You Hold Aa.... Call Or Fold

[James D 0]

Read THIS .Paul Phillips proves that you have to call if you like money. This is not close.

Totally different situation... The link you gave, is discussing a situation where ONE early position player had raised 4x the BB... Next to act has pushed all in.. Everyone else has folded - So, that is only one all-in before you!!Of course that an easy descision. You call, and hope that the first player calls too - Against 2 players, AA is a super strong.But the OP was 8 or 9 all ins...Also, I have thought that if this did really happen, then the likelyhood is that the other 2 aces are gone too... Perhaps someone else also has AA. So, the odds of just one pair holding up against 8 or 9 other hands would be longer. This is why I still would fold.

[simo_8ball 0]

Read the goddamn thread and not just the first few posts. Read Paul Phillips posts.Tell you what, I'll copy and paste some of the posts he makes:

YoungJedi <kduddles...@cox.net> wrote:>The reason you push all in or raise heavy with AA is to isolate against one>or maybe two other hands. Heads up, AA is a heavy favorite. Against four or>more hands, it is an underdog. It's that simple.I hope everyone I play against thinks it's that simple.By "underdog" I will presume you mean it becomes less than 50% likelyto win the pot? This is obviously not NECESSARILY true against fouropponents, or any number of opponents for that matter. AA has 96.5%pot equity if the four opponents hold 22, 22, 33, and 33, and naturallythere are many shades of grey in between. I hope by underdog you don'tmean AA is less likely to win than one of the other hands, as that'ssuper-obviously false.But whatever it is that you mean, you are failing to grasp the source ofprofit in poker.If you could take AA and put it up against any number of random hands,what would the optimal number be? Let's see... we'll have each player put100 in the pot for simplicity. AA vs. 1 random hand: 85.2% x 200 = 170.4 AA vs. 2 random hands: 73.4% x 300 = 220.2 AA vs. 3 random hands: 63.9% x 400 = 255.6 AA vs. 4 random hands: 55.9% x 500 = 279.5 AA vs. 5 random hands: 49.2% x 600 = 295.2 AA vs. 6 random hands: 43.6% x 700 = 305.2 AA vs. 7 random hands: 38.8% x 800 = 310.4 AA vs. 8 random hands: 34.7% x 900 = 312.3 AA vs. 9 random hands: 31.1% x 1000 = 311.0Now can you spot when adding a caller became bad for our bottom line?That's right, not until the tenth caller. Up until that point everyadditional caller was making us money. In real life these statitics areoften even more pronounced since the most likely hands to be puttingmoney in the pot after several other people have are pairs, and youdeeply dominate pairs with AA.If your goal with AA is to maximize your chance of WINNING THE POT,then you want as few callers as possible. Zero, preferably. AA vs. 0 random hands: 100% x 100 = 100 (plus the blinds)However, if your goal is to maximize the MONEY YOU WIN, then in almostall practical circumstances you want as many callers as possible beforethe flop. All of this of course ignores the difficulty of playing acesafter the flop, and that's important, but if you're all-in and you stoprooting for people to call you with AA because a few already have, thenyou have a doomed mindset for winning poker.(There are also tournament situations where you will give up someimmediate chip EV to increase your chances of survival, but that toois outside the scope of this point.)>You limp in with Aces and you get what you deserve..Perhaps so; but what do you deserve? Maybe what you deserve is more money.People frequently put too much money in the pot with aces after the flopwhen too little went in before the flop, and that's not wise. But therecan be no doubting this in the general case: if you hold AA you desire asmany callers as you can seduce into joining you.

>What if you were BB and everyone at>the table moves in before you? Full table, all-in, you have AA in the>BB. First hand or early in the tourney...what do you do now?You beat them into the pot.>I wouldnt, I would fold and hope to get a chance to double up>at a more opportune time, and give up the chance of adding 9x to my>stack.You would HOPE to get such a chance. You were just seated at a tablewith apparently the nine worst players in the world, and eight of themare going broke THIS HAND, and you had the BEST POSSIBLE HAND, andyou folded it. Good luck getting a better opportunity.You are also now co-tabled with an obviously completely fearlessmaniac who has 9x your stack. Sounds like a good situation to findan easy double-up... he'll probably be moving all in every hand fromnow on and you'll get to keep folding 37o dreaming fondly of thatone hand where you had AA and FOLDED.>These only work in a tourney situation where when your broke, your>out.There's other poker in the world. There are plenty of games downstairsif you want to keep playing.I live for the tournaments where I get all in with AA preflop the firstfew hands, regardless of outcome. There's no more efficient use of timethan to increase the stack immediately as a big favorite or go out.The more opponents the merrier.If your goal is just to last a while in the tournament and get somefun value out of it, then go ahead and fold AA. If goal is to win money,you will never be correct in folding AA preflop on the first hand.Nobody is so good they can pass that up. Nobody is even *close* to sogood that they can pass that up. Nobody.

Ian Berry <i...@berry81.fsnet.co.uk> wrote:>a) In a raised pot with multiple callers, the chances are that there is at>least one more ace out there in the other hands. This halves your chances>of catching trips or a a boat, and therefore hurts your chances of taking>down the pot if it goes to the river.Adding ANY callers will tend to hurt our chances of taking down the pot bythe river, not just hands with aces in them. The chance of taking down thepot by the river is NOT IMPORTANT. All that matters is expectation.Further, if you hold AA you should be strongly rooting for other big acesto be out there calling you. I raise with AA and get called by QQ, AQ,and AK. Did the other aces being out hurt me or help me? Would I ratherbe heads up with QQ but leave the aces in the deck? Of course not! AA vs. QQ: AA has 81.5% pot equity (.815 * 200 = 163) AA vs. QQ, AK, and AQ: AA has 77.4% pot equity (.774 * 400 = 310)Taking the other two aces out of the deck might have hurt our chancesof taking down the pot by the river, but that almost DOUBLED expectation!In a game of small edges, if you can DOUBLE EXPECTATION when it's alreadyhuge you should be on cloud ninety-nine.AA wins unimproved often, even against many opponents. An extremelycommon way to flop way ahead of many opponents is for a pair to flop thatdoesn't make trips for anyone. Now your opponents have a LONG ways toswim to beat aces up. Dead aces are just not a concern when you have AA.You are too far ahead to be sweating how to improve.>I'd be interested to>hear what you think on these points, Paul, because I found your>justification for throttling down pre-flop on aces quite interesting.I didn't suggest throttling down on AA preflop. I said when you have AAyou want as many callers as you can get -- but I didn't say not to raise.How to play AA before the flop is so game-condition dependent that ananalysis could fill many, many pages. There's practically a book in it.My only point in this thread is that the idea that you WANT to play AAagainst one or two callers is false. You WANT to play AA against as manycallers as you can get. But you want many other things as well, such asto get as much money into the pot before the flop as possible; sousually raising is indicated, and if you limp, limp-reraising is almostalways indicated if the opportunity arises (assuming one is cautious notto ONLY limp-reraise with AA.)In a nutshell: if you raise with AA UTG and everyone calls you and youare silently cursing your luck even before the flop comes down, you havea big leak in your mindset. You should be silently celebrating witheach additional caller. If your problem is that you cannot lay down AAafter the flop when it's beaten, then solve THAT problem, but stop beingafraid of trading winning percentage for expectation. It's a great tradeunless you are playing in a game too big for you. Don't do that.

YoungJedi <kduddles...@cox.net> wrote:>It isn't oustide the scope of this point--in fact, this is PRECISELY the>point. Tournament survival. The original post related to a NL tourney. I do>not want nine all-in callers in a tounament when I hold AA. Under your own ,>AA is a 31% shot against nine callers--an underdog. There is the simplicity.>That was my point. Am I missing something?Dramatically.I don't know how to put it any more clearly though. Perhaps if youhired someone to analyze "that crap" that I wrote for you in the firstplace, things would become more clear.Put it this way: if you don't know what expectation is, you are not ina position to analyze anything relating to poker. And if you do (and youcan go find out right now if you like, we'll wait), then what you aremissing is that your tournament expectation with AA is almost invariablyhigher by putting money into the pot than it is by folding, regardlessof the number of hands, which hand of the tournament it is, or anythingelse that might be distracting you from noticing the huge edge AA holds.The exceptions where you might fold are pathological corner cases thatexist almost completely for academic navel-gazing, and only apply when oneis very close to a dramatic leap in prize money status, such as in a supersatellite. The situations proposed in this thread are not even close.31% of 10x your stack is a LOT OF CHIPS. Assuming a starting stack of1000, you are suggesting throwing away *2100* chips just because you can'thandle the prospect of busting. This is insane.It's not even close.

[kkot 0]

But the OP was 8 or 9 all ins...Also, I have thought that if this did really happen, then the likelyhood is that the other 2 aces are gone too... Perhaps someone else also has AA.

Wouldn't it be likely that all of the other players hands have high cards, removing their outs and reducing them to longshot straight or flush draws? You will rarely have to improve if this is the case.

[Zach6668 513]

FYP sir.

Nope. Easy call, AINEC.

FFS, I said if in my original post, if this bothers you DO NOT post!!!!!! I knew that this had probably been discussed before, that is why I said that.Once again children, as I said already, I KNOW this would never happen!!! It is just that, a hypothetical question.

Doesn't bother me. I said it's an easy call. Insta call with a big hard on and enjoy. +EV is +EV.

Fold...If anyone says call, punch them in the throat and kick them in the spleen. No one with a brain is callling 9 all ins with AA for 10K main event.

No. Not close.***************The anger in this thread is funny. This is a simple EV calculaton. If you aren't going to take a +EV situation, then you should probably not be playing poker.Furthermore, respected pros have all gone of record saying that they will insta call this, and Paul Phillips has gone on to prove it mathematically.I just don't undestand why this is still being discussed. Easy call.Even in the situation you showed, with those exact hands, we still have an equity advantage. We are 14.7% to win, and only need to be good 11.11%. INSTA CALL.- Zach

[James D 0]

Subject changed: vaguely related question From: Eric Lindholm - view profile Date: Sat, Aug 30 2003 2:25 am Email: "Eric Lindholm" <some...@microsoft.com> Groups: rec.gambling.poker Not yet ratedRating: show options Reply | Reply to Author | Forward | Print | Individual Message | Show original | Report Abuse | Find messages by this author At a hypothetical full table, one can compose a distribution of hands in which the player with AA isn't the favorite, or is even worse than average among the hands at the table. For example: Ad Ac 0.122 8c 7c 0.162 5d 4d 0.147 6d 6c 0.140 Jh Th 0.136 Ks Qs 0.102 Ah 3h 0.096 As 2s 0.095 (average 0.125) So the question is, what is the minimum number of opponents for which it is possible that AA (with only one player holding it) is not the best hand going in? What is the minimum number for which it is possible that AA is worse than average? Ok, so this is a thread from the post you sent for me to read, proving my point that AA will not always be favorite.I read the Paul Phillips quote, and he says that he doesnt believe that AA could be less of a favorite than any other hand... Well, this is just not true, as it is easily possible to create a situation where is actually is an underdog.Remember that you are up against 9 all ins and last to act, so the likelihood is that the other aces are gone too.And if everyone really has just gone all in, they have not done it blind (as if it were 9 purely random hands) You would have to be thinking that there are no aces left, leaving you with virtually no chance of improving your hand, with many strong drawing hands and smaller pairs with live outs too, in which case, as I said, there are many situations where AA will be an underdog (not just an underdog to win the entire pot - but an underdog against specific other hands).

[Abbaddabba 0]

It's still over 20% to win if you filter the randoms to "any broadway and any pair".

as it is easily possible to create a situation where is actually is an underdog.

It's easy to create a situation where top full house is drawing dead to quads.But im sure being that you're a small winner at $10 sit 'n goes, you'll be able to find better spots. Easy fold.

[simo_8ball 0]

There are examples of where it would be correct to fold. However, these examples are few and far between. How do you know they don't have KK, KK, QQ, QQ, JJ, JJ, TT, TT, 99? That would be quite a good situation. Would you call then?Another extempore quote:

EIGHT people just moved all-in on the first hand. What do they have?The only way this can happen is if mind-control beams are shooting at thetable from someone's crazy scifi device. (It missed us in the BB, givingus a chance to unwisely fold AA.) Since that's what's happening I see noreason to put the small blind on AA.I don't know anyone who would put their whole stack in after TWO all-inplayers on the first hand of the WSOP with less than AA, let alone THREE,FOUR, FIVE, SIX, SEVEN, and EIGHT. So you see, either this deck has afew more aces than normal, or we have to assume people are moving inwith whatever they find in front of them. Which means AA is unlikely.

[James D 0]

Nope. Easy call, AINEC.Doesn't bother me. I said it's an easy call. Insta call with a big hard on and enjoy. +EV is +EV.- Zach

You would have a big hard on huh? Thats nice to know man, real nice!!! Whatver turns you on big boy... I guess if I am sitting next to you at a table and I want to know if you have aces, then I know your 'tell'.Some strange people at this forum, very strange.

[simo_8ball 0]

Yeah, there are some very strange people who want to fold aces preflop.

[James D 0]

Another extempore quote:EIGHT people just moved all-in on the first hand. What do they have?The only way this can happen is if mind-control beams are shooting at thetable from someone's crazy scifi device. (It missed us in the BB, givingus a chance to unwisely fold AA.) Since that's what's happening I see noreason to put the small blind on AA.I don't know anyone who would put their whole stack in after TWO all-inplayers on the first hand of the WSOP with less than AA, let alone THREE,FOUR, FIVE, SIX, SEVEN, and EIGHT. So you see, either this deck has afew more aces than normal, or we have to assume people are moving inwith whatever they find in front of them. Which means AA is unlikely.

That is the best thing I have read on this subject so far... You didn't write it obviously, but nice find.

[Zach6668 513]

You would have a big hard on huh? Thats nice to know man, real nice!!! Whatver turns you on big boy... I guess if I am sitting next to you at a table and I want to know if you have aces, then I know your 'tell'.Some strange people at this forum, very strange.

It's figurative. Get over yourself.

[simo_8ball 0]

That quote is in the thread I directed you to. Really, if you can read Paul Phillips analysis and still advocate folding, you don't understand equity.

[LongLiveYorke 38]

Also, I have thought that if this did really happen, then the likelyhood is that the other 2 aces are gone too... Perhaps someone else also has AA. So, the odds of just one pair holding up against 8 or 9 other hands would be longer. This is why I still would fold.

At a hypothetical full table, one can compose a distribution of hands in which the player with AA isn't the favorite, or is even worse than average among the hands at the table.

There is no justifiable range of hands that one can attribute to opponents (even giving different ranges to different opponents) that would make this a fold. I have a lot of time of my hands, please give me ranges that you put opponents on and I will calculate our EV against those ranges with AA. The ranges have to make sense, though. You can't say, "Player A will only go in with 87s, Player B only goes in with 65s, etc". Also, this is assuming that for some reason we have enough information against our opponents to even put them on more specific ranges than the generic one.It is my assertion that the generic range would be high poket pairs and high broadway cards, which I have shown that we are WAY, WAY ahead of. Here it is again (with more trials this time):Text results appended to pokerstove.txt 4,411 games 6805.316 secs games/secBoard: Dead: equity (%) win (%) tie (%) Hand 1: 37.1178 % 35.62% 01.50% { AA }Hand 2: 06.8790 % 06.17% 00.71% { 88+, AJs+, KQs, AJo+, KQo }Hand 3: 06.9659 % 06.19% 00.78% { 88+, AJs+, KQs, AJo+, KQo }Hand 4: 07.4873 % 06.98% 00.50% { 88+, AJs+, KQs, AJo+, KQo }Hand 5: 07.3438 % 06.89% 00.45% { 88+, AJs+, KQs, AJo+, KQo }Hand 6: 06.3878 % 05.64% 00.74% { 88+, AJs+, KQs, AJo+, KQo }Hand 7: 06.2896 % 05.64% 00.64% { 88+, AJs+, KQs, AJo+, KQo }Hand 8: 06.5578 % 05.94% 00.62% { 88+, AJs+, KQs, AJo+, KQo }Hand 9: 07.3211 % 06.71% 00.61% { 88+, AJs+, KQs, AJo+, KQo }Hand 10: 07.6498 % 07.10% 00.55% { 88+, AJs+, KQs, AJo+, KQo }The only thing that would make this a fold is if we make crazy scenerios. For instance, if our life depends on our finishing in the money in the Main Event and a guy has a gun to our head the whole time, I may fold. Other than that, its an easy call.

[eYank 0]

reraise to 20k by pulling a 10k wad of cash out of your pocket and placing it on the table

[simo_8ball 0]

The only thing that would make this a fold is if we make crazy scenerios. For instance, if our life depends on our finishing in the money in the Main Event and a guy has a gun to our head the whole time, I may fold. Other than that, its an easy call.

Well, we are already in one crazy situation, why not add to it?

[LongLiveYorke 38]

Well, we are already in one crazy situation, why not add to it?

Okay, fine. I fold then because I'm not risking my life on a 36% chance. Though, I'm not sure that my odds of making the money in the ME are above 36%. What if I could choose to play out the AA hand and if I win it I live or if I lose it I die vs folding and playing in the ME where if I make the money I live and if I don't I die? Which one would I take...?The scenarios where I consider folding AA are extremely arbitrary.

[James D 0]

It's figurative. Get over yourself.

Ok, I apologize, thank you very much for painting that beautiful, figurative image of you with a big hard on, in my head.Get a girlfriend.

[James D 0]

There is no justifiable range of hands that one can attribute to opponents (even giving different ranges to different opponents) that would make this a fold. I have a lot of time of my hands, please give me ranges that you put opponents on and I will calculate our EV against those ranges with AA. The ranges have to make sense, though. You can't say, "Player A will only go in with 87s, Player B only goes in with 65s, etc". Also, this is assuming that for some reason we have enough information against our opponents to even put them on more specific ranges than the generic one.It is my assertion that the generic range would be high poket pairs and high broadway cards, which I have shown that we are WAY, WAY ahead of. Here it is again (with more trials this time):Text results appended to pokerstove.txt

Thanks for putting the time in, to evaluate the odds through PokerStove, with high pocket pairs and High Face cards... this does make sense to me too... It could be likely that the range of hands that you are up against is one such as this.If that is the case, then I would be more inclined to call, but the main reason I found this interesting is that there are certain situations where AA would be an underdog, in which case, it would be technically the correct fold.But your point is a good one (that 1010, JJ JJ, QQ QQ, KK,KK - or similar), could be a possibility.

[simo_8ball 0]

You have to try pretty goddamn hard to find a range where AA is a collective underdog. It's nearly impossible to come up with a realistic range for each player's hand such that folding is anywhere near correct.It is the fact that noone would call allin with anything other than AA after even one player has open shoved preflop on the first hand of the main event that makes assigning ranges trivial. After 5 players have moved in, would ANYONE call with 78s? Paul Phillips assertion is correct - people must be moving in with whatever two cards they have in front of them, be they rags, suited connectors or aces.

[James D 0]

You have to try pretty goddamn hard to find a range where AA is a collective underdog. It's nearly impossible to come up with a realistic range for each player's hand such that folding is anywhere near correct.It is the fact that noone would call allin with anything other than AA after even one player has open shoved preflop on the first hand of the main event that makes assigning ranges trivial. After 5 players have moved in, would ANYONE call with 78s? Paul Phillips assertion is correct - people must be moving in with whatever two cards they have in front of them, be they rags, suited connectors or aces.

I did acknowledge in my previous post, did I not, that the type of range you could begin to imagine in a freakish hand such as this, could well be High pocket pairs and face cards which would also cancel out your opponents chances of winning the hand therefore increasing the odds of AA holding up.

[simo_8ball 0]

The question remains, would you still fold?

[Zach6668 513]

Thanks for putting the time in, to evaluate the odds through PokerStove, with high pocket pairs and High Face cards... this does make sense to me too... It could be likely that the range of hands that you are up against is one such as this.If that is the case, then I would be more inclined to call, but the main reason I found this interesting is that there are certain situations where AA would be an underdog, in which case, it would be technically the correct fold.But your point is a good one (that 1010, JJ JJ, QQ QQ, KK,KK - or similar), could be a possibility.

Just because AA is an underdog in your example, that doesn't make it correct to fold in your example.

[James D 0]

The question remains, would you still fold?

Due to the fact that it is a $10,000 buy in, (1,000 times my average buy in) and that I would not really be looking to play a hand where I could be out, up to 85% of the time, and that I would want the chance to try to 'play my game' at this level, my head would be telling me to fold the hand.But, I have listened to the arguments posted, and some realism has been brought into a hypothetically, practically impossible situation, such as the fact that if it actually did happen, the range you would be up against would in fact, in theory, help your chances of AA holding up.So, I think I may call...Thanks for posting guys, as I said, this was something that I was discussing with friends... so it's good to hear opinion from here, as we were all also arguing about it.Ok, you can lock it up now if you want!

[Abbaddabba 0]

Due to the fact that it is a $10,000 buy in, (1,000 times my average buy in) and that I would not really be looking to play a hand where I could be out, up to 85% of the time, and that I would want the chance to try to 'play my game' at this level, my head would be telling me to fold the hand.

The probability of you making pay if you fold is likely less than the probability of you making pay if you call.

[LongLiveYorke 38]

I would not really be looking to play a hand where I could be out, up to 85% of the time

Again, in what scenerio would your AA be no better than 15%?