Correct analysis of played hands. How to Analyze Your Poker Hands and Eliminate Leaks

If you want to improve your level of poker playing, then the best thing you can do for this is recording and subsequent analysis hands played. But simply recording the hands you played and reviewing them is not enough. You have to ask yourself the right questions.

There aren't many options for constructive analysis. I detail this in-depth analysis method in my new book, Poker's 1%. If this topic interests you and you want to know what I think is the most effective way to improve your game, read about it in the book.

The first step is to select the hands to analyze. I prefer to start with hands that end on the turn or river without a showdown. But any hand about which you have worthy questions is worthy of consideration. You can select from two to four hands from the session played.

Then you should determine the strategic line of a particular distribution. Given that the determining factor in poker is a series of confrontations, and not individual hands played, in the long term, money is won or lost at the level of the battle of strategies. You play according to a certain strategy. If your strategy better strategy opponent, then you will win at a distance. If your strategy is structured in such a way as to take advantage of your opponent's weaknesses, then after some time you will simply tear him apart.
Therefore, once you have chosen a hand to analyze, the next step is to determine the key principles of your opponent's strategy.

Let's say you pick a hand that ends on the turn. You are on the button and one of the players before you has limped into the game. This limper is your main opponent. What are the main features of this player's strategy? In an offline game no limit hold'em we can assume (especially since he limped into the hand) that this player is playing a large amount preflop starting hands. Perhaps he likes to watch a lot of flops in hopes of getting some decent hands. It is likely that if he misses the flop, he will often fold his cards. He prefers to bet one or two streets when he makes a hand - in which case he does it automatically. If you show weakness, he may well try to steal the bank. Once he has a strong hand, he will try to find a way to get you to call a big bet. For example, by slowplaying or raising on an early street.

This is what his strategy looks like. He watches a lot of flops. Without resistance, he passes cards with a weak combination. In order to use all his options, he actively plays one or two streets whenever he receives any hand. If he senses his opponent's weakness, he may well try to bluff. Having made a strong combination, this player tries to get an expensive call.

This is a fairly standard strategy used by many offline players. What are her weaknesses? I counted a few.

1. A player often enters preflop, but tends to fold on the flop or turn without a strong hand. This means that you can safely bluff on the turn every time your opponent checks, and this alone will probably make the game profitable against such an opponent.

2. With a strong hand, this opponent is trying to make a big bet. This means that while in position, you can freely bluff on the river, even if he called your bluff on the turn. With a strong hand, this opponent will usually be uncomfortable slowplaying to the river and then checking, giving you a free ride to showdown. Given that his strategy is to get you to call a big bet when he has a strong hand, checking the river will indicate that he is ready to fold.

3. When your opponent bets big, it's usually a strong hand and not a bluff, so you can feel free to avoid trying to call his bluff.

By understanding his style, we can develop a counter strategy. Given that our opponent is playing too many hands, our standard plan would be to increase the pot size as early as possible. And also bet on the turn and quite often on the river when the opponent checks. At the same time, fold on his large bets. If we develop a strategy (regarding hands against this opponent) based on his weaknesses, we can win this confrontation of strategies.

So, let's get back to the distribution analysis. Now we have a certain strategy in our minds and we must apply it to the given hand. Is our line of play consistent with our strategy, or are we missing an opportunity to execute our approach? Or is this a hand that doesn't require our strategy?

Here are some examples. In each case, this will be a $2-$5 limit game hand, our opponent, as previously described, is limping preflop, and we are on the button.

First distribution. We have 9-7. We then enter the game by calling. The small blind (SB) also calls, the big blind (BB) checks. The flop comes out Q-J-7. Everyone checks and we do the same. The turn is a 5. The blinds check and our opponent bets $10. We pass the cards.

Second distribution. Our hand is A-7. We raise to $25. The blinds fold and the limper calls. The flop is K-7-6. The limper bets $25, we accept. The turn is Q. He checks, we bet $100 and our opponent folds.

Third distribution. We have K-K. We raise to $25. The blinds fold their cards and the limper calls. The flop is Q-5-4. Our opponent checks, we bet $40, and he folds.

In the first hand we missed the opportunity to apply our strategy. Our approach is to bluff the turn and river, and 9-7 on the button is a good hand for this. We had to raise preflop to create a pot worth stealing. Due to the fact that we did not do this, there were players in the blinds in the hand and a situation arose for which profitable strategy we do not have. In this hand we missed an opportunity to apply our strategy, so we had to play the hand in a different way.

In the second example we played according to our strategy. We raised preflop, thereby creating a pot that we could steal on the turn or river. Having caught a pair on the flop, we called a small bet. There was no reason to give up on this street. Your opponent checked on the turn green light our rate, and everything worked out perfectly.

The third hand is an example of a situation where we didn't have to use our strategy. We received a strong hand, made a bet, and our opponent folded.

Our main task is to clearly understand what goal we are pursuing with this or that action. We must see that every small decision we make contributes as much as possible to a larger goal. Next time you play, write down two to four hands. And try to develop a strategy that would allow you to beat your opponents in these hands. And then analyze the hands to find out whether you played in accordance with the winning approach or not. If you view what is happening from this perspective, you will become a much more dangerous opponent.

The basis of any winning poker player and a prerequisite for growth in limits is a constant analysis of the hands you have played. Most likely, even novice players have heard about this, but when it comes to how exactly to do this, problems and questions may arise. In this article we will give you a step-by-step guide to analyzing any poker hands.

During the game, it is extremely difficult to take into account all the nuances and quickly assess the situation, and with limited time to make a decision, all players, regardless of skill level, make mistakes. At the same time, the result over a short distance does not correlate with the quality of the game, i.e. Mathematically, we can play extremely poorly, but due to luck, end the sessions in the black and vice versa.

Why is it necessary to analyze hands?

In case you have such a question, we answer. Hand analysis is one of the most effective methods of improving our game, which allows us not only to understand how well or poorly we acted in a particular hand, but also allows us to find best solution, which we can apply in the future when we encounter a similar situation.

By evaluating our play after the fact, we continue to develop our skills and improve our ability to read our opponents' ranges.

Hand analysis can be compared to a kind of poker laboratory in which we determine the EV of each action at each stage of the hand. In fact, if you learn to correctly analyze your game, then only due to this you will be able to easily pass the micro-limits and make a significant breakthrough in your game strategy.

Analysis Tools

Of course, in general, we can get by with just a piece of paper, a pen and a calculator, but this will not be entirely reasonable in terms of effort and time. Today, there are a lot of specialized poker calculators, ranging from free to more advanced ones, so we recommend choosing one of these two options.

Their principle is quite similar and they allow us to quickly and conveniently calculate the equity of our hand against a whole range of opponent’s hands, on any street and taking into account the cards that came out.

Step 1: Determine your opponent's starting range

This is the first and most important step that is sometimes overlooked by players. The fact is that on any board you can often find a lot of hands stronger than ours, for example, ours on the flop in theory will beat doppers, or 5o, but if we are not playing against some super-loose fish, then where in his initial range will these rather trashy hands take hold?

Therefore, it is very important not only to determine the initial range of the opponent, but also to start from it in all subsequent thoughts.

The rule is simple: we can only reduce our opponent's starting range from street to street, but not increase it in any way.

We determine the pre-flop range taking into account all the information we have about our opponent. The main parameters will be:

• Player position
• His style and gaming features
• Actions in the distribution before it
• Statistics (if available)
• Dynamics

Regarding the last two points, statistics should be taken into account only if you have a sufficient number of samples for the stat you are interested in, and the concept of dynamics should be used only if you are absolutely sure of its presence and relevance. If you are a novice player, it is better not to refer to dynamics, since often your perception may be wrong.

So let's understand it with an example. We played a hand at a 6-max table and, being in an early position, made an open raise with pocket pair. All players up to the big blind fold, and the tight regular from this position makes a standard sized 3-bet.

We play TAG style and by default we have a fairly strong early raising range. Additionally, having position postflop lowers our fold equity even further. Understanding this, a regular's 3-bet range will be biased towards value, although it will contain a certain number of bluffs.

The value part of his 3-bet will be no worse than QQ+, AKs, AKo, while the opponent will simply call part of the queens and AKo. 3-bet bluffs in the spectrum structure will be no more than 40%.

Turning to the notes, we note that the enemy polarizes 3-bet with suited connectors, and based on our arguments we form an approximate range, leaving 50% of QQ and AKo in it: AA-KK, AKs, T9s, 98s, 87s, 76s, QQ, AKo

Stage 2: Assess the change in the spectrum taking into account the structure of the board and the opponent’s line

From street to street we narrow the enemy's range, shaping his final form.

As an example, let's continue looking at the 3-bet pot mentioned earlier and assume that the following 3 cards hit the board:

The opponent made a continuation bet and called our raise. Then on the turn c both players checked, and on the river with a repeat of three, BB put a 60bb all-in into a pot of 80bb.

On the flop, we assume that the opponent will bet-call with hands no worse than top pair, and will simply throw away all draws and weaker made hands. On the turn, his range of KK+, AKs, AKo will consist entirely of two types of hands - top dopers and sets, and with all these hands the opponent will put all-in on the river.

Stage 3: Calculate equity, pot odds and evaluate the solution

If we use an equalizer, then we take the equity value from the program, otherwise we determine Eq ourselves. In a simplified way, we should find the total number of combinations in our opponent’s range and calculate the percentage of hands that we beat - this will be our fair share of the pot.

In the case of the second option, it is worth understanding that this will only be true when making calculations on the river and in the absence of the possibility of splitting the bank. For any other street, calculations without an equalizer will be very difficult.

For our case, the software estimates the equity of a pair of tens at the level 47.8%.

“On the fingers” this is confirmed by a simple calculation. Taking into account the known cards on the river, the opponent’s range is conditionally 11.5 hands (3 pairs of AA and KK, two suited AKs and 3.5 AKo). We hit the doper, there are no sets. From here:

Eq=5.5/11.5=0.4782 or the same 47.8%

Now we have all the necessary information and we calculate the expected value (EV).

If we win at the showdown, we will get +140bb, if we lose, we will lose 60bb. The probability of winning/losing corresponds to our equity in the pot, i.e.

EV = 140 x 0.478 – 60 x 0.522 = 35.6 (bb)

Those. calling, unlike folding, has a positive mathematical expectation and if we called here, then we played correctly, no matter what hand the opponent has, a set or two pair.

To put it simply, if the pot odds are lower than the equity, then the action is profitable and vice versa. In our case, the chances of calling are 60/200 = 30%, which is much lower than our equity of 47.8%, which means calling has a positive mathematical expectation.

In this material, as an example, we looked at a simple calculation with two solutions: call and fold. There are more difficult situations, when we choose one optimal line from several possible ones and in the process evaluate not only equity, but also fold equity and possible actions of the opponent. For example, deciding on the river how to play better, through check-call, check-fold, bet-call or bet-fold. A more complex calculation is given in the material devoted to mathematical expectation.

Let's sum it up

As mentioned above, constant analysis of hands is important for developing your game and poker thinking. When analyzing a hand, it is important to find the answer for yourself - which decision, taking into account all the factors, would be the best.

If you have not analyzed your game before or have done it superficially, then at first all this can cause some difficulties. But the more you work, the easier this process will be for you.

Analyzing your hands (and the hands of your opponents) is, of course, best way improve the game because it allows you to find your leaks and learn from your mistakes. This means that you can change the decisions you make at the poker tables and finally achieve good results that will bring you victory.

But here's the thing... You won't be able to figure out what to change unless you analyze your hands to see exactly where you went wrong (or vice versa)!

Most people don't analyze their hands at all and don't try to find faces. And this is just crazy if you set out to become a very successful poker player.

In this article we will look at how to analyze your hands and how to guide your faces in the right direction.

Use statistics collection programs if you play online poker

If you are an online player, then you need to use poker software, such as PokerTracker or Hold'em Manager. These programs record the history of every hand you play and then allow you to review them step by step whenever you want. They also provide you with a lot of specific data and statistics about you and your opponents.

You can also use a HUD (heads-up display) to place this information next to your opponents at the poker tables.

PokerTracker is probably the most complex and at the same time the simplest program. It allows you to study your opponents' play in more detail and analyze every aspect of your own play.

It also includes extensive filters to help you pinpoint exactly where your problem areas are. We'll look at how to use the program right now.

Lastly, these programs are essential for an online player because they allow you to track your results and also display them in a graph. This way you will always know exactly what position you are in. No more guesswork.

If you take it seriously online poker, then try the free trial. It doesn't matter whether you plan to use a HUD or not.

Most people don't even realize that HUDs are just the tip of the iceberg in terms of what these programs can do to improve your game.

How to Analyze Your Poker Hands

So, as mentioned above, the main reason to use the program is to analyze hands. Over time, it is not necessary to review everything after each played session. You need to analyze most of your bad hands in order to learn from your mistakes.

In poker we either win or we learn. Let this be your motto.

When you win, you know you probably did a lot right. Most people tend to play correctly when they are lucky. However, if they lost, it was because they played certain hands poorly. Maybe they were unlucky and that's why they lost, but you need to make sure of this.

So, before you start analyzing your poker hands, you need to check that you are downloading hand history from the poker site.

Hand histories are text files from which PokerTracker records and processes all the information. This also includes the data used, which allows you to replay your hands and analyze them in more detail.

Most poker rooms will have an option in the lobby to simply download your hand history. Make sure this option is available and your history will be saved on your computer.

Then go to PokerTracker and check that the hands are being transferred to the program.

Make sure you select the window "Play Poker"(play poker) which is at the top, and then double-check the poker room settings at the bottom.

Finally, click "Get Hands While Playing"(receive hands during the game) and all your hands will be automatically recorded by PokerTracker.

The next thing you need to do is adjust your settings so that you only receive hands from the last session.

Click on the window "View Stats"(see statistics) and make sure you include the date "today"(today) and the limit you are playing at.

After this, your played hands will be immediately loaded into the history. Click on the window "won column"(win column) to sort the winning and losing pots.

To pull out the replayer window and start viewing your hands, just click right click mouse on your hand and then select "replay hand"(play hand).

You can also use the "shift" button on your keyboard to select as many hands as you want and put them all into the replayer at once (recommended).

Now as you go through each hand step by step, ask yourself these 3 questions:

• What type of player?
• What is your opponent's range here?
• What is the most appropriate play option in this situation?

If you decide that you made the best decisions at each stage of the hand, then simply accept the result and move on to the next hand.

However, if you feel that you made suboptimal decisions (calling when you should have raised or folded), then you can learn from this when faced with a similar situation in the future.

Let's look at an example

Hand Analysis Example – Double Barrel with Overpair vs. Nit

NL10 – 6-max

Hero raises in early position with the aces of diamonds and hearts (A♢A♡). A nit opponent calls on the button.

Flop:​ 4♡5♧9♤​

Hero bets. Your opponent calls.

Turn: 8♢

Hero bets again. Your opponent raises. Hero goes all-in.

This is a great example of a hand where you can immediately see a big mistake. This is a serious face that needs to be corrected as quickly as possible. The reason has everything to do with the type of players. In this case, the player type is nit. When such a tight/passive opponent raises on the turn or river after our double barrel, we will almost always get beaten.

It doesn't matter that we have a strong AA overpair here. The line that this particular player has taken here clearly indicates that he has 2 pair or better. Most likely, he has a set on this board with hands such as: 44, 55, 99 or 88.

This means that in this situation his range completely beats our one pair hand. The ideal decision in the game would be to fold. In fact, our game was far from ideal, and folding here was the right decision. Therefore, by analyzing this hand, you can see the big win and the next time a similar situation arises, you can make a better decision.

Poker is a game of real time under pressure

It’s not a fact that next time at the most crucial moment you will play correctly. Still, poker is easy in theory, but in reality everything is different. When there is pressure and you have to "fight", it is difficult to always play the right game.

The point of this analysis is to remind yourself of the mistakes that cost you money. Sooner or later you will get tired of losing and you will make the necessary adjustments to the game. It can take quite a long time to finally come to the conclusion of folding in this situation where you double barrel and a nit raises you.

Most people continue to make those same bad calls, stupid bluffs, and missed value bets for years and years and never learn anything. This is one of the main reasons why they never achieve the results they want.

This is why regularly reviewing sessions and analyzing key hands is so important. This allows you to soberly evaluate all the bad decisions you have made and leads to self-control and change the situation.

Search and elimination of faces

Another extremely valuable feature of PokerTracker is that it allows you to find your leaks and eliminate them.

More precisely, this means that you can run filters across your entire database of hands and find specific problem areas. And, much more importantly, you can see for yourself the background information in these situations. Is your game profitable or unprofitable? The numbers don't lie.

For example, you can analyze a situation where you:

• 3-bet out of position
• Took all the money preflop
• Set up a double barrel
• Float on the flop and then bet on the turn
• Bluffed on the river, etc.

You also have the opportunity to study one specific hand in more detail. For example, you can run a filter on all AK shoves preflop and see if you are in a winning situation or not. The possibilities are endless and the data you get is incredibly useful.

To access the “filter” window, make sure you click "View Stats"(see statistics). Then click "All Dates"(all dates) and click on below "More Filters"(more filters).

Let's focus on situations where you lose (i.e. negative outcomes). For example, if it states that you lose money when you double barrel on the turn, as in the previous example, then you have a problem.

Because winning player must demonstrate profit in this situation. So this is a leak in the game that needs to be addressed. You need to filter this particular situation and then attach many hands to the replayer and start analyzing them one by one.

And again, you need to know:

• What type of player?
• What is your opponent's range in this situation?
• What is the best play option in this situation?

Such information will help you find out the reason for the loss in this situation. You may not be taking into account the nit range, as noted. But the reason may be something else, for example, you are trying to bluff too much against recreational auto callers.

You can sit for hours and analyze one specific situation and review dozens of hands until you finally understand why you are losing. Based on this, you can adjust your game.

To make sure the changes to the game are correct, it is advisable to review the data again after a month or so. You will probably see that you are already profitable in this situation.

In a nutshell, this is what you can use to progress in the game. Chances are that 95% of your micro-stakes opponents don't do this.

You Can't Always Win at Poker

It is important to note here that some situations in poker will not be profitable no matter how hard you try. A classic example of this is playing in the blinds.

You won't win in poker from the blinds no matter how hard you are good player, even if your name is Negreanu or Ivy. Due to the basic structure of the game (being forced to put money into the pot every time with a random hand and playing out of position), the blinds are simply non-winning positions for poker table.

However, poker is very much a game where every inch still counts, and losing small can have a major positive impact on your overall win rate. But you should still analyze hands and improve your play in the blinds, even if you can't make a profit from those positions.

The point is, if you really want to figure out what's holding you back at the poker table, then analyze your hands, and Pokertracker will. best option to find your faces.

This will allow you to get to the source and find specific problems.

It is also recommended to analyze the performance of the best regulars in these situations. The big advantage of such programs is that you collect hand history on them as well. The best regulars in your games win big for good reason. Learn from their game!

Don't attribute your poker success to chance. Don't just play at the tables, but also use Pokertracker and you will notice an improvement in your results.

Final Thoughts

As you can see, it is not that difficult to work with the Pokertracker program. Many people mistakenly believe that these programs are only good for HUD (i.e. getting all the statistics on the screen while playing).

In reality, the opposite is true.

The main goal of these programs is to analyze your game, find leaks and improve your results. Study your opponents' game and develop effective strategies to defeat them.

Start following these 2 tips more often and you will notice that your results are constantly improving.

Translation: Dubova Diana

Self-analysis is one of the most important methods for improving your game.

When everything is good and you are winning, or you are too lazy to work on yourself, then you can limit yourself to a general analysis of the hands based on statistics Poker Tracker(at least in limit hold'em). But the maximum benefit will come from a more thorough analysis of the hands played. A full analysis should be carried out during the initial period of learning to play, after large losses, and when moving to more expensive limits. Studying your games in depth helps you identify mistakes, improve your understanding of the game, and ultimately increase your win rate.

It is better to start analysis immediately after the session(of course, unless it ends in tilt, in which case it’s better to calm down first). Take the game history (you can use a replayer when possible) and look at all the hands you played, especially those in which any decent pots were played. Analysis after gaming session similar to in-session analysis. You look at your hands, try to bet on your opponent's possible range of cards. You evaluate the chances and make the best decision, which you compare with the real one. Software can help in making decisions, in general, this is the difference - there are electronic assistants and more time to think.

You start preflop. Beginners who completely follow the table of preflop starters can skip this stage. When you are trying to change the table depending on your opponents, and were also in a defense/attack blinds situation, you need to see if there is any doubt about the correctness of the move. Are there any? Then we take the tool and check it.

For limit hold'em the tool is Poker Studio or Poker Stove. Enter cards, expected ranges of opponents' hands and calculate the odds. The probability of winning should be higher than the pot odds (although this estimate is not ideal, it is suitable as a working one). For no-limit poker, you have to take more into account the chances of winning on the flop, the playing style and the size of your opponents' stacks. For the last stages of SNG tournaments, when the only decision needs to be made preflop (fold or push), you should use pushbots, for example, SnG Wizard.

Flop, turn: we already see our hand, its chances of improvement. In limit poker, the game is played according to odds - you need to calculate discounted potential odds. We are trying to reduce the range of our opponents' hands by analyzing their actions. On third street it is still quite difficult, but by the turn the situation usually becomes clearer. Based on the possible combinations of the enemy and your own, you need to estimate the probability that you are ahead at this stage, then add the probability of improving and, finally, make a decision. In no-limit hold'em, everything is similar, only the chances of improvement are compared not with the current pot, but with the remaining stack of the opponent (of course, if you think that you will be able to lure him out). In general, of course, in No Limit the analysis is much more subjective and complex.

One of the biggest mistakes is folding your best hand on the river. Dan Harrington argued that, no matter the situation, the probability that your opponent is bluffing is at least 10%. Even with a mediocre hand, it's a good idea to call if the pot odds are better than one in ten.

Again, game analysis is essentially the same as the thought process during a game, but here you have time to do calculations, estimates, and you have various poker calculators at your disposal. However, there is a significant psychological difference between analysis after a game and analysis during a game. A common mistake here is focusing on results. When you analyze, you already know the result of the game, remember the opponent’s combinations and the cards that came on the board. Only a few players are able to abstract from this information and analyze it as they would during the game, in a situation of uncertainty.

There are many examples of result orientation:

You folded to your opponent's aggression, he demonstrated a bluff, and you realized that you played incorrectly; used a slowplay with a set, left heads-up, and the opponent made a flush - was the slow play a mistake?

You bet heavily on every street with two pair, but your opponent gets a straight on the river, and you feel like you shouldn't have put so much money into the pot.

Knowing that your opponent got a set, you believe that calling a raise on the turn with top pair was a mistake.

Knowing your opponents' hands makes it much easier to determine the optimal playing tactics, but this does not mean that any other tactic during the game would be wrong! During the analysis, you need to forget further information and rely only on what is available at a specific stage of the game. By the way, this will be easier to do if you do the analysis a couple of days after the session, but there is another difficulty - you will forget information about the players, and this is an important element when making decisions.

In some cases, you may also face the risk of “future” knowledge about your opponents. If in the first games of the session you folded to the aggression of an unknown opponent, and then it turned out that he was a loose maniac, then again, when analyzing, you cannot focus on facts that you did not have at that time: you played correctly against an unfamiliar player.

Conducting game analysis, forget about the results of the game, but remember information about the opponent, preferably available at the time of the draw. If the situation is difficult, use programs, carry out calculations and try to calculate your chances as accurately as possible. Post the controversial hand on a poker forum (but don’t say the answer right away, so as not to cause interference).

We hope that self-analysis will allow you to identify mistakes and avoid them in the future.

“To get to the poker Olympus, you need to constantly study” - this is exactly the idea that has been imposed on us, ordinary players, for many years. There is nothing wrong with watching various training videos and articles in poker schools. However, the main vein of learning has always been under our noses - this is the analysis of our own hands. What if there is someone else nearby? experienced player and will help with this matter, then we can consider ourselves very lucky.

Why is hand analysis needed? To save on your mistakes! Usually a poorly played hand is used for review. After the gaming session, we must choose our worst hands and try to find the most profitable option for developing the game. All this is done because in poker almost identical situations are repeated quite often. For example, having analyzed the line of drawing a flush draw against a loose opponent, we will definitely know the plan of action next time. If you manage to identify a problem in your distribution and find a solution, then such a mistake is unlikely to happen again.

For a good analysis of hands, special programs would be useful. All Hold'em Manager users can easily find all the necessary hands played after the gaming session, since the entire history is recorded on the computer. Next we need a program to calculate equity. This could be Equilab, CardrunnersEV, or any dedicated online calculator.

Now you need to decide on the sequence. Despite the wide variety of gaming situations, there is a certain algorithm by which you can sort out most of the hands:

1. Determine your opponent's range. To correctly assess your chances in a hand, you need to roughly understand what cards your opponent might have? Let's say we open with a raise from UTG, the cut-off and button call, and the tight-passive player in the small blind makes a 3-bet. In this case, we think the SB has a monster on his hands and here's why: his playstyle involves little action in the hands, and here he is 3-betting out of position against an early raise and two limpers. Pocket aces, kings, queens, jacks, and possibly a big slick - these are the only cards a given opponent can have.
2. We choose development options. After the received 3-bet, we have only three options for developing the hand: call, 4-bet or fold. If we just fold the cards, there will be neither a win nor a big loss. To call a 3-bet we need to take into account the strength of our own hand, the pot odds and the possible range of opponents participating in the hand. For example, sometimes playing with low suited connectors can be very beneficial against several tight players with a narrow range. Finally, let's look at the 4-bet option. Here you need to pay the most attention to your cards and how often your opponent folds to re-raises. Are we ready to go with such a hand to the end? We need to know the answer to this question from the beginning, since folding after our opponent’s 5-bet will deprive us of most of our chips.
3. Let's draw conclusions. Having decided on the opponent’s range and chosen the necessary option for developing the hand, all we have to do is adjust the opponent’s range and work out an action plan for similar situations. Let’s say a 3-bet is made not by a tight-passive player, but by a loose-aggressive one. What to do in this case? Here it is more necessary to look at the strength of your hand. Most likely our 4-bet will be followed by an all-in, fold good cards It doesn't matter against aggressive players, so the only option left is to call. A good hit on the board and we will win a good pot, since most likely the opponent will bet on several streets.

Don’t be upset if you can’t immediately find the best option for a particular case. Sometimes it happens that any decision is negative, and then you have to choose the lesser of two evils. When analyzing hands, it is necessary to take into account as many different factors as possible that influence the correctness of the decision. At first we need to do this immediately after the game, but with experience any player can learn to make winning moves right during the current hand.