Loose games when you can almost never protect your hand

[Xhad]

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"As has been stated previously, it has NOTHING TO DO WITH THE SIZE OF THE POT. "

SSHE also says "to use any of these tools (pot odds, implied odds, pot equity), however, you must count the size of the pot."

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Actually, it's not completely accurate to say that your pot equity has nothing to do with the size of the pot, HOWEVER it's usually not that useful to think of it in those terms.

If you want to use pot equity when deciding whether to call (as opposed to folding, I'm not talking about slowplaying), then the formula involved is:

Equity % * pot size >= amount required to call

So if you will only win 25% of the time, and the pot is 2 bets, then your equity is .5 bets, so you should not call a bet.

BTW, the above inequality is the same thing as saying:

equity % >= (amount to call)/(pot size)

Since equity is the same thing as probability of winning the hand, this is what you should use in practice.

The more common use of equity specifically is value betting. The way to look at it is that the equity is your "share" of the money going into the pot. To tell if a value bet is +EV, the formula is:

equity% * number of players > 1/(number of players)

Which is a fancy way of saying that if you have a hand with above-average % of winning you can value bet.

Regarding why it can be correct for one player to value bet/raise and someone to call down, as an extreme example imagine that you are heads up against someone with AA and there is $1000 dead money in the pot (casino promotion or something). You are "only" an 80/20 favorite against most hands, meaning that your opponent's equity is at least $200 or so. Meaning if the betting is $2/$4 limit, your opponent must call. But since you still have the best hand, according to the second inequality you should still bet, even though you will be called and even though your opponent should call you. By similar logic you should still raise 10-handed even if you know your opponents will go all the way to the river and even though you are going to lose more often than not (as your equity is still greater than 10%)

In practice, what more often happens is that there is a lot of money sitting in the pot on late streets either because people posted blinds and folded, or people incorrectly called on previous streets (as in your loose game example).

speaking of trolls. I've asked this question at PITR on SA, I have a feeling I'll get the answer there a bit quicker.

Thank you, I knew "pot size" referred to the total pot up to that point, but others insist it's only the pot bet on a certain street (hence 1/n, with n players on that street). That's why it made no sense to me, why should I not consider all the dead bets in the pot (like the 1000 in your example)?

Now 1/n is used with value bets as you said, but you DID consider dead money in the pot, which is what I was trying to say. You look at the whole pot, not just the pot bet on that round.

[milesdyson]

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speaking of trolls. I've asked this question at PITR on SA, I have a feeling I'll get the answer there a bit quicker.

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see my edit

i wasnt sure if i had to adjust my bluff fold pot equity by the lowest common demonitaror of the limp reraiser to my right's went to showdown %. is this rite?

edit: preflop raise

edut 2: 1/n!

edit 3: wait am i rite?

edit 4: wait are we suposed to use our blood alcohol content in any of these pot odds equations?

edit 5: bump

[Xhad]

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Thank you, I knew "pot size" referred to the total pot up to that point, but others insist it's only the pot bet on a certain street (hence 1/n, with n players on that street). That's why it made no sense to me, why should I not consider all the dead bets in the pot?

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Because when I bet $5, and you call $5, only $5 more of your money is going in the pot regardless of what was already there.

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Thank you, I knew "pot size" referred to the total pot up to that point, but others insist it's only the pot bet on a certain street (hence 1/n, with n players on that street). That's why it made no sense to me, why should I not consider all the dead bets in the pot?

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Because when I bet $5, and you call $5, only $5 more of your money is going in the pot regardless of what was already there.

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But the proportion I put in differs.. If there's 100 dead money in there vs. 0, i'm putting in 1/22 vs. 1/2.

I just don't get why with some bets, I should only look at the pot for that round, while with other bets, I should look at the total pot for the entire hand.

[milesdyson]

if i bet too large a portion, who eats my leftovers?

edit: roast beef

[Xhad]

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Thank you, I knew "pot size" referred to the total pot up to that point, but others insist it's only the pot bet on a certain street (hence 1/n, with n players on that street). That's why it made no sense to me, why should I not consider all the dead bets in the pot?

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Because when I bet $5, and you call $5, only $5 more of your money is going in the pot regardless of what was already there.

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But the proportion I put in differs.. If there's 100 dead money in there vs. 0, i'm putting in 1/22 vs. 1/2.

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We are talking about betting, not calling. If your hand is below average then you should not want to put any more money in the pot than you have to. This is regardless of whether the pot is 5 bets or a million bets, it's not a value bet if you have the worst hand!

EDIT: The difference is that when deciding whether to call, you say, "Will I win enough when I win to cover the times I lose?" which is a function of the size of the pot. When deciding whether to bet, the question is "Is my hand above average?" which is independent of existing pot size.

[milesdyson]

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We are talking about betting, not calling.

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uuuuuuugh then what is this "bet/call"-ing thing i see around here!

edit: am i rite?

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Thank you, I knew "pot size" referred to the total pot up to that point, but others insist it's only the pot bet on a certain street (hence 1/n, with n players on that street). That's why it made no sense to me, why should I not consider all the dead bets in the pot?

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Because when I bet $5, and you call $5, only $5 more of your money is going in the pot regardless of what was already there.

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But the proportion I put in differs.. If there's 100 dead money in there vs. 0, i'm putting in 1/22 vs. 1/2.

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We are talking about betting, not calling. If your hand is below average then you should not want to put any more money in the pot than you have to. This is regardless of whether the pot is 5 bets or a million bets, it's not a value bet if you have the worst hand!

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Ok.. so for leading, I should only look at the pot and players on that street, but to call I look at the overall pot.. when you say value bet I assume you mean raising bets?