This post is the first in an aperiodic series of articles discussing how to exploit particular opponent tendencies in common post-flop scenarios. It is my thesis that observing and exploiting particular opponent’s tendencies is crucial to playing profitable Pot-Limit Omaha. I will consider this series a success if it manages to debunk the notion that it is appropriate to respond to a post-flop problem in Omaha with a ‘standard’ line.

Situation: You call an open from the CO in the BB with your optimal calling range versus this opponent. The flop is unpaired and two-tone and you check-call a bet on the flop. The turn completes the flush with a low card. How do you proceed?

First, let us examine the contents of the respective ranges:

Opponents range comprised of {air, made hands which want to get to SD cheaply, weak flushes, strong flushes}

Our range comprised of {weak flushes, strong flushes (dependent of CR range), now-bluffcatchers, missed SDs-air}

At this point, we shall also make a reasonable assumption: Opponent will check all his 2p/sets/straights to get to showdown as cheaply as possible. Opponent will also bet all of his strong flushes on the turn and will not have a check back turn-shove river on brick range. Thus what we care about is what our opponent does with his air and what he does with his weak flushes.

We can now divide our opponent’s possible behaviors into 5 common groups:

Player TypeBET TURNCHECK BACK TURN
NitStrong flushesCheap SD, air, weak flushes
Fit/FoldStrong flushes, weak flushesCheap SD, air
Polarized LAGAir, strong flushesCheap SD, weak flushes
Merged LAGAir, strong flushes, weak flushesCheap SD
BalancedSome air, strong flushesCheap SD, weak flushes, some air

The remainder of this article shall consider each of these ranges in turn and examine how best to exploit them.

1) Exploiting the Nit

Nit Psychology: “Does not want to pay off big bets, accepts that he may get bluffed sometimes.”

We can c/f any hand that isn’t a flush (he might have some air but won’t barrel the river with it). When he checks back the turn we should lead the river with our air a size that depends on his calling tendencies. If he will always call with 2p/sets we should just bet enough to fold him off of 1 pair, 60% of pot should be sufficient.  If he tends to fold anything that isn’t a flush to a large bet we can bet near-pot to encourage this tendency.  He will let us get our made hands to SD frequently, so we can check with random 2 pair/sets/straights. If he starts bluff-catching the river with two pair we can start leading the sets/straights for value on the river. We must lead our strong flushes on the turn since that is the only way to get two bets in. Against this player type we should expect not to be able to get the money in with nut over second nut flush; one way to achieve this is to lead the turn and then check-raise a river brick! You should only do this if your opponent is calling the turn lead wide and then routinely folding to a river bet (where of course we should double barrel all of our air). Lead the turn with a lot of air and note his folding point; some nits will only call flushes and sets on the turn and so we don’t have a profitable river bluff. If he starts bluff-catching turn and river light we can move our weak flushes into our check-call/lead/lead range.

2) Exploiting the Fit/Folder

Fit/folder Psychology: “Flushes are good… I don’t have flush, next hand.”

Value check-raise strong flushes. Blocker bluffing this player can be profitable but you want to have some evidence that he can make big folds and you must fire the river since he won’t often fold any flush on the turn. If you check-raise turn/shove river you will typically be risking around 92BB to win 53BB, so the sequence needs to be successful 64% of the time.  When the turn goes check/check we should only expect him to fold air on the river, so size your bluffs accordingly. Since he doesn’t have a flush, we can thin value straights/sets/top two frequently. Be aware that if you check-call/lead turn with air you will get called more frequently than by a nit (sometimes even TPTK+gutter!) and so will need to fire the river to make this profitable. As a default, take the k/k lead river line as a blocker bluff against these players since we are checking all of our flushes on the turn and we gain some semblance of balance when the decision is otherwise close. As with the nit, if he starts bluff-catching turn and river light we can move our weak flushes into our check-call/lead/lead range.

3) Exploiting the Polarized LAG

Polarized LAG Psychology: “I have to win this hand, he probably doesn’t have a flush and will let me know on the turn anyway, FIRE!!!”

This player will only check back the turn when he actually has a hand, and will often use the bet/check/bet line with a weak flush. We should thus show his turn checks a lot of respect, and only lead for value on the river once he checks back the turn.

1 His biggest leak is how he constructs his turn barrel range. Leading turns against this player type is really bad since it eliminates the major flaw in his range construction. We should check/call the turn really wide with SD value (anything that beats a made hand that he might turn into a bluff, so fold TPTK if he turns overpairs into bluffs, but consider calling this hand if he checks them back.) and check-raise a polarized range.  In practice, this should mean we just check-raise the Nut flush, Nut/2nd Nut blockers and all of our air. Until he adjusts his barrel range, his only way of countering our line is to make a move against us with no equity. His options are to either  shove back over our turn check-raise or to float the turn and bet the river when checked to. Theoretically, the latter option is terrible 100BB deep and so should only be used if we behave in a very exploitable fashion by giving up on the river with the {air} portion of our range with a high frequency. In practice, many players still shove the nut flush when we check-raise the turn (they are concerned about losing value from flushes if the board pairs on the river) and so our river barrel becomes mandatory once our opponent starts floating. I have yet to meet a player who is willing to shove over a turn check-raise without a blocker in this spot, but that would be the correct counter to our line! This should demonstrate to the reader how effective back-door aggression can be in certain spots against a player type who often causes good players difficulty.

4) Exploiting the Merged LAG

Merged LAG Psychology: “I’ll keep betting for value here with a flush, he’ll tell me his hand on the turn; I’ll check back two pair here, obviously cannot get value from worse, and make a read on the river.”

The Merged LAG is the player type who requires the closest observation to exploit. His first-level tendencies are not intrinsically bad, but his second-level tendencies can be very exploitable. With no flushes in his checking back range, most of these players will tend to either fold too frequently too a river lead, or call too much, overcompensating for the perceived weakness of their range. Start by bluffing large and often when they check back the turn. This way you exploit them anyway if they fold too much, and you start gaining information about what they call with if they do call. In a similar fashion, the most crucial detail about this player’s turn betting range is how he responds to a check-raise with his weak flushes. His turn betting range is even wider than the polarized LAG, but since it contains the weak flushes it has solid potential bluff-catchers. If he will bet/fold the turn with weak flushes we should CR the turn 100% with air and give up on the river. If he will bet/call the turn and call the river with all flushes, we should check-raise all  big flushes for value and only check-raise blockers on the turn (in this way we reduce the strong flush part of his range and the pure air becomes a larger fraction of his overall range.). Amusingly the most exploitable way he can play requires the most guts to exploit: if he will bet/call weak flushes on the turn and fold the river, we can check-raise the turn and shove the river 100% of the time. (This does assume there are sufficient weak flushes in his range, don’t start taking this line against strong pre-flop ranges.) Sadly, the only way to discover this is to actually do it. I would suggest, once you discover a player is barreling the turn with weak flushes, that you blocker check-raise the turn and shove the river with the second nut blocker. If he bet/calls turn, folds river then it is likely he folded a weak flush. Be aware that it is very exploitative/exploitable to do this with 100% of your air. Once he calls you down with a weak flush in this spot and sees air, no blockers he will likely think you are a maniac, so dial down your bluff frequency for a while.

5) Exploiting a Balanced Opponent?

Since these are the ranges I will use myself against a competent opponent, I am hardly going to tell you how to exploit me! That said, I will give you some pointer questions which you should ask yourself whenever you are faced with an opponent who is playing well in a given spot.

“Can I reduce the frequency of this situation if he plays it well?”

Here we could look to check-raise or donk into two-tone boards more often if we know our opponent plays well when we check/call the flop. He may not be as good at playing without the initiative.

“What are the micro-leaks he has, how does he respond to cc/cc/cr?”

This is similar to looking at second-level leaks with the Merged LAG. Introducing a highly unusual line to our range can also make it more difficult for our opponent. If we do this with the nut flush and turn some non-flushes into bluffs on the river then we can put even the second nut flush in a difficult position at the cost of folding all of our pure air on the turn when facing a bet.

“It would be more worth my time to look at more exploitable players, or parts of my opponent’s game where he is more exploitable.”

There are so many ways in which a given opponent can be exploited in PLO, and there are many opponents to choose from. You will generally make more $/hour choosing a different situation/opponent to exploit.

 

This concludes my first ‘Tackling Tendencies’ post. Please subscribe in the sidebar if you haven’t already for access to exclusive content! I shall be taking the present subscriber content down in a few days to replace it with a new, interesting article. I am also aware that a lot of my audience at the moment is professional/semi-professional players. Going forward, I want to provide some content for recreational/micro-stakes players so if you fall into that category and are reading this please take the time to email me to let me know what would interest you. Use either the comments page or the contact form provided. Thanks for reading,

Quad

Show 1 footnote

  1. The exception to this is if he classifies hands like TPTK as “SD value”, now he has so many non-flushes in his check back range that we can lead a wider range on the river, either for value/bluff depending on his bluff-catching tendencies. As a default I would suggest leading wider for value (straights/sets/top two on non-straight boards) since this player type will likely call too much rather than fold too much. ↩