effect of the size of the bring-in?

[grapes]

I play a lot of $10/20 stud online, at a few different sites, but all the ones I've seen have a $1 ante and $5 bring-in. The $1 ante seems a bit low to me ($1.25 would be better) but I don't mind that because I'm usually one of the tighter players at the table. I know that a $1.25 ante would be more trouble than it's worth in a B&M cardroom, but online odd amounts shouldn't be a problem - you don't have actually make change for a quarter to put in the pot.

This is an issue that many cardrooms seem not to understand online. Paradise uses no ante in their .50/$1 rather than use a denomination less than a quarter. Party is so intent on using dollars or halves that their ante is the same at $3/6 as it is at $5/10 - 50 cents.

But, the part that really bothers me is the bring-in. I like the structure at $3/6 with a $1 bring-in, and even the $2 bring-in at $5/10 is an improvement. The $5 bring-in at $10/20 is too big. I think the $10/20 games online are suffering because of it. I'm thinking of lobbying a few sites to change the $10/20 bring-in to $3.

I have an hazy intuitive understanding of the effect this would have, but I'm having a hard time elaborating it. So, my question is, what effect does the size of the bring in have in stud? Specifically, changing it from $5 to $3 in a $10/20 with a buck ante? Which players would it help? Who would it hurt? Would it have a positive effect on the game?

[Andy B]

I don't play on-line, but I do think that on-line poker should mirror live poker as closely as possible. While $1.25 might be a better ante, proportionally, for $10/20, I don't think it would be practical or desirable to have $.25 (or $1.25) chips in a casino. Your practical choices for an ante in that game are $.50, $1, and $2. I think that you'll agree that $1 is the best choice among those three.

My local room uses a $.50 ante for $2/4, $3/6, and $4/8 stud games. It's too high for $2/4, but it's not that big a deal. It's still one of the most popular games in the room. I don't think that there's anything wrong with having the same ante for two different games. $.50 is a better ante for $3/6 than it is for $5/10, IMO (and yours too, apparently). I do think that $.50 is a better ante for $5/10 than $1 would be.

I am of the opinion that the ideal structure for a game is a three chip/six chip structure with a half-chip ante and a one-chip bring-in. Sometimes it isn't convenient to have the bring-in be exactly 1/3 of the small bet. A 1/4 bet bring-in, as in $20/40, isn't a bad solution. The $2 bring-in in $5/10 isn't bad. A half-bet bring-in is bad, I think. That first raise should mean something. In most games, you will occasionally limp in with a marginal hand and then fold when it's raised behind you. I the bring-in is half a bet, this should never happen. If you're the bring-in, you will call a completion significantly more often than usual. You should attempt fewer steals, because the bring-in should call a largish percentage of the time.

The flip side of this is that with a $5 bring-in, there is a little more money in the pot to start, which compensates for the smaller ante. There is about the same amount of seed money in the pot as there would be if the game employed a better structure.

The smaller bring-in favors the tighter player.

[DoctorK]

I asked a similar question about the structure in a post about a month ago. I got several responses you might find helpful. If this link doesn't work, you can search my previous posts to find it.

Post about 10-20 structure on Party Poker