Coldcalling third in Stud8

[Aaron W.]

Being a Hold'em player first, I have certain tendencies built into how I play. One of them is avoiding coldcalling as much as possible. I've been told this is not the case in stud. I don't understand it. Why is coldcalling more acceptable in this game?

I also don't have any general principles to try to follow when deciding if coldcalling is good. I don't even has a reasonable thought process yet. Below are the third streets of hands where I'm faced with a coldcalling decision. I hope that someone can tell me how the thinking looks. All of the hands have the same structure.

7 Card Stud High-Low ($0.25/$0.50), Ante $0.05 (converter (http://j.1asphost.com/greenage))

-------------------------
Hand 1: I've got a 7-low with an ace showing against a full bring-in. The pot is most likely going to be heads up. If he has a pair in the hole (AA5), then I'm in a lot of trouble as a 62-38 dog (http://twodimes.net/h/?z=1354205). If he has a wheel draw (532), I'm a slight 52-48 favorite (http://twodimes.net/h/?z=1354206). If it's a pair and a connecting low (554), I'm an even more slight 51-49 favorite (http://twodimes.net/h/?z=1354207). The ace is up, so I'll probably be OOP the whole time and a lot of my hearts are dead. This probably means I should just wait for another hand.

3rd Street - (1.60 SB)

Seat 1: xx xx 9/images/graemlins/heart.gif___folds
Seat 2: xx xx J/images/graemlins/club.gif___folds
Seat 3: xx xx T/images/graemlins/heart.gif___folds
Hero: 7/images/graemlins/club.gif 5/images/graemlins/heart.gif A/images/graemlins/heart.gif___...
Seat 5: xx xx 6/images/graemlins/heart.gif___
Seat 6: xx xx 5/images/graemlins/club.gif___bets
Seat 7: xx xx 8/images/graemlins/club.gif___folds
Seat 8: xx xx K/images/graemlins/spade.gif___folds

----------------
Hand 2: I've got a very strong starting hand, but it's been raised by an open ace. The pot figures to be 4-5 handed, and the king and queen are obviously going high. If Seat 2 has a better low draw than me, then it's a wheel draw, otherwise I figure to have the best low draw in a multiway pot. Either way, this is a strong enough starting hand and I have a good low draw and some live scooping chances. This would be a good coldcall.

3rd Street - (1.60 SB)

Seat 1: xx xx 2/images/graemlins/spade.gif___folds
Seat 2: xx xx A/images/graemlins/spade.gif___raises
Seat 3: xx xx K/images/graemlins/diamond.gif___calls
Hero: 6/images/graemlins/club.gif 3/images/graemlins/club.gif 2/images/graemlins/diamond.gif___...
Seat 5: xx xx 2/images/graemlins/club.gif___brings-in
Seat 6: xx xx A/images/graemlins/heart.gif___folds
Seat 7: xx xx Q/images/graemlins/club.gif___calls
Seat 8: xx xx Q/images/graemlins/spade.gif___folds

------------------
Hand 3: I'm up against a 2 that brought a full bring-in and a coldcalling 5. I've got a good looking hand, but it's on the crappy side for low (875). On the other hand, the flush draw is pretty live and my straight draw is also quite live (I've lost one gutshot 6 and one 4 on the end of the straight). So even though I'm probably a dog to win low, I've got an excellent chance of taking high and I may even find myself scooping if the other two players draw bricks. This hand is a good coldcall.

3rd Street - (1.60 SB)

Seat 1: xx xx 5/images/graemlins/club.gif___calls
Seat 2: xx xx 8/images/graemlins/club.gif___folds
Seat 3: xx xx 6/images/graemlins/spade.gif___folds
Hero: 8/images/graemlins/heart.gif 5/images/graemlins/heart.gif 7/images/graemlins/heart.gif___....
Seat 5: xx xx Q/images/graemlins/club.gif___
Seat 6: xx xx 2/images/graemlins/heart.gif___bets
Seat 7: xx xx 4/images/graemlins/spade.gif___folds
Seat 8: xx xx 7/images/graemlins/club.gif___folds

[Andy B]

I actually think that this would make a good topic for a magazine article. I have some time over the holiday weekend, so maybe I'll write one. If it gets published, I'll buy you a beer. Unless you're underage. Then I'll buy you a case. /images/graemlins/grin.gif For now, I'll just make a few points:

Hold'em and stud/8 are very different games. I know a number of very good hold'em players who just never got the hang of stud/8 when it got hot at Canterbury a few years ago.

Generally speaking, hands that play well multi-way also depend heavily on implied odds. This includes suited connectors in hold'em, low draws in stud/8, and three-card flushes in stud. If you face two bets cold in hold'em, your implied odds are pretty well shot. If you face a full bet rather than a partial bet in stud, your implied odds are still cut, but they're frequently good enough to take a card off.

In hold'em, the community-card nature of the game means that you are often dominated. If someone raises in front of you and you're sitting on KQ, you toss it because there's a pretty good chance that the raiser has AK or AQ, meaning hitting can only cost you money. In stud games, the hands are independent. If the other guy has a big pair and you have a smaller pair, you can outrun him more easily. Also, in stud/8, you will often be going the other way.

Think about why cold-calling is bad in hold'em. It isn't just because David and Mason and Ed and everybody say it's bad. There are reasons why they say it's bad. A lot of them aren't as applicable to stud games.

On all three of the hands you list, you have more than enough hand to call a full bet. In this game, there just aren't that many hands that I'll play for the bring-in that I also wouldn't play for two bets. Some are situational, obviously, especially big pairs other than Aces and small pairs with small kickers.

[Aaron W.]

[ QUOTE ]
I actually think that this would make a good topic for a magazine article. I have some time over the holiday weekend, so maybe I'll write one. If it gets published, I'll buy you a beer. Unless you're underage. Then I'll buy you a case. /images/graemlins/grin.gif

[/ QUOTE ]

I won't hold you to this /images/graemlins/smile.gif. I just want to learn stud8.

[ QUOTE ]
Generally speaking, hands that play well multi-way also depend heavily on implied odds. This includes suited connectors in hold'em, low draws in stud/8, and three-card flushes in stud. If you face two bets cold in hold'em, your implied odds are pretty well shot. If you face a full bet rather than a partial bet in stud, your implied odds are still cut, but they're frequently good enough to take a card off.

[/ QUOTE ]

I did have some thoughts that went along this line regarding implied odds. In hold'em, if you're facing a raise, the betting on the next street is smaller than the raise you have to call. Whereas in stud, the full bring-in is still the same size as betting on the next street. Also, hold'em has fewer streets to bet than stud, which drives down implied odds even further because you just don't have as many chances to collect.

[ QUOTE ]
In hold'em, the community-card nature of the game means that you are often dominated... In stud games, the hands are independent. If the other guy has a big pair and you have a smaller pair, you can outrun him more easily.

[/ QUOTE ]

This makes sense. I think that I had started to equate things like "drawing to a second place low on third" with "being dominated", but that doesn't really seem to be true. If he bricks on 4th and I don't, I suddenly jump from being behind to being ahead. I don't have any intuition on how much of a jump that is, so I ran a couple twodimes simulations.

http://twodimes.net/h/?z=1355282
pokenum -mc 500000 -7s8 6h 5d 2d - 5s 3h ac
7-card Stud Hi/Low 8-or-better: 500000 sampled outcomes
cards scoop HIwin HIlos HItie LOwin LOlos LOtie EV
5d 2d 6h 143265 238980 260770 250 168325 58100 1011 0.473
5s Ac 3h 170074 260770 238980 250 184829 41497 1011 0.527

http://twodimes.net/h/?z=1355284
pokenum -mc 500000 -7s8 6h 5d 2d 8h - 5s 3h ac ts
7-card Stud Hi/Low 8-or-better: 500000 sampled outcomes
cards scoop HIwin HIlos HItie LOwin LOlos LOtie EV
5d 2d 8h 6h 176039 245709 254238 53 270146 76211 345 0.570
Ts 5s Ac 3h 106248 254238 245709 53 120913 21325 345 0.430

http://twodimes.net/h/?z=1355292
pokenum -mc 500000 -7s8 6h 5d 2d 7h - 5s 3h ac 8s
7-card Stud Hi/Low 8-or-better: 500000 sampled outcomes
cards scoop HIwin HIlos HItie LOwin LOlos LOtie EV
5d 2d 7h 6h 134590 239586 260329 85 252632 77233 347 0.517
8s 5s Ac 3h 117718 260329 239586 85 189486 140272 347 0.483

That's a fairly big shift for one card, especially looking at the low-win numbers (which are highlighted). Even if hits a low card, but it forces him to be drawing to a worse low than me, I still get a large shift in my favor.

This also very clearly illustrates to me why getting out on 4th is so important if the other guy draws a good card and I don't.

[ QUOTE ]
Think about why cold-calling is bad in hold'em. A lot of them aren't as applicable to stud games.

[/ QUOTE ]

Heh. I was working the opposite direction. When is cold-calling good in hold'em? Which of those apply to stud games? Since there aren't many good reasons to cold-call in hold'em, I wasn't able to get very far.

[bygmesterf]

Here' a quite little test of the difference between stud and hold'em. Compare AA vs KK in stud and Hold'em. Except for rolled up hands the idea of domination doesn't really exist in stud.

The community card nature of Hold'em makes it very hard to suck out on people after the flop. In stud it's very easy to suck out on people, so you don't concern yourself with worrying too much about going uphill.

Before you play stud/8, you owe it to yourself to play some Razz, which will get you entirely out of your hold'em way of thinking.