How does Kill affect strategy?

[VBCurtis]

Morongo's 3/6 HE game is full kill, which I've never seen at such a low limit. Should I be more aggressive when the pot is killed? Is there any reason to loosen up to become the killer? How does game texture change this? For example, I've seen tables where 6 see the flop most hands fold around to me when it's killed, and tables where nothing changes. (when nothing changes, I assume you just play your usual game on kill pots).

Seems there's little discussion of kill strategy in most HE books.. is the feature that uninteresting to not merit discussion?

[midas]

What is the kill criteria - 2 winning hands in a row or pot size? The 2 wins in a row rarely happens, so strategy adjustment is not necessary. Pot size may produce more kills and put some people out of their bank-roll comfort zone but if they're sitting they know the cost to play. I'm not a big fan of pot size kills because of the wild pot swings. I would just play your normal game.

[VBCurtis]

Thanks for the replies!
The kill criterion is two pots in a row, with first above $40 (at 3/6). Only once did I see the leg-up not passed to someone, meaning the pots were always over $40.

The kill happened about a dozen times in the 5 hours I played, with 2 people who clearly loosened up when possessing the leg-up; it seemed backwards, but I thought I might be missing some advantage other than LAG pride for killing. The killer at this room always acts last preflop, which I can see as a significant advantage when cutoff or button, especially for a LAG.

What is the reason to have a kill? I thought it was intended to stimulate action, but that's clearly not necessary at SoCal 3-6 tables. If the necessary adjustments are small, why have it at all? That said, I like it, since it seems to cause my opponents to alter their game much more than I do, often in obvious ways.
-VBCurtis

[Bremen]

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What is the reason to have a kill?

[/ QUOTE ]
Because the fish like it. They want to gambool it up and are afraid to actually sit at the higher limit table. Good players also like it since some fish play fishier in kill pots.

[guidoguru]

Al's comments are spot-on. Also, Bremen makes a good point that good players like kill games because the fish do play fishier in them. My regular B&M game is 3/6 full kill(2 pots in a row to trigger), and it SIGNIFICANTLY increases my hourly rate. Not just because once in a while the stakes will be higher, but because when the stakes are higher the fish play even worse than usual.
This brings up an interesting question which i have asked on several forums before, but never gotten a good answer for: How should one calculate their hourly rate when playing in a kill game? If im playing 3/6 full kill, is the big bet $6 or $12?

[Xhad]

Assuming everyone plays exacly the same way when there is a kill, the formula for a big bet would be: (non-kill pots)/(total pots)*(normal big bet) + (kill pots)/(total pots)*(kill big bet)

The easy way to prove this is to assume that you're playing at two tables, one of which is a 3/6 game, and one of which is a 6/12 game, and you can only play one at a time. Clearly if the players are exactly the same, you should have the same BB/100 rate at one game as you do at the other, meaning your winrate at the big table is exactly twice your hourly rate at the little table. Then it's just a matter of how many hands you spend at each table vs. total hands played to determine what your winrate is.

For example, in a 3/6 full kill game where it averages one kill every 10 hands (I'm just pulling this number out of my arse), it would be (9/10)*$6 + (1/10)*$12, or $8.1

If the people play fishier when there is a kill, how much that adds to your EV is kind of an intangible so I don't know that any numbers would help. Also the issue that the kill gets his own big blind can also change things, however since you won't be playing as loosely as the rest of the table will in a kill game you're less likely to post a kill, meaning that factor doesn't hurt you either. It seems the real question here is how often do pots get killed? That's the important unknown, and in fact it likely varies from game to game (depending on how badly the people in question want to "defend their kill button")

[Bremen]

One thing you have to remember is that if you're going to have to post a kill if you win a pot then the pot is essentially smaller by that ammount. So if you're on the end and with the nuts and someone bets into you, it isn't worth raising if that would cause it to be a kill.

Ok, that isn't going to happen very often. But you get the idea :0)

[JoshuaD]

[ QUOTE ]
One thing you have to remember is that if you're going to have to post a kill if you win a pot then the pot is essentially smaller by that ammount. So if you're on the end and with the nuts and someone bets into you, it isn't worth raising if that would cause it to be a kill.

Ok, that isn't going to happen very often. But you get the idea :0)

[/ QUOTE ]

Isn't the kill live? If so, it's got some equity and shouldn't be written off as "lost".

[mosch]

kills are live. Considering it lost is overcompensation. It's basically just a blind, but one in (usually) a less shitty position.

If you get the kill on your blind, you only have to post the kill.

Personally, I like the east coast kill better (pot size). The Foxwoods 5/10 games I've played in were often 10/20 games where I didn't have to pay the big blind my fair share of the time. West coast kill (2 in a row) is just a random trip to another limit... though it's a lot of fun to rake a 20bb pot from an 8/16 kill game that plays with $2 chips. (a little over a rack and a half of chips, from one pot)

[jpumass11]

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The Foxwoods 5/10 games I've played in were often 10/20 games where I didn't have to pay the big blind my fair share of the time.

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So at foxwoods the blinds dont post on a killed pot? What are the blinds at 5/10 anyways? Thanks.