Could you make money?

[Kaz The Original]

Could you make money playing only poker pairs, and folding if you didn't hit a set or an overpair? BB hands for free you would only play if they made the nuts.
Discuss.

[hagelito]

Possibly in no limit if you meet different opponents every time, otherwise they will read you easily after a couple of sessions and fold as soon as you bet/call on flop.

Limit - I don't think so.

[NLSoldier]

Definately on party NL at all levels. My friend made about 5k in about 8 months of casual play last year(maybe an avg of an hour a day...) You might win slightly slower though because he played AK as well

[rdu $teve]

[ QUOTE ]
Definately on party NL at all levels. My friend made about 5k in about 8 months of casual play last year(maybe an avg of an hour a day...) You might win slightly slower though because he played AK as well

[/ QUOTE ]

Ive heard a little about this strategy, but nobody ever gives up the details. Do you raise them preflop?
How high does the pair need to be to raise?
What do you do in these situations after the flop; do you ever slow play when they hit?

AK - hits top pair, no other paint, no flush/straight draws
- hits top pair, some paint, and/or obvious straight/flush draw
- hits top pair, board paired other than AK (ie, A99)
- flop set or full house (I slow play these, but with the above strategy, I think this would come across to obvious)
- misses, with this tight strategy this is an obvious
check/fold

Big pair - flops set again I slow play these unless obvious draws are out, but seems to obvious. Check-raise?
- over pair, Bet? How much? Check-raise?
- overs on flop bet and check/fold to any opposition?

Small pairs (99 or lower) - I assume these are folded unless they flop a set. How much do you bet if they do hit the set?

[Kaz The Original]

Only ever bet pot, always bet pot if you hit. Never check or fold if you hit. Special case, over pair on 3 suited board, you have no suit, check and fold!

[jomatty]

sklansky writes about something similar in one of his books but im not sure which. he suggests that in a truly wild game you could win just playing big pairs and AK. i imagine hes correct.
matty

[dogmeat]

Yes, you could make money by just playing pairs, but why would you want to?

I have the +EV (from 55K poker tracker hands) of my top 30 starting cards. If I were to play only these hands, I would make 18.93 big bets after playing each one once (on average). Of these hands, pairs account for 53%, or 10.08 big bets per once played each. Also, hands like AK come-up a lot more often than AA does. If I only played pairs, and got the same action (which I would doubt), I would probably only win about 6bb per same period of time I win 19bb. Why do it?

Dogmeat /images/graemlins/spade.gif

[Cry Me A River]

[ QUOTE ]

If I only played pairs, and got the same action (which I would doubt), I would probably only win about 6bb per same period of time I win 19bb. Why do it?


[/ QUOTE ]

Because presumably the original poster is looking for an "idiot proof" strategy. That it wouldn't maximise profits is not the point. The point would be to make it as simple as possible to play and try to minimise variance.

I'm guessing he's looking to outsource his poker playing to India like the MMORPG players are doing /images/graemlins/grin.gif

[NLSoldier]

From watching him a little what i saw was he would generally raise between $9 and $11 with his big hands preflop (on NL 100) and wait for idiot callers with dominated hands, and then bet around half the pot or so on each street as long as he had an overpair or TPTK, he would very quickily give up when overcards flopped or when somone came back over the top PF if he had less than aces or kings. He would limp with the smaller pocket pairs and auto muck unless he hit trips and in this case would sometimes slowplay depending on the board. He described his play as completely robotic and involving very little thinking, which is part of the reason he decided to switch to short handed limit play like me /images/graemlins/cool.gif

[rdu $teve]

I can play SnG and MTT games all day long and I wind up well in the black, in person and online. My SnG ITM% varies from 55-60 in the $5 - $50 games, average finish is ~1.7. This seems to stay consistent and the same online or live. I like to play various levels so I can handle all different types of players. My average finish in MTTs is ~35% in placement, not quite as good but thats to be expected, and the higher payouts more than make up for it.

I am having trouble adjusting to the online cash games; my stack seems to slowly dwindle the longer I'm at the table (only online, I dont have this problem in person). I dont like the robotic playing style, but I like pissing away my tourney winnings even less. I know that every hand is a different situation and the robotic style is very stupid/boring and less profitable than playing real poker. The reason I asked about this strategy is that I am looking at it as a starting point, and as I gain experience at the online cash games, I can add my usual hands and strategies, without losing money during the adjustment period.

[Andy B]

I sure couldn't.

You pass up way too many profitable situations. Only one hand in seventeen is a pocket pair, and those pairs aren't always going to be playable. You only flop a set one time in eight or so, so you're going to have some long dry spells where you don't drag a pot. I am quite sure that significantly less than half of my winning hands are pocket pairs.

[NLSoldier]

Just to clarify im not reccomending this strategy or saying it is a good way to play, im just saying that is can work if you really wanted to do it.

[AnthonyMSU]

I actually came up with a similar system that made me quite a lot in by only playing a few hours a day, the only problem was I’m not quite sure if it was the system working or me getting very very lucky. But it is very similar to playing only pocket pairs. I only did this in NL poker online because I figured that there is where I would make the most money. You probably saw me on there, I was the bastard who always went all-in then as soon as I won a big pot or two I left the table.

I got this idea from someone’s book, I think it was John Feeney ‘Inside the poker mind’ but it was basically a strategy for someone with no skill to play in the WSOP. Basically all my system (changed a little bit from the one I read about) consisted of calling much looser pre-flop. I’m not talking about no starting standards whatsoever, but basically cold calling with any hands Sklansky ranks above a ranking of 6 (in Hold'em Poker for advanced players) from any position. If there was pre flop aggression, I would fold anything except for AA of KK sometimes QQ or AKs in those cases I would raise all-in. Now then, with the rest of the hands that I would cold call with, if I hit top pair with the flop I would go all in; unless the flop was a 3 card strait or all same suit. Otherwise if my cards did not hit then I’d dump them. I found out that if I tried to play hands, that I would loose much more money because I am just a bad no limit player.

The system being said, here are the two things that I believe made the system so profitable:

1. I would buy in for the absolute minimum the table would allow.
2. After I would double, or triple my money I would leave the table and sit at another for the minimum amount at another table.

I figured doing this would maximize my profit while minimizing my risk because I would only loose the minimum rarely, and when I won some pots continuing to do the system would risk my profit for the table. Also people always want to call a small all-in online because they just think that you are most likely frustrated, or that your all in raise isn’t that much of a raise at all and they want to call it. This was especially true at the lower NL tables, the higher limits I played at the worse this system would play ($200 Max buy in tables hated me, and after a while I realized not to play there).

Well any thoughts or cursing remarks to this warped system?

[Andy B]

Nowhere has he said this was no-limit. Even in no-limit, this approach is such that anyone who implements it would be leaving a lot of money on the table. If your opponents are so bad that this can be a profitable strategy against them, then you could probably make three times as much money by reading something as basic as Daugherty/McEvoy and doing a reasonable job of implementing those ideas. It might be possible, I don't know, but it almost certainly isn't worth pursuing.

[illunious]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm guessing he's looking to outsource his poker playing to India like the MMORPG players are doing

[/ QUOTE ]

LOL, Are you serious about the MMORPG outsourcing? Got a link to an article or something?

[Saint_D]

Slansky in Tournaments for Advanced players has a system that he outlines clearly for no limit tournament play that has this at it's heart.

The point of the system is to nuetralize the advantage of experienced players against a less experienced player. He goes on for several pages about it.

Frankly, the book is too advanced for me. I am unworthy to judge if "the system" is any good or not. However, you should check it out if you are interested.

-D

[Gandor]

Sklansky's "System" is only designed for tournament play. The concept hinges on the idea of the gap concept and the unwillingness (due to correct play) of expert players to put a large portion of their chips at risk during a tournament. To try to use the "System" in ring game would be poker suicide.

[Saint_D]

Yes, Gandor you are quite right. I play ring and tournament and no-brainers in ring games are totally different in the tournament.

Losing a big chunk of money on AA in the ring doesn't phase me mutch. It's a high variance hand and the odds are in my favor.

In a tournament, if I got AA on the first hand, I could muck it and not hurt my chances of winning much if at all. In the ring mucking AA pre-flop is just idiotic.

So if you are going to use a system like this, keep it in the NL tournaments where even a 60% edge against you isn't enough to bring a smart player all in against you. And hope you don't run into AA when you do go all in.

-D

[Cry Me A River]

[ QUOTE ]
LOL, Are you serious about the MMORPG outsourcing? Got a link to an article or something?

[/ QUOTE ]

Yep, right here: Wired Article (http://www.wired.com/news/digiwood/0,1412,64638,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_2)

[NLSoldier]

[ QUOTE ]
Even in no-limit, this approach is such that anyone who implements it would be leaving a lot of money on the table. If your opponents are so bad that this can be a profitable strategy against them, then you could probably make three times as much money by reading something as basic as Daugherty/McEvoy and doing a reasonable job of implementing those ideas. It might be possible, I don't know, but it almost certainly isn't worth pursuing.

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree 100%.

[NLSoldier]

[ QUOTE ]
1. I would buy in for the absolute minimum the table would allow.

[/ QUOTE ]
Interesting, he used to do the same thing, but as he got more confidence he started buying in for the full amount.

[Zim]

Well ... it works well up to about 100 NL, I can`t say beyond that.

Here`s your starting hand guide:

http://www.kleptic.com/poker/nlhands.html

(It suggests only advanced players should play anything other than pocket pairs and AK)


And here`s a quick article to flesh it out:

http://www.winningonlinepoker.com/

(go to the NL section)

Best,
Zim

(ps When I first started NL, I too would always buy-in for the minimum. Going all in with JJ or better, AJ-AK. Seemed to work well ... but maybe it was just luck. Hit a slump and profits started to nose dive. Started experimenting with various approaches, when I hit upon over pairs, pocket pairs for sets, and AK TPTK followed by pot size bets. I believe it`s near optimal for a beginner playing multiple tables.)

(The only snag I hit today was calling pot size bets with TT, on a small rainbow board. 3 consecutive pot sized bets gets pretty big. The villain kept calling, and he had QQ. Quite annoying.)