implied odds/reverse implied odds much greater in no-limit

[JJNJustin]

There are many times in poker wnen you hold a hand that may be very strong at the moment, however IF beaten, have little or none in the way of outs. There are other hands, which have a higher chance of being beat at the moment, but have a much better chance to improve. Knowing how to play both these kinds of hands is important.

example of hands type A) a small flush, a non-nut straight, bottom set, especially on a 3-straight coordinated board, a medium pocket pair with one over card on the flop, top pair top kicker on a three straight board

examples of type B) are top pair and suited A kicker on three suited flop, top set on a three straight flop, middle pair with an overcard kicker and a 3 or 4 flush, top pair and open-ended straight, top pair and four to the nut flush

In a multiway pot, you would almost always prefer the type of hand that can improve, especially to a nut hand. In a non-multiway pot the made hands become more powerful, and you normally shouldnt discard your hand unless there exists strong evidence you are beat. However, in multiway pots, you may want to get away from your made hand, not only because it may be beat at the time, but because you can easily be outdrawn against many opponents. An extreme example would be to throw away AT on a flop of 10s 8d 7d against many opponents, unless you are also suited in diamonds. One of the biggest mistakes beginners make is over/under valueing their hands in multiway vs non multiway pot. For example, against one or two opponents, the AT now becomes a clear raising hand, and you should not necessarily throw your hand away even if another diamond falls, or if another straight card falls. However, against many opponents, you should probably protect yourself from those painful turn and river situations by not even calling a bet on the flop. Perhaps you can just call, but by playing the hand you open yourself to get "sucked in". You are basically looking to catch two perfect cards and hopefully boat up. This will not happen often enough to make it correct strategy to stay with this hand. When you do, you will often have the board locked and will not much action either.

This relates to the concept of implied odds vs reverse implied odds. Hands that a decent enough chance to improve to the nut hand relative to the number of bets going into the pot give a player the best of it, whereas a made hand with no chance of improvement sometimes becomes costly when outdrawn, players often exclaiming at the river as he tosses in two or three big bets "Let me see your .....".

Made hands are stronger in non multiway pots where, if you do have the best hand, there is a decent chance your opponents are drawing dead. However, if someone else has the pure nuts, then it is YOU who is drawing dead. For example, if you flop a small flush against two opponents. Sometimes you will have them drawing dead, sometimes they will out draw you with a bigger flush, and other times they will have flopped a bigger flush. The thing you want to avoid giving away alot of bets in these smaller pots when you are beat and you want to avoid chasing away a potential fish who thinks his one pair type hand is the best. In general you want to play these hands more passively until you see how things on the turn and river develope and how your opponent responds to you checking and calling. You might want to even check behind him on the turn if he checks, although probably you should bet but usually not raise, because a raise will gain only gain a reraise from someone holding a better hand and a fold from someone you want to be in there. Your raise, for example, may drive out the one pair type hand, and gain a reraise from the other guy who is slow playing a bigger flush, now angry you have chased away his fish.
Also, dont necessarily throw your flush away if 4 flush fall in non-multiway pots. Although your opponent may be betting for value, he may be betting out of desperation, knowing that with no flush card in his hand he can only win if you fold.

What I wanted to stress is that the rules about what types of hands you should play vs many opponents vs the types of hands you would prefer against many opponents and also HOW you play them is important. Getting away from a hand early even if it figures to be the best hand is important in multiway pots is as important as making a flat call down on what looks to be an outdrawn hand in a non multiway pot. Playing made hands in such a way that gains more bets when you have the best hand and dont lose more bets when you dont is important.

For example, I would hate holding a pair of pocket JJs against many opponents on a flop of 678. Even if no one has flopped a straight, what cards can you hope for? Only the two case jacks will help you. a 4,5,6,7,8,9,T,Q,K,and Ace will all hurt your hand. I would actually check and fold the jacks, or maybe just look at the turn. But here is another situation: you hold pocket KK against wo or three opponents and the flop is 678 and the turn comes 4 and someone bets into on fourth street. Dont throw those kings away! Although he could have two pair or straight, wouldnt he more likely check and raise you with that straight? This is where a lot of players get confused, two situations require opposite actions, and look exactly the same. The difference is that one is multiway and the other isnt. Another example is when you raise with QQ, get called by two players, the flop comes K76 and the first player bets into you. You usually should check and call. You lose less when your opponent holds a K and win more when he is bluffing or semi-bluffing.

In general, you only gain from opponents who hold worse hands and are drawing against you when playing smaller pots and hold the best hand before the flop or on the flop. Sometimes, in multiway pots, the plethera of possible draws make their worse, although strong draw potential hand preferable to your made, very susceptable hand with little chance for improvement.

When you play multiway pots, make sure you play hands that play well in multiway pots and make sure you get flops that help your hand, not just flops that have seemingly "missed" other hands. When you play non-multiway pots, be careful about laying down made hands even if they seem hopeless, and dont get too aggressive if your hand has little chance for improvement and may be badly beaten already.

These topics relate to implied odds and reverse implied odds. For the longest time I clearly understood implied odds but for some reason never clearly understood reverse implied odds. When I started playing no-limit, I realized how important these concepts are. They are very important in limit poker, and in no limit poker, they become magnified quite a bit. Implied odds relate to having a weak holding or a holding that may be beat at the time, but its potential to improve and collect a lot of bets later make it playable; reverse implied odds relate to having a strong holding at the time that can easily lose or make second best hand and become costly on later on in the hand if a player gets lucky and outdraws it. In no-limit hold'em, these guidelines become intensely magnified for every given round. The implied odds of hands go way up, because if you catch and get lucky, you may potentially win a player's whole stack, or potentially two player's whole stack. The reverse implied odds also go way up, because you make a hand you can not get away from and lose your entire stack, not just a few bets later on. Not fully appreciating how these concepts relate to how you should play your hand is one of the key differences between good and bad limit and especially no-limit players.

There are too many example to post, but as an extreme example, against a bad player who gets married to a big pair and will usually go all-in somewhere in the hand, I would play any two cards before the flop, if I can get head-up and dont have to call a raise that gives me "stack odds" of less than 8 to one. This relates to the Doyle Brunson concept of playing a small suited connector against a tight predictable player with lots of chips. For example, if bad player X raises to $20 with QQ, I'll play almost any two cards if no one else shows any interest, try to catch a good piece of the flop or turn and bust player X for the remaining $500 s/he holds. Against a player who gets married to the overpair heads up, making this call is very profitable. However, dont carry this concept too far, some players, say player y, can read your play very well and might fold their hand if they dont get improvement or make offensive checks. These types of players arent the same as player x. Now everything is the same except you dont get the big pay-off when you get lucky. Against these types of players it is usually better not to get involved when they hold the big pair- they will know how to extract the maximum from you when you are drawing and leave escape doors when they feel they might be beat. Now instead of getting enormous implied odds from predictable "married to big pair" player X, you are actually giving away odds to top notch player Y.

If you are playing a raked game, you can always fold your hand and give up some close decisions if you are unsure, or dont feel like gambling, but in a timed drop game, you have to look for as many profitable situations as possible per unit time.

Here is an opposite example: You hold KJ in the big blind and many opponents limp for the minimum. The flop comes K25, with two diamonds. You check raise a late position better who now reraises double your bet. You should fold. Even if he is raising on the come of the flush, he could still make it or pair his Ace and beat you, and with that many players seeing the flop for the minimum the chance goes up that someone has flopped a set. If you call his raise, you are going to call many big bets on the turn and river, possibly all-in, jeapordizing a lot of your chips on a marginal hand, that although could be the best hand, if beaten, has little in the way of outs.

In summary, implied odds odds and reverse implied odds are magnified tremendously from limit to no-limit play. In some extreme cases, you may have to fold some very strong hands, and make calls with some very weak ones, depending on the players and the action. I cant get into all the situations. Perhaps you 2+2'ers could list some additional situations involving reverse implied odds and implied odds in No-Limit Hold'Em.

-J

[wutevahung]

good post, thank you, learn a lot!

[riverboatking]

a much more helpful post would be one stressing the importance of paying close attention to all the players in the game and their tendencies so you can apply the best strategy against them in specific situations.

there is a lot of value in your post, especally for beggining players (i would have recommended posting this in the small stakes fourm), however i am wary of people who put forth "rules" regarding how to play hands...seeing as the key to a winning strategy in big-bet deep-stack poker is flexibility.
flexibility and adaptability. period.
and all of that is properly implemented by KNOWING your players... i guess this may be a difference between live and online play as often times online you cannot get the same reads, but in live action there is nothing more important then KNOWING your opposition...there are many times when i play hands completely the opposite of how you would recommend because i have information that leads me to make decisions based on the players in the pot...no amount of preset guidence can effectively account for the many varied situations you will encounter on a table and so while you may present good advice to be used in certain situations to simply try and implement what you have offered with a blind eye to the dynamics of the table and its composition would be foolhardly and unproductive.

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Here is an opposite example: You hold KJ in the big blind and many opponents limp for the minimum. The flop comes K25, with two diamonds. You check raise a late position better who now reraises double your bet. You should fold. Even if he is raising on the come of the flush, he could still make it or pair his Ace and beat you, and with that many players seeing the flop for the minimum the chance goes up that someone has flopped a set. If you call his raise, you are going to call many big bets on the turn and river, possibly all-in, jeapordizing a lot of your chips on a marginal hand, that although could be the best hand, if beaten, has little in the way of outs.

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thing is against good observant players you have to mix it up enough that they won't be able to pick up on the fact that you will always release top pair if someone plays back at you.
i understand your point but to put it out there as gospel without giving context is a misleading thing to do.

its always real easy to spot the nits who won't defend a hand if it aint the nuts and take a lot of pots from them.
and if you only play the nuts then you never have implied odds cuz no one ever gives you action.

[JJNJustin]

I wasnt at all trying to negate the importance of instinct and feel. On the contrary, I feel intellect should always be secondary to instinct and feel. One of the biggest mistakes I see beginning players make, especially ones making the transition from limit to no-limit is that all implied-odds types and reverse implied odds situations are intensively magnified and beginning players do not realize this until they have waited ten hours to try and pick up a nut hand and end up losing all their chips because they get married to it and outdrawn. The go off, saying, how could you call xx$ with 5-6 offsuit and dont actually see the mistake(s) they're making.

There are other mistakes they make as well, such as playing in a game so big their entire bankroll is on the table. I condemn such playing. To them, it is win or nothing. I never play in a game so big as to risk my whole bankroll. Nor do I buy in to a no limit game with more money than I expect to need. I am not one of those guys who makes up for lack of playing ability by stacking mountains of chips. When I play a hand, I expect to go all-in at some point. It is just a matter of when. Having $10000 on the table makes it much harder to do that unless you hold the absolute nuts, doesnt it?

[Ulysses]

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Having $10000 on the table makes it much harder to do that unless you hold the absolute nuts, doesnt it?

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Not if you have any business being at the table w/ $10,000 in front of you.

[JJNJustin]

We have a no-limit game in Detroit where players frequently overbuy. The blinds are like $2, $2, and $5, and some of them sit with $10,000. There is no max buy-in. I am not a fan of buying in for the maximum I can afford. I am a fan of max buy-ins.

[Ulysses]

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i guess this may be a difference between live and online play as often times online you cannot get the same reads

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Not really, rbk. The bigger the games get online, the closer and closer they get to live games in that respect. I agree w/ pretty much everything you said in your post.

I skimmed OP's post and it might be helpful for SSNL, but it's in many respects backwards from the way I think you need to approach the game to beat MHNL.

[Ulysses]

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I am a fan of max buy-ins.

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That speaks volumes.

[JJNJustin]

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I skimmed OP's post and it might be helpful for SSNL, but it's in many respects backwards from the way I think you need to approach the game to beat MHNL.

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In what respects, specifically are you referring?

[Kyo Souma II]

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I skimmed OP's post and it might be helpful for SSNL, but it's in many respects backwards from the way I think you need to approach the game to beat MHNL.

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In what respects, specifically are you referring?

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You will be throwing in enough money in these circumstances where folding equity and deception plays a bigger part than implied odds.

jk.

Sorry for the bs post, I just wanted an excuse to use my new avatar.

-kyo