20+2. I dont understand poker.

[vqc]

#Game No : 3010807507
***** Hand History for Game 3010807507 *****
NL Texas Hold'em $20 Buy-in + $2 Entry Fee Trny:17279698 Level:7 Blinds(150/300) - Wednesday, November 09, 21:36:48 EDT 2005
Table Table 67121 (Real Money)
Seat 5 is the button
Total number of players : 4
Seat 5: IModFTR ( $1910 )
Seat 6: captjjb1 ( $4460 )
Seat 7: funnyguy17 ( $1310 )
Seat 9: NUTZREALSMAL ( $320 )
Trny:17279698 Level:7
Blinds(150/300)
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to IModFTR [ Js Ad ]
NUTZREALSMAL folds.
IModFTR is all-In [1910]

Witht he small stack in the BB next, this should be an easy play.
The problem is, I dont kno wat the right answer is.

Discuss.

[WildBobAA]

If you're playing for 1st, push. If you're playing for 3rd, fold.

[vqc]

I didnt have any reads on captjjb pertaining to calling ranges for pushes.

I ddi however see him limp alot and minraise alot with a big stack.

[vqc]

If you're playing for 1st, push. If you're playing for 3rd, fold.

Does pushing or folding give me more $ over time?
prove it.

[Scuba Chuck]

Pushing here is surely not -$EV. But I doubt it is the wise move you're hoping it is. Here's the important considerations. Does bigstack know how to play the bubble? If he doesn't, then I think a min-raise or call is the best move, because you know that BB is only playing about 4 or 5 hands back at you (which coincidentally, are the same hands he'd call you with.)

So, in this case, all you're concerned about is did BB get lucky and found himself card rich? Or, is bigstack a donkey, or know how to play the bubble?

Here's a great example where $EV analysis could be just as useless as it is valuable.

[Scuba Chuck]

If you're playing for 1st, push. If you're playing for 3rd, fold.

This is garbage. Feel free to extrapalate if you will, but I'm certain I will have visions of my dog chasing his tail.

[WildBobAA]

If this wasn't the bubble and you were 3 handed on the button w/ AJ would you ever consider folding here? You're making the play that will get you the most chips over time which gives you the better chance at placing higher.

Ya'll need to chill out, that's just what I think, definatly open for debate. Prove me wrong.

[vqc]

if UTG had 1 chip left and was guaranteed to bust out next hand, Does my increase of chips (and therefore equity) from pushing this hand outweigh the fact that the very next hand I am gtd 20% of hte prizepool?

[Scuba Chuck]

If this wasn't the bubble and you were 3 handed on the button w/ AJ would you ever consider folding here? You're making the play that will get you the most chips over time which gives you the better chance at placing higher.

Ya'll need to chill out, that's just what I think, definatly open for debate. Prove me wrong.

It's not my job. Feel free to prove that you're right.

[WildBobAA]

I know what you're saying but here's another thing to consider. Funny is in the BB and he definatly doesn't want to bust before the shortstack. So unless he wakes up with a monster, the only person you have to worry about is captj. If the SB and BB just fold, you have put quite a large gap between you and funny. You'll have 2300, he'll have 1000. And there's definatly no guarantee that the shortstack will bust.

[WildBobAA]

If this wasn't the bubble and you were 3 handed on the button w/ AJ would you ever consider folding here? You're making the play that will get you the most chips over time which gives you the better chance at placing higher.

Ya'll need to chill out, that's just what I think, definatly open for debate. Prove me wrong.

It's not my job. Feel free to prove that you're right.

Nevermind, I stated my opinion you can disagree if you want. Now you're just being an asshole.

[vqc]

I know what you're saying but here's another thing to consider. Funny is in the BB and he definatly doesn't want to bust before the shortstack. So unless he wakes up with a monster, the only person you have to worry about is captj. If the SB and BB just fold, you have put quite a large gap between you and funny. You'll have 2300, he'll have 1000. And there's definatly no guarantee that the shortstack will bust.

I undestand that the SS isnt gtd to bust and that I will make chips.

My questino is just that
does my equity of the prize pool increase by such a margin with an increase of chips that I do not need to worry about allt he times that I get knocked out here.

[Scuba Chuck]

It's not my job. Feel free to prove that you're right.

Nevermind, I stated my opinion you can disagree if you want. Now you're just being an asshole.

It's too bad you can only see my responses in that light rather than a challenge.

Feel free to call me an asshole. It don't hurt.

[gabe]

I know what you're saying but here's another thing to consider. Funny is in the BB and he definatly doesn't want to bust before the shortstack. So unless he wakes up with a monster, the only person you have to worry about is captj. If the SB and BB just fold, you have put quite a large gap between you and funny. You'll have 2300, he'll have 1000. And there's definatly no guarantee that the shortstack will bust.

you can prove using ICM that you lose enough when the big stack does have a hand that makes it not worth it. this does consider how tight the short stack will be.

[vqc]

sometimes i hate both of u.
NO more posts of that nature in this thread please.

[Demiparadigm]

How about:
1)State an opinion
2)State why you feel this way

If you're playing for 1st, push. If you're playing for 3rd, fold.

This is garbage. Feel free to extrapalate if you will, but I'm certain I will have visions of my dog chasing his tail.

Neither of these posts do that.

you can prove using ICM that you lose enough when the big stack does have a hand that makes it not worth it. this does consider how tight the short stack will be.

This is a good post.
I am not sure I agree though. I'll have to do the math.

What do we think that Big stack's range is? This should tell us if the play is + or - EV.
Small stack's range should tell us how+ or - EV it is.

[Scuba Chuck]

How about:
1)State an opinion
2)State why you feel this way

If you're playing for 1st, push. If you're playing for 3rd, fold.

This is garbage. Feel free to extrapalate if you will, but I'm certain I will have visions of my dog chasing his tail.

Neither of these posts do that.

Wow, you're quite the mediator. Thanks for villifying me, and completely ignoring my first post on this topic. It's this type of qualiy in a poster that make me so happy that I spend any time at all thinking about a post.

[Trikflow77]

No way im min raising here, any big stack with a clue would set u all in (which scuba mentioned). Every time you get called all in here u will be behind, so i would not push this hand. The short stack is too short to be pushing marginal hands here. If he had, say 800 chips, i would push this, but not when hes going to be all in blind in a hand or two.

[Demiparadigm]

Let's assume Big Stack calls with every hand that beats us.
This is 4.7% of hands.

equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 27.7561 % 26.30% 01.46% { AdJs }
Hand 2: 72.2439 % 70.78% 01.46% { TT+, AQs+, AQo+ }

So 95% of the time Biggy folds, and of the 5% we're called, we win ~25%

Ignoring the small stack,
we win the blinds (450) 95% of the time for a total cEV of 427.5
5% of the time we are called and either
win 1910+300=2210 with a probability of 0.05*0.25= 0.0125
or lose 1910 (p=0.0375)
These combine to a cEV of 2210(0.0125)-1910(0.0375)= -44
So the total cEV vs just the big stack is
427.5-44= +383

Now assuming the same calling range for the small stack, and assuming that we are never called by both players:
5% of the time we are called by the small stack and either
win 1310+150=1460 with a probability of 0.05*0.25= 0.0125
or lose 1310 (p=0.0375)
These combine to a cEV of 1460(0.0125)-1310(0.0375)= -31

So our total cEV for the play is
450(0.9) -44 -31= +330

So the play is clearly +EV for chips.

Now how does that relate to $EV?

With our current chipstack we can use ICM to show that we have equity of 0.29 (29% of the prize pool)
If we win the blinds that changes to 0.315
If we lose to the big stack it is obviously 0
If we lose to the short stack it becomes 0.17
If we beat the big stack it is 0.38
If we beat the small stack it is 0.37 (since the small stack is now knocked out)

Now we find the difference in $EV of each of these by subtracting our currint EV and combine that with the probability of their occurrance to give us:
(0.9)(0.025)+(0.0375)(-0.29)+(0.0375)(-0.12)+(0.0125)(0.09)+(0.0125)(0.08)
= 0.00925

So the move in terms of $EV is worth about 1% of the prize pool.

Note that a move that on average increases our chipstack by 17% only increases our $EV by about 3% even on the bubble.

[Demiparadigm]

ICM takes chip stacks into account as each chip having an equal probability of helping you win the tournament. This changes when we know one player is about to be blinded out.

Now if the tiny stack loses the next hand, our equity increases to 0.315 which is an increase of 2.5% of the prize pool.
Since this is more than the 1% we get for pushing, we need to find the probability of it occurring.

I wouldn't mind some ideas for a better way to do this. I ran some monte carlo simulations through poker stove and came up with the following:

15% of the time his equity is 25% (assuming 1 player with top 5% of hands)
30% of the time his equity is 35% (assuming the button will raise 20% of hands and sb folds)
35% of the time when the small blind completes with approximately 80% of his cards, tiny's equity is 45%
we'll also assume 10% of the time he plays 2 opponents and his equity is 25%
but when he wins he triples up.
The remaining 10% of the time tiny takes the blinds.


So he doubles up
0.15*0.25+0.3*0.35+0.35*0.45= 30% of the time

and triples up 0.1*0.25= 2.5%

and takes the blinds 10%

So he only busts 57.5% of the time.

If we take the probability of him busting and multiply it by the increase in equity we recieve when he busts, we get:
57.5% *2.5% = 0.014375 or 1.4% of the prize pool.

If we take the equity of our push and subtract the equity of the tiny stack busting, we get:
0.00925-0.014375 = -0.005125

So waiting for the small stack to bust is actually worth 0.5% of the prize pool more than pushing.

[vqc]

Demis been doing a long long very impressive calculation on the rest of this hand.
It pertains to how often the SB loses and gets knocked out or doubles up.

I cant wait for him to post everything.

[vqc]

yay!

if we assume that shorty busts a tad more than 40% of the time,
folding yields a higher gain in equity of prize money than pushing.

interesting.

[arkana]

I don't have the time to go through all those equations Demi (looks like a great analysis though) but I have a quick question for you (sorry if its a dumb question because i didnt carefull read your posts).

You calculated the money EV for pushing as 0.00925 and the money EV of the small stack busting as 0.14375.
Then you say subtracting the two shows that waiting for him to bust is better. I dont agree with this.

Firstly the equation 0.00925-0.14375 = -0.005125 is wrong, I am assuming the 0.00925 is actually 0.925 then which would make more sense. Secondly we only lose out on the EV of the short stack busting when we bust after pushing, as long as we don't bust we still get the EV from the times the short stack bust so this calculation should look more like this:

(I couldnt find the value in your calcualtions but lets assume we bust 20% of the time)
0.925 + 0.8*(0.14375) - 0.14375 = x
(If x is positive then we should push)

Am I way off here?

[Demiparadigm]

I don't have the time to go through all those equations Demi (looks like a great analysis though) but I have a quick question for you (sorry if its a dumb question because i didnt carefull read your posts).

You calculated the money EV for pushing as 0.00925 and the money EV of the small stack busting as 0.14375.
Then you say subtracting the two shows that waiting for him to bust is better. I dont agree with this.

Firstly the equation 0.00925-0.14375 = -0.005125 is wrong, I am assuming the 0.00925 is actually 0.925 then which would make more sense. Secondly we only lose out on the EV of the short stack busting when we bust after pushing, as long as we don't bust we still get the EV from the times the short stack bust so this calculation should look more like this:

(I couldnt find the value in your calcualtions but lets assume we bust 20% of the time)
0.925 + 0.8*(0.14375) - 0.14375 = x
(If x is positive then we should push)

Am I way off here?

I fixed the equation.

I see your point about the second one.
We actually only bust 3.75% of the time.
The equation isn't that simple, however as the change in our EV is slightly different for each stack size that we may have when the short stack busts.

[vqc]

demi just go to sleep! =D.

[LeFou]

Awesome work, demi. but:

Let's assume Big Stack calls with every hand that beats us.
This is 4.7% of hands.

equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 27.7561 % 26.30% 01.46% { AdJs }
Hand 2: 72.2439 % 70.78% 01.46% { TT+, AQs+, AQo+ }

Aren't we behind any pair, i.e. add 22-99?

[Scuba Chuck]

So waiting for the small stack to bust is actually worth 0.5% of the prize pool more than pushing.

I haven't looked over your math, but you have very much impressed me with your thought process and thoroughness.

[arkana]

I fixed the equation.

I see your point about the second one.
We actually only bust 3.75% of the time.
The equation isn't that simple, however as the change in our EV is slightly different for each stack size that we may have when the short stack busts.

Agreed. If we only bust 3.75% of the time then pushing is definitely the correct play though.