AA - What the?

I'm a newb and literally overwhelmed looking through this site. I had no idea where to post this, so here goes anyway.

I understand the uniformly published way to play these hands BUT

AA or any high pocket pair for that matter; (if I'm right) the equity edge for these hands increases with number of opponents. That being said, I can see no reason why you would raise with these hands in EP. Call (letting poorer quality hands in) and hope for the chance to reraise is the way I see it. Sure, you're not going to win as often but in the the longrun you'll win more. (not to mention deception)
Why is this wrong?
and
Has anyone done any maths on - if you do raise, how much your equity edge drops due to the higher quality of hand now required to call.

[Pov]

I think there are a number of reasons to open raise AA from early position. In no certain order:

1) bad players will call anyway, particularly before the flop - charge them now before they get the chance to miss the flop and fold cheaply

2) meta game - if you raise a lot from early position with AJ, KQ, 99 type hands then you should raise your really big ones too - keep 'em guessing

3) your hand is easier to play post-flop when you raise - if you don't raise and the flop comes 6 handed you'll have no idea how to read a raise on most boards. By showing some preflop strength you define the hands that call you a little bit and can hopefully make more profitable decisions on the big bet streets. You prevent your own hand from being too well defined with #2 above

In low limit games I think #1 is the most important and the main reason to raise. Your profit in poker comes from your opponents making mistakes. Give them a chance to make one of the most profitable mistakes in the game - cold calling preflop. With another limper or two, the guy playing 76s isn't making a mistake to call even if you show him your Aces. Any time someone makes a +EV decision, it's -EV for you. Maybe you're still making a profit on the hand, but it's not as big as it would have been if that player made a poor decision.

[SheridanCat]

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I'm a newb and literally overwhelmed looking through this site. I had no idea where to post this, so here goes anyway.


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Welcome. You've come to the right place to get started.

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AA or any high pocket pair for that matter; (if I'm right) the equity edge for these hands increases with number of opponents.


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Why do you think this? Against a single player with a random hand your equity is about 85%. Against two players it dips to just over 70%. Meanwhile, your opponents' equity has remained about 15%. I'd prefer to face a single opponent with 15% equity than two with that same equity.

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That being said, I can see no reason why you would raise with these hands in EP. Call (letting poorer quality hands in) and hope for the chance to reraise is the way I see it. Sure, you're not going to win as often but in the the longrun you'll win more. (not to mention deception)
Why is this wrong?


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For every player you let in you lose a big chunk of equity. Meanwhile each of them only lose a little bit of equity every time you let another player in. You are paying more per player than everyone else.

I haven't done any simulations with implied odds, but I think you are not correct since you'll be run down a great deal more than usual if you play AA passively.

The simulations I've done have been hot/cold sims with Poker Stove.

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Has anyone done any maths on - if you do raise, how much your equity edge drops due to the higher quality of hand now required to call.

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The thing is, if you're holding aces, you don't really care how strong that other hand is. Here are some results:

<font class="small">Code:</font><hr /><pre>
equity (%) win (%) / tie (%)

Hand 1: 82.6366 % [ 00.82 00.00 ] { AdAc }
Hand 2: 17.3634 % [ 00.17 00.00 ] { KdKc }

</pre><hr />

<font class="small">Code:</font><hr /><pre>
equity (%) win (%) / tie (%)

Hand 1: 79.3958 % [ 00.79 00.00 ] { AdAc }
Hand 2: 20.6042 % [ 00.20 00.00 ] { JcTc }
</pre><hr />

Interestingly, you want QQ and KK to call you more than you want those middling decent hands that will often fold. But this is even better - when you dominate the other player:

<font class="small">Code:</font><hr /><pre>
equity (%) win (%) / tie (%)

Hand 1: 93.0317 % [ 00.92 00.01 ] { AdAc }
Hand 2: 06.9683 % [ 00.06 00.01 ] { AsQd }
</pre><hr />

Those dominated hands will often call.

Does that make sense and answer your question?

Regards,

T

[SheridanCat]

Pov trumps it all with his #1 which is really key.

Regards,

T

[Pov]

[ QUOTE ]

<font class="small">Code:</font><hr /><pre>
equity (%) win (%) / tie (%)

Hand 1: 82.6366 % [ 00.82 00.00 ] { AdAc }
Hand 2: 17.3634 % [ 00.17 00.00 ] { KdKc }

</pre><hr />

<font class="small">Code:</font><hr /><pre>
equity (%) win (%) / tie (%)

Hand 1: 79.3958 % [ 00.79 00.00 ] { AdAc }
Hand 2: 20.6042 % [ 00.20 00.00 ] { JcTc }
</pre><hr />

Interestingly, you want QQ and KK to call you more than you want those middling decent hands that will often fold. But this is even better - when you dominate the other player:

<font class="small">Code:</font><hr /><pre>
equity (%) win (%) / tie (%)

Hand 1: 93.0317 % [ 00.92 00.01 ] { AdAc }
Hand 2: 06.9683 % [ 00.06 00.01 ] { AsQd }
</pre><hr />

Those dominated hands will often call.



[/ QUOTE ]

Now that is an awesome awesome point. I remember discussing this once with a poker buddy long ago and thinking it was really smart then, but apparently I had forgotten it. This is good stuff.


I'll defend the OP's statement on rising "equity" with more callers though. You may be 85% against one random hand and 70% against two, but would your rather have 85% of 2 bets or 70% of 3 bets? Clearly, the 70% of 3 bets is worth more. I think where you get into trouble though is your hand becomes more difficult to play as profitably on later streets. But preflop anyway, you make more money with more callers.

[Twitch1977]

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I'll defend the OP's statement on rising "equity" with more callers though. You may be 85% against one random hand and 70% against two, but would your rather have 85% of 2 bets or 70% of 3 bets? Clearly, the 70% of 3 bets is worth more.

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This is important to remember. Even though adding players decreases the % chance you have to win the hand, your net profits will go up.

That said the reason you raise before the flop, as pointed out, most loose players will call anyways they don't care if it was raised. The danger of not raising, also as pointed out, is that you let them in for one bet and if they miss the flop they fold and you only get one SB out of them.

Raising, also helps preserve the best of both worlds in terms of % chance to win and profit in such that you only need half as many players in the pot to equal the same amount of money as if you just limped plus your equity is that much higher since you have fewer hands to beat.

T

[Pov]

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Raising, also helps preserve the best of both worlds in terms of % chance to win and profit in such that you only need half as many players in the pot to equal the same amount of money as if you just limped plus your equity is that much higher since you have fewer hands to beat.


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There's the creamy filling we were looking for I believe. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[AKQJ10]

Much to be said here, and Pov's points are good ones. However, I want to point out one important fallacy:

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Any time someone makes a +EV decision, it's -EV for you.

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This is very untrue. Exaggerated example: You're in the cutoff with AA, button has 7 [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] 6 [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]. 6 limp, you raise, button calls the raise (which as you say is correct with so many in the pot), blinds and limpers all call.

Flop (20 SB):

A [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] K [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] T [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]

Eight check, you bet (which must be correct -- you probably have the best hand and there's no way giving free cards to draws is correct here), button calls (or raises to get out single higher clubs in case two more clubs come, but the more I think about that play the less I like it)....

You and button have both played +EV here. The reason this is possible in a zero sum game is because the other eight have played so poorly, building a big pot. Button playing +EV isn't costing you money. Perhaps in the very strict sense that you would profit even more if he wrongly threw away the flush draw, it's costing you money. But that's not -EV for you; rather it's not as +EV as it would be if he made an egregious mistake. Him playing correctly is not cutting in to the huge profit you both have made from all those limpers in the pot.

Anyway, kind of a contrived example but my point is, with enough bad players in the game, one good player's +EV decisions aren't -EV for the other good player; they both can be playing in a way made profitable by all the other bad players. It's a zero sum game for the table as a whole (actually a negative-sum game with the rake) but not a zero-sum game between any two opponents unless they're heads-up.

[Pov]

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Anyway, kind of a contrived example but my point is, with enough bad players in the game, one good player's +EV decisions aren't -EV for the other good player; they both can be playing in a way made profitable by all the other bad players. It's a zero sum game for the table as a whole (actually a negative-sum game with the rake) but not a zero-sum game between any two opponents unless they're heads-up.


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I'll agree I overstated and I'm glad you corrected it. What I was really trying to say is that any +EV move is equally -EV for someone or a combination of someone's as it has to come from somewhere.

However, I don't think your example illustrates this and I think some discussion might be interesting. When he correctly calls on the flop, this is very -EV for you. He loses 3/4 of the current bet to you, but claims 1/4 of the pot which is much larger. Your bet was +EV for you because anyone who calls it with less equity is forfeiting a part of that bet, but his call was -EV for you. From his point of view, he would have been receiving infinite pot odds for him if you had let this check through while instead he has to pay 3/4 of a bet so your bet was -EV for him as well. You have both made +EV decisions, but both decisions were -EV for their opponent.

I think where it can come in that a decision doesn't affect you is when a third hand has outs against the current leader of the hand, but not against the drawing hand if it hits. So when the guy holding the Q[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]9[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] calls, he's taking money away from the player with AA, but not from the player with 7[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]6[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]. A Jack will now force the AA to fill up to win, but the flush draw is unaffected so all the -EV comes from the made hand.

edit: clarified infinite pot odds

[Pov]

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Anyway, kind of a contrived example but my point is, with enough bad players in the game, one good player's +EV decisions aren't -EV for the other good player; they both can be playing in a way made profitable by all the other bad players. It's a zero sum game for the table as a whole (actually a negative-sum game with the rake) but not a zero-sum game between any two opponents unless they're heads-up.


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I'll agree I overstated and I'm glad you corrected it. What I was really trying to say is that any +EV move is equally -EV for someone or a combination of someone's as it has to come from somewhere.

However, I don't think your example illustrates this and I think some discussion might be interesting. When he correctly calls on the flop, this is very -EV for you. He loses 3/4 of the current bet to you, but claims 1/4 of the pot which is much larger. Your bet was +EV for you because anyone who calls it with less equity is forfeiting a part of that bet, but his call was -EV for you. From his point of view, he would have been receiving infinite pot odds for him if you had let this check through while instead he has to pay 3/4 of a bet so your bet was -EV for him as well. You have both made +EV decisions, but both decisions were -EV for their opponent.

I think where it can come in that a decision doesn't affect you is when a third hand has outs against the current leader of the hand, but not against the drawing hand if it hits. So when the guy holding the Q[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]9[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] calls, he's taking money away from the player with AA, but not from the player with 7[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]6[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]. A Jack will now force the AA to fill up to win, but the flush draw is unaffected so all the -EV comes from the made hand.

edit: clarified infinite pot odds

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This is fun. To add to my own post . . . If the AA's flop bet is called by multiple players besides the 76s the bet may have in effect have been +EV for the 76s though really it is the multiple calls of the other hands rather than the actual bet that is profitable for him. He may then decide to raise since he gets a portion of these flop bets and they could add up to more than the raise costs him, thus making the raise itself a +EV play - the old pumping the flush draw move. But it's an even more +EV move for you since your set will earn an even bigger percentage of these flop bets. Whether the +EV from the raise counters the -EV from the call is just a numbers game, but I'm sure we could make it happen.

So there is a good example of a player making a +EV move that is actually also +EV for you, but once again, it's really the calls of the other players that make the raise +EV for him, he's losing money on it if they don't call (and you do) - the call portion of his action is +EV for him right away because of the existing pot and -EV to you.

You can only make money from this player if he folds incorrectly or calls incorrectly. It's your job to make him do one or the other. Sometimes you can't, so you have to do what you can to make his play as close to the incorrect one as possible, i.e. make him pay to draw even though he is still correct to do so.