Set Mining/Speculative hands

[slownpainful]

I believe I understand the concept of limping low PP's or suited connecters early blinds to try to hit a monster and stack off with someone, but my question is at what point do the blinds get too high for this to be a profitable play? Currently I just try to make sure I'm in middle/late position with at least a couple of limpers ahead of me. Does it have more to do with what % of your stack you're limping off? Any advice would be helpful. Thanks.

[zachaser]

The standard is you don't wanna put more than 10% of your stack at risk when calling a raise, and you need to be able to win 15 x what you're investing preflop to justifying playing your pair. So, for example, if we're on Pokerstars at 15/30, and a 900 stack raises 120 from early position, we should fold if it folds to us because we don't have implied odds against his stack size.

Also, at 25/50 on stars I am no longer limping pocket pairs in early position. I will only limp pairs from late position if other big stacks have limped ahead of me, or if I'm in the SB. From utg and a few spots after that, I am probably folding 77 and down, sometimes raising 88-99, sometimes folding, and raising 10+.

[drmcboy]

good post za

here is something applicable mcat wrote about small pairs in MTTs,

http://www.flopturnriver.com/phpBB2/...ts-t73277.html

And ofc you should be nittier in SNGs.

[mukaka]

I limp from any position and call small raises at first two levels.. when bb is 50 I never open limp.. I limp behind at least one limper and fold to most raises..

[slownpainful]

Makes sense, I was being much too nitty with them. Always folding to raises and thinking hard about limping them at the 20/40 blind level. I'll have to open up a bit more with them. Should I be distinguishing between low PP's and Suited connectors at all? Does one have more potential to hit than the other?

[mukaka]

I don't believe in suited connectors much because it's less likely you'll stack someone off with a straight or flush since they are more obvious than sets.. I'll only play them from SB with decent odds..

As for sets, I don't think it's too much of a problem to fold against raises more than 100 at the starting levels.. but you can't miss cheap or multi-way pots with them because people at lower buy-ins such as me love to donate stacks..

[mikeneron]

The times I seem to fold are when the raise is just a bit too much in the early rounds...and those are the times I would have hit my set and there is an ace out there

[Im_new]

Mikerneron, those folds are good I think. Its because of the effective stack rule. You need at least 2x the effective stack (pot size) to play the hand. So you should fold when facing ridiculous bets in the early rounds. Here is why:

Villian has 3100 in chips.
You have 2030 in chips.
Blinds are 15/30.
You are in the Big Blind.
Villian is a donk in MP and open raises to 210.
It is folded around to you.
It is 180 for you to call.


---> This situation satisfies all the rules except the effective stack rule.
-------> You can win 15x the bet from Villian.
-------> It is less than 10% of your stack to call.

BUT

*The effective stack (pot size) is only 255.
255 [effective stack] / 180 [bet] = 1.417

We need this ratio to equal at least 2. We need at least 360 already in the pot to play our pair correctly. So if there is at least one brave caller ahead of us, the effective stack gets well over 2. We can play our pair, and we stack at least one of them often enough for this to be +EV at low stakes... hopefully. ...

(And of course like everything in poker, there are situation where this rule can be easily (and happily) ignored.)


(edited for silly mathematical errors... ...that's what I get for trying to do that shit in my head lol)

[mikeneron]

I haven't heard of the 2x pot rule...just the 15x the bet rule.

In your example, it would be 180 for me to call preflop and not 150.

15x the bet would be 15 x 180 = 2700...since the villian started the hand with 2180 in chips that is under 15x the bet, it's only 12.

The pot would actually be 255 (15+30+210). So pot size divided by bet would be 255/180=1.42...again I hadn't heard of this ratio of the pot to the size of the bet having to be 2 or more before...how did I miss this?

[Im_new]

wow... really screwed up that example lol... editing it now...


and the rule may be bad advice... I've heard it around here somewhere, but I can't remember who said it...

[mikeneron]

Even though the villian now has 3100 chips, we only have 2030...so we wouldn't be able to win 15x the bet...so based on that this would be a fold. If we had 2700 chips or more then it would satisfy the first argument.

[Im_new]

damn.. I didn't even think of that part... I clearly don't understand this thing thoroughly enough when I'm not at the table...

can someone please comment on this rule?

[drmcboy]

You need at least 2x the effective stack (pot size)

effective stack =! pot size

effective stack is how many chips the shorter stack in a HU pot has.

If you have 5k in chips and you are playing against someone with 1k, the effective stack is 1k because no more chips can go into the pot past 1k.

You should just change

You can win 15x the bet from Villian.

to

You can win 15x the bet from Villian+what is in the pot already.

and you don't need the other rule, if you can win 15x the bet it has to be < 10% of your stack.

I'd focus less on memorizing the rules and more on understanding them.

[Im_new]

Thanks drmc!

I was told effective stack was the amount of chips in the pot not too long ago when I asked on here. Ehh... oh well... thanks again.

[mikeneron]

I think this is a good example from one of the games I just played. Usually set mining is during the first few levels of blinds. But this hand is from the 50/100 level.

PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em Tourney, Big Blind is t100 (6 handed) Poker-Stars Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com (Format: FlopTurnRiver Cards)

SB (t1270)
Hero (t1930)
UTG (t3695)
MP (t1160)
CO (t1710)
Button (t3735)

Preflop: Hero is BB with , .
3 folds, Button raises to t200, 1 fold, Hero ???

Size of bet we need to call is 100 since I am in the BB.
1) Size of bet must be <10% of our stack: Bet is 5.2% of our stack (100/1930). CHECK
2) Need to win more than 15x the bet (1500): We can win up to the amount of our chipstack (1930) because villian has more chips. CHECK
Easy call.

Now what happens if we aren't in the BB and it costs us $200 to call this or if villian had made a standard raise of $300.
1) Size of bet must be <10% of our stack: Bet is 10.4% of our stack (200/1930). CLOSE, but no cigar.
2) Need to win more than 15x the bet (3000): We can win up to the amount of our chipstack (1930) because villian has more chips. NOT EVEN CLOSE.
Easy fold.

To take this a little further, what happens if we are in the BB and villian had made a standard raise of $300, but our chip stack is 3200?
1) Size of bet must be <10% of our stack: Bet is 6.25% of our stack (200/3200). CHECK
2) Need to win more than 15x the bet (3000): We can win up to the amount of our chipstack (3200) because villian has more chips. CHECK
Do we call in this situation? Even though both criteria have been met, I think you have to take into consideration this is a single table SNG, so if you have 3200 in chips you are in good shape to make the money...kind of an interesting situation. Would like to hear what others have to say.

[mukaka]

this is an easy fold for me.. BB is 100, you are in dangerous waters now.. even if you call here you might see strong pre-flop action from players behind you and 200 chips is too much.. I quit setmining in the middle game when the game gets more aggressive..

[taipan168]

To take this a little further, what happens if we are in the BB and villian had made a standard raise of $300, but our chip stack is 3200?
1) Size of bet must be <10% of our stack: Bet is 6.25% of our stack (200/3200). CHECK
2) Need to win more than 15x the bet (3000): We can win up to the amount of our chipstack (3200) because villian has more chips. CHECK
Do we call in this situation? Even though both criteria have been met, I think you have to take into consideration this is a single table SNG, so if you have 3200 in chips you are in good shape to make the money...kind of an interesting situation. Would like to hear what others have to say.

I would call this because you are both deep stacked, but I wouldn't put (m)any more chips in the pot on the flop if you don't hit your set. One of the issues here is that your implied odds may not be that good as they are earlier in the tourney because opp will be aware that he is up against a fellow big stack, so he may not stack off without a big hand (bigger than he might stack off with earlier in the tourney with even stacks).

[drmcboy]

Shove over with the 66 unless the min raise is non standard, if it is not his usual your implied odds are probably higher than normal. In general playing implied odds vs a BU open raise is terrible, you may pick off a c-bet but you get a stack much less often than you need to.

If you think you can win the hand without a set it's another story. In the deep stack scenario you mention, I would fold unless you feel OK fighting on some good boards.