Wednesday, August 13, 2008
FTOPS Event 14: $500 HORSE
I wanted to make this post about how bad people are at Stud/8, because they are. Split pot games will rip clueless players to shreds. O/8 is a pretty easy game to get, so you don't see quite as many huge mistakes. Plus there are fewer betting streets and it's easier to make the nuts. But in Stud/8, people chase absurd lows and call down with any pair even when they are clearly crushed or getting freerolled.
But I also made a pretty big error in a Stud/8 game, so I guess I'll be talking about how I suck at Stud/8 (though this is really just a Stud high error). On the river, my opponent was showing 6655, and I had Aces up with both Aces and two high cards showing. My opponent bet, and I raised for value. Like I was saying, no matter how clear I make it that I have Aces up, people will call down with any two pair.
I forgot, however, to think about what my opponent would be value betting. Since his two pair was open, there was no way he could be betting on the strength of that alone. He had to have either a boat or a low, and in either case there was no value in a raise. Sure enough, he had 6's full.
Despite playing for four and a half hours, I only made it to the top 25% of the field. The hand that really hurt me came in LHE. A guy in MP raised, and I 3-bet with AKo. He called. The flop came Ad 5c 3c. He checked, I bet, he check-raised, and I called. the turn was an off-suit 8, he bet, and I raised. The river was a T, and he check-called with Ac Tc. Unlucky river for me, but there were quite a few of those that could have come.
Stumble It!
But I also made a pretty big error in a Stud/8 game, so I guess I'll be talking about how I suck at Stud/8 (though this is really just a Stud high error). On the river, my opponent was showing 6655, and I had Aces up with both Aces and two high cards showing. My opponent bet, and I raised for value. Like I was saying, no matter how clear I make it that I have Aces up, people will call down with any two pair.
I forgot, however, to think about what my opponent would be value betting. Since his two pair was open, there was no way he could be betting on the strength of that alone. He had to have either a boat or a low, and in either case there was no value in a raise. Sure enough, he had 6's full.
Despite playing for four and a half hours, I only made it to the top 25% of the field. The hand that really hurt me came in LHE. A guy in MP raised, and I 3-bet with AKo. He called. The flop came Ad 5c 3c. He checked, I bet, he check-raised, and I called. the turn was an off-suit 8, he bet, and I raised. The river was a T, and he check-called with Ac Tc. Unlucky river for me, but there were quite a few of those that could have come.
Labels: 3-bet, FLHE, FTOPS, Full Tilt Poker, HORSE, O8, poker, poker strategy, session review, Stud, Stud/8, tournament
Stumble It!
Friday, February 8, 2008
FTOPS Event 3
Lasted a little over three hours in the $500 HORSE, then made an illustrative Stud mistake:
FullTiltPoker Game #5166723748: FTOPS Event #3 (35825861), Table 26 - 500/1000 Ante 100 - Limit Stud Hi - 0:35:56 ET - 2008/02/08
Seat 1: zartarious (10,468)
Seat 2: WCJOKER (16,873)
Seat 3: Rambo no5 (2,006)
Seat 4: jesseja777 (17,150)
Seat 5: joshuah333 (9,909)
Seat 6: Sira21 (6,110)
Seat 7: urbandb888 (3,792)
Seat 8: hattrick8810 (5,714)
*** 3RD STREET ***
Dealt to zartarious [Ad]
Dealt to WCJOKER [7c]
Dealt to Rambo no5 [6s]
Dealt to jesseja777 [4s]
Dealt to joshuah333 [5h]
Dealt to Sira21 [4d]
Dealt to urbandb888 [4c 5c] [Jc]
Dealt to hattrick8810 [Ks]
Sira21 is low with [4d]
Sira21 brings in for 150
urbandb888 completes it to 500
hattrick8810 folds
zartarious raises to 1,000
WCJOKER folds
Rambo no5 folds
jesseja777 folds
joshuah333 folds
Sira21 folds
urbandb888 calls 500
*** 4TH STREET ***
Dealt to zartarious [Ad] [8c]
Dealt to urbandb888 [4c 5c Jc] [Tc]
zartarious bets 500
urbandb888 calls 500
*** 5TH STREET ***
Dealt to zartarious [Ad 8c] [Ac]
Dealt to urbandb888 [4c 5c Jc Tc] [Jh]
zartarious bets 1,000
urbandb888 calls 1,000
*** 6TH STREET ***
Dealt to zartarious [Ad 8c Ac] [9c]
Dealt to urbandb888 [4c 5c Jc Tc Jh] [Qs]
zartarious bets 1,000
urbandb888 calls 1,000
*** 7TH STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [4c 5c Jc Tc Jh Qs] [7s]
zartarious bets 1,000
urbandb888 folds
Uncalled bet of 1,000 returned to zartarious
zartarious shows [Ah 7h Ad 8c Ac 9c 6h] three of a kind, Aces
zartarious wins the pot (7,950)
There are a couple of things wrong with my play on 3rd street here. I'd been playing very tight, partially because that's just the right strategy in fixed limit tournaments and partially because of some lackluster cards, and so I thought my raise would get some credit. It was a semi-bluff, hoping to represent a pair of Jacks but actually holding a three flush.
However, my hole cards are small, making them less valuable, and worse, they are dead. That is, a 5 and two 4's are showing, making it more likely that I will brick future streets. Stud is a game about constant improvement. Generally your hand needs to keep getting better, either by pairing or improving draws, for you to continue with it on each street. And those dead cards make it harder me to improve my hand.
Raising into two bigger cards behind me is also problematic. No matter how tight my image, no one is folding a pair of K's or A's when a J raises.
Three flushes are also generally less playable in tournament Stud, especially when stacks are shallow. This is because pots are more likely to be contested heads up and you will often commit a lot of chips chasing only to fold the river, as I did here, and leave yourself crippled.
It's always true in tournament poker that your last chips are worth more than the others, but it's especially true in fixed limit games. In NLHE, a short stack is worth more than half a stack of twice its size because of the value of survival, but it also has its disadvantages. With a short stack, you lose the ability to make certain plays, such as to re-raise with fold equity pre-flop or to make a continuation bet on the flop. In a game where the bet sizes are fixed, a guy with enough chips to bet every street to the river is almost exactly as threatening as a guy with ten times his chips. There is very little the bigger stack can do that the shorter cannot. Thus, it is especially important not to put your last chips in jeopardy in a marginal spot. Like I did.
Stumble It!
FullTiltPoker Game #5166723748: FTOPS Event #3 (35825861), Table 26 - 500/1000 Ante 100 - Limit Stud Hi - 0:35:56 ET - 2008/02/08
Seat 1: zartarious (10,468)
Seat 2: WCJOKER (16,873)
Seat 3: Rambo no5 (2,006)
Seat 4: jesseja777 (17,150)
Seat 5: joshuah333 (9,909)
Seat 6: Sira21 (6,110)
Seat 7: urbandb888 (3,792)
Seat 8: hattrick8810 (5,714)
*** 3RD STREET ***
Dealt to zartarious [Ad]
Dealt to WCJOKER [7c]
Dealt to Rambo no5 [6s]
Dealt to jesseja777 [4s]
Dealt to joshuah333 [5h]
Dealt to Sira21 [4d]
Dealt to urbandb888 [4c 5c] [Jc]
Dealt to hattrick8810 [Ks]
Sira21 is low with [4d]
Sira21 brings in for 150
urbandb888 completes it to 500
hattrick8810 folds
zartarious raises to 1,000
WCJOKER folds
Rambo no5 folds
jesseja777 folds
joshuah333 folds
Sira21 folds
urbandb888 calls 500
*** 4TH STREET ***
Dealt to zartarious [Ad] [8c]
Dealt to urbandb888 [4c 5c Jc] [Tc]
zartarious bets 500
urbandb888 calls 500
*** 5TH STREET ***
Dealt to zartarious [Ad 8c] [Ac]
Dealt to urbandb888 [4c 5c Jc Tc] [Jh]
zartarious bets 1,000
urbandb888 calls 1,000
*** 6TH STREET ***
Dealt to zartarious [Ad 8c Ac] [9c]
Dealt to urbandb888 [4c 5c Jc Tc Jh] [Qs]
zartarious bets 1,000
urbandb888 calls 1,000
*** 7TH STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [4c 5c Jc Tc Jh Qs] [7s]
zartarious bets 1,000
urbandb888 folds
Uncalled bet of 1,000 returned to zartarious
zartarious shows [Ah 7h Ad 8c Ac 9c 6h] three of a kind, Aces
zartarious wins the pot (7,950)
There are a couple of things wrong with my play on 3rd street here. I'd been playing very tight, partially because that's just the right strategy in fixed limit tournaments and partially because of some lackluster cards, and so I thought my raise would get some credit. It was a semi-bluff, hoping to represent a pair of Jacks but actually holding a three flush.
However, my hole cards are small, making them less valuable, and worse, they are dead. That is, a 5 and two 4's are showing, making it more likely that I will brick future streets. Stud is a game about constant improvement. Generally your hand needs to keep getting better, either by pairing or improving draws, for you to continue with it on each street. And those dead cards make it harder me to improve my hand.
Raising into two bigger cards behind me is also problematic. No matter how tight my image, no one is folding a pair of K's or A's when a J raises.
Three flushes are also generally less playable in tournament Stud, especially when stacks are shallow. This is because pots are more likely to be contested heads up and you will often commit a lot of chips chasing only to fold the river, as I did here, and leave yourself crippled.
It's always true in tournament poker that your last chips are worth more than the others, but it's especially true in fixed limit games. In NLHE, a short stack is worth more than half a stack of twice its size because of the value of survival, but it also has its disadvantages. With a short stack, you lose the ability to make certain plays, such as to re-raise with fold equity pre-flop or to make a continuation bet on the flop. In a game where the bet sizes are fixed, a guy with enough chips to bet every street to the river is almost exactly as threatening as a guy with ten times his chips. There is very little the bigger stack can do that the shorter cannot. Thus, it is especially important not to put your last chips in jeopardy in a marginal spot. Like I did.
Labels: poker, poker strategy, session review, Stud, tournament
Stumble It!
Saturday, December 22, 2007
Book Review: Tournament Stud
To his credit, David Gray's Seven Card Stud chapter in the Full Tilt Poker Strategy Guide: Tournament Edition is actually about tournament strategy. Even when introducing basic concepts such as starting hand selection, which he is wise to do given that most of his audience will likely come from a NLHE background, he makes clear how his advice differs from standard cash game strategy. Having little background in tournament stud, it is hard for me to evaluate the quality of Gray's advice. The strategy he suggests seems a sound one, but it concerns me that much of what he says sounds disturbingly like the overly weak tight approach to tournament NLHE that many sub-par players adopt.
In the early rounds of a stud tournament, where stacks are deep relative to the stakes, Gray advises nothing more than a "good, normal, solid strategy" akin to what would be appropriate in a cash game. I appreciate that he doesn't elaborate overly much on what exactly that is, since there are other, presumably better resources for learning the game of Seven Card Stud.
As its name implies, this compact chapter sets its sights on tournament stud, his approach to which Gray sums up as follows: "After the first few levels, you can't afford to lose a full pot in a tournament and still have relative chip strength. You are definitely looking to play a top hand and move on people you think have nothing." His point is that you can't afford to play from behind. Even when getting the right pot odds, the price is too high to chase a likely big pair with a flush draw or an underpair and an overcard or two, since you end up crippled all too frequently.
But doesn't one also lose money by folding when the odds are good? Gray does his best to mitigate this effect by advising extreme selectiveness on third street (you can't make a four-flush if you fold your three-flush) and again on fifth street, when the bets double and calling is likely to price yourself in until seventh.
Intuitively, this cautiousness makes sense, and I'm inclined to say that it's good advice. What concerns me is Gray's occasional resort to weak-tight tournament platitudes such as, "a tournament... is about losing the least, especially because losing hurts you more than winning helps--when you're out, you're out." I've just heard this from too many old nits at live tournaments to accept it as gospel in a stud tournament with no further analysis. I'd like to know that Gray is aware of this principle's flawed application in NLHE tournaments and nonetheless believes it relevant in a stud setting.
It is also hard to say when exactly one ought to switch from cash game to tournament strategy. Gray advises that, "Until you are very close to the money, you should play your normal strategy." However, his warrants for especially cautious play relate more to stack depth than to the divergence between chip equity and cash equity.
Presumably it is acceptable and maybe necessary to take some gambles when your stack gets small relative to the stakes. As he cautions, "If you play too tight, you can become so low on chips that even winning with your last chips doesn't improve your position." But in lieu of advice about how to navigate between these extremes, the reader gets only an acknowledgment of the challenge: "Weighing proper strategy... against your survival is difficult, and though I recommend you place a very high value on your survival, you sometimes have to risk going broke."
This tight strategy works, Gray believes, because other players tend to be overly loose and because stud poker is not a game of implied odds. It is difficult to make a killing with a concealed monster the way one can in NLHE by flopping a set or an unlikely two pair. Thus, his goal is to stay out of trouble, play mostly big pairs and rolled up trips, and take advantage of others' loose play. As Gray puts it, "I don't ever want to enter a pot where I don't think I'm a favorite."
Gray addresses some other unique elements of tournament poker, such as the fact that the ratio of ante:big bet will change from level to level, necessitating an adaptation in hand selection that few players recognize. He also considers short and big stack play, arguing that the former need to pick a hand and stick to it, whereas the latter ought to splash around a bit more but get out of the way quickly when a shorter stack shows interest, since that player can probably not be bluffed out.
David Gray's tournament stud strategy seems like a useful one, particularly for those new to the game, ie the majority of his readers. It is designed to keep you alive, keep you out of trouble, and put you in position to win some money. With a good table draw and a bit of luck, it might even win you a tournament or two.
Stumble It!
In the early rounds of a stud tournament, where stacks are deep relative to the stakes, Gray advises nothing more than a "good, normal, solid strategy" akin to what would be appropriate in a cash game. I appreciate that he doesn't elaborate overly much on what exactly that is, since there are other, presumably better resources for learning the game of Seven Card Stud.
As its name implies, this compact chapter sets its sights on tournament stud, his approach to which Gray sums up as follows: "After the first few levels, you can't afford to lose a full pot in a tournament and still have relative chip strength. You are definitely looking to play a top hand and move on people you think have nothing." His point is that you can't afford to play from behind. Even when getting the right pot odds, the price is too high to chase a likely big pair with a flush draw or an underpair and an overcard or two, since you end up crippled all too frequently.
But doesn't one also lose money by folding when the odds are good? Gray does his best to mitigate this effect by advising extreme selectiveness on third street (you can't make a four-flush if you fold your three-flush) and again on fifth street, when the bets double and calling is likely to price yourself in until seventh.
Intuitively, this cautiousness makes sense, and I'm inclined to say that it's good advice. What concerns me is Gray's occasional resort to weak-tight tournament platitudes such as, "a tournament... is about losing the least, especially because losing hurts you more than winning helps--when you're out, you're out." I've just heard this from too many old nits at live tournaments to accept it as gospel in a stud tournament with no further analysis. I'd like to know that Gray is aware of this principle's flawed application in NLHE tournaments and nonetheless believes it relevant in a stud setting.
It is also hard to say when exactly one ought to switch from cash game to tournament strategy. Gray advises that, "Until you are very close to the money, you should play your normal strategy." However, his warrants for especially cautious play relate more to stack depth than to the divergence between chip equity and cash equity.
Presumably it is acceptable and maybe necessary to take some gambles when your stack gets small relative to the stakes. As he cautions, "If you play too tight, you can become so low on chips that even winning with your last chips doesn't improve your position." But in lieu of advice about how to navigate between these extremes, the reader gets only an acknowledgment of the challenge: "Weighing proper strategy... against your survival is difficult, and though I recommend you place a very high value on your survival, you sometimes have to risk going broke."
This tight strategy works, Gray believes, because other players tend to be overly loose and because stud poker is not a game of implied odds. It is difficult to make a killing with a concealed monster the way one can in NLHE by flopping a set or an unlikely two pair. Thus, his goal is to stay out of trouble, play mostly big pairs and rolled up trips, and take advantage of others' loose play. As Gray puts it, "I don't ever want to enter a pot where I don't think I'm a favorite."
Gray addresses some other unique elements of tournament poker, such as the fact that the ratio of ante:big bet will change from level to level, necessitating an adaptation in hand selection that few players recognize. He also considers short and big stack play, arguing that the former need to pick a hand and stick to it, whereas the latter ought to splash around a bit more but get out of the way quickly when a shorter stack shows interest, since that player can probably not be bluffed out.
David Gray's tournament stud strategy seems like a useful one, particularly for those new to the game, ie the majority of his readers. It is designed to keep you alive, keep you out of trouble, and put you in position to win some money. With a good table draw and a bit of luck, it might even win you a tournament or two.
Labels: book review, poker, poker strategy, Stud, tournament
Stumble It!
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