[Zag]

[ QUOTE ]
Zag, your pricing of various hands is extremely interesting to me. Here you price a set at about 100BB. I remember in another post somewhere you priced TPGK at about 40BB; do I remember correctly? Where do your benchmarks come from? Can you put some color behind them?

[/ QUOTE ]
They come from a combination of personal experience and extrapolation from what I have learned from better players (mostly here).

Somewhat, they are calculated this way: If I have AK in early position, I will raise preflop. Then, if I hit my TPTK, I will check-raise. If you calculate it out, you will find that this check-raise will put my total investment so far in the 40 BB range. Of course, this depends on the number of callers, whether the bets were pot-size or half-pot, etc. but it gets you into a neighborhood. Note that if you do check-raise the flop and are re-raised, the opponent probably has TPTK beaten, which is why this is the number I choose for that hand.

Of course, these numbers vary greatly according to the opponents, my image, etc. but they represent a good starting point. The big value that they offer to me is that I can put in that raise with confidance, because I know that I will feel OK about losing 100 BBs (or whatever). If I have to think about it, then I am more likely to inspire the opponent to make a play at me.

[ QUOTE ]
The one thought I keep coming back to in this specific case is that villain doesn't have the set. Sure, he may be a maniac, but would a thinking player play middle or top set this way? I absolutely would not. I still might chicken and fold but I think P( VillainSet ) < 1/3.

[/ QUOTE ]
If that is your belief on the assumptions, then you should always call here or quit playing no limit poker. It helps to try to think of any money that you have bought in with as already gone, already invested. If you can't put it all at risk when you are pretty sure you have much the best of it, then you should stick to limit games.

To everyone who disagreed with my assumptions: I agree with you that they are probably flawed, and I think we can all agree that the amount to put on the ratios is a matter of opinion. My point was primarily to figure out the EV, given some assumptions that I thought would make it close but slightly negative -- I was right about close, at least. Also, I wanted to set it up so that people could easily plug in their own assumptions and see the EV. If you assume that the chance of a set is substantially less than 1/3 I don't argue with you, as long as you can make that call when you are at the table.