mini-blind games

[housenuts]

UB offers 4/8 mini-blind games where the blinds are 1/2 but post flop the game continues like 4/8. what type of player will this be most advantageous to?

[bobbyi]

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UB offers 4/8 mini-blind games where the blinds are 1/2 but post flop the game continues like 4/8. what type of player will this be most advantageous to?

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This rewards tight preflop play. It also somewhat punishes aggressive preflop play because stealing the blinds (or forcing them out to get dead money in the pot) is less attractive than with the usual structure. However, it matters how the other players are playing. If seven people are seeing every flop, then you can afford to play plenty of hands and plenty of drawing hands. But, in theory if people were playing correctly, having less seed money in the pot to chase should mean you don't play as many hands.

[Fnord]

What are the stakes on pre-flop betting? Raise to $4, 3-bet to $6 and cap at $8? How is the rake structure?

Sounds like the big hands go down in value and speculative hands would go up in value. Particularly if the game is loose.

[Shillx]

So in the example you give the blinds are 1/2 but would a raise preflop make it $4 to go or $8 ot go?

If a raise only makes it $4, you have to play all pairs and suited connectors (or any hand that has a chance of winning a big pot). It plays a little bit more like a NL game in that you should be trying to sneak into lots of pots for cheap and then use the big streets to punish people when you make your hand. I don't know what a good VPIP would be but I'm thinking like 30-35%? /images/graemlins/confused.gif I might be off here but you would need to play looser.

If the raise makes it $8 you need to punish people who try to limp in cheap. Slowplaying preflop would be very dangerous given the huge implied odds.

[Fnord]

Yeah, that's kinda along the lines I was thinking. Almost like pot-limit game. A better comparison is a Limit game with overs (any strategy written up on that?)

Small/Med pocket pairs should RULE as premium hands will not be able to punish them as harshly pre-flop.

S00ted connectors and aces are interesting. You're getting in cheap and post-flop betting can't take away your odds to draw like it can in a PL/NL game because of the structure and that there will almost always be money left behind on the river. Yet you really want a large field to cover or give value while you're drawing to a very strong hand.

I guess AQ/AJ/KQ/QJ/KJ offsuit would all go down in value (the money for the spectulative hands tends to come from here) and KT/QT/JT offsuit might even be unplayabe outside of short-handed and blind steal situations.

[Shillx]

There are more interesting concepts to this game as well. Let's say that you raise AA and 4 other people call (the pot is 10 SB on the flop). Let's that that only one guy decides to call down and he flopped bottom pair.

In the mini-blinds, he is putting in $20 (post-flop) on his call down to win $40.

In a normal 4-8 game, he would be putting in $20 but he would be doing so to win $60.

So postflop skill is also magnified because the pot odds aren't as good should you flop a weak hand. When people call down with bottom pair in this game, you are even better off then in a full game. So if you play this game, seek out the loose-passive (calling station) type players and milk them.

Brad