How do you extract the most value with very strong hands?

[lapgame]

Sometimes that dream flop hits — top set, flush nuts, full house... — and we wonder:
“Better slowplay to induce or bet hard to build a pot?”

I wanted to know how you usually play very strong hands in different scenarios:

• What are the criteria for choosing between slowplay and direct aggression?
• Do you usually balance the game or do you explore to the max when you think the villain has something?
• Is there a move or sizing that you find especially effective for extracting value without being surprised?

I'm trying to improve my ability to win chips when I'm really right — sometimes I get the feeling that I won little with hands that deserved a giant pot. 😅

 

[sandy358]

Sometimes that dream flop hits — top set, flush nuts, full house... — and we wonder:
“Better slowplay to induce or bet hard to build a pot?”

I wanted to know how you usually play very strong hands in different scenarios:

• What are the criteria for choosing between slowplay and direct aggression?
• Do you usually balance the game or do you explore to the max when you think the villain has something?
• Is there a move or sizing that you find especially effective for extracting value without being surprised?

I'm trying to improve my ability to win chips when I'm really right — sometimes I get the feeling that I won little with hands that deserved a giant pot. 😅

Slowplay is rarely a good move, though sometimes it is the correct decision for trapping and for the balancing sake (but from my experience with solvers, in this case you have to balance somewhat inbetween hands, not super strong, but not that weak either, or some hands with additional runouts aka good middle pair with a flush draw etc while your good value hands {sets, two pairs, top pairs good kicker, overpairs} should still be extracting value) or when your opponent's range connected with the board so poorly that you are not going to extract enough value from them either way. Slowplaying can also be deadly on the boards which require big cbets for protection (which are mostly 9-high, 10-high and similar boards with vulnerable top pairs and overpairs in your particular range present), because you have to fold out at least some of the overcards with the weak pairs in your range, and weaking up your big bet range while missing out on extra value would be a mistake.

Though.

* Top sets occasionally slowplay, because they heavily block top pairs, which are in the opponent's continuation range, and giving your opponent chance to improve on the turn will give you more profit. That's why middle and bottom sets are kind of better than top sets, as they don't block the hands that your opponent is going to call a lot with.
* Nut flush flops also usually slowplay IIRC, but it is mostly related to the fact that you should play much much more passive on monotone flops in general. And, again, giving your opponent a chance to improve to an inferior 4-community-card flush on the turn would be kind of more profitable? (but flush draws don't fold on the flop either way, so I guess this particular explaination is out of the picture)

Slowplay can be good exploitative though. If you are sure that if you display weakness against this particular opponent, they are always going to willingly put a lot of money in the pot for free, you should absolutely go for trapping against them every time.

 

[fundiver199]

• What are the criteria for choosing between slowplay and direct aggression?

Most of all board texture. If you have on , there are lots of hands that can call a big bet or raise. For instance the opponent could have or or or or and so on and so forth, and these hands are not going to fold on the flop.
However if you have on then you monopolize the flop, and most of your opponents range is going to fold to a big bet or a raise. So this is a good time to either check or just call to allow the opponent to either bluff or catch up.

• Do you usually balance the game or do you explore to the max when you think the villain has something?

This is related to the above, because the strength of Villains range depends on the board texture. On the first board its highly likely, he "has something", but on the second board its not.

• Is there a move or sizing that you find especially effective for extracting value without being surprised?

In cash games you typically want to try to stack bad players, when you have the nuts. So in the first example you would use sizing, that allow you to jam the river. In tournaments its a little more complicated, since players tend to get risk averse near the bubble, and then you can sometimes get called significantly more often, if they dont have to risk their entire stack.

 

[sandy358]

Slowplay is rarely a good move, though sometimes it is the correct decision for trapping and for the balancing sake (but from my experience with solvers, in this case you have to balance somewhat inbetween hands, not super strong, but not that weak either, or some hands with additional runouts aka good middle pair with a flush draw etc while your good value hands {sets, two pairs, top pairs good kicker, overpairs} should still be extracting value) or when your opponent's range connected with the board so poorly that you are not going to extract enough value from them either way. Slowplaying can also be deadly on the boards which require big cbets for protection (which are mostly 9-high, 10-high and similar boards with vulnerable top pairs and overpairs in your particular range present), because you have to fold out at least some of the overcards with the weak pairs in your range, and weaking up your big bet range while missing out on extra value would be a mistake.

Though.

* Top sets occasionally slowplay, because they heavily block top pairs, which are in the opponent's continuation range, and giving your opponent chance to improve on the turn will give you more profit. That's why middle and bottom sets are kind of better than top sets, as they don't block the hands that your opponent is going to call a lot with.
* Nut flush flops also usually slowplay IIRC, but it is mostly related to the fact that you should play much much more passive on monotone flops in general. And, again, giving your opponent a chance to improve to an inferior 4-community-card flush on the turn would be kind of more profitable? (but flush draws don't fold on the flop either way, so I guess this particular explaination is out of the picture)

Slowplay can be good exploitative though. If you are sure that if you display weakness against this particular opponent, they are always going to willingly put a lot of money in the pot for free, you should absolutely go for trapping against them every time.

Okay, speaking of flopped full houses. Solver prefers slowplaying them from OOP (unless your opponent's hand improves enough not to fold, i.e. an overcard or a flush comes) and kinda slowplaying them from IP on earlier streets. It also depends on what kind of full house you have. If you flopped a full house with a pocket pair with enough trips present in your opponent's range, you should start going for value earlier. It is all once again tied to the fact that if you flop a boat, you basically block half of your opponent's trips and 1/3 of their top pairs for an unpaired hand and 2/3 of their pairs (which half of the time are top pairs) with a pocket pair, which is all a huge chunk of their continuing range against a bet.

Summarising all that, it depends on how the board connects to your opponent's range. If your nuts block most of your opponent's calling range, you should slowplay mostly to give your opponent a chance to improve and extract value from there.

 

[sandy358]

Okay, speaking of flopped full houses. Solver prefers slowplaying them from OOP (unless your opponent's hand improves enough not to fold, i.e. an overcard or a flush comes) and kinda slowplaying them from IP on earlier streets. It also depends on what kind of full house you have. If you flopped a full house with a pocket pair with enough trips present in your opponent's range, you should start going for value earlier. It is all once again tied to the fact that if you flop a boat, you basically block half of your opponent's trips and 1/3 of their top pairs for an unpaired hand and 2/3 of their pairs (which half of the time are top pairs) with a pocket pair, which is all a huge chunk of their continuing range against a bet.

Summarising all that, it depends on how the board connects to your opponent's range. If your nuts block most of your opponent's calling range, you should slowplay mostly to give your opponent a chance to improve and extract value from there.

It feels kinda surprising for me, but solver prefers slowplaying flopped full houses even at the boards with flush draws, despite the opponent being bound by the notorious "unfoldable flop flush draw" curse. OOP I guess it's connected with IP's duty to bet most of their flush draws on the flop after a check, but what makes it slowplay full houses IP after a check is a mystery to me. Though after a check-check and a turn flush it starts occasionally betting boats right there.