... He kind of is.
At 88, Poker Legend Doyle Brunson Is Still Bluffing. Or Is He?
11–20 of 59 posts
Re: At 88, Poker Legend Doyle Brunson Is Still Bluffing. Or Is He?
#12It’s funny that the two examples used to illustrate his play (the 10 2) stories are examples of him making extremely bad reads on his opponent and bad beating them. I can only assume that’s him massaging the narrative a bit to help him win in the future, cause it isn’t great poker playing.
I think inspiring a bunch of amateurs to make plays with mostly garbage is a great example of a +EV play.
Additionally with two pair heads up you need to get it in, the stuff about making reads gives amateur players the license to go nuts because they feel like it, again +EV. Dolly knew the odds better than almost anyone for a very long time, objectively we've learned a lot about poker in the last few years, and it's not fair to judge his play vs today's standards.
Re: At 88, Poker Legend Doyle Brunson Is Still Bluffing. Or Is He?
#13For those of you who would like to learn the basics of poker, Johns Hopkins offers an online course: https://hopkinspokercourse.com/ MIT OCW also has a course on poker theory: https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/15-s50-poker-theory-and-analytic...
The book “no limit theory and practice” continues to be the most valuable poker book I’ve read. That said about 80% of that book and 95% of anything written about poker before about 2019 is irrelevant to today’s games. People never intended to play game theory optimal in the past; it was a war of “leveling” your opponent into making the wrong move. You would make money by playing an “exploitive strategy” meaning, you…
> These days that doesn’t work beyond micros (or small stakes at a brick and mortar casino.)
I would like to introduce you to Hustler Casino Live. I assume that most of the games they steam are not B&M small stakes. There is plenty of room for exploitative play at higher stakes if you game select well. This is especially true if one has figured out the home game scene (where the best games are, imho).
Online on competitive sites, folks still make have relatively large gaps in their game up to nl100.
On online agent apps… lol, gto is not a thing except at 5/10 and higher (sometimes).
I will add that all of this is a discussion about nlhe.
There is a push to get away from solver-based games online because they are largely bad for the ecology. Casuals get fleeced rapidly, even by folks who implement a “gto” strategy poorly. Just having a good starting hand strategy/chart is usually a huge advantage alone.
The following are some ways that this is happening, and I think that these are the future of poker:
- plo
- more blinds/antes (3 blinds, big blind ante, short deck antes, etc.)
- bomb pots
- double board
- deep stack (most solver work is for 100bb or less)
- mixed games
Plo bomb pots are typically very much loved wherever they are played, and double board adds an extra element of skill. It lets causal gamblers gamble and get action (see every flop!), but there is a huge skill element that is not in solver territory yet.
Any poker scene for which a gto strategy can reasonably be implemented will rapidly wither to a small pecking order of pros. I hope folks in the poker playing community, especially pros and serious casuals, can embrace games where gto theory is not the baseline. It’s healthy for the poker ecology by keeping casuals involved and engaged.
Re: At 88, Poker Legend Doyle Brunson Is Still Bluffing. Or Is He?
#14Earlier quoted context omitted.
The book “no limit theory and practice” continues to be the most valuable poker book I’ve read. That said about 80% of that book and 95% of anything written about poker before about 2019 is irrelevant to today’s games. People never intended to play game theory optimal in the past; it was a war of “leveling” your opponent into making the wrong move. You would make money by playing an “exploitive strategy” meaning, you…
> These days that doesn’t work beyond micros (or small stakes at a brick and mortar casino.) I would like to introduce you to Hustler Casino Live. I assume that most of the games they steam are not B&M small stakes. There is plenty of room for exploitative play at higher stakes if you game select well. This is especially true if one has figured out the home game scene (where the best games are, imho). Online on compe…
> Casuals get fleeced rapidly
It's funny how the meta-game works here. Fleecing the casuals is, of course, the way the pros make money; so it's basically the point of the game. But I can see how fleecing the casuals slowly is probably a better long-term strategy, that will ultimately extract more money from them, than doing it quickly, draining their bankroll, which may stop them from playing or get them to play less consistently.
Re: At 88, Poker Legend Doyle Brunson Is Still Bluffing. Or Is He?
#15If we use Betteridge's law of headlines then it's no. I'm all in.
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Re: At 88, Poker Legend Doyle Brunson Is Still Bluffing. Or Is He?
#16Earlier quoted context omitted.
The book “no limit theory and practice” continues to be the most valuable poker book I’ve read. That said about 80% of that book and 95% of anything written about poker before about 2019 is irrelevant to today’s games. People never intended to play game theory optimal in the past; it was a war of “leveling” your opponent into making the wrong move. You would make money by playing an “exploitive strategy” meaning, you…
Fascinating. I haven’t played or thought about poker in 15 years. Can you elaborate more on the current strategy of poker? A real example would be helpful.
At every decision point, you know what your range is and what your opponent range is. Then you choose one or two bet/raise sizes based on the board and the ranges. Then you split your range into categories: value bet, call, bluff, fold. And then you look at your hole cards and play based on its category.
Of course, this is very hard to do in your head so, in practice, players rely on various principles and heuristics based on what the solver does in various situations.
Here's a pro explaining his thought process: https://www.partypoker.com/blog/en/its-the-same-game-but-it-...
Re: At 88, Poker Legend Doyle Brunson Is Still Bluffing. Or Is He?
#17Earlier quoted context omitted.
Fascinating. I haven’t played or thought about poker in 15 years. Can you elaborate more on the current strategy of poker? A real example would be helpful.
People use rng generators to take decisions nowadays. Impossible to really exploit.
Using randomization doesn't mean you're anywhere close to being unexploitable.
Re: At 88, Poker Legend Doyle Brunson Is Still Bluffing. Or Is He?
#18For those of you who would like to learn the basics of poker, Johns Hopkins offers an online course: https://hopkinspokercourse.com/ MIT OCW also has a course on poker theory: https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/15-s50-poker-theory-and-analytic...
The book “no limit theory and practice” continues to be the most valuable poker book I’ve read. That said about 80% of that book and 95% of anything written about poker before about 2019 is irrelevant to today’s games. People never intended to play game theory optimal in the past; it was a war of “leveling” your opponent into making the wrong move. You would make money by playing an “exploitive strategy” meaning, you…
Most of what you say is accurate however it’s worth understanding that GTO really only applies in specific situations. E.g., heads up (2 players) play. GTO is unable to produce an unexploitable strategy against 2+ players. Additionally, as a matter of practical application, less of theory, GTO suffers in ultra deep stacked heads up play where effective stacks are > 500 BB deep.
NL Hold ‘Em has progressed a lot but it’s far from solved.
Re: At 88, Poker Legend Doyle Brunson Is Still Bluffing. Or Is He?
#19Earlier quoted context omitted.
> These days that doesn’t work beyond micros (or small stakes at a brick and mortar casino.) I would like to introduce you to Hustler Casino Live. I assume that most of the games they steam are not B&M small stakes. There is plenty of room for exploitative play at higher stakes if you game select well. This is especially true if one has figured out the home game scene (where the best games are, imho). Online on compe…
> Casuals get fleeced rapidly It's funny how the meta-game works here. Fleecing the casuals is, of course, the way the pros make money; so it's basically the point of the game. But I can see how fleecing the casuals slowly is probably a better long-term strategy, that will ultimately extract more money from them, than doing it quickly, draining their bankroll, which may stop them from playing or get them to play less…
> But I can see how fleecing the casuals slowly is probably a better long-term strategy, that will ultimately extract more money from them, than doing it quickly, draining their bankroll, which may stop them from playing or get them to play less consistently.
This is exactly correct.
This is why it’s difficult to build and sustain a plo8/nlo8 ecology online or live. The good players just clean out the casuals so quickly and relatively risk free via freerolling. It largely only exists in a sustainable way in mixed rotations.
I was an online plo8 player who had to switch to plo to increase my game selection. It got to a point that I knew all of the other players at the table, and they were not giving up much in terms of ev (although most of them had exploitable gaps in their games).
Re: At 88, Poker Legend Doyle Brunson Is Still Bluffing. Or Is He?
#20The man is an absolute legend. And the most awesome thing about poker is that you can play until the end of your days if you can stomach the swings.