Everyone please read this. (free card play)

[ArturiusX]

The free card play may sound all warm and rosy; seeing a free turn/river card, but it must be used SPARINGLY. Its not a play to be used every single time you flop overcards with position.

The free card play works best when:

1) Obviously on the button
2) Heads up (maybe with one other opponent)
3) All opponents are very passive.

LAGs are not the type of player you want to try the free card play on. Regularly 'bet any kind of hand' fish are not the ones to try the play on. Passives that like to see showdowns for the bare minimum, no matter what hand they're holding is who we want to target.

So this means, to try for the free card play, WE NEED A READ. Pokertrackers enough though. If someone barely shows aggression post flop, with a high range of hands they play preflop, the free card play might work. Make sure your read is a good one.

Next point; backdoor draws are your friend. Backdoor flush draws, gut shots and even backdoor straight draws are all very nice bonuses we can use. If we have a ton of outs, but no made hand vs a suspected mediocre hand (bottom pair and the like), and the hand holder is a passive player, the free card play will allow us to see both turn/river and obviously hit our draw and win the pot, or miss and fold cheaply.

Another point, the free card play works BEST with a scary board, but an unlikely hand. 972 of rags isn't neccesarily the best board; your opponents know its drawless, and will try and spike some miscellenous hand. A better flop would be: JT[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] 4 [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]. Why? Its a much scarier board, its also a board we're likely to have lots of backdoor draws too; hopefully we hold a diamond, if we have AK or AQ we have a gutshot, KQ has a open-straight draw.

Now in the above situation, our equity is huge, we have multiple ways to make the nuts, and overcards will likely win it for us too. So we raise because we not only want a free card, but because we're the favourite to take the pot vs 1 or 2 random hands. If the turn comes up blanks, thats ok, because we can checks and get infinite odds to make our hand (but you might consider popping another on the turn, I'll elaborate why in a second).

If we hit our hand on the river, thats great, we'll most likely win the pot. Another good thing about the check is that we might entice a bluff. Bluffs are good, because we can raise with security. We can also fold with an easy decision.

Whether or not to pop another on the turn is very read dependant. Is your villian going to laydown his hand? What are the chances he's picked up a good hand and will re-raise us? Is he tricky and will bluff? Does he play any two from the sb (if he is in the blinds)? You know the drill, folding equity and such. If the pot is 4BB big, and we bet, we need him to fold 25% of the time to break even, more to show a profit. Is this possible?

Against multiple opponents, I almost always take the free card. Its obvious; our folding equity goes down considerably. We now need to make 2 people fold to make our bet possible. Unless you have an awesome read (which happens now and again), don't try it.

Alrighty, I hope this guide helps a few out, I also hope its correct (some poohbahs will correct me very quickly if its not).

Remember these points:

1) Only use with reads, otherwise you're shooting in the dark.
2) Never against multiple opponents
3) Works better on scarier boards
4) Backdoor draws improve the return on the play immensely.
5) Sometimes its not correct to take the turn card. Once again, this is read dependant.


I welcome everyone to expand on this, correct me, or add new stuff. I might possibly edit the post to include some juicey stuff. Oh, and one more thing:

I talked about having AK (one diamond) on a JT5 board with 2 diamonds. I said a free card play is good. However, your equity is so good here, you can raise for pure profit here, and you don't mind the action. This would not be using the freecard play, this would be having a strong hand where a good portion of every bet going in the pot is yours. This is a strong multiway hand. Just clearing that up incase some people were confused [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

[UncleSalty]

Excellent post.

[hicherbie]

agreed. nice work...got me thinking about the situations where i try to pick up a card for the cheap.

[numeri]

[ QUOTE ]
Next point; backdoor draws are your friend. Backdoor flush draws, gut shots and even backdoor straight draws are all very nice bonuses we can use. If we have a ton of outs, but no made hand vs a suspected mediocre hand (bottom pair and the like), and the hand holder is a passive player, the free card play will allow us to see both turn/river and obviously hit our draw and win the pot, or miss and fold cheaply.

[/ QUOTE ]
This thread was mentioned on another thread, but it got me thinking about the free card play. When I first learned how to count outs - and particularly adding 1.5 outs for the backdoor flush draw, I think I really overvalued my hands on the flop.

I was re-reading SSH for the 53rd time the other night (I'm slow, OK?) and I caught the part about raising for the free card much better. The point I'm trying to make is that our hands with backdoor draws change dramatically on the turn. With a backdoor flush draw, our AKs seems like 4.5 outs on the flop, but if the 2nd flush card doesn't come on the turn, we're down to just overcards. In that case, raising for a free card, even in ideal situations if we knew we were going to get it, probably wouldn't be the best play. It'd be better to see the turn cheaply (and correctly if the pot odds offer it) and see if our hand improves.

Anyway, just a thought. Let this thread sink back down again... [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

[reubenf]

I don't agree that you can only use it with reads. There are certainly times when it's the right play against more opponents than it's the wrong play against.

[deepsquat]

Nice post mate.

Can someone give me a range on Poker tracker Postflop AF figures as to what is considered-

passive, neutral and aggressive.

Thanks

[Isura]

Good post overall. However, I don't aggre that you should not try the free card play with multiple opponents. I think that multiple opponents is a better time to try for a free card for several reasons: 1) You are more likely to be behind against 3 opponents vs 1 opponent, so you really need the free card and are not the one GIVING the free card. 2) When the free card works against multiple opponents you gain a lot of pot equity. When you get the chance to beat 2+ hands with your free card, that's a huge edge you have gained. 3) With multiple opponents you are "protected" from bluffs more. HU often you get bet into on the river when you check the turn. If you had something like a flush/straight draw and good overcards (A high or better), so have to fold these hands to worst hands that can take shots with their own missed draws or weaker overcards.

[Isura]

[ QUOTE ]
Nice post mate.

Can someone give me a range on Poker tracker Postflop AF figures as to what is considered-

passive, neutral and aggressive.

Thanks

[/ QUOTE ]

These numbers can be very deceptive, and you really need to understand how it interpret them. For example, you can't compare the aggression numbers of a 20/10 player to a 50/5 player. I really think it's better to not use these numbers at all during play. Focus more on getting real reads on your oppoents. Your game will improve much faster this way.

[aargh57]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Nice post mate.

Can someone give me a range on Poker tracker Postflop AF figures as to what is considered-

passive, neutral and aggressive.

Thanks

[/ QUOTE ]

These numbers can be very deceptive, and you really need to understand how it interpret them. For example, you can't compare the aggression numbers of a 20/10 player to a 50/5 player. I really think it's better to not use these numbers at all during play. Focus more on getting real reads on your oppoents. Your game will improve much faster this way.

[/ QUOTE ]


Then why did I buy the stupid thing!!?? [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]
Just kidding, but do you use it at all? I find it very difficult to get real reads when multitabling and therefore use it as a crutch. Maybe I'm just being too lazy.