[pudley4]

</font><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr />
Can anyone demonstrate whether it is good or bad to put the maximum amount of money into the pot when you are on the nut flush draw (assumes the board does not pair)?


[/ QUOTE ]

It depends on the number of players in the hand.

If you have a 4-flush on the flop, you are 2-1 against making the flush by the river. If you assume you will only win when you make the flush, this means you need to get 2 bets into the pot for every 1 bet you put in. So if you have 2 opponents, you are breaking even. If you have more than 2 opponents, you are making money. If you have only 1 opponent, you are losing money.

If you have a made hand, you want your opponent to pay to make his flush. You don't care how many people are in the hand because you are making money off every bet that goes in.

Here's an example:

You - A [img]/forums/images/icons/club.gif[/img] 2 [img]/forums/images/icons/club.gif[/img]
Opp1- K [img]/forums/images/icons/spade.gif[/img] K [img]/forums/images/icons/diamond.gif[/img]
Opp2- Q [img]/forums/images/icons/heart.gif[/img] 5 [img]/forums/images/icons/heart.gif[/img]
Opp3- J [img]/forums/images/icons/diamond.gif[/img] T [img]/forums/images/icons/diamond.gif[/img]

Flop: K [img]/forums/images/icons/club.gif[/img] 5 [img]/forums/images/icons/club.gif[/img] 4 [img]/forums/images/icons/diamond.gif[/img]

Plugging this into twodimes, we find these results:

Holdem Hi: 820 enumerated boards containing Kc 5c 4d
cards win %win lose %lose tie %tie EV
Ks Kd 492 60.00 328 40.00 0 0.00 0.600
Ac 2c 289 35.24 531 64.76 0 0.00 0.352
Qh 5h 1 0.12 819 99.88 0 0.00 0.001
Jd Td 38 4.63 782 95.37 0 0.00 0.046

Notice that even though you are an underdog to the KK, you will still win over 35% of the time. For every bet that goes in on the flop, you are getting .35 bet back. So if you bet and everyone calls, you are getting .35 * 4 =1.4 bets back, which is a net win of .4 bets. If you bet and KK raises and everyone calls, you are winning .8 bets. If you reraise, you're winning 1.2 bets.

Now if you are heads-up against the KK, you will only win 33% of the time. In this case, you are losing money every time a bet goes into the pot.

In most games, especially at low limits, you will have a large number of players in the hand. Even though you might be an underdog to one or two of your opponents, you are winning more than your "fair share", so you are making money on the bets that go in.