All-In-Fest... what hands would you play?

I joined a 10NL table tonight and it happened to have a player who would go all in on every hand. At one point he had his $10 stake up to over $150 and continued to go all in. As would inevitably happen, he busted out, and just kept reloading and going all in.

What had me puzzled was that about half the table seemed to be calling his all in nearly every hand. Finally one of them got his pile up to well over $500. This was happening because he was getting a lucky streak, but also because others would double up on the first guy and keep putting their whole stacks in to try it again. So the lucky guy was not only doubling up, but quadrupling or more.

As for myself, I sat back and waited for premiums. I played four hands, calling the all in for my $10, in the half hour or so before it ended: AQo, AKo, AA, and JJ in that order. Lost the first two. Quadrupled up with the aces to get to $40, and doubled up with the jacks to make it to $80.

My question: what hands would you play, knowing that at least one player at the table will go all in with any two cards? Are hands like Ax good, and if so how high would it have to be? Or would you wait for high pocket pairs, and if so how high? Or mid or low pockets?

I was very happy to see the AA, but when the JJ came later and the bet was $40 I was plenty nervous.

I'd wait for premiums if the rest of the table was calling too.
Then I'd double or triple and leave.

That sort of play is almost pure gambling once others get involved and certainly -ev if you accumulate a stack and then lose to the idiot with a marginal holding.

Go somewhere else and play poker.
Or take what you've learnt and play some turbos, not quite the smae but my general advice for any question.

Originally Posted by topsoyale

Go somewhere else and play poker.

Are you serious? I LOVE finding players like this.

Reminds me to unibet freeroll

I gotta say mark this dude and try to find him later. On a table like that, I would play something like...

HU w/ AI guy: all PP's, Ax, KQ, KJ, QJ

2 callers: PP's 9+, AJs, AQ, AK, KQs, and maybe QJs

3 callers+: PP's T+, AKs

Something like that.

Originally Posted by topsoyale

-ev if you accumulate a stack and then lose to the idiot with a marginal holding.

You're mixing potential valuation (-EV) with final result (losing). "+/- EV" isn't used to indicate final outcome. The result doesn't determine whether a decision is +EV or not.

At a table like this, the variance could put you through some big swings, but if you have the stomach (and roll) for it and choose your hands wisely, the payoff could be huge.

Unibomber's starting hand range seems about right, though I personally wouldn't include QJs even as a "maybe" against 2 all-in callers.

i think the biggest factor is how many other callers as your %EV and %$EV go way down as each new player enters thepot regardles of your holdings. I think the fact that this is obvious also causes later players like 3rd or 4th player to call, to have even stronger hands so your EV drops even further down then it would if they all had normal hands say 25% AA-.

effectivly every time someone calls their hand range gets tighter (for the most part excluding total donks and gamblers wich you diddnt really make clear in your post..)

Heads up you just have to decide what edge you want to gamble for, i would say passing up any thing 55% or more is very nitty as holdem is a game of small edges and getting your money in with the best of it is all we can do. Technicly speaking you should take any edge 50.1% or better givin you have the roll. that range is pretty much J8+22+ as any hand in that range is at least a 51% fav over a random hand. Lets go with the bottom J8

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0{ J8o }
: 51.490% 49.71% 01.78% 12513359484 447161892.00 { J8o }
Hand 1{ random }: 48.510% 46.73% 01.78% 11763185532 447161892.00 { random }

now if we add one more player we cant assume they have a random hand like villan although we can assume they call with our range so lets see if we're still prfitable at the bottom of our range with another oppont now.

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 29.552% 28.16% 01.40% 673540 33400.83 { J8s, J8o }
Hand 1: 29.898% 28.56% 01.34% 683241 31967.83 { random }
Hand 2: 40.550% 38.96% 01.59% 932003 38039.33 { 22+, A2s+, K2s+, Q3s+, J8s+, T9s, A2o+, K2o+, Q2o+, J8o+, T8o, 98o }

Yikes we were not makin money now. So wheres the bottom range with one caller? heres what i found. After trying all sorts of hands i fountd that the weakest hand that has over 33% equity is QT. So QT+ if you have a caller

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 35.737% 34.00% 01.74% 751347 38397.00 { QTs, QTo }
Hand 1: 29.033% 27.89% 01.14% 616363 25230.50 { random }
Hand 2: 35.230% 33.43% 01.80% 738736 39820.50 { 22+, A2s+, K2s+, Q3s+, J8s+, T9s, A2o+, K2o+, Q2o+, J8o+, T8o, 98o }

This is all though assuming you have a large roll as the varience will be huge. Some players wont put in alot of money witho only a 5% edge as they feel they can out play the table and get their money in much better in a different situation. Now if you have unlimited bankroll the most profitiable way to play poker would be to take every single tenth of a percent you can get weather your getting it all in or not. This is what casinos do to some exent in house games. You would make the most money possibe in the long run. But most of us dont have an unlimited BR and we arent particularly fond of varience. So we choose to take larger edges if possible stripping away our overall ev but in turn lowing our varience wich in turn RAISES our $EV. Look at it this way, in an MTT with 5000 people your %$EV is very high as you could win up to 1k times your buy in or more. In an STT your $EV is lower because most you will win is 5x your Buy in. But its exact oppisite for %EV. Your actual % of the prize pool, (based on skill level and #hands dealt, "varience") is much larger at an STT then it is at an MTT.

Anther way to look at it is chips in play vs your personal stack. An mtty may have 5M chips in play all worth X amount of the prize pool, smae with an STT but there may be 15K in play. This translates to what your chips are worth in tearms of $ (in a 10$ STT there is 100 in the pool, you get 1500 chips making them worth about 6.5 cents a chip. But think about it when you dbl up their alue halves. Now think of how much value a chip has in an MTT when your on the 3rd day and have 50x what you started with) I think that demonstrates how your %EV is much lower in a an MTT then an STT. and you $EV is hogher in the MTT.

With that said both are profitable it just depends whats more iportant to you. $EV or %EV and that the question you have to ask when calling these all in bets. If you want to in crease you %EV you only call priem hands AJs+ KQs+ JJ+ as they will all give you at least a 2-1 edge. If not lets see what happens when a third player enters the pot.

Now we ant assume the third player has our range any more as its obvious you need a stonger hand here. At this point i think vil would HAVE to have at least a prime hand.

If we call bottom end prime AJs...

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 25.316% 23.48% 02.01% 305508 26213.33 { AJs }
Hand 1: 18.817% 18.31% 00.64% 238222 8337.83 { random }
Hand 2: 18.818% 17.95% 01.00% 233583 12986.67 { 22+, A2s+, K2s+, Q3s+, J8s+, T9s, A2o+, K2o+, Q2o+, J8o+, T8o, 98o }
Hand 3: 37.049% 35.50% 01.80% 461971 23480.17 { JJ+, AJs+, KQs, AQo+, KQo }

Not surprising ly its just about even,about .3%EV edge. We want to get (if we're gamblers) at least 5% so after running some numbers

Dead:

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 24.622% 20.05% 04.57% 251770 57441.50 { AQs }
Hand 1: 19.547% 19.07% 00.47% 239524 5958.00 { random }
Hand 2: 20.310% 19.32% 00.99% 242607 12456.67 { 22+, A2s+, K2s+, Q2s+, J8s+, A2o+, K9o+, Q9o+, J9o+ }
Hand 3: 35.521% 31.20% 04.32% 391839
AQs and better will give us about 5%, after 2 caller though to get any significant edge you cant call anything less then KK AA even AKs is only a small edge, however its borderline weather to take it or not, heres the numbers.

Dead:

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 30.527% 25.91% 04.80% 270203 50023.08 { AKs }
Hand 1: 19.170% 18.81% 00.47% 196157 4926.75 { random }
Hand 2: 19.584% 18.73% 00.96% 195389 10042.42 { 22+, A2s+, K2s+, Q2s+, J8s+, A2o+, K9o+, Q9o+, J9o+ }
Hand 3: 30.719% 26.47% 04.42% 276109 46125.75 { JJ+, AJs+, KQs, AQo+ }

Well hope this helps.





your table position elitive to the maniac player is absolutly huge as knowing whos calling and not can influence your calling range. I guess if he litteraly does it every single hands its not so bigh though as the button moves youll have equal amounts of times being in and out of position.

I want to point out that all of the ranges I used depend on the knowledge that there are that many callers. If I'm in middle position, I may limp with a hand that can take two callers as long as it's folded to me.

Originally Posted by Xianti

I personally wouldn't include QJs even as a "maybe" against 2 all-in callers.

I agree 100%. I did some thinking on the situation, and found that when I used the hand { 22+, A2s+, K2s+, Q3s+, J8s+, T9s, A2o+, K2o+, Q2o+, J8o+, T8o, 98o } that SHAKE used above, I'm beaten alot more often than not.

SHAKE. I see that you have used the math very well. However, I think that getting your money in in this situation with some of the hands you describe will cause more trouble than not. The math here won't take into consideration that this guy is AI on every hand. You will be abe to take advantage of the bigger hands in your range, and capitalize on them alot more often than you would normally get the chance to. In this situation, I am going to get enough opportunities with my bigger edges to make it fine just to wait for them. Even when he goes broke, he rebuys and I get the chance to take his stack again. You did differentiate between %EV, and $EV; however, when does any poker player use pure %EV to make decisions. This math just seems pointless to me.

Originally Posted by Unibomber14

I want to point out that all of the ranges I used depend on the knowledge that there are that many callers. If I'm in middle position, I may limp with a hand that can take two callers as long as it's folded to me.

Originally Posted by Xianti

I personally wouldn't include QJs even as a "maybe" against 2 all-in callers.

I agree 100%. I did some thinking on the situation, and found that when I used the hand { 22+, A2s+, K2s+, Q3s+, J8s+, T9s, A2o+, K2o+, Q2o+, J8o+, T8o, 98o } that SHAKE used above, I'm beaten alot more often than not.

SHAKE. I see that you have used the math very well. However, I think that getting your money in in this situation with some of the hands you describe will cause more trouble than not. The math here won't take into consideration that this guy is AI on every hand. You will be abe to take advantage of the bigger hands in your range, and capitalize on them alot more often than you would normally get the chance to. In this situation, I am going to get enough opportunities with my bigger edges to make it fine just to wait for them. Even when he goes broke, he rebuys and I get the chance to take his stack again. You did differentiate between %EV, and $EV; however, when does any poker player use pure %EV to make decisions. This math just seems pointless to me.

Alot of times we use pure EV. More then $EV i would say. Would you rather take a 10-1 shot at a million or a 2-1 at 1k. I think questions like that come up alot even more so ijn MTT's on the bubble or close to it. I do see your point though and i thought i covered that by saying if you dont want to gamble and you dont have unlimited bank roll really the only hand you can call with a substantial edge are priem hands basicly AJs+ JJ+. But if you had 1m dollars you could call all those ranges and make money based on the math alone.

What isnt taken into account in m,y post though is the way play changes when he wins or loses. If a caller gets 2 outered and rebuys his range will change.

I did math as far as calling a random hand with an edge before the flop and then compinsated for the other players ranges.

I called a $100 shove with ATo once.

Originally Posted by Fnord

I called a $100 shove with ATo once

Congrats,
Do you want a cookie or something?