[MyTurn2Raise]

now, we can begin

LESSON ONE: The Resteal

I remember distinctly when I took the leap from being a rakeback/bonus shortstacking pro to making a real profit. The credit actually goes to 2p2 poster Vanveen. There was a thread with Grimstarr complaining about hit and runners. The amazing thing is this thread turned into a theoretical and actual goldmine for those that could read what was being implied. I wasn't that smart, but did find the starting block. This is what Vanveen wrote
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Helpful hint, cero. I challenge you to outline your obvious adjustment that both nullifies the shortstack's edge and maintains a style of play most would consider worthy of the descriptors 'loose' and 'aggressive'. The way I use those words, it is the very nature of LAG play to overplay the blinds in an attempt to induce costly overadjustments or distort information well enough that the LAG gains a greater edge when the pots and bets get bigger. In the process the LAG makes himself susceptible to a shortstack concerned only with pot size, pot equity vs. easily estimated hand ranges, folding equity vs. easily estimated hand ranges, and simple flop situations w/pot sizes that are usually within a very small range. The only way to reduce the edge a shortstack can have is by playing tighter and less aggressively, almost to the point where I really doubt you're reaching the threshold required to get the adjustments you want and need.

And I don't understand how a shortstack's cards are any more face-up than a LAG's or how you're going to force a numerate shortstack to make ill-advised committment raises. We're dealing with %s - LAG raises 28% of hands from the CO. He will call a shove w/x% of hands in his range. He will fold y%. Do some math, figure out what hands we should be shoving. If we're really ambitious we can analyse flops and maybe just call sometimes. Tedious, but fairly easy. If LAG shows capacity to adjust we estimate adustment %s. HINT: Nearly everyone at six-max tables is raising too often and just dumping money to players w/<30bb (do the math w/availale database!) who can work a calculator and move their slider bar. If they stopped raising that often the games would change considerably and LAGs would have a smaller edge (as would everyone because the information being given would be PURER and more amenable to analysis). That is a fact.


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Ding Ding Ding

6max and fullring no-limit has come to be dominated by players that are very aggressive preflop. This is fine in a 100+BB stack game as position, aggression, hand reading, etc play such a huge role and building pots early helps in stacking opponents. However, it doesn't work when someone can use the blunt tool of the all-in preflop to destroy the position and later aggression. Suddenly, the shortie is the aggressor and forces the original raiser to know the math of hand v range.

Vanveen lead me to crack out the excel and pokerstove (or SNGwizard)...whatever works and see what hands are +ev to push verse different villains.

It all became a math equation since it became a one-street game.

let's put it all in terms of blinds
I had to find which hands had a positive expectation, while the variables at play were the opponent's initial raise size, the effective stack size, the opponent's initial raise range, and what the opponent would call with out of that range.

it works out to something like this:
f(R+1.5) + c(w((E+1.5)-1/20(2E+1.5))-l(E)) > 0
where
f = % of time initial raiser folds to push
c = % of time initial raiser calls push
R = Open raise size of initial raiser
w = win % of pushing hand v initial raiser's calling range
l = loss % of pushing hand v initial raiser's calling range

Basically, those terms account for the money won when the inital raiser folds to the push and the amount won win the push hand beats out the calling hand outweighing the amount lost when the calling hand beats the push hand.

Here, the action of the table dictates the initial raise size and the effective stack. The shortstacker must estimate the initial opening range and the calling range.

NOTE: this is assuming a BB and SB and a 5% rake. All of this stuff can change as well as there being overcallers...yummy!

the solution is to simplify for w and find out what win pct your hand needs verse a villain calling range.


w > ( (c-1)(R+1.5)/c + E) / (19E/10 +57/40)

Luckily, there are some good ways to find a villain's initial raising range. Many 2p2ers have given it away for free in posts. I recall that I looked at a thread where punter 11235 asked the MSNL forum to help him play 22/19 or something like that. Big Jim and AZK came through with some dynamite responses for hand ranges. In addition, there are numerous written sources that give away ranges as well.

Here are some
13.1% Common NIT range up front from forum posts 66+,ATo+,A9s+, KT+, Qjs
15.8% Common TAG range up front from forum posts 22+, A2s+, Kts+, T9s+, AT+, KQ
19.8 Tight players cut/but range from sources 66+, BW, A8+, K9
28.8 Very common stealing range
22,+A2+,K9o+,K8s+,Q9s+,Q9o+,J9o+,J8s+,T8s+,T9o,65s +,75s+

So, if we can guesstimate that someone steals with the 28.8% range, but will only call a push with the 19.8% range, we know what hands to push that are +ev.

For example, our effective stack is 20BBs. The initial raiser uses the 28.8% range for stealing and opens up 3BBs. If our previous play with the player makes us think he'll call with teh 19.8% range earlier, it's +ev to push 55+, A8s+, KJs+, A9o+, KJo+ (yes, I've done the math on all of these things).

This is the simplest scenario. Things get much more complicated with overcallers and players acting behind you and whatnot. However, this is the root of the most powerful tool. You still have to estimate opponent raising and calling ranges. Your opponents will adjust these over time playing with you. However, you'll successfully negate and profit from one of the full stacks big weapons--preflop aggression.