Archive for November, 2008
Why the cards matter least – Poker Stategy part 2
Thursday, November 6th, 2008 | Poker Strategy | 2 Comments
Submitted by McTap, this article is a part of the Poker Strategy series.
In the last poker article I discussed the blinds and your chips stack in relationship to those blinds. In this article I will discuss the size of everybody’s chips in relation to the blinds.
By the time it is your turn to act, you need to have a good understanding of which of the players around you have a large stack and which have a small stack. There is 1 exception to this, and that would be the first hand of the tournament/SNG, then everybody has exactly the same amount of chips. After that point having an idea who’s the big dog and who’s the short stack is good information to have before you look at your cards.
Early on in tourneys/SNG everybody is sitting with a good M-factor. This leads to several possibilities: either your opponents are willing to limp with medium hands to see a cheap flop, they might be aggressive knowing that they may be able to steal chips against tight opponents and the blinds won’t affect them for a while, or they will just play tight and wait for the good hands. In the early stages you probably don’t have enough information on your opponents to know how they play and which move they are trying. If you happen to have a HUD (heads up display) that pulls from your hand database, and you have played against some (or all) of your opponents before, you may have a better idea of their style and this would help you make a proper analysis on what they could be doing with their call/raise. This then leads to you to decide on whether to call/raise/fold and feel confident in your choice.
Although HUDs and Poker Software are outside of the initial scope of this series, I would recommend learning more about them and trying to use them in your everyday game as they will help you make proper decisions pre and post flop.
As the tourney/SNG enters the later stages, then chip stacks play an important role to ones decision. At this point you will see the short stacks either fold every hand until they pick up a monster, or they start pushing with almost any two cards in hopes of either stealing the blinds or winning a race.
In order to make better decisions you need to pay attention to the stacks before and after you, as well, have an idea at what stage of the tourney/SNG you are in, all before you look at your cards. If a short stack raises before you, you need to decide if you are willing to commit all/or most of your chips as they are most likely pot committed to any calls/raises after them. If a big stack raises, you need to decide how much of you stack you are willing to commit as they could put you all-in at any point during the hand. If no action happens before you (or just some limper’s) you need to have an idea of the stacks after you. If there are short stacks after you, is their M-factor lower than 10, as this could mean they could be going all-in, meaning that any chips you commit to the pot could lead you to calling an all-in. If there are big stacks after you, then how many chips do you need to commit to either get them into the pot (you having a strong hand and are hoping to dig into their stack) or get them out of the pot (you having a medium/weak hand that you only want to steal blinds or pick on the short stacks)
So the next time you are at the table make sure you take a few extra seconds to think about this before looking at your cards. The more you know the better chance you have at making a good decision.
Good luck at the tables.
McTap03
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Caribbean Poker Classic 2008; preliminary itinerary
Monday, November 3rd, 2008 | Caribbean Poker Classic 2008 | No Comments
This article is a part of the Caribbean Poker Classic 2008 series. Follow the link to read more about how I got to go on the trip in the first place.
I have made a preliminary itinerary for our Caribbean Poker Classic 2008 adventure. Needless to say I like to plan ahead:-)
Thursday November 13th
• Departure Copenhagen 07:05
• Arrival Miami 14:40
Friday November 14th
• Trip to The Everglades
Saturday November 15th
• Drive to Key West and the other Keys
• 20:00 Interpoker Cocktails on roof top terrace at the Miami Hilton Hotel
Sunday November 16th
• Ship departs from The Port of Miami
• 20:00-22:00 Cocktails with Interpoker staff
• 22:00 Super satellite to main event, buyin 250 +20$
Monday November 17th
• Destination Puerto Rico
• 24:00 Tournament, buyin 300 + 30$
Tuesday November 18th
• 15:00 arrival Puerto Rico
• Check out San Juan
• 23:00 departure Puerto Rico
• 20:00 Tournament, buyin 400+40$
Wednesday November 19th
• 08:00 Arrival Charlotte Amelie, St. Thomas
• Check out Magens Bay and Secret Harbour beaches
• 16:00 Departure Charlotte Amelie, St. Thomas
• 20:00 Super satellite to main event, buyin 250 +20$
Thursday November 20th
• 08:00 Arrival Phillipsburg St. Maarten
• Snorkeling all day on Simpson Bay, Lay Bay, Cay Bay and Mullet Beach
• 17:00 Departure Phillipsburg St. Maarten
• 20:00 Tournament, buyin 500+50$
Friday November 21st
• Cruising
• 24:00 Main event, buyin 2500 + 200$
Saturday November 22nd
• Cruising
• 13:00 Tournament, buyin 1000 + 100$
• 24:00 Main event continues
Sunday November 23rd
• 07:00 Arrival Miami
• Check out Key Biscayne and possibly a round of golf in South Beach?
Monday November 24th
• 12:26 Departure Miami
Tuesday November 25th
• 09:10 Arrival Copenhagen hopefully sun tanned and rich
Poker Freeroll; “WOSB Free” at Goldwin
Monday, November 3rd, 2008 | Poker Freeroll | No Comments
Freeroll tonight at Goldwin at 20:00 CET.
You can find the tourney in:
Poker Lobby -> Tournaments -> Special.
The name of the tourney is “WOSB Free”.
The prize pool is EUR 100. To join you only have to post a reply this thread on the PokerBRB Forum, easy!!
If you are new to Goldwin Poker make sure that you claim your 100% sign up bonus (max €300).
If you have any questions please feel free to post them here or add us to your messenger. pokerbrb@live.com.
Enjoy!!
Poker probabilities; all you need to know
Sunday, November 2nd, 2008 | Poker Articles, Poker Mathematics | 5 Comments
This article is a part of the Poker Mathematics series.
This article is number 2 in a series of 3 articles covering the (in my opinion) most important mathematical aspects of poker:
- Calculating pot odds: see Poker pot odds; all you need to know
- Calculating poker probabilities: see Poker probabilities; all you need to know
- Calculating expected value: see +EV poker; making the winning plays
Calculating exact poker probabilities for each hand you play can be a complex mathematical operation which is simply not feasible with the short response times in online, and to a lesser extent live poker. Poker players have different approaches to deal with this challenge. Some players use poker tools in the form of programs that continuously calculate and display probabilities and pot odds. Others memorize the probabilities of a wide range of poker situations. There are players who don’t calculate exact probabilities but instead base their decisions on previous experiences and intuition (I myself belong to this group, but am motivated to include more mathematical considerations in my game). In this article I will explain how exact poker probabilities are calculated from the number of outs you have and also present a very useful shortcut to calculating poker probabilities from outs.
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First of all a clear definition of a poker out is needed: If you believe your hand needs improving after the flop to win the pot, then an out is a card that will do just that. Say for example that you are holding AK suited and the flop gives you two of your suit. Your opponent has QQ (none in your suit), so you need to improve your hand in order to win the pot. Your outs would be any card of your suit (9 remaining in the deck) or any A or K (6 remaining in the deck) giving a total of 15 outs. Keep in mind that counting your outs is always an estimate. If your opponent has flopped a monster what you might consider outs will end up costing you your stack. On the other hand your opponent could also be bluffing in which case your AK might already be the best hand.
Once you have estimated how many outs you have, calculating the probability of either the turn or the river being one of your outs is fairly straightforward. Simply divide the number of outs with the remaining number of unseen cards in the deck. Using the example from above the probability of the turn (P(turn)) being one of your suit, an Ace or a King is 15 divided by 47 (52 card minus your two hole cards and the three cards constituting the flop) or roughly 32%. If one of your outs did not come on the turn and the board did not improve your opponents QQ you still have 15 outs on the river giving you a probability of 15/46 or roughly 33% (P(river)) that one of your outs will come on the river.
Calculating the probability that one of your outs from the example above will come on either the turn or the river (P(turn or river)) is a bit more tricky. This probability is NOT simply the sum of P(turn) and P(river) because by summing these two probabilities you will be including outcomes that are not possible. For example if the Ace of Clubs hits on the turn it cannot come on the river. In mathematical terms the events of one of your outs coming on the turn or the river are not independent. I will give you two ways of calculating the exact probability of one of your outs coming on either the turn or the river.
Method 1:
There are 3 possible outcomes of hitting on of your outs on the turn or the river, namely you hit one on the turn and not on the river (P(turn not river)), you don’t hit one on the turn but one comes on the river (P(river not turn)) and you hit one on both the turn and the river (P(turn and river)). The probabilities are calculated as follows:
P(turn not river)= P(an out comes on the turn)*P(an out does not come on the river after an out has come on the turn) = (15/47) * (46-14)/46 = 0,222
P(river not turn)= P(an out comes on the river)*P(an out does not come on the turn) = (15/46) * (47-15)/47 = 0,222
P(turn and river)= P(an out comes on the turn)*P(an out comes on the river after an out has come on the turn) = (15/47)*(14/46) = 0,0971
Summing the 3 probabilities from above gives 0,54 which is the probability that one of your 15 outs will hit on either the turn or the river
Method 2:
The probability of hitting one of your 15 outs on either the turn or the river is the complement of the probability not hitting one of your outs on both the turn and the river:
P(turn or river) = 1- P(an out does not come on the turn)*P(an out does not come on the river) = 1-((47-15)/47))*((46-15)/46)) = 0,54
I hope you agree with me that none of the methods above are very practical when it comes to calculating poker probabilities when you are sitting at the poker tables. Luckily there is an easy to remember rule of thumb that does a good and quick job of calculating poker probabilities from poker outs.
Easy rule of thumb:
P(turn or river) = (4*(number of outs) – 1)%
P(turn) = (2*(number of outs) +1)%
P(river) = (2*(number of outs) +1)%
Taking our 15 out example from above, the easy rule of thumb yields the following probabilities:
P(turn or river) = 59% = 0,59
P(turn) = 31% = 0,31
P(river) = 31% = 0,31
which is accurate enough for most purposes.
I will leave it to you to practise estimating how many outs you have in any given poker hand since this is one the most important disciplines in poker. The list below should get you started:
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Outs when you are drawing to:
- Three of a kind: 2
- High Pair: 3
- Full house when you have hit two pair: 4
- Open-ended straight: 8
- Flush: 9
- Flush or high pair: 12
- Flush or pair: 15
- Open-ended straight, flush or pair: 21
In my next article I will explain how to use the concepts of poker pot odds and poker probabilities to become a winning poker player in the long run.
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