One Step Ahead

You’ve probably heard poker players talk about first-level thinking, second-level thinking, and so on, but do you know what exactly these terms mean? More importantly, do you know how these concepts should affect your play? Do you know how to think on the highest levels? This month’s article will look at these ideas in light of a hand I played in the recent British Columbia Poker Championship.

Levels of Thinking

I’ll begin by explaining, for those who don’t know, what exactly I’m talking about. In poker, levels of thinking refer to the depth with which a player is analyzing a given situation and the factors he considers when making his decisions.

The first-level thinker considers solely the strength of his own hand rather than what his opponent might have. Only the absolute worst players are pure first-level thinkers, though many poor players revert to this level in certain situations.

The level-two thinker considers his opponent’s likely holdings and then plays his own hand accordingly. He bluffs when he suspects he is beat but with little regard for whether he has consistently represented strength on earlier streets. When he bets for value, it is because his hand is strong relative to his opponent’s range rather than relative to the range he has himself represented. Most players think on level two most of the time.

Level-three thinkers are aware of what their hands look like to their opponents and use that information to inform their own hand reading. They make thin value bets when they know they have shown weakness and bluff when they know they look strong. This can be a difficult thing to do consistently, but most players who can beat the mid-stakes games are at least capable of it.

Things continue getting more complicated from here, but thankfully, very few players employ fourth-level thinking or higher with any regularity, so you don’t have to worry too much about it. Adapting to the level on which your opponent is thinking is a critical poker skill, as thinking either too low or too high can cause you to misinterpret the situation and consequently make a mistake. This nearly happened to me on day two of the BCPC main event.

The Hand

Blinds were 400-800 with a 50-chip ante, and I opened to 1600 with Q-J on my button. The big blind, a seemingly good young player who had just moved to the table, defended. I began the hand with about 100K, whereas he had less than 40K.

We both checked the J 9 8 flop. You could certainly make a case for betting here, but I would hate to get check-raised, and although the board looks coordinated, there really aren’t that many bad turn cards for me. As this hand will illustrate, it can also be beneficial to disguise a relatively strong holding by checking in an unexpected spot.

My opponent bet 2600 on the 6 turn, and I called. Although there were now a few more draws he could have, I didn’t want to raise against a player capable of second-level thinking. It sets him up to reraise as a bluff or semi-bluff. After checking the flop, I’m unlikely to have a really strong hand, so my opponent can represent one and put a lot of pressure on medium-strength holdings like this one. In short, I’d rather risk giving him a free card than risk getting blown off the best hand by a reraise.

The J on the river gave me trips. He checked, and I bet 6600. He quickly raised to 24,500, and believe it or not, my first instinct was to fold. Of course trips is a strong hand, but with the possible exception of J-T, I can only beat a bluff. I just don’t see a lot of river check-raise bluffs.

I took some time before doing anything, though, and I realized that against this player I needed to think at a higher level. So far I’d gotten only to the second level, thinking about what he might have but not what he would expect me to have. If he assumed I’d always bet top pair or better on the flop, then he wouldn’t expect me to have a hand as good as trips almost ever. To a player capable of reading my hand in that way, this would look like a great spot to check-raise bluff.

From what little I’d seen of him, it seemed like this was such a player. I still believed I could only beat a bluff, but it now seemed more likely that he could be bluffing. A hand with a jack is a good bluff-catcher because it makes it harder for my opponent to have trips with a better kicker or a full house. There is only one jack left in the deck for him to hold. After two to three minutes of thought, I called. He told me I was good and mucked his cards.

Table Talk

Since this took place in a tournament, I was required to show my cards even though my opponent mucked. Although I would have preferred not to show, observing the other players’ reactions provided some information about their respective levels of thinking.

A few seemed surprised that I had to think about it at all. These were the level-one players. The guy who told me, “nice call” and seemed genuinely impressed was probably level two bordering on level three — he could see in retrospect why it was a good call but didn’t sound like he would have made it himself.

Even this sort of very general read can be valuable, because your goal should be to stay exactly one level ahead of your opponent, no less and no more. My opponent was clearly not a level-one thinker — his bluff relied on an attempt to read my hand — so a level-two thought process would have led me to the wrong decision. Had he been a level-one player, then my third-level thinking would have been inappropriate and my call bad, since he wouldn’t have seen this as a good spot to bluff and would have shown up with a nutted hand almost always. So it’s important to be capable of thinking at a high level, but also to tailor your thought process to your specific opponent so that you always stay precisley one step ahead. ♠

Andrew Brokos is a professional poker player, writer and coach. He’s a member of Poker Stars Team Online and blogs about poker strategy on ThinkingPoker.net. Andrew is also interested in education reform and founded an after-school debate program for urban youth.