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11:29 am
June 24, 2009
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Greyzy
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Pete, I don't know if starting a new thread is the way you want us to discuss. I hope that like this we won't be jumping back and forth too much between different topics.
Anyway,
this is what I'd like to talk about:
1. The 64 squares were a much needed eye opener for me. I confess to be guilty of playing the nitty game as described on page 14 (I guess I'm not the only one…???). Good point!
2. I find the part on pages 15-17 a bit misleading. It is said, that (starting) hands have two types of equity: showdown and steal equity. Although it is NOT said explicitly the reader (at least I did) might get the impression that BOTH equities differ depending on the 2 cards you hold.
BUT: It's only the showdown equity that differs depending on which cards you hold!
As I understand it the steal equity is INDEPENDENT from the hole cards. You never show your cards, so what difference do they make?! Yes, you might feel better bluffing with a draw than with totally whiffed low cards, but that's because the draw MIGHT gain showdown equity and you could fallback on that draw coming in if stealing fails.
What the steal equity REALLY depends on is described later on 23-27. Please note that your hole cards are NOT mentioned in the list of factors that help you steal (pg. 23)!
3. What do you make of the footnote on page 20? Are the authors assuming that the opponents WILL or WILL NOT "pay off big those few times you make a strong hand."?
Also I think it should read: "… pay off a couple OF bets with middle pair…", or not?
Greyzy
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1:12 pm
June 24, 2009
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Tackleberry
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Greyzy said:
Pete, I don't know if starting a new thread is the way you want us to discuss. I hope that like this we won't be jumping back and forth too much between different topics.
Anyway,
this is what I'd like to talk about:
1. The 64 squares were a much needed eye opener for me. I confess to be guilty of playing the nitty game as described on page 14 (I guess I'm not the only one…???). Good point!
2. I find the part on pages 15-17 a bit misleading. It is said, that (starting) hands have two types of equity: showdown and steal equity. Although it is NOT said explicitly the reader (at least I did) might get the impression that BOTH equities differ depending on the 2 cards you hold.
BUT: It's only the showdown equity that differs depending on which cards you hold!
As I understand it the steal equity is INDEPENDENT from the hole cards. You never show your cards, so what difference do they make?! Yes, you might feel better bluffing with a draw than with totally whiffed low cards, but that's because the draw MIGHT gain showdown equity and you could fallback on that draw coming in if stealing fails.
What the steal equity REALLY depends on is described later on 23-27. Please note that your hole cards are NOT mentioned in the list of factors that help you steal (pg. 23)!
3. What do you make of the footnote on page 20? Are the authors assuming that the opponents WILL or WILL NOT “pay off big those few times you make a strong hand.”?
Also I think it should read: “… pay off a couple OF bets with middle pair…”, or not?
Greyzy
Greyzy, I agree with all you said. While reading I hade the subliminal thought as well that steal equity differs depending on the hand you actually hold, until I realized that this shouldn´t be the case - if we completely separate both equities and just look at the steal-part, i.e. when semi-bluffing.
The footnote on p. 20 assumes that your opponents WILL NOT routinely pay you off when you make a better hand. This assumption is necessary because otherwise you in fact could rely solely on showdown-equity with hands like A7s or 87s (i.e. if you knew you´ld win Villains stack 100% if you flop 2-pair or better with hands like A7s, you could play them and fold every single time you won´t make your hand).
- Tack -
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1:46 pm
June 24, 2009
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orestto
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It's only the showdown equity that differs depending on which cards you hold!
As I understand it the steal equity is INDEPENDENT from the hole cards. You never show your cards, so what difference do they make?! Yes, you might feel better bluffing with a draw than with totally whiffed low cards, but that's because the draw MIGHT gain showdown equity and you could fallback on that draw coming in if stealing fails.
What the steal equity REALLY depends on is described later on 23-27. Please note that your hole cards are NOT mentioned in the list of factors that help you steal (pg. 23)!
While this seems logical, remember that it is the combination of showdown equity and steal equity that dictate if playing a hand is profitable or not. There's really not much sense on independently analyzing a hand's steal equity, because you have to take into consideration its showdown equity.
So while 32o has a similar steal equity to 96o, I would much rather play the later because its showdown equity is much better. 32o would have to have a huge steal equity (ultra-tight passive fit-or-fold blinds) to make up for its really lame showdown equity to be playable. 96o could have less steal equity (just tight blinds, not ultra-tight), because it has much better showdown equity than 32o.
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2:04 pm
June 24, 2009
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Greyzy
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orestto said:
96o could have less steal equity (just tight blinds, not ultra-tight), because it has much better showdown equity than 32o.
That's exactly the kind of misunderstanding that is provoked by that paragraph in the book! You also make it sound like the cards (96o in your example) have steal equity. But in fact your "game situation" (see pg. 23 for details) determines YOUR (= the player's) steal equity (not the card's steal equity).
What you probably wanted to say is this (sorry for mincing words here):
"When holding 96o you can live with a game situation that has less steal equity (just tight blinds, not ultra-tight), because it has much better showdown equity than 32o."
Greyzy
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2:28 pm
June 24, 2009
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gracias_nena
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This is my opinion:
I agree with this about steal equity. What determines the steal equity of your hand is ont your hole cards, since they could be any two because you are not planning to get to the showdown at the moment of steal (you could hit a big hand later but then you would be relying on the SD equity instead of the steal one).
What determines your hand´s steal equity is evertything else in the hands: position, your image on the table, bet sizes, number of players, board cards, and, or course (even when you don´t see them) the other players hands, wich you must figure out to read properly.
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3:02 pm
June 24, 2009
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orestto
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Greyzy said:
orestto said:
96o could have less steal equity (just tight blinds, not ultra-tight), because it has much better showdown equity than 32o.
That's exactly the kind of misunderstanding that is provoked by that paragraph in the book! You also make it sound like the cards (96o in your example) have steal equity. But in fact your “game situation” (see pg. 23 for details) determines YOUR (= the player's) steal equity (not the card's steal equity).
What you probably wanted to say is this (sorry for mincing words here):
“When holding 96o you can live with a game situation that has less steal equity (just tight blinds, not ultra-tight), because it has much better showdown equity than 32o.”
Greyzy
Yeah, that's exactly what I meant. I wasn't really refering to the hand, but the blinds situation, but I get your point.
We can conclude that the situation determines your steal equity, but your hand strength does matter, not because of steal equity*, but because of showdown equity.
Although holding big cards will make it less probably that your opponent is holding big cards as well, which should make the pot easier to steal to some extent. But probably not a huge factor, heh.
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4:35 pm
June 24, 2009
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Pete
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Greyzy said:
Pete, I don't know if starting a new thread is the way you want us to discuss. I hope that like this we won't be jumping back and forth too much between different topics.
Great post. No problem about creating a new thread. This studygroup is dynamic.. as long as we're all learning from each other, we're in great shape. :)
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3:36 am
June 25, 2009
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Optimistic
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Post edited 10:39 am – June 25, 2009 by Optimistic
Post edited 10:56 am – June 25, 2009 by Optimistic
Post edited 10:57 am – June 25, 2009 by Optimistic
I'll be nitty now and disagree that all cards have the same steal equity.
AA rarely has much steal equity on the flop as it is so often the best hand. We rarely steal because we just can't as we have the better hand
Similarly 96o will hit the best hand (very) slightly more often and because of that we can't (and shouldn't want to) steal with them as much.
Edit: If we consider winning a pot with the best hand stealing then its still not the same. The reason being that we would 'steal' with AA a lot more than other hands as we would nearly always bet the flop but other hands we might check as the flop hits villain's range.
But imo.. the point of that section is to get us to understand what our purpose is of our hand. If we have good value in our hand (relative to our opponents) then stealing becomes less valuable and getting to showdown (with villain calling our bets) becomes more so.
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7:34 am
June 25, 2009
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RML604
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That's an interesting point, and I think you're right. Because if you think about it, the sum of your showdown equity and your fold equity can never be greater than 100%. So if we have 80% showdown equity, can we ever have more than 20% fold equity?
So does that mean that fold equity only comes from making hands that are ahead of us fold? For example, if I c-bet on a board with K high and get my opponent, who has A high, to fold, then I benefited from fold equity. But if the cards were reversed, am I still benefiting from fold equity?
And most importantly, does it even matter?
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8:42 am
June 25, 2009
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Optimistic
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Post edited 3:43 pm – June 25, 2009 by Optimistic
RML604 said:
That's an interesting point, and I think you're right. Because if you think about it, the sum of your showdown equity and your fold equity can never be greater than 100%. So if we have 80% showdown equity, can we ever have more than 20% fold equity?
So does that mean that fold equity only comes from making hands that are ahead of us fold? For example, if I c-bet on a board with K high and get my opponent, who has A high, to fold, then I benefited from fold equity. But if the cards were reversed, am I still benefiting from fold equity?
And most importantly, does it even matter?
I agree that the point about fold equity changing is just semantics and makes no real difference. As long as we understand that if we have little value in our hand strength (relative to villain's range), we're only continuing if we believe stealing is profitable.
Months ago I had a problem with the idea that if I cbet when I had ace high I'd only get called by better on some flops (pair+) and you fold out worse (Khigh) so why cbet? But you are still benefiting from fold equity as you'll win the pot outright (rather than 75% of the current pot), it reduces the chance you'll be bluffed as it makes it expensive for him to (if we didn't bet he could for cheaper and with the knowledge that his bluff will probably be successful) and it helps get value when you do have a hand.
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8:55 am
June 25, 2009
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RML604
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Yeah that's an interesting point. I think often you hear people saying that you only fold out worse hands. But there's nothing wrong with folding out worse hands if you're not going to get more value from them on later streets. So c-betting A high on the flop is a great example, because you're never going to get 2+ streets of value out of A high. So you bet on the flop to win the entire pot right there.
An extreme example of wanting the worse hand to fold b/c you can't get any value from it later in the hand is if you and your opponent had $1000, you had AA and he had 27o, he bet pre for $999 and showed you his hand, and you shoved over for the extra $1. Even though you have his hand absolutely crushed, you'd rather he fold because the extra $1 going into the pot doesn't compensate for the times that he'll suck out on you. So it's important to realize that if you'll never get more value from worse hands, then making them fold their equity share is the best option.
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11:59 pm
June 25, 2009
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orestto
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RML604 said:
So it's important to realize that if you'll never get more value from worse hands, then making them fold their equity share is the best option.
This is a great point. Just wanted to point that out.
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8:21 am
June 26, 2009
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kmart1
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Post edited 6:04 pm – June 26, 2009 by kmart1
Post edited 6:09 pm – June 26, 2009 by kmart1
Post edited 7:44 pm – June 26, 2009 by kmart1
For anyone confused about the number you use for fold equity, it's the percentage chance that a person will fold to your bet multiplied by your opponent's pot/showdown equity.
Here are a couple examples, assuming that only two players are in the pot (I apologize if the actual percentages are off; I'm at work and I don't have access to any odds calculators):
Example 1:
Hero [Ad Ac]
Villain [Kh 6d]
Flop: Kc 8h 4s
Here, Hero's pot equity is something like 80%. Let's give the Villain a 20% chance to fold to an opening bet. So the Hero's fold equity is (10% * 20%) = 2%. The Hero's combined equity for the pot is 82%.
Example 2:
$1/$2 NL Hold 'em
Button: Hero [8s 8c]
UTG: Villain [ Qd 9d]
Pre-flop:
Villain calls $2
Everyone folds to Hero, who raises to $11
Everyone folds to Villain, who calls $9.
Flop: Ad Kd 4c (Pot: $25)
Villain bets $25 as (what he thinks is) a semi-bluff.
Hero: ??
Here the Villain is actually approximately a 70-30 favorite, but let's assume for simplicity's sake that he believes that only the flush draw is good enough to win it for him, and the Hero has a good enough read to know this information. Let's assume he will call 100% of the time if the Hero raises to less than $150, and he will fold 80% of the time if the Hero raises to $150 or more. These tendencies are roughly based on the pot odds of his flush draw, with the math a little bit off (hey, not everyone can calculate odds perfectly when under pressure!)
A raise to less than $150 would give the Hero approximately 30% in showdown equity and 0% in fold equity (0% * 70%). A raise to $150 or more would give the Hero 30% in showdown equity and 56% in fold equity (80% * 70%).
Where I get confused is how this ties into the notion of the combined equity vs. the risk of playing on (p. 17). Am I thinking of the following situations properly?
With a pot of $50, the equity of
-Raising to $150 is (86% * $325) = $279.50, or an 86% equity for a 46.2% contribution.
-Calling $25 is (30% * $75) = $22.5, or a 30% equity for a 33% contribution.
-Folding is obviously $0, or a 0% equity for a 0% contribution.
Assuming a perfect read of the Villain's cards and tendencies, does this mean that raising to $150 (considering it is the smallest bet that will get the job done) is definitely the correct play?
If anything I explained is wrong, please correct me! 
EDIT: Fixed some math/understanding.
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2:30 pm
June 26, 2009
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orestto
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Post edited 9:31 pm – June 26, 2009 by orestto
On the original topic, I just read this today, it's from page 124 of Professional NLHE Volume I, by our awesome authors.
“If most of your equity comes from fold equity [steal equity], people call it a bluff. If both pot equity [showdown equity] and folding equity [steal equity] contribute significantly, people call it a “semi-bluff”. If pot equity [showdown equity] plays the largest part, then it's a “value bet”.
It's all a continuum. Ultimately, the only things that matter are your equity and how to maximize your expectation.“
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8:01 pm
June 26, 2009
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LT
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Hello folks…I scanned through the above discussion and disagree with some stuff.
First, both pot equity (ala showdown equity) and fold equity (ala steal equity) depend on your equity in the pot (one minus villain's equity in a 2-way pot), and therefore depends on your hole cards.
Also, the more equity you have in the pot the lower your folding equity is all else equal, and the more likely the villain folds the higher your fold equity (obviously).
The idea is that making the villain fold a hand that is incorrect in calling anyway won't be that beneficial (i.e. no real folding equity). Assuming the villain's calling range is related to your bet sizing to some extent, in these situations we MAY want to half pot it (or 2/3 pot it) rather than full pot (inducing an incorrect call so to speak).
Now on to the calculation of folding equity, the details of which I do NOT think is important as long as you understand the above concepts regarding its relationship with pot equity and fold percentage.
Folding equity (or "folding EV" so we can speak in $ terms) is essentially the difference in EV when villain folds some % of time and the EV when villain never folds. Put another way, it is villain's share of the pot if called minus your bet size, times fold percentage of villain. Brief example to clarify: if you bet $10 into a $10 pot, and your pot equity is 40%, your folding equity is essentially [$30*(1-0.4)] -$10 = $8. Now, $8 is the maximum folding equity you can possibly have because it assumes the villain folds 100% of the time, so your actually folding equity will be lower, e.g. if villain folds 50% of the time your folding equity will be 50% of $8 = $4. Continuing with our example, but now we have 85% equity in the pot (near lock), our folding equity is [$30*(1-0.85)] -$10 = -$5.5! So regardless of how often villain folds, our folding equity will still be negative.
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8:22 pm
June 26, 2009
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RML604
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I don't understand your calculations. Wouldn't we be losing $5.50 on avg. ever time villain folds?
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9:01 pm
June 26, 2009
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LT
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RML604 said:
I don't understand your calculations. Wouldn't we be losing $5.50 on avg. ever time villain folds?
yes, that's what it says (2nd part of example)…can you pls clarify what you don't understand?
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10:16 pm
June 26, 2009
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RML604
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How can we be losing money if villain fold?
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2:00 am
June 27, 2009
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Greyzy
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RML604 said:
How can we be losing money if villain fold?
LT said:
Folding equity (or “folding EV” so we can speak in $ terms) is essentially the difference in EV when villain folds some % of time and the EV when villain never folds. Put another way, it is villain's share of the pot if called minus your bet size, times fold percentage of villain.
My 2 cents regarding fold equity:
>RML604
Let me show you how you "lose" money if villain folds.
Please be aware that folding equity is the DIFFERENCE between 2 scenarios (as LT said):
Scenario 1: You bet and villain calls and it comes to a showdown.
Scenario 2: You bet and villain folds.
Now imagine your opponent is drawing dead on the river. What do you want him to do? Well, you want him to put in his stack (the biggest bet possible). Do you want him to fold? No! The difference in those 2 outcomes (gaining 0 additional $ when folded compared to gaining x$ when either you bet or you let him bet/bluff) is your fold equity. And since 0$ -x$ is a negative number you have negative fold equity.
BUT: Did you LOSE money? Of course not. The negative number just means that you can expect to make MORE money if you do NOT try to make villain fold.
Greyzy
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