Using a big stack to gamble?

[Atropos]

Should you use a big stack to gamble with your extra chips OR
Should you use a big stack to wait for better stealing opportuinities?

[raptor517]

with a big stack you should take advantage of steal opportunities. i wouldnt call it gambling, i would call it taking the initiative in +ev situations. holla

[Atropos]

"i would call it taking the initiative in +ev situations."

Isnt that what you should always do, regardless of stack size?

Concrete Example:

Blinds 25/50, Stack: 1800
1 Limper who got an average stack
You are on the button
Raise to 200 with any two?

[Atropos]

Is this too simple or too hard?

[Voltron87]

don't ask vague questions like these, post specific hands.

[Nick B.]

[ QUOTE ]
Is this too simple or too hard?

[/ QUOTE ]

No this is too annoying. Search the archives, check out stuff for yourself. Basically you are cluttering up the forum with questions that either can't be answered or would take forever to answer.

[Atropos]

I already posted one, here again:


Concrete Example:

Blinds 25/50, Stack: 1800
1 Limper who got an average stack
You are on the button
Raise to 200 with any two?

[Atropos]

Searching the archives is quite difficult because 90% of the posts are "Should I push this" or "Should I call here" + there is so much of totally meaningless or wrong information out there too.

If it was the point of a forum that everybody should figure out everything for himself or that he should only ask questions like "What is 1+1" to get the answer "2" it would have no point at all.

[Voltron87]

[ QUOTE ]
I already posted one, here again:


Concrete Example:

Blinds 25/50, Stack: 1800
1 Limper who got an average stack
You are on the button
Raise to 200 with any two?

[/ QUOTE ]

fold, but post some read hands. awith the stack sizes of all players.

[Atropos]

I dont see how this can be answered correctly using only one word.

[Voltron87]

this is my last response, your questions are pointless. Here I fold without a good hand.

ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer.

[ripped]

a big stack is not 1800. Thats a good stack but big stacks we are talking 3000+.

Now with a stack this size you can totally dominate the game once it gets down to 4. You can push so many hands with a monster stack as long as there is not a stack that can cripple you. Dont start pushing with this stack at least till level 5 either. To me pushing with the blinds small is dumb. No reason to risk so much of your stack for 75 or 150 chips. Say you had 4000 and the other 3 split the 4K in chips. You can pretty much steal with any ace, any pp, KQ, KJ, QJ. Just keep pushing. Nobody wants to finish 4th so you will only get called by a very strong hand. I play 3way with the big stack pretty much the same also.

I also do this a lot now. I try and look to figure out why someone did a certain thing. Say a small stack pushes and I have say AT. I will look at how much his stack is and ask myself if I was in his situation am I desperate to push any 2? If he pushes from UTG and the blinds are going up next hand AT to me is an autocall depending on position or a push to isolate the small stack. I( have made many calls like this to really help my stack in many of the tournaments I have been in lately. Most of you probably already do this but I figured I would share my thought.

[Atropos]

THX for your efforts, but dominating stack in bubble situation is obvious. I think more about stuff like Gigabets 94s blind defense, and if it is advisable to play that way even without superior hand reading skills + how big your stack has to be to do stuff like this if you are x% worse than Gigabet.

[Voltron87]

[ QUOTE ]
THX for your efforts, but dominating stack in bubble situation is obvious. I think more about stuff like Gigabets 94s blind defense, and if it is advisable to play that way even without superior hand reading skills + how big your stack has to be to do stuff like this if you are x% worse than Gigabet.

[/ QUOTE ]

if you're playing 33s, don't try to apply what gigabet does to your game. use it to learn about poker, but don't go crazy.

[Atropos]

"if you're playing 33s, don't try to apply what gigabet does to your game. use it to learn about poker, but don't go crazy."

We probably have different reasons to play poker. You play to win money. I dont. I play because I find Poker a rather interesting game. I want to find the most +EV way to play in every situation. If this increases variance 100fold - I dont care. If this involves losing money while learning - I dont care either.

[Scuba Chuck]

[ QUOTE ]
Concrete Example:

Blinds 25/50, Stack: 1800
1 Limper who got an average stack
You are on the button
Raise to 200 with any two?


[/ QUOTE ]

Well, you've chosen the one level, IMO, where you could pull some tom foolery like this. I don't recommend this on levels 1 or 2, and it's too dangerous on level 4+.

In general, in tournament play, creative ideas like this are good and bad. Here you're risking 200 to earn 125. Not a bad risk/reward ratio.

I'm not advocating things like this, but I will sometimes do this with much fewer chips. (And something better than any two cards).

That being said, it is a rare move for me. These games can be beaten without such trickery.

Scuba

[Atropos]

"These games can be beaten without such trickery. "

Probably they can, but not for the most possible. Plus you have to take into consideration that due to bad timezones I can only play in the toughest games possible (most I play between 4 and 8 AM CDT).

[Voltron87]

[ QUOTE ]
"if you're playing 33s, don't try to apply what gigabet does to your game. use it to learn about poker, but don't go crazy."

We probably have different reasons to play poker. You play to win money. I dont. I play because I find Poker a rather interesting game. I want to find the most +EV way to play in every situation. If this increases variance 100fold - I dont care. If this involves losing money while learning - I dont care either.

[/ QUOTE ]


I try to find the most +EV situation possible as well. But if you are playing 22s and 33s, using advanced level thinking like Gigabet does will not be optimal. Doyle Brunson's advice for playing against bad players is to play straightforward. As a generalization it is correct.

Players at low limits will not make the assumptions and insights that players at the 109s and 215s will, so adjust according. There is this thing called Fancy Play Syndrome.

[Atropos]

I think one can try advanced level thinking to a certain point. Of course, trying to bluff your opponent of AKo when he hits his Ace is pointless in the 20s or 30s. But I'm quite sure that semi-bad hands like QTo or T9s against one limper are +EV if you raise from the button.

If I have a big stack I now will try to gamble with everything from late positions playing only for fold equity, because it seems the only way to find an answer is to try it and see if it werks.

[spentrent]

[ QUOTE ]
because it seems the only way to find an answer is to try it and see if it werks.

[/ QUOTE ]

To be fair, you asked for opinions -- which you got -- and didn't like them. So it seems that, yes, you must simply try it and see if it works.

[ QUOTE ]
Blinds 25/50, Stack: 1800
1 Limper who got an average stack
You are on the button
Raise to 200 with any two?

[/ QUOTE ]

There's not enough in here to call this a "concrete example." I need to know the limper's position and stack size. I also need to know the stack sizes of the blinds.

You can make this play if

1) you decide you need to steal 125 chips now
2) you think you have any fold equity.

Number 1 is debatable. Number 2 is the big question and the info left out is crucial in coming up with an answer.

But here's what I think about this in general: every time you make an aggressive move to the pot in the early levels, you affect your table image and fold equity for the later levels.

When the blinds are 100/200 and you raise/push pre-flop, your opponents will ask themselves, "Is he just on a steal?" You want the answer to be "maybe, but it's not worth finding out with my QJs."

If you consistently made positional steal plays in the earlier rounds -- like punishing limpers from late position or the blinds -- then you're more likely to be viewed as an aggressive preflop stealer in the later rounds when you want to be viewed as a tight player who overplays strong hands preflop.

[Atropos]

"If you consistently made positional steal plays in the earlier rounds -- like punishing limpers from late position or the blinds -- then you're more likely to be viewed as an aggressive preflop stealer in the later rounds when you want to be viewed as a tight player who overplays strong hands preflop."

As a small stack you would care - but I dont think that as a big stack this matters too much too you. If you end up having 6000 chips and 3 other players with 1000 chips. You can safely push every hand, and even after the 7th time in a row they will fold without monster. If there are 6-7 players left I would be less inclined to steal after playing aggressive the rounds before, but thats what I can use the chips I won for.

[spentrent]

[ QUOTE ]
If you end up having 6000 chips and 3 other players with 1000 chips. You can safely push every hand, and even after the 7th time in a row they will fold without monster.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't dispute this. You've just injected a special case here that

1) doesn't happen all that much and
2) doesn't apply to your 25/50 example.

You don't "end up" with 6000 chips by stealing 2.5BBs every 10 hands.

[citanul]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
If you end up having 6000 chips and 3 other players with 1000 chips. You can safely push every hand, and even after the 7th time in a row they will fold without monster.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't dispute this.

[/ QUOTE ]

I do.

The case where the other players have equal stacks is not close to ideal for pushing every hand. Players will consistently start to call you when the stacks get low, as there is no other person who is in MORE danger of busting than they. So they'll take shots when they think they're ahead, because well, winning one hand here would be a significant boost. Now you might be able to like, whittle them down from like 1600 each to 1000 each, but I find they start to call after that. A commonly used piece of advice is to push every hand until you're called and lose in such a situation. This advice could be improved by also telling the player to stop pushing right before they're going to start calling, unless you have a real hand. So what if you aren't risking busting and they would be? It doesn't actually help you to run it out as a dog to get into the money when you're dominating the tournament. Learning how to judge the tempo and other player's tempers is very important as the big stack.

citanul

ps: taking a hand off stealing has the added benefit of often someone will steal from someone else, creating a disparity in stack sizes, creating a nice gap for you again. It's really all about manipulating the size of the gap.