struggle for the antes

[wyattjames4]

i just started reading the theory of poker and it states that poker starts with the struggle for the antes or blinds. if that is so, then how does that relate to a game where the rake wipes out the blinds such like the casino games i play in where the blinds are 1 and 3 and theres a 3 dollar rake and 1 dollar jackpot. thanks for any insight.

[Louie Landale]

It only wipes out the antes when there is action. But the antes are 10% smaller than face value, and early bets/raises are only worth it if you have the 10% advantage. Those facts discourage marginal bets/raises early in the hand. Yup, raked games favor the tight player.

- Louie

[laja]

Without antes or blinds no one would ever play a hand, that is the initial incentive, the rake would not crush this small blinds amount either as rake is %, so it can never dominate money being made, but also later in hands the amount used to win that blind comes into play and can further profit

[laja]

That exclamation basically means that without the blinds/antes no one would ever play a hand except a/a because it would not be logical too. Rake is a %, if everyone folded to the blinds no rake would be taken so rake cannot destroy the blinds. However all the betting rounds is how you fight for those blinds and most of the profit comes from there, but it needed to start somewhere.

[Louie Landale]

Nit-pick: without antes or blinds nobody SHOULD play anything except AA so long as everyone else is doing likewise. This is like the winner must force bet $1 stud games I've seen. Bozos DO in fact play in these situations, and good players should likelywise "loosen up" to play hands that beat these bad players.

- Louie

[ACW]

...and if nobody is playing anything except AA, you shouldn't even play AA in a raked game with no blinds/antes because the rake gives even that hand negative EV. You either take down the pot (0) or are 50-50 on a raked pot (which nearly always gets split).

[TMFS9]

I was going to post a similar question but i will include it since similar to your post. I too am reading theory of poker and have a question about the same chapter. It talks about loosening up with higher antes and tighting up with smaller antes which makes perfect sense when everybody antes. But with a blind structure with no antes (most hold'em games) should you follow the same logic? I am thinking that while the blinds are smaller relative to chip stacks you should loosen up becaue your implied odds are substianlly greater. And as the blinds increase you should tighten up when not in the blinds and loosen up in your blind defense. Is my thinking wrong. And is it different between a tournament and a cash game.

[piratesocrates]

I, too, came across this curiosity. I play in a home game with miniscule blinds in comparison to both our chip stacks and the ensuing bets. It's a NL hold'em game with a very odd structure, the max bet/raise is $4.00, but the SB is .25 and the BB .50, so since it is so cheap to see the flop compared to how much the next bets are going to be, it puts my implied odds high enough(or so I would imagine, if my understanding of poker theory is correct)to loosen up significantly. Help in this area would be very useful.

[LokiV]

Aren't your implied odds so much lower since the max bet on any street is $4 when you're committing .50 as a blind/min raise anyway?

Implied odds means you stand to take their whole stack (or a significant portion of it) which you do not with those limiting bets.

[spadeclub99]

you are playing spread limit not NL.