How to deviate from GTO?
Hello guys,
Currently, I am playing Ignition 25nl with aspirations of being a winning serious recreational player at 100/200nl. Lately, I have been having trouble with implementing a consistent strategy. I definitely know way more theory than the average 25nl player, but of course that doesn't necessarily translate to winning and you would be stupid to play GTO against some of the stuff I see.
With that being said, I have trouble figuring out what deviations I should make to my GTO strategy because of variance. For example, for a thousand hands I might feel my river barrels get through super often so I over bluff then for another thousand hands I will feel my barrels always get called so I under bluff. I never know which way to adjust then when I try to be balanced, I feel stupid running a "optimal" bluff and being called with dogshit or 4b A5s into AA. With that all being said, what strategies do you guys play with? Do you stick to theoretically optimal? Do you hand read and not follow GTO at all? How do I figure out which ways to adjust especially in Zone? I started looking at population tendencies in PT4, but all the stats I looked at so far honestly line up with the leak checkers recommended frequencies.
Here is an example hand I played with my thoughts:
BU (Hero, A4cc, 100bb): open 2.5bb
SB (Unknown, 200bb): 3b 10BB
First decision point. I've been through phases where I would fold like 80% to 3b, and I've had phases where I call a more reasonable range. I do think this pool underbluffs pre, but I also felt at times I have overfolded. Today, I was in a defend mindset, villian 3b on the smaller end, and with a 200bb stack is more likely to be strong so I called. GTO this is fine even in high rake, though maybe it is losing in practice.
Pot 21bb
Flop: Ah 3d Jh
Villian cb 6.6bb
Hero calls
Standard call esp for the size. Villian could have better A but also may be cbetting worse like KK, QQ, J10, or a gutter etc.
Pot 34 bb
Board: Ah 3d Jh, Ts
Villian x
Hero x
When villian x I feel he condenses his range more. This now feels less like AK AQ AJ more like KK, QQ, QJ, QT etc, though Villian can always trap. Standard check by hero.
Pot 34 bb
Board: Ah 3d Jh Ts, 3s
Villian x
Another decision point. x back or bet? I had phases where I would always thin value bet and phases where I didn't. Sometimes, I feel population doesn't protect their range enough. Other times, I feel they trap too much. In theory, this is a X as the hand is just not that strong. At the same time, I might get a call with villians midding pairs. I decided to bet to get called by KK, QQ, QJ etc.
Hero b 21bb
Villian r 56bb
:(. Yes, small river raises are so often value but at the same time my odds are amazing and I've seen some ****. Would villian really trap KQ, AA, JJ etc? I ultimately called as front door bricked out and maybe villian could turn their pairs into bluffs.
Will reveal later to eliminate bias.
Thanks for reading, I would appreciate any advice on the above as well as analysis on my preflop and river decisions.
3 Replies
Hey fishfinder,
GTO is a baseline strategy meant to make you unexploitable. It’s powerful but not always the most profitable against suboptimal opponents.
At stakes like 25NL, your goal should lean more toward exploiting population tendencies, as most players are far from optimal.
Instead of going through cycles of over- and under-bluffing, think in terms of board dynamics:
On wet boards, bluff more against weaker players who might fold weak hands.
On dry boards, reduce bluffs if the pool tends to overсall.
Avoid emotional adjustments (Variance Trap). Don’t let recent outcomes dictate your adjustments too much.
If bluffs aren’t working for a stretch, don’t abandon them entirely. Review the hands to see if they are good or not.
Variance can make it seem like players are overcalling or overfolding in small samples. Stick to data-backed trends for long-term decisions.
About the example of your hand:
Preflop-turn looks standard.
River
In theory, this is a X as the hand is just not that strong. At the same time, I might get a call with villians midding pairs. I decided to bet to get called by KK, QQ, QJ etc.
It sounds good, but you must consider all possible scenarios and assess your opponent's tendencies.
If it's a passive/unknown opponent, a small bet might work, but it's always a fold to a raise because such players never bluff on the river.
If it's an aggressive opponent who can raise the river, then it's just a check.
So the main flaw in your thinking is that you did not consider the possibility of a raise.
Also, how did it happen that before the bet you thought your hand was not strong enough to bet, but after a few seconds it became strong enough to bet/call?
You seem to be changing your strategy too much based on your inner feelings.
It doesn't work that way.
If you feel insecure on the preflop, then study the standard preflop charts and adjust them slightly depending on the opponent. If your opponent 3-bets too much, you don't need to defend too much, just don't over-fold so that he can't make money off you.
Also, try to find information about MDA (Mass Data Analysis)
There is a good article about it on H2N website:
https://www.hudstore.poker/mda-poker-how-to-use-mass-data-analysis-to-crush-games
Yeah, you're adjusting your strategy based on variance and emotions. Try to learn a strategy and thought process that helps you determine whether your hand was played well regardless of the results. Remember that a good bluff is a good bluff even if it get's called 4 times in a row and you lose. That's just variance. When you bluff, you should expect that you get called quite often, but you have determined that they fold enough of the time that you make a profit. Remember that it is a very very uncommon occurrance that a bluff would through close to 100% of the time.
I think that throughout your poker career, your ability to adjust to pool and player tendencies and playing exploitative poker (when applicable) is going to be super important. Studying GTO should give you an understanding on how ranges interact but ultimately you should use that information on how to deviate and exploit other people. On figuring out how to deviate, I would recommend getting into nodelocking. That way you can notice how even really small deviations in your opponents strategy (such as folding 1% more that optimal) will change your strategy.
Another thing that you can do is say look at a sim of a BTN vs BB flop of K82o. Look at BTN's response after they cbet range and get raised. What are the hands that BTN should be calling or folding or reraising? Is there something that surprises you? For example you might think that there are a lot of unintuitive calls that BTN is supposed to make and that in reality most likely people are not going to follow this and you conclude that pool will be overfolding vs. a raise. Therefore you can start raising a lot more liberally on a similar flop as BB.
Ask yourself why GTO takes a certain line or produces a certain range? Check the opponents response and ask yourself how likely is it the pool (or a specific opponent) responds in this way. The most basic example over c-betting a board. At micros it is unlikely your opponent will punish you correctly by having a solid MDF and check raise frequency.
Look at more complex nodes late in the hand, become familiar with boards that run out in your favour. Most players do not slow play nearly as much as GTO, therefore look for bet-bet-shove lines on boards that complete hands they are unlikely to have and leave your opponent with a lot of 1 pair bluff catchers. (backdoor straights are great example)
For the above example it is a useful exercise to write out the combos in notepad or use flopzilla. It is more laborious than GTO wizard but is significantly better for improving your hand reading which is key to exploitative play.
Finally, if you play in a non anonymous pool, I would pay attention to game dynamics, history and note taking - even in todays games I see tons of betsize tells, timing tells and players over adjusting based on recent history. Sometimes bluffing with the right image vs an opponent outweighs having the correct combo.
