Third Level of Thought – Your Image in the Eyes of Your Opponent

In the next few articles we’ll move you from “second level” thinking – which is when you’re no longer just thinking about your hand and are starting to take advantage of your opponent by recognizing what cards he’s likely to be playing. We’ll look at “third level” thinking – which is when you’re outsmarting your opponent by considering what he’s likely to think you have.

Being able to think about what your opponent believes you have will allow you to profit not only from your opponent's playstyle, but from their impression of your playstyle.

Before we go any further, however, here’s a quick reminder about the first and second levels of thinking.

Improving: moving from the first to the second level of thinking

The first level of thinking was about learning the basics of the absolute value of your hand. This included learning about good and bad starting hands and also learning how to play tight.

As players progress from beginners and gain more experience, they move to the second level, which is when they learn to think about the relative strength of their hand by adding what their opponent is likely to have. This may seem like a small step, but it is actually a huge leap from the first level of thinking.

A player using second-level thinking will fold a hand that he or she previously thought was very strong. Players who are capable of second-level thinking are able to take advantage of information they perceive about the hands their opponents are likely to have. In this way, they may not waste as many chips as a first-level player, and they may avoid some major losses when they properly recognize the value of their hands relative to the value of their opponents' likely hands.

Similarly, they learn to spot weaknesses in their opponent's hand, often based on their opponent's bets. They can capitalize on this by bluffing when they perceive their opponents as weak, even when they themselves hold hands of very low absolute value.

Improving: Acquiring the Skill of the Third Level of Thinking

If you become very good at the second level of thinking, you can make a profit in your home game. You can also do well at lower levels in clubs, such as R$ 1/2 no limit hold'em, assuming you also have the discipline to place bets correctly based on what you have learned about the strength of your opponent's hand.

If, for example, you are able to determine that your pocket AA is probably beat because your opponent has probably made a set, completed a straight, or even a better hand and you have the willpower to fold pocket AA in that situation, then you are probably ahead of your limit.

Still, further progress is possible and necessary if you want to beat better players.

Specifically, you are now ready to think about how you can force your opponent to make mistakes based on his perception of you. You can win more money from him if you can take advantage of the impression he probably has of you and your style of play.

In short, you use a combination of your opponent's perception of you and your betting to make him incorrectly infer the likely strength of your hand. Then, punish him for his incorrect inference.

Here is an example of how this would work.

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Applying the third level of thinking

Imagine that you are viewed as a very tight player – a “rock” – by everyone at the table. Maybe you have been a rock for years. Maybe you are playing with players who only know you from this one session and you happen to have folded every hand up until this point. Whatever the reason, you are certain that any attentive player at the table assumes that you play nothing but AA, KK, QQ or AK suited preflop and that you never make a big bet on any street without the nuts.

Knowing this, how could you possibly take advantage of your opponents? You would bluff them a lot, right!? Since they would think of you as a rock, your bets would be highly respected. With this in mind, you could win with any two cards simply by betting aggressively (assuming no one had the nuts when you tried this).

Here's a very simple, albeit somewhat exaggerated, example to illustrate this point. You, with a picture of a rock (but ready to use your third-level thinking skills), are dealt :Ac :4s . You and the other players are very deep, with R$ 500 stacks in a R$ 1/2 no-limit hold'em game. Three players call R$2 and an honest player immediately to your right raises to R$ 20. You call and everyone else folds.

The flop comes :Kh :8c :5c . Your opponent bets R$ 40. You call. The turn comes a :2c . Your opponent bets R$ 60. You call. The river comes a :Qh , making the board :Kh :8c :5c :2c :Qh You completely missed the board, having only A-high. Your opponent bets R$ 100. Very tight, you raise to R$ 250.

Even if your opponent has a flush, he couldn't have made the nut flush. Knowing that you're a rock as you always are, he'll almost certainly conclude that you couldn't have played anything worse than :Ac :Kc initially, and therefore, since you're raising, you've hit the nut slush. He'll be inclined to fold based on his image of you and your bets.

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Conclusion

To be a winning player, especially in a home game, you must not only correctly infer what cards your opponent is likely to have. You must also learn to recognize what cards your opponent believes you are playing. Becoming accustomed to third-level thinking is one of the keys to beating better players.

Article translated and adapted from the original: Third Level Thinking: Your Image in the Mind of Your Opponent