[CrisBrown]

Hiya Hotrod,

I don't think there's much way to avoid going bust on set over set. The odds of two people having pocket pairs and hitting sets are very, very small. I haven't done the math, but I'll give it a shot....

Odds of drawing a pocket pair: 13:221 or p=0.059

Odds of at least one other player at a full (9-player) table having a pocket pair: 0.96^8 = 0.15

Odds that their pocket pair is higher than yours depends on your pair, obviously, but on average = 6:13 = 0.46

Odds of hitting a set on the flop = 1:8 = 0.13

So ... odds of someone flopping a higher set when you flop a set are:

0.15 [odds someone else has a pair] * .46 [average odds their pair is higher] * 0.13 [odds of their flopping a set] = 0.00897 or, a little less than 1%.

Now, it might be a bit higher than that, because I assumed only two pocket pairs (max) at the table, and on occasion there will be three or more. On the other hand, the odds of another player flopping a set when you have also flopped a set are a bit less than the usual 1:8, because one of the three flop cards can't hit their hand (unless they have the same pocket pair you do). I'm not including board-paired sets, because those are fairly easy to read.

On the whole, I think you can probably assume that running into a bigger set won't happen more than 2% of the time. Given that, it'd be playing way against the odds to worry about a bigger set.

If one is out there, you just have to pay it off. *shrugs*

Cris