Multiway pots in weaker games.
I'm an online player who plans on playing some live games this year. I've got a couple of ideas regarding general exploits I'm planning to implement but one spot I am somewhat struggling with is multiway.
The reason is that I'm aware in multiway spots opponents mistakes do not necessarily contribute to your Ev. They could in fact be to your loss. My question is in a multiway pot against weaker opposition are there any general rules to avoid such situations or any situations where your opponents mistakes contribute more to your EV than others
7 Replies
Read this article like 5x a day. Then read it some more. It’s basically the Bible for live low stakes multiway pots.
Basically:
- Be a nit
- Don’t range bet often
- Don’t do things like attack capped ranges often
- Rarely bluff
- Favor hands that make the nuts (pocket pairs, suited Ax, etc)
- Keep bet sizing small unless making large bets as exploits with very good info to back it up
Read this article like 5x a day. Then read it some more. It’s basically the Bible for live low stakes multiway pots.
Basically:
- Be a nit
- Don’t range bet often
- Don’t do things like attack capped ranges often
- Rarely bluff
- Favor hands that make the nuts (pocket pairs, suited Ax, etc)
- Keep bet sizing small unless making large bets as exploits with very good info to back it up
You want to be the opposite of a nit since all your opponents are bad. We play more hands vs fish since they are passive preflop.
You want to be the opposite of a nit since all your opponents are bad. We play more hands vs fish since they are passive preflop.
I think he is referring to post flop as far as being a nit goes. You shouldn’t be making any fancy bluffs or cbetting because “I have a range advantage”. Just bet when you make a big hand and don’t bet when you miss. You’ll get paid off when you make a hand most of the time so bluffing (at least at a GTO type frequency) is unnecessary.
Preflop you are right, especially in late position. Get involved in a lot of hands relatively cheaply. In my experience with live, three bets are rare and usually mean premium hands. I have seen many live players just call an open even with hands like AK, JJ and TT. This makes raising a lot of hands a good play - you will rarely be 3bet and it is an easy fold when they do 3 bet you (unless you opened with a premium yourself of course).
Just bet when you make a big hand and don’t bet when you miss. You’ll get paid off when you make a hand most of the time so bluffing (at least at a GTO type frequency) is unnecessary.
AFAIK there are plenty of ATC opportunities multi (like X-X-X-X-X-X-X, to choose an extreme example alluded to in that article). That are so +EV not taking them is at best wasteful. Plus adding in player tendencies/ table dynamics/ runout + how bad people are (and that multiway = fish magnets).
I doubt there's reliable MDA (?), but imagine a lot of the same principles apply as to how much EV could be extracted using reasonble assumptions that align with (and stem from) SRP lessons.
as always its going to be about identifying mistakes and formulating a strategy that crushes those mistakes.
all kinds of game textures happen live, but as others said above low stakes live is usually loose passive.
online a raise usually thins the field to a 2 or 3 way flop, but live open raisers get 3 or 4 callers as the norm. why do 1 or 2 additional opponents matter so much? its because of how folding frequencies multiply.
heads up, your opponents folding frequency(for a particular betsize) is equal to the chance your bluff succeeds with that betsize. board and opponent range reading become driving forces behind heads up bluffs and value bets. with an unshowdownable hand heads up on the river, you must bluff unless youre very confident that the opponent will call often(learn river call ev math).
3+ handed it gets trickier. to find the chance that everyone folds, you multiply the individual fold frequencies by each other.
3 handed. opponent A folds flop 50% vs 1/2 pot bet. opponent B folds flop 50%. youll win immediately on the flop 25% of the time(0.5*0.5 = 0.25).
4 handed. same bet same opponent A and B. opponent C folds 50% of the time. youll will win immediately on the flop 12.5% of the time(0.5 * 0.5 * 0.5 = 0.125).
of course some boards(or larger bet) will cause higher fold frequencies, and some boards will cause lower fold frequencies. understanding how they multiply together is important. dont just glaze over this math. do some multiway range analysis and see for yourself how adding a player can drastically reduce the chance a bluff works multiway.
MW post goes like this:
Fold a ton versus bets
Bet a ton versus checks
There are many spots in non standard lines using sometimes standard and non standard sizings that are grossly underraised and overfolded so really pounce when people show weakness.
However, if someone shows a keen interest via aggression themselves do fold early and often as they usually have strength to their range moreso than GTO (which is why it prints to be aggressive facing checks).
When figuring out why you want to minimize bluffs, itÂ’s important to note the biggest reason for this is SPR. Think about a semi-bluff when open-ended draw.
Imagine youÂ’re in a 1-3 game at 100BB with KJs on the button. Four limps in front of you, raise to 25. Three callers.
The pot after rake is right about $100 and your SPR is 2:1. Effective stack is likely much lower because so many players at lower stakes either buy short or donÂ’t top off.
Flop comes QT5.
This board can easily be 2-pair with QTs/QTo, a set, plus almost any queen. If the board is suited at all someone could be in with any two cards of that suit, at this level the cards donÂ’t have to be connected at all. These players arenÂ’t getting off most of these hands.
If you bet $50 and get just one caller, youÂ’re SPR is 3:4. If you bet $33 and get one caller youÂ’re at 1:1. 2+ callers and it goes down. Bet smaller you get more callers. You just donÂ’t have the chips to make an effective play on the turn.
If you donÂ’t hit your straight you probably have to take the next card.
Say you bet $30 on the flop, had one caller and the turn comes a 6. Can you take a stab against the one guy who called? Pot is $160, stack is $170. A $70 bet will get some folds here for sure but do they fold enough to justify the number of times you are called? Probably not, because your flop callers are either going to have a good made hand that isnÂ’t folding the turn enough, or a draw with more equity than you.
So (to me) the strategy here isnÂ’t necessarily to never bet, itÂ’s to sometimes check this flop and sometimes bet relatively small (1/4 pot or so).
But as opposed to online or higher stakes, youÂ’re not really bluffing. YouÂ’re funding your draw, and trying to use your flop bet as a blocker bet to check the turn if you donÂ’t hit it.
