GTO stands for “game theory optimal.” In poker, this term gets thrown around to signal a few different concepts. It refers to thoughts about opponent modeling, and thinking about poker situations in terms of ranges and probabilities, as opposed to being strictly results oriented.
Sometimes those ideas gets reduced to young pros shouting across a poker room (or the Twittersphere) about whether a given play is “GTO” — or even “the opposite of GTO,” as I recently saw in a discussion thread. But what does this really mean? And does it apply to your game?
Seeking an Unexploitable Strategy
A game theory optimal solution to a game has precise mathematical definitions.