What if you knew everyone's hole cards? (continued)

Nearly all respondents to my previous post (yesterday) feel that the magical ability to know the hole cards of everyone else at your table throughout a tournament would make you very likely to win the tournament. Percentages in the 90 to 99+ range appeared in a number of posts. Here are some reasons why I think the percentage is much lower:

1)The facts that we a dealing with: a) a tournament, and b) a large field, both seem important to me. You must accumulate chips fast enough to keep the escalating blinds from becoming a factor, or your flexibility will erode as time passes. Since it is a very large field, dozens among the hundreds at other tables will accumulate large stacks via the usual combinations of skill and luck. You will run into these people starting in the middle stages, you won't always have the dominant stack, and I think the blinds will often start to matter.

2) Usually, few big pots are played in the early rounds. The consensus strategy (with which I agree) is to avoid big confrontations early on unless you are a huge favorite. Such situations often won't arise frequently. Even when they do, you won't always win them. You are very likely to make the middle stages, but not necessarily with an overpowering stack.

3) Unexpected things happen. Sometimes you will "see" someone try to steal with J8, you will reraise with 96 because "he can't call," he'll call anyway, hit the flop and you'll have to fold. Granted, these things will happen a minority of the time, but in some tournaments it will be a big enough minority to be relevant.

4) With nine other people at the table, many of your pre-flop decisions will be murky. Example: Someone raises in early position with 66, you have AT, and someone behind you has KQ. If you fold in these situations, you will sometimes not get enough better ones for enough chips to build a big stack early. If you call, raise (or move-in), you will end up playing respectable-size pots where you are the favorite, but not overwhelmingly.

5) The cards and your opponents won't always cooperate with the approach of playing big pots only when you're either a monster favorite on (or maybe before) the flop or have the best hand on the river. Most often, the big money goes in before the river, and the pre-river monster favorite situations for big money aren't that frequent.

6) When the tournament "really starts" in the late stages, almost every pot is raised. Usually, you won't be a monster favorite over the raiser or over someone who calls your raise/reraise. You'll be facing a lot of 52/48 to 2/1 situations for decent money against short stacks who decide "it's time to gamble." and big stacks who get to act before you to punish the short stacks. Example: You have AQ utg, a small (but not microscopic) stack has 66, and the big blind (who has a big stack and is very aggressive) has KJ.

7) A 2x average player (which I postulated) will make mistakes, especially in multi-way pots. The magical powers don't include the ability to flawlessly calculate odds and EV under playing conditions.

SUMMARY OF MY THOUGHTS: If we were talking about live play, you would of course be unbeatable over any but short time frames. In a tournament with a lot (hundreds or more) of opponents, the escalating blinds and the finite number of hands played will eventually force you to play big pots as a less-than-overwhelming favorite against others whose stacks are relevant to you. It still seems to me that knowing the hole cards will increase your probability by a factor of around five, so that an above-average player might win 10% of the time and a great player (say 5x average without magic powers) might win 20 - 25 % of the time.

Bob Feduniak

[JackWhite]

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3) Unexpected things happen. Sometimes you will "see" someone try to steal with J8, you will reraise with 96 because "he can't call," he'll call anyway, hit the flop and you'll have to fold. Granted, these things will happen a minority of the time, but in some tournaments it will be a big enough minority to be relevant.

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I think you would be deadly in this situation from the BB. Asuming the original raiser in the only one in the hand, you could just push all-in everytime your opponent had a bad hand in a steal situation. This would take away the chance of your opponent calling with their J-8 and hitting a flop. Of course you always run the small risk of someone calling with garbage, but that is very unlikely. Consistently pushing from the BB against weak/marginal hand(s) would allow you to accumulate the chips necessary to dominate knowing the hole cards.

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I think you would be deadly in this situation from the BB. Asuming the original raiser in the only one in the hand, you could just push all-in everytime your opponent had a bad hand in a steal situation. This would take away the chance of your opponent calling with their J-8 and hitting a flop. Of course you always run the small risk of someone calling with garbage, but that is very unlikely. Consistently pushing from the BB against weak/marginal hand(s) would allow you to accumulate the chips necessary to dominate knowing the hole cards.

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This makes sense, but BB against one opponent on a steal with trash is sort of a special case because you are absolutely guaranteed to have only one opponent who doesn't like his hand at all. Usually, things are complicated a bit by the unpredictability of players yet to act and the possibility that a raiser might decide he really likes a marginal hand. Even so, give your opponent jack-high, throw in a double-up-early-or-go-home mindset and after the second or third time you make this sort of move you might get called.

[MicroBob]

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Such situations often won't arise frequently. Even when they do, you won't always win them.

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They arise more frequently then you are ever aware.


You have 97 in the BB...
SB is trying to steal with 88.
The flop is AQ9.

Without knowing your opponents cards you are lost here and have no idea that you are a huge favorite.


You have J2o....your opponent has 98s.
Flop is AT5.

you have J2o against AK and QJ.
Flop is T42.


We only THINK of us being a big favorite in situations where we have top-set on a ragged flop because we are so used to having to play in the dark and not know what our opponents' cards are.
We never know about ALL those times that we were miles and miles ahead even when we practically completely missed the flop.



In your AT example.
You play and see a flop depending on how much 66 has raised for.
KQ comes along cheaply as well perhaps.
If you flop a pair then you're golden.
If not then you can go ahead and fold.


More important than the hands where we just get to take the pots are the hands where we can size our bets appropriately to induce calls.


I have QJo.
Opponent has JT.
Board is J8732 or something.
You should be able to bet enough to keep him from being too scared. And if comes over-the-top of you then you have nothing to fear. Whereas normally with top-pair and not-great kicker you are frequently not going to be willing to put your whole tourney on the line.


From one Bob to another: I know I'm not the only one here who thinks you are truly underestimating the advantage that you have.

I'm pretty much in agreement with your estimate of your advantage if you could see your opponents' hole cards. For people to say you can win 100% of the time is ridiculous.

Also, when you're in tourneys in which there tend to be high Q low M situations towards the end, you're dependent on pre-flop pushing which raises the element of luck.

[SossMan]

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1)The facts that we a dealing with: a) a tournament, and b) a large field, both seem important to me. You must accumulate chips fast enough to keep the escalating blinds from becoming a factor, or your flexibility will erode as time passes. Since it is a very large field, dozens among the hundreds at other tables will accumulate large stacks via the usual combinations of skill and luck. You will run into these people starting in the middle stages, you won't always have the dominant stack, and I think the blinds will often start to matter.


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No you won't. You simply limp into a lot of pots early. Call raises with all sorts of hands. Then you either blow people off the hand when you know they cannot call or you value bet them perfectly.

Example: You have 94o. MP opens for 3x w/ 99. Sweet, you think to yourself. You call. You both have typically deep early stacks (like 150xBB).
Flop comes 237. You check call a pot sized bet. Turn is a King. You check, he bets, you blow him off the hand. If he calls, then blow him off the hand on the river.

You just won like 10-20 BB. Imagine being able to do this once or twice an orbit.

Another example:
You have Jh9h on the button. EP player makes it 4xBB w/ QsJs. Another player in the middle calls w/ 55. You call, blinds fold.
Flop is 9sTh6s. You call a small bet from EP, MP folds.
Turn is a blank. You lead out and he calls.

River either makes his hand or it doesn't. If he whiffs, he might bluff into you and you can make the impossible call w/ the 9. If he hits, you simply fold.

You check call them to death or value bet them to death. You will will be able to build an ennourmous stack early simply by doing these things. Then, later, you apply the same pricipals knowing that the players will adjust for their shortening stacks.

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4) With nine other people at the table, many of your pre-flop decisions will be murky. Example: Someone raises in early position with 66, you have AT, and someone behind you has KQ. If you fold in these situations, you will sometimes not get enough better ones for enough chips to build a big stack early. If you call, raise (or move-in), you will end up playing respectable-size pots where you are the favorite, but not overwhelmingly.


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I don't see any reason to play a big pot like this until you have a larger advantage. There are plenty of hands where people won't have enough of a hand to look you up when you blow them off it. Eventually, you will become unplayable since it's 'like he knows what I got every time'.


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6) When the tournament "really starts" in the late stages, almost every pot is raised. Usually, you won't be a monster favorite over the raiser or over someone who calls your raise/reraise. You'll be facing a lot of 52/48 to 2/1 situations for decent money against short stacks who decide "it's time to gamble." and big stacks who get to act before you to punish the short stacks. Example: You have AQ utg, a small (but not microscopic) stack has 66, and the big blind (who has a big stack and is very aggressive) has KJ.

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Then you simply adjust when you resteal from someone to a time when they haven't committed themselves to the pot and you are only a small favorite. Wait until they make the raise w/ 59o on the button and you are on the BB and they raised less than 10% of their stack. Those are virtually risk free.

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7) A 2x average player (which I postulated) will make mistakes, especially in multi-way pots. The magical powers don't include the ability to flawlessly calculate odds and EV under playing conditions.


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This is the only factor that I didn't consider, but a player who is 2x their buyin in terms of equity has a pretty good grasp of most basic concepts and would be able to quickly adjust for the proper strategy given the context of the situation.

[SossMan]

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Also, when you're in tourneys in which there tend to be high Q low M situations towards the end, you're dependent on pre-flop pushing which raises the element of luck.


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By the time you get to the end, it would be too late for anyone else to have a chance. You would literally have 90% of the chips in play.

Also, this advantage is so large that it's likely that the tournament would go from 3 days to 2 days.

[TimTimSalabim]

I agree that your advantage is not as big as others are saying. I think people are underestimating the number of donkeys who will call you when they have only a 10-20% chance of winning. Which means you can't just push all-in with your 80-90% favorites every time. The best strategy is probably to save your big bets until the river, where you can play with 100% accuracy, but doing so is not going to win you the tournament anywhere near 90% of the time.

[TimTimSalabim]

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Example: You have 94o. MP opens for 3x w/ 99. Sweet, you think to yourself. You call. You both have typically deep early stacks (like 150xBB).
Flop comes 237. You check call a pot sized bet. Turn is a King. You check, he bets, you blow him off the hand. If he calls, then blow him off the hand on the river.

You just won like 10-20 BB. Imagine being able to do this once or twice an orbit.

Another example:
You have Jh9h on the button. EP player makes it 4xBB w/ QsJs. Another player in the middle calls w/ 55. You call, blinds fold.
Flop is 9sTh6s. You call a small bet from EP, MP folds.
Turn is a blank. You lead out and he calls.

River either makes his hand or it doesn't. If he whiffs, he might bluff into you and you can make the impossible call w/ the 9. If he hits, you simply fold.

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These are some awfully passive players in your examples. What if they don't cooperate with your plans? What if the 99 guy blows *you* off the hand before you get a chance? Or much worse, what if he is passive like your example, then decides you're bluffing and calls the river? What if the QsJs guy moves in on the flop or the turn? Etc. etc.

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The best strategy is probably to save your big bets until the river, where you can play with 100% accuracy, but doing so is not going to win you the tournament anywhere near 90% of the time.

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Exactly. But the problem is when the M's get low (orange zone or lower) the game becomes a pre-flop move in party which takes away all plays from the flop to the river. This causes an extreme increase in the luck factor. Thus making it impossible to win a big percentage of the time despite the huge info edge of being able to see hole cards.

But getting in the money 100% of the time if 10% of the field gets paid is possible.