1/3 play against loose deep stack bullies

Delusion? Sir, you are the one hallucinating. No one brought up GTO except you. No one is talking about GTO, except you. Nothing anyone here has said has anything at all to do with GTO. I find it hilarious how you are so confidently arguing against something nobody ever said. It's like you're screaming out loud that you don't understand the relevant concepts. You're letting your disdain for me cloud your poker judgement and find contrarian lines just to be a tough guy. This is probably why you play poker by "brute force". But you should realize that tantrums are -EV.

MDF is a counter to an EXPLOITATIVE strategy, not a GTO one. Your opponents DO play exploitatively. Sometimes they're trying to do that, other times they just do it unknowingly. For example, a fish knows what c-bet is. They know they're supposed to do it a lot. They know they're doing it to get players who missed the flop to fold. They may not be using GTO, balance, or reading board textures. They may not be analyzing ranges. They may just be reflexively c-betting because that's a thing they saw on TV.

You still have to respond by not overfolding vs their bet size otherwise, you lose. If the 10-IQ drooler who never heard of GTO makes a half pot c-bet and you fold more than 2/3 of the time, he is profiting and you aren't. That's not a GTO concept, that's elementary school math.

I was once asked to monitor a new receiver coach and he began to teach the players a down and out route in the meeting room. This guy meant well, unlike 2, but in a few minutes he was able to confuse everyone in the room including me about a simple route. The idea is to make things easier to understand and he didn’t last long.

I honestly suggest people not waste time with 2 because though he may hit on a good point now and then, he obviously has no experience playing the game and a lot of it is nonsense.

Its funny i found this thread this morning because someone hinted at me being this guy saturday night. I had squeezed otb for the 2nd time in one orbit and one of the other players says " are they opening a 2/5 or plo soon? i hope so im sure your on the list". I dont specifically remember him from any hands but he looked familiar enough that im sure we have played together.

so as me being " that guy" your speaking about, i will give you my pov.

I dont raise, 3b and squeeze light just because..i do it because most 1/3 players dont have the stomach to play for stacks without the nuts. it only takes a few orbits to get a beat on a couple players and then start running plays vs them. Thats my goal when i sit down, the 2 players on my right and the 2 players on my left. i want the most information possible vs them because we will be in wide vs wide most often ( HJ, CO when im BU and SB, BB). It seems relentless because it really is, one thing that 2/5 "regs" do is know the exploits. Now whether they correctly use them or not is a different question but i digress, just through sheer trial and error most players that play 2/5 ( good and bad) will know what to do instinctively because they play in aggressive games vs the 1/3 which is mostly passive play.

an example, no straddle, 3 limpers and i look down at 98dd on the button, theres 13 in the pot, im going to make it 20-25 here 100% of the time. why?
i dont want to go 5 or 6 ways to the flop, it reduces my equity overall the more players in the pot and makes it harder for me to win the hand.
If i call the 3, sb will come along with anything decent and bb will check near 100% of his range so we will go 6 ways with a pot of $18. $500 eff stacks leaves a SPR of 20+ which means its going to be difficult to get all the money in.

if i raise to 20, lets assume both blinds fold and 2 limpers call. now the pot is 67 and a spr of 7 or so. on top of that i was the aggressor preflop so i will almost 99% of the time get checked to and given the option to bet or check back flop. Thats a easy spot for me, i will do the same with a wide range of hands because i want to play for it all, im not looking to play limped pots with huge sprs where im forced to make the nuts because making the nuts is hard to do.

another example, std 1/3 plyr opens to 10, one caller and im in position. i will sqz here pretty light for the same reasons as above. i only get 4b by QQ+ and AKs, so when i get called its mostly 22-JJ, AKo and all the other suited broadways and suited Kx, Qx, Jx, Tx type hands. with the premise that 90% of players at 1/3 refuse to felt without the nuts it becomes a very easy game of bet/folding. im either sizing for 2 streets with value or 3 streets with a bluff. i dont need to balance or protect my range because theyre not fighting back. they tighten up, flop top pair and will call twice and fold to a river jam even on a brick river and just give credit for a hand that i can have without considering my whole range. its like critical thinking skills go out the window when you apply big betting pressure on early streets because they are use to playing a ton of limped pots or single raised pots multiway.

another example, say a 1/3 player opens to 10, one caller and I squeeze to 50 in position for the 3rd time this orbit.
Most 1/3 players dont know the counter play or dont have the stomach for the play which is just to call down and let me barrel. Its very uncomfortable for most people to call AK or KQ preflop oop to a sqz, K83 two spades flop, check call flop bet without a spade in their hand. This is the biggest mistake 1/3 guys make that i see, they will absolutely bomb this flop vs my bet. Occasionally some will wait for a brick turn like an offsuit 4 and then check jam when they should be check calling again. If the river is Ts completing flush they should check call again. why? because its a fantastic bluff card for me. Remember that i know the exploit, that most players refuse to felt without the nuts. Im using that to my advantage, i might have a hand like AQ with As ( blocking AK, KQ and NF) or a hand like 65 that turned equity or QJ with a spade ( blocking KQ, KJ, Q8, J8). i will have piles of bluffs on this river at 1/3 and i will only get called by flushes. Now at 2/5 its different because i know i will get called down lighter, i will get x/r on flop and turn more with semi-bluffs and value so i have to keep my sqz in line and do some checking to protect myself but at 1/3 its just not something thats needed.

FWIW, I find deep aggro difficult tables very difficult myself. But they are extremely easy to beat when sitting on a shortstack (I start and constantly top up to $200 at 1/3 NL); just patiently wait for the top ~5% of hands (which I would probably limp/overlimp from almost any position at tables this aggro). And if you do eventually double+ up, then you'll have to make a table changing decision dependent on how much longer you were planning on playing, comfortableness of remaining at this table this deep, etc.

It most definitely isn't a blueprint / strategy for how to play deep at difficult deep tables. But it does allow you to play in the game if you're attempting to figure that out.

GcluelessdeepstacknoobG

Thanks for the perspective from the other side . When I say bully I really mean the opposite of NIT not like it is a bad play. What interests me here is how 1/3 players do not understand check calling keeps the bluffs of a LAG. I actually see more calls on two spade flops, then fold to a 3rd or 4th spade. There are also callers after the 4th spade if they find the bet itself is small enough, not in percentage of the pot. One question I have is, when bombing from button, we can expect some AKo, AQ, AJ, KQ, JJ-77 calling. Then some calling stations simply would not fold if they see a K with Kx or 972 flop with JJ. If we triple barrel with a decent frequency don't we kind of face big reverse implied odds when we bomb preflop?

For this case I am taking MDF as a way to define the cards we want to defend with when, say, villain triple barrels, by putting a range on the V and on us. It does not have to be GTO but based on what we believe the V's range has. We only have to choose a range of hands to match V's average betting size right? I think this makes it easier to call down V as it is a detailed plan that is easy to follow. I am not sure though how to do this for all board types systematically.

If you have a logical, defendable reason to make a specific decision in a given spot, then there's no reason to attach a negative emotion to it. Instead of "painful" try "building my confidence that I know when and how to adapt."