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Poker Video: MTT/SNG by Luceboy (Mid Stakes)

Time Link to 00:55:09

I think it would be an extremely good idea to use sngwiz on some of these spots in future videos but the K5o looks to me to be a close call and KTo is a snap call. If SetTheHook is a good reg, he should be shoving fairly wide given how weak the SB is and how much FE he has on the two of you. Sngwiz shows the BE point to be slightly more 50%. I personally would shove more than 50% OTB. You are too far from the money and too short on chips for ICM to be a huge factor. Just pokerstoving this spot shows that K5o has 43% equity against a 50% range and your pot odds shows you need 42%. The fact that sngwiz agrees with your pot odds should show you how little ICM matters.

With all that said, I think folding here is fine given how close it is. The two other fish are fairly passive which should offer us more +EV future spots. But if the BTN continues to push, I would be looking to call wider since a disparity in chips between us and another good player is detrimental to our chances of winning.

Time Link to 01:06:03

I can't see how a bet here is better than a check at all. IF Sally is willing to c/rai on the turn as a bluff then he is just as willing to bluff the river with anything that doesn't have a piece of this board. I rather check the turn and give all his air a chance to bluff the river than bet the turn and force most if not all his air to fold. Checking the turn might also induce a lighter call or bluff on the river when you minbet for value since that is the last street he has to worry about.

I almost never shove the river when a heart falls. It's true that when he c/c the turn and checks river, he rarely has a better hand than your two pair but at the same time there are very few hands that can call your shove on the river. He can still have a weakly played suckers end of the straight, slowplayed straight, weakly played set, and a backdoored flush. You can realistically get value from 88, 34 and 45 only. I'm amazed that he called you with AJ and given that information I like your play, but not so much if it wasn't known that he is a station at the time.

Time Link to 01:09:59

Given what you know about him being a passive player with a fairly high FvCB and high F_BB, wouldn't it be a better strategy to be aggressive and minraise close to ATC OTB and cbet close to 100%?

Forgive me for abusing the timeline comment ability and if I sound a little bit rude. I just like to jump straight to the point =P. There isn't much 6max sng content on DC and I just wanted to take this opportunity to start a dialogue with you. I play 6max turbos as my main game so I might be taking some thinner spots than desirable for regular speed 6max games. I am really enjoying this series and hopefully you can get back to as many of my comments as possible and we can create a good learning environment! Thank you for your time Luceboy.

Yeah I generally like limp/stabbing against weaker players as well but I think this is actually a very +EV shove because of how tight I expect Jody to be calling. It's true that you are risking your tournament life on the shove but lets say Jody is calling top 20% (this is a bit light imo), we are going to pick up the pot pre-flop 80% and the other 20% when he calls, we have at least 30% equity. We're going to win the pot 86% of the time with a shove and double up 6% of those times. Limp stabbing is definitely profitable but you are letting him see a flop for free and the times where you stab and fail, you wasted 150 and gain the same you would have by shoving. I think winning the 150 and improving our stack to 1000 or more 86% of the time by shoving is probably better than improving it to 1000 60% of the time and losing another 100 on a stab the other 40% of the time. Overall a 1000 chip stack has much more utility than a 700 chip stack should your limp stab fail.

I think this calls for a full hand equity analysis, I hope you can follow all this...

Right:

Im going to make a number of assumptions

1) Jody will call our shove with 17.1% of hands. This range is equal to 33+, A2s+, A7o+, KTs+ and KQo. This is what i estimate considering ive had some history with this player.

2) When we limp jody will raise us 5% of the time. This value is equal to Jodys HUD stats and the range includes TT+, AQs+ and AQo+. In this case we will fold and have a stack size of 835 chips.

3) If Jody doesnt raise our limp, we will min bet the flop 100% and Jody will fold 60% of the time (according to the HUD stats). In this case we will end up with 1035 chips.

4) The remaining 40% of the time, Jody calls our min bet stab, we check/fold and will never win the hand (a conservative assumption). In this case we will end up on 735 chips.

Now considering we know all the stack sizes, we can plug them into http://www.icmpoker.com/Calculator.aspx. This tells us our equity for each stack size. Now we can make the following calculation in order to find our equity of limp/stabbing.

5% of the time we end up on 835 chips. Here we end up with a 10.444% equity.

Of the other 95% of the time:

60% of the time we have 12.762% Equity
40% of the time we have 9.261% Equity

Therefore,

(0.05*10.444)+(0.95*0.6*12.762)+(0.95*0.4*9.261) =
0.5222+7.2742+3.5192= 11.3156

So assuming we never win when we min bet and get called,

EqL/S% = 11.3156

We know from SNG Wiz that:

EqP% = 11.74
EqF% = 11.03

So it would appear that pushing is indeed the best option. However,

It was wrong to assume that we would never win when called. The question is, how often do we need to win when we're called to make limp/stabbing favourable?

To work this out we just equate the equity value for pushing with our calculation and add in an extra equity sum on the LHS.

Of the 40% we're called, will will win a percentage which i'll call X. Estimating our equity when we win is hard, but lets assume that jody checks it down (what with her being so passive) so no more chips go into the pot. If we win we have a stack of 1135 and an equity of 13.899.

So recalculating,

(0.05*10.444)+(0.95*0.6*12.762)+(0.95*0.4*9.261*(1-X))+(0.95*0.4*13.899*X) = 11.74

7.7964+3.5192(1-X)+5.2816X=11.74

3.5192(1-X)+5.2816X=3.9436

3.5192 - 3.1592X + 5.2816X = 3.9436

2.1224X = 0.4244

So X = 0.2

Assuming that youre going to hit a pair 32% of the time on the flop, this value of 20% for your win rate when called is not unreasonable. Ok, granted youre going to probably hit middle or bottom pair, but if you assume that:

1) Jody wont bluff you off your hand very often, and you wont get value bet very often (because she's that passive)
2) Youre only going to bet then onwards for value...

Then this figure of 20% is even more reasonable as sometimes youll be increasing your equity further by value betting, and because youll rarely be losing more equity by calling value bets. It is Jodys very nature in being very passive that allows us to make these assumptions - and this passisvity is the reason why I feel I can exploit her post flop so much with a hand such as 75o. (N/B: This is only possible due to the HUD, which is why its so goddam useful).

In conclusion, given Jodys calling range, our hand (which plays fairly well post flop), all the reasons above and MOST IMPORTANTLY, her pre AND post flop passivity, i prefer limp/stabbing to pushing.

If youre still not convinced, think about it this way. When you have a big edge over someone dont you want to play them post flop as much as possible as this is where you probably have your biggest advantage? I mean yeah youve only got 9BB to play with but this is plenty for a couple of small bets. If theyre really passive then thats even better as you can just take a cheap stab and then value bet if neccessary.

You only need to push wide into aggressive opponents who will attack your limps, bluff you off and generally discourage you from playing out of position. Feeble poker creatures do not need the same treatment.

Safe

This spot with the T3s is pretty close to a shove depending on the BTN's limp/calling range. At this point in the SNG, our skill edge comes from push/folding better than the other two players and I would take even the smallest of edges. I'm pretty sure you could play with sngwiz to make this an extremely bad push or a decently good push, but with that said I would probably still push because there is 375 out there which is almost half our stack. The other two have been fairly passive and we still maintain a lot of FE because of our stack relative to theirs. Also, our hand is SOOTED.

My SNG wiz ranges are:

Jody calling 14.3% and Sally Opening with 44% and calling with 28.2% give a range of 37% however because of my edge id probably push something like 20% which is 33+, A5o+, A2s+, KJs+,QTs+ and JTs. Pushing over a limp, especially if its an unpredictable fishbowl limping and you only have 5.5BBs, requires some sort of a hand in my book, T3s just doesnt quite cut it.

My SNG wiz ranges are:

Jody calling 11% and Sally Opening with 44% and calling with 19.5% gives:

Push with 33+, A5o+, A2s+, KJs+,QTs+ and JTs. This is pretty much the range im going to push here.

I did this a second time and used your inputs. I got push with 99.1%.

I don't mind the shove here but I would like to ask whether folding might be better than shoving given the table dynamic. There are a couple of things that are working in your favor. The two fish are overly passive meaning they are more likely to limp than raise your BB. The big stack knows you are committed and therefore will not be shoving ATC (although still a very wide range) and if Jody and SetTheHook folds, Sally is either going to limp or fold. If Sally limps, you can either jam over him preflop or if you think there is ABSOLUTELY no chance of him folding, then you can check and shove the flop if he checks to you or just call if he shoves getting just about 2:1.
I think the only real difference is that shoving preflop in this spot will get more folds from SetTheHook than if it folds to him OTB on the next hand where he can shove a wider range himself. The other two players are so passive that they are almost a non factor. If anything, it works in your favor.

SetTheHookJJ is an all-round top notch pro. I know that he will attack my blind with a very very wide range and ill probably have to call all-in. I really do not like this predicament. Addionally, i really prefer having fold equity and will always prefer to push ATC UTG than take a random hand in the BB. Anytime you find yourself with a stack so small that you cant steal the blinds then youve blinded yourself out and youre basically out of the SNG (see Moshmann SNG Strategy for this one).

Given what you know about him being a passive player with a fairly high FvCB and high F_BB, wouldn't it be a better strategy to be aggressive and minraise close to ATC OTB and cbet close to 100%?

Yeah almost certainly. I was probably playing a lot of tables at the time.

Love the analysis, the numbers really help put things in perspective. I didn't assume that we would never win when called but I did not know how to analyze our equity postflop. I greatly appreciate your effort put into explaining this hand and I learned a thing or two.

I agree that 20% is not unreasonable, but that is just the BE point. This shows you how small the EV difference really is even though we are making a lot of assumptions about his game. If he deviates from what you think he would do even a small % of the time, it has a big negative impact on the EV of limp/stabbing.

I totally love the math though, thank you thank you!

I think it would be an extremely good idea to use sngwiz on some of these spots in future videos but the K5o looks to me to be a close call and KTo is a snap call. If SetTheHook is a good reg, he should be shoving fairly wide given how weak the SB is and how much FE he has on the two of you. Sngwiz shows the BE point to be slightly more 50%. I personally would shove more than 50% OTB. You are too far from the money and too short on chips for ICM to be a huge factor. Just pokerstoving this spot shows that K5o has 43% equity against a 50% range and your pot odds shows you need 42%. The fact that sngwiz agrees with your pot odds should show you how little ICM matters.

With all that said, I think folding here is fine given how close it is. The two other fish are fairly passive which should offer us more +EV future spots. But if the BTN continues to push, I would be looking to call wider since a disparity in chips between us and another good player is detrimental to our chances of winning.

The fish in the SB does enjoy calling all-ins, i cant say how tightly but i expect SetTheHookJJ to know this and to tighten up his range. If i was him i'd probably be pushing 50% but i think hes a bit tighter than me as he only plays reg speeds and because im mainly a stack happy turbo player. Its a marginal call at best. KTs is a snap but it would be towards the bottom of my range. Id call with 55+ mid aces and big kings.

I can't see how a bet here is better than a check at all. IF Sally is willing to c/rai on the turn as a bluff then he is just as willing to bluff the river with anything that doesn't have a piece of this board. I rather check the turn and give all his air a chance to bluff the river than bet the turn and force most if not all his air to fold. Checking the turn might also induce a lighter call or bluff on the river when you minbet for value since that is the last street he has to worry about.

I almost never shove the river when a heart falls. It's true that when he c/c the turn and checks river, he rarely has a better hand than your two pair but at the same time there are very few hands that can call your shove on the river. He can still have a weakly played suckers end of the straight, slowplayed straight, weakly played set, and a backdoored flush. You can realistically get value from 88, 34 and 45 only. I'm amazed that he called you with AJ and given that information I like your play, but not so much if it wasn't known that he is a station at the time.

Honestly the only reason i played it this way is because i know the player and have enough hands for accurate HUD stats. Against anyone else i would have bet more on the flop or shoved the turn.

Forgive me for abusing the timeline comment ability and if I sound a little bit rude. I just like to jump straight to the point =P. There isn't much 6max sng content on DC and I just wanted to take this opportunity to start a dialogue with you. I play 6max turbos as my main game so I might be taking some thinner spots than desirable for regular speed 6max games. I am really enjoying this series and hopefully you can get back to as many of my comments as possible and we can create a good learning environment! Thank you for your time Luceboy.

I appreciate your interest, it helps me to learn too . Whats your username and what site do you play on?

I did this a second time and used your inputs. I got push with 99.1%.

I apologise i keep forgetting to change the game structure from Full Table to 6max, if my numbers are wrong in the future this is why

I think i then edited the comment and changed the values

Love the analysis, the numbers really help put things in perspective. I didn't assume that we would never win when called but I did not know how to analyze our equity postflop. I greatly appreciate your effort put into explaining this hand and I learned a thing or two.

I agree that 20% is not unreasonable, but that is just the BE point. This shows you how small the EV difference really is even though we are making a lot of assumptions about his game. If he deviates from what you think he would do even a small % of the time, it has a big negative impact on the EV of limp/stabbing.

I totally love the math though, thank you thank you!

If he deviates im in trouble, but thats when youve got to just trust the HUD - it helps i have a decent sample size though.

If you want another one of these im afraid you may have to pay for coaching, the thing took me ages!