Comprehensive Guide to Exploit Strategy!! One Must Understand GTO Before Exploiting!!

What is the most important thing in playing poker? It’s not about being knowledgeable about poker or being able to play entirely according to theory. What’s important is to gain the most profit in the long run. To achieve this, various things are necessary, such as learning theories, analyzing hands, and memorizing pre-flop actions.

In this chapter, we will explain the very important ”Exploit Strategy” for maximizing profits and minimizing losses.

Exploit Strategy

What is the Exploit Strategy?

What exactly is the ”Exploit Strategy”? In English, ‘Exploit’ means ‘to use or extract’. In poker, the closest meaning to ‘exploit’ is indeed ‘to extract’.

The Exploit Strategy refers to identifying your opponent’s playing style and tendencies and formulating a strategy to target their weaknesses. Essentially, the goal is “to make the most of the opponent’s incorrect plays”.

While the Game Theory Optimal (GTO) strategy seeks a theoretically optimal solution, the Exploit Strategy aims to maximize expected value (EV) by intentionally deviating from the GTO strategy.

The Concept of Exploit Strategy

Let’s consider the example of rock-paper-scissors. Intuitively, the most balanced optimal strategy is to throw rock, paper, and scissors each at a rate of 33.3%.

However, what if your opponent throws rock 40% of the time and paper and scissors 30% each? Naturally, maintaining a 33.3% rate won’t reduce your winning chances.

But if you throw paper 100% of the time, you can increase your winning rate to 40%. This 6.7% gain is precisely what the Exploit Strategy aims to achieve.

In other words, you maximize your EV by deviating from your actions to capitalize on the opponent’s divergence from the optimal GTO strategy.

In poker, the optimal strategy (GTO) is quite complex, and even for professionals, it’s challenging to perfectly replicate GTO, with inevitable tendencies and habits. Identifying these habits is key to executing an effective exploit.

The Approach to Exploit Strategy

How can we identify the tendencies mentioned in the previous section? For instance, in rock-paper-scissors, after several rounds, you can intuitively sense if someone is deviating from the 33.3% distribution.

The same is true in poker. As you play more hands, you’ll start to notice if someone is more aggressive or passive than the Game Theory Optimal (GTO) strategy. You use this information to execute your exploit.

In online poker, where opponents’ stats are visible, you can use these numbers to inform your exploits. However, in live games or situations where stats are unreliable, it’s necessary to carefully observe the opponent and compare their tendencies to GTO.

To identify these tendencies, you first need a benchmark, and in poker, that benchmark is GTO. Therefore, to become proficient in exploiting, you first need to learn GTO.

With a deep understanding of GTO, you can strategically exploit your opponent’s tendencies – this is the essence of the Exploit Strategy.

How to Identify Specific Tendencies and Decide on Actions

We will now explain how to strategize against certain types of opponents, focusing on plays that deviate from GTO.

Overcalling with Drawing Hands

Characteristics

• Players who call bets and raises with open-ended or flush draws even when the odds do not justify it.

How to Spot It

• Are they calling with only gutshots on the flop and turn?
• Are they calling against bets where the odds (including implied odds) don’t justify it with flush draws or open-ended?

Countermeasures

• Increase the bet size when value betting.
• Widen the lower limit of your value bets and actively make thin value bets if the opponent is a calling station.
• Narrow your betting range when the river completes a draw, and increase bluff frequency when it doesn’t.

Rarely Raising

Characteristics

• Players who mostly call and rarely raise.

How to Spot It

• Is the frequency of raising unusually low? (For check-raises, an appropriate frequency is around 10%)
• Do they tend to have value hands at showdown?
• Are they often slow-playing strong hands?

Countermeasures

• Increase the frequency of continuation bets (CBs) on the flop, betting with a wider range of hands.
• If the flop CB is called, consider that the opponent’s range might be strong and plan your actions for the turn and beyond accordingly.
• If raised, mostly fold.

Calling Too Much on Continuation Bets

Characteristics

• Players who call too often against continuation bets with hands like overcards or backdoor draws.

How to Spot It

• Is their fold frequency to continuation bets too low?
• Do they often show down hands at the flop that shouldn’t be in their calling range?

Countermeasures

• Decrease the frequency of CBs, forming a more linear betting range.
• Increase the bet size when value betting.
• Be more aggressive with double-barreling, as the opponent’s calling range is weaker.

Bluffing Too Much

Characteristics

• Players who bluff with every hand that misses a straight or flush draw, with a very high bluff frequency.

How to Spot It

• Is their betting or raising frequency obviously too high?
• Do they bluff with hands that should not be in their bluffing range at showdown?
• Are they turning many of their offsuit hands into bluffs?

Countermeasures

• Strengthen your checking range to withstand opponent’s bets.
• Widen the lower end of your value-raising range, raising more hands to force opponent folds.

How to Improve at Exploiting?

The most crucial aspect when actually playing poker is to:

• Observe the table situation.
• Understand how opponents perceive your tendencies.
• Study the playing style of your opponents.

Always consider the most EV-efficient actions and decisions based on these observations.

Repeatedly practicing and refining this process is the only shortcut to improving at exploiting. To maximize efficiency, deepen your understanding of GTO and analyze how effectively opponents deviate from GTO.

Summary

The Exploit Strategy is an advanced strategy aimed at targeting the opponent’s weaknesses. Conversely, deviating from GTO means being vulnerable to exploitation, making it a ‘double-edged sword.’

To effectively use the Exploit Strategy, first understand GTO, then spot the opponent’s tendencies and decide on specific actions. Mastering this process significantly improves your poker skills.

While the Exploit Strategy may be challenging, its mastery yields significant benefits. Progress steadily and aim to build a dominant position at the poker table.

This concludes our explanation on the theme of ”Comprehensive Guide to Exploit Strategy!! One Must Understand GTO Before Exploiting!!” Please use this information to enhance your play.