See also
When we looked at bet sizing the wet boards are often a little more tricky to play. When there are many draws on the flop the preflop caller is simply more likely to play back at us early in the hand. He will be doing it with semi-bluffs, strong made hands and pure bluffs. The frequency of each part of his range depends on the player, but in today's aggressive games we can expect to get played back at a fair amount.
Aggressive players
- Will very often play flush draws aggressively
- Will often play disguised draws passively
- Will almost always play sets fast
- Will have a fair amount of air in their range
Passive players
- Will often play flush draws passively
- Will often raise a set and two pair on the flop
- Will often play disguised draws passively
- Will very rarely raise air
Good players
- Will play the flush draws aggressively when the spot is right
- Will play the sets fast when the spot is right
- Will have a fair amount of air in their range depending on the villain
When we are playing draw heavy boards the range of hands we get called by depends a lot on the player type we are facing. So we need to pay extra attention to what lines the preflop caller takes, otherwise we risk getting seriously outplayed.
As you have figured out by now draw-heavy board textures are way more complex to play than their dry cousins. The type or player we are in the pot with makes a huge difference. So instead of outlining plans based only on the board texture, we will use the player type as our primary parameter.
Versus aggressive players
We can pretty quickly spot players of this type since they are raising a lot of wet flops when they are in position, and check-raising them when they are out of position.
When our c-bet gets raised.
Against an aggressive player we should strongly consider expanding our value range - since the mistake the aggressive player makes is that they stack off with weak draws too frequently and bluff too much. The typical example is overplaying weak flush draws on Ace, King, or Queen high boards, where they expect us to c-bet 100% and therefore expand their semi-bluffing range too much.
The problem with just calling is that we then too frequently give their weak draws a free card and we rob ourselves of the chance to get the money in as a favourite. Here we assume that the aggressive villain is not folding the weak flush draws if we re-raise him.
Obviously, if he is bluffing so much that we don't really worry about a free card, calling is a no-brainer.
The alternative line is to check the flop. Here the check is motivated by two factors:
Protect our equity.
This makes sense if we have a hand that we are not willing to go to war with. We fear that he will bluff us out of the hand.
Lower short term variance.
While we will get lower short term variance, we will get higher variance in the long term. We will no longer win the fair chunk of pots where the villain simply folds to our re-raise, which would help us withstand the times where we get the money in bad.
When our c-bet gets called.
Since the aggressive villain raises almost any flush draw and strong hand on the flop, his range on the turn is dominated by medium strong hands, such as top pair decent kicker and second pair type hands.
His range is inelastic and we can pot control, value bet him to death or fire a 2nd barrel as a bluff depending on what hand we have and game flow.
Guidelines for bluffing.
Because the aggressive player is re-bluffing our c-bets with a high frequency, he is a little tough to bluff. We have found two lines to be pretty effective.
On the flop when we are out of position and hold a weak semi-bluff that we are not willing to get it in with, we some times goes for a check-raise.
The reason that it works so well against players who play draw heavy flops very aggressively, is that their strategy is to get us to check/fold a lot of our air (we can't really check/call with air). So, when we check they will try to take the pot down. They will be stabbing at the pot with a range that cannot stand a check/raise, because they think that their strategy has started to work.
This idea also works when you are in position. It may look a little different, but fundamentally it is the same move. Check behind on the flop with the intention of raising the turn lead, you can think of it as fake pot equity protection.
When we actually have a hand we want to take to showdown there's nothing fake about our check and we should not be raising the turn lead as a standard.
The move serves two purposes. The first is to punish the aggressive player to be stabbing with too wide of a range. The second is to protect us for the times when we are actually checking for pot equity protection. Before you pull the move you should actively think about what you are trying to do. Can you justify it?
This villain may be very aggressive but obviously we are not going to stop c-betting as a bluff. The times we get called it can, as previously mentioned, be a very good idea to fire a second barrel because this player type tends to have an inelastic range on the turn. Please note it is rarely a good idea to fire a third.
