it's not both ways. there are other boards and other scenarios where it can be both but this is not one of them. if derb had something like TT then this might turn into a bet-call scenario depending on the opponent. but for derb to bet-call this board means he is playing on the fly and while his instincts may be good at times due to experience, he's basically a donk.

[mike l.]

"A good default line is to bet / fold"

i disagree. i think this is generally a bad play online where the player are more erratic and aggressive.

but i understand and agree with your mixed strategy to an extent. it's basically an extension of sklansky's concept of "game theory". except really that generally applies to total unknown opponents. and then we're back to defaults. which we all agree are wrong.

the game is situational. there are no defaults. there's always a best play and it's oftentimes detectable, and, more often than would seem to be possible, it's counterintuitive as well.

the thing is a mixed strategy works best on the flop and turn and when making a choice between calling or raising. at least that will instill the greatest confusion in your opponents, if that's your thing. if you make a mixed strategy fold the only one who knows about it is you. folds still need to be dictated by pot and implied odds and knowing your opponent.

what if we think about folding (and check-folding) always being the default play in any scenario and street and anything other than that being the entire mixed strategy matrix of possible check-calls, bet-folds, check-raises, call-reraises, etc, etc.

[NLfool]

I haven't read all the responses but I hate how the hijack played this. 22 in the hijack sucks in a heads ups or battle for the blinds. I mean you're better off with 89 as you're going to make a continuation bet regardless and you'll get the fold if he misses with 22 or air. You'll hit better draws pairs and etc. Plus 22 sucks against a player like DERB

If you get 3 bet with 22 well I would hope with position you'd cap it and take control for only a SB which is a bargain.

to me 22 is the worst hand in this situation against this player. Gives you just enough to stick around but really it's not enough

[mike l.]

agreed. the 22 is a ridiculous hand bound to be played ridiculously. which it was.

[elindauer]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I find it interesting that many people think DERB will DEFINITELY call a raise, while at least one person believes he is probably going to fold to a raise.

This is exactly the kind of confusion a mixed strategy would cause in a field of players who believe there must be one right answer. To take this further, based on the number of players who think he'll call and the size of the pot, I'll guess that DERB's mixed strategy here about coincides with the size of the pot, ie, he's handling a raise with the triple:

{10, 90, 0}

-Eric


[/ QUOTE ]

No way man, I bet it is 12,87,1.

[/ QUOTE ]

You seem to be making fun of me for trying to give numbers here. The real comedy is that so few people are willing to see that it can be something other than definitely fold, or definitely call.

Of course I don't know exactly. I don't even know for sure he's using a mixed strategy. I'm just trying to give an estimate of what he seems to be doing. I thought that would be obvious, but apparently not.

-Eric

[elindauer]

[ QUOTE ]
He calls turn and river, even if both miss him. He does not fold A high here. He also would never fold to a raise on the river...

His river play is not mixed strategy. He doesn't even care what his opponents have, he only cares what he has - see his flop check on this hand for further evidence of that point.

[/ QUOTE ]

Please give some evidence for how the hell you could possibly know any of this. You state this like you know it for a fact. I find this virtually impossible to believe.

I don't know that he's using a mixed strategy. I'm simply noting the following facts which suggest he may be:

- mixed strategies are good and profitable
- it would be hard to recognize someone using one
- there is lots of confusion about how DERB plays, including dissension about whether or not he would fold to a raise here. this confusion is consistent with a mixed strategy
- DERB seems to be winning consistently and we're having a hard time explaining why any other way


Somehow you just know this is not what's happening. You choose wording like he does not, he can't, and he never... Please explain how you've hit on this insight.

-Eric

PS. In my short sessions with DERB, I found that he folded the river in many spots that surprised me. My short experience is not consistent with your "always / never" analysis above.

[elindauer]

At the risk of sounding like I'm arguing just to argue, let me point out a few minor disagreements with what you wrote:

[ QUOTE ]
but i understand and agree with your mixed strategy to an extent. it's basically an extension of sklansky's concept of "game theory".

[/ QUOTE ]

It is game theory. I'm not so arrogant as to believe that I have invented anything new here. Just trying to give it a name and make it more easily used as an analysis tool.

If you research existing poker bots, you'll find that the best ones use this triple concept already. I'm just trying to point it out to the forum.

[ QUOTE ]
... except really that generally applies to total unknown opponents...

[/ QUOTE ]

Not at all. It applies very well to opponents who are good enough to adjust to what we are doing, which means it applies to lots of players that play mid and high limit poker. If we always call in a spot, they stop bluffing. But then we'd want to fold. But always folding causes them to bluff a lot... so we need a mixed strategy to hold them off.

[ QUOTE ]
there's always a best play and it's oftentimes detectable, and, more often than would seem to be possible, it's counterintuitive as well.

[/ QUOTE ]

I basically agree that at any given moment, there is one best play and that it is often times detectable. What you have to keep in mind though is that against good players, our plays change the way they play us. So, given a hand in a vaccuum, we have to consider that folding may cause them to raise more, making calling right next time, which makes folding right the time after that which... we can simplify this by writing {50, 50, 0}.

[ QUOTE ]
the thing is a mixed strategy works best on the flop and turn and when making a choice between calling or raising. at least that will instill the greatest confusion in your opponents, if that's your thing.

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree that mixed strategies have applications in many spots on the flop and turn when deciding to bluff / semi-bluff. I don't agree that it's not just as useful on the river when deciding both when to value bet / raise / bluff and when to call such bets.

[ QUOTE ]
if you make a mixed strategy fold the only one who knows about it is you.

[/ QUOTE ]

So? That can be a great thing. Say I call down with ace high when check-raised on the turn, but I only do it 20% of the time. Well, those showdowns provide a lot of deterrence against my opponent semi-bluffing me on the turn, right? If your theory is correct, he'll now assume that I always call down with ace high, and will bluff far too seldom. Since I'm folding 80% of the time, I'm taking quite a bit of advantage of this tendency, and would like to keep it that way. If he knew what I was really doing, he'd be better off bluffing more. But he probably won't. This may well be exactly how DERB uses his loosey goosey image to fold lots of other times with mediocre or even strong hands without detection.

[ QUOTE ]
folds still need to be dictated by pot and implied odds and knowing your opponent.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes, of course you are right here. Pot odds should have a major bearing on the fold percentage in the triple. Just because the pot is big doesn't mean you should never fold though, right? Maybe you only fold 1% of the time in the big pots.

[ QUOTE ]
what if we think about folding (and check-folding) always being the default play in any scenario and street and anything other than that being the entire mixed strategy matrix of possible check-calls, bet-folds, check-raises, call-reraises, etc, etc.

[/ QUOTE ]

This seems to be just a rewording of what I've been saying all along, but perhaps I don't understand what you mean exactly.

-Eric

[DcifrThs]

dude, this hand is like a train wreck w/o complete knowledge on the flop. wtf is that? what hands does he check with after 3 betting preflop?

that right there has to be exploitable in some way. how often does he fold after checking the flop after 3betting pf from the sb?

-Barron

[tongni]

[ QUOTE ]
I find it interesting that many people think DERB will DEFINITELY call a raise, while at least one person believes he is probably going to fold to a raise.

This is exactly the kind of confusion a mixed strategy would cause in a field of players who believe there must be one right answer. To take this further, based on the number of players who think he'll call and the size of the pot, I'll guess that DERB's mixed strategy here about coincides with the size of the pot, ie, he's handling a raise with the triple:

{10, 90, 0}

-Eric

[/ QUOTE ]

This post makes me want to kill myself. The content is alright, but why do we have to come up with stupider and stupider ways to describe "call 10% of the time and fold 90% of the time", or whatever you are trying to describe here. I forgot what position means what, so this might as well be "checkraise 90% of the time 3bet 10% of the time.

Can we please stop making it so much more complex than it really is? Enough of this regression analysis, crazy graphs and multivariable calclus to show that calling the river with AK on a 8553J board is a mistake of .01 BB, and the phrase "If we run it through twodimes against his range of hands. ." I don't even remember what regression analysis means anymore. Can we just say stuff like "I'd probably fold here but I might look him up once in a while." or do we need little brackets and commas to prove that we are winning players? If so:

{{{}}{}{{}}{{}{{{{{{}{}{}{{ , , , , , , , 10, 41, 0{{{{{{{[{{

In summary: If he's bluffing, call. If not I would probably lay it down.

[Lestat]

elindauer-

You're too good to make fun of. But isn't what you're talking about nothing more than game theory?

[Noo Yawk]

I don't see the brillance in representing a straight on the river. He got lucky and got called by a pair of 2's. He could have gotten unlucky and been called by 5's. If he was trying to get a better hand to fold he picked the wrong opponent.

I think you guys are overthinking DERB.

[newhizzle]

[ QUOTE ]
I don't see the brillance in representing a straight on the river. He got lucky and got called by a pair of 2's. He could have gotten unlucky and been called by 5's. If he was trying to get a better hand to fold he picked the wrong opponent.

I think you guys are overthinking DERB.

[/ QUOTE ]

i dont think he was necessarily trying to represent the straight, this is a standard value bet in my oppinion

he is going to be good more often when he is called than when he checks and his opponent bets and his opponent will check behind a lot of hands that would call a bet

[newhizzle]

heres a fun one, this just happened:

DERB is BB

Party Poker 50.00/100.00 Hold'em <font color="#0000FF">(10 handed)</font> link (http://www.darksun.lunarpages.com/poker/)

Preflop: Hero is Button with J/images/graemlins/club.gif, Q/images/graemlins/club.gif.
<font color="#666666">2 folds</font>, <font color="#CC3333">MP1 raises</font>, <font color="#666666">2 folds</font>, CO calls, Hero calls, <font color="#666666">1 folds</font>, DERB calls.

Flop: (8.50 SB) T/images/graemlins/spade.gif, 8/images/graemlins/diamond.gif, 9/images/graemlins/heart.gif <font color="#0000FF">(4 players)</font>
<font color="#CC3333">DERB bets</font>, MP1 folds, CO folds, <font color="#CC3333">Hero raises</font>, <font color="#CC3333">DERB 3-bets</font>, <font color="#CC3333">Hero caps</font>, DERB calls.

Turn: (8.25 BB) K/images/graemlins/heart.gif <font color="#0000FF">(2 players)</font>
<font color="#CC3333">DERB bets</font>, <font color="#CC3333">Hero raises</font>, <font color="#CC3333">DERB 3-bets</font>, <font color="#CC3333">Hero caps</font>, DERB calls.

River: (16.25 BB) 3/images/graemlins/diamond.gif <font color="#0000FF">(2 players)</font>
DERB checks, <font color="#CC3333">Hero bets</font>, DERB folds.

Final Pot: 17.25 BB.

any thoughts on what he might have had?

[wheelz]

J/images/graemlins/heart.gifx/images/graemlins/heart.gif where x != a card on the board

[elindauer]

[ QUOTE ]
elindauer-

You're too good to make fun of. But isn't what you're talking about nothing more than game theory?

[/ QUOTE ]


You got it Lestat. That's exactly it. Straight out of Theory of Poker. I think we need to approach a lot more of these situations by first finding the game theory solution, or something close to it, and then adjusting from there.

I think many cases where we end up kind of stumped are simple the ones where we don't know enough about the opponent to make a decision, so we don't make any. Instead, we should answer those posts with a game theory solution.

I suspect that doing this would open a whole new world of metagame discussion that we are only now just barely acknowledging.

On a personal note, these last fews days I've been thinking a lot about some of the heads up lines I take and how they might be improved by employing a few mixed strategies. Where would these strategies be appropriate? How would my opponents react to them? I've been on a wild ride of discovery, and that's just what I can come up with on my own. I can only imagine the breakthroughs we'd get if everybody collaborated on this stuff.

-Eric

[Lestat]

You make some great points. The only thing I would add is, let's not forget game theory is best applied against opponents who are equally matched in playing skills.

I believe Sklansky uses the example of the childhood game rock,paper,scissors. It's possible for your opponent to have (or develop) tendencies or patterns which are exploitable. Now, you do better to simply continue exploiting these tendencies rather than resorting to any kind of game theory. It's only when your opponent starts making decisions as well as you (thereby taking away your edge), that game theory becomes necessary.

So against "unkown" opponents (particularly online), I often err on the side of paying off to learn what his tendencies are and see if he is exploitable. I find that most players fall into 2 catagories. a). They play poorly, or b). They multi-table and resort to patternistic tendencies. It is rare I find someone good enough to where I need to resort to game theory.

But again, your point is well taken. These tougher players do exist (many of them post on here), and game theory should not be overlooked.

[Chris Callahan]

[ QUOTE ]
i can't imagine that he would call a river raise... but who knows. Part of the reason why he makes those crazy calls on the end has got to be to prevent people from bluffing at him in a situation like this.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think so too. The solid approach if you are going to make thin value bets like this is to fold to a raise with the bottom end of your betting range. A4 is probably at the bottom, so if DERB has some brains he will likely fold that hand.

This means DERB (correctly) will pay off a raise most of the time (e.g. with A8), but not always. Maybe those who are saying DERB always calls here are confusing "always" with "most of the time"?