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four betting?

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  1. cneuy3 cneuy3 is offline

    Chiang Mai
    Thailand

    Posts: 105
    Joined: Jun 06

    Aug 25th, 2007 (8/25/2007 11:59am)

    First of all. I'm probably a cash game donk or breakeven player at medium stakes cash games at this point but mainly because of some pretty simple leaks in my game. I consider myself one of the best SnG players on the internet and I feel if I ever took a legit run at MTTs I'd be quite successful. My question is whether or not four betting is ever the most profitable move. This usually only applies in cash games because Mtts or SnGs rarely have stacks deep enought where the forth bet is not an all in. In my honest opinion four betting is just not used enough for it to be the highest EV move especially when you have position on the player that three bet you. What i mean is this.....Most of the time I think four betting is not used as bluff in any form of unless possibly both players have very deep stacks. Are you not giving away your hand strength if you rarely four bet as a bluff? I think in the long run it is more profitable to call three bets when in position because more often than not you will get a fairly large continuation bet from the three bet raiser that is out of position.

    I'm not going to lie. I've been drinking and as I say above have not played NL cash games in quite sometime but I just think four betting should be rarely used in any circumstance. the only one I can come up with is in a deep stacked cash game. When player A and player B have 100BB to 200BB how can it ever be more profitable to four bet than to just cold call when in position. Three bets have become common in the online poker world and many times are used as steals. I realize that some might say you four bet the three bet stealer but would it not be more profitable to just cold call and let them continue to bluff at you? this is of course assuming you have a strong hand and high pair. Even so ...if you argue that you only four bet AK and you cold call with AA KK and QQ won't that be fairly obvious for your opponents to pick up on and play perfectly against. I just don't see the value in four betting. Maybe somebody can prove to me that four bets can be more profitable in the long run. I'd be interested. Thanks.

    sorry if this post doesn't make total sense. As I've said I've been drinking and railing some mid level stake cash games. This four bet thing is just something I'm curious about. Thanks.
     
  2. GuiGui_88 GuiGui_88 is offline

    Posts: 378
    Joined: Jan 07

    Aug 25th, 2007 (8/25/2007 12:11pm) in reply to cneuy3

    http://cts687.livejournal.com/14591.html
  3. pariah pariah is offline

    United States

    Posts: 1,730
    Joined: Apr 06

    Aug 25th, 2007 (8/25/2007 1:43pm) in reply to cneuy3

    I play much lower stakes than CTS so take my advice with a grain of salt. I do mostly limit now but when I was doing NLHE almost all of my 4bets were bluffs or steals because I agree that just calling the re-raise disguises my premiums and I usually win more post-flop.

    This IS exploitable, but my opponents didn't know that or didn't act on it. For one, I pick situations where I won't have to showdown my hand... I'm bluffing after all. Vast majority of the time overwhelming force gets a fold and my opponents often assume I had AA, and that's fine with me since that's not how I play aces. Secondly, it's hard for people to act on this read even if they've figured me out. Some regulars have thousands and thousands of hands on me and even if they've picked up this tendency, it's hard to act on it because there's a lot at stake. Picking off a 4bet bluff w/o the nuts is harder than a tiny post oak bluff on the river. Remember, these aren't world-class players so putting them to tough decisions is super +EV for us.

    That said, I will 4bet my premiums under at least three situations (maybe more):
    1. My opponent is clearly pot-committed and disguising my hand has no value b/c we're getting it in regardless
    2. I'm somehow not in a HU pot yet (more common the lower stakes you play obv).
    3. My opponent is completely braindead and will call even if I showed my AA beforehand. I've seen some sick folds from mediocre players so be careful, you really gotta be sure he's ready to stack off no matter what.
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