5 card draw bb question

[kilclon]

So you are sitting in the bb and dealt AAxxx.
Its folded around to the sb who limps.

You raise and sb calls.
Both discard 3.

sb now bets.

How often do you call unimproved if sb seems to be doing this say 1/2 to 2/3 of the time

Thanks.
AK

[flafishy]

Seriously, how many times is this going to come up in any given session?

That said, I'd call the first couple of times in this situation to give him the message that he's not going to get away with any crap.

[THEjDonk]

If this is $1/$2, it's $2 to call and you can win $6.

How often your opponent improves to something that beats your hand depends on the range of hands he can have here. Let's assume he makes two pair or better about 30 % of the time. If he plays game theoretical, 25 % of his bets should be bluffs with the current pot size. In that case, he should bet 40 % of his hands. Since he's betting more often, you should probably call 100 % of the time with aces.

I assume that you're raising with some weaker hands than aces after he limps. If you want him to continue to bluff frequently, I suppose you could fold some of the time with pairs of tens/nines/eights and that kind of stuff in a similar situation.

[bigpooch]

Correct! Suppose the BB only raised with nines or better.
According to GT (game theory), the BB has to AT LEAST call
2/3 of the time or with about 53% of unimproved pairs.

Since the SB appears to be (statistically) abusing his
betting privileges, the BB MUST call with JJA to AA and if
the BB believes that the SB bluffs more than 1/4 of the
time, he should call with any pair of jacks and maybe some
TT hands as well.

[stripsqueez]

whilst the mathematical answer to the question is interesting i think its a poor answer

contemplate that someone who is weak enough to open complete in a limit draw game is unlikely to bluff a lot post draw

i fold when i more or less know he has me beat

stripsqueez - chickenhawk

[bigpooch]

Well, then you simply didn't understand/read the OP

[ QUOTE ]


sb now bets.

How often do you call unimproved if sb seems to be doing this say 1/2 to 2/3 of the time



[/ QUOTE ]

and hence, the rationale for the correct answer. Against
a player who is playing theoretically soundly, one MUST
consider game theory. Against a player that is NOT playing
soundly (we have statistical evidence based on past
experience, and make a Bayesian inference), we employ an
exploitative strategy that has higher overall EV than the
GT (game theoretical) one. Since it appears the SB is
betting frequently postdraw, he may be bluffing more than
what GT (game theory) dictates and hence, even intuitive
players know to call in this spot, not just with AA but
hands as weak as JJA.

The post by THEjDonk is correct and is the right way to
think about answering the question posed by the OP. My post
was to clarify the technical details and hence, the
conclusion to call this particular player in the SB given
the situation with AA is correct. Should further data be
collected in the future about this opponent, in this
scenario of SB versus BB, the conclusion may change, but it
is very unlikely (one would have to think that the SB RARELY
bluffs in that spot to fold AA since one will be raising
with not just AA when drawing three).

[Big Limpin]

kidclon,

what level stakes is this from? If its mid/high-ish stakes, and your opponents seem decent (are bluffing close to the optimal frequency), then jDonk and bigpooch's advice is clearly correct. At lower stakes though, your opponents are more likely to be either spazzes who bluff incessantly when they see you draw3, or total granny-style of never ever ever bluffing. The former should be always called, the latter never called. My experience is that at low stakes, granny-style is predominant, and therefore stripsqueez's advice will outperform the GT approach.
[ QUOTE ]
sb seems to be doing this say 1/2 to 2/3 of the time

[/ QUOTE ] He will legitimately improve ~30% of the time, so it would appear its about 50/50 if he did or didnt improve. Clearly at 3:1 on your money, you want to look this guy up with AA. ***HOWEVER:

Its important though to have a sample size before assigning generalizations to the villain. Just because he has bet out 2/3rd of the time lately doesnt necessarily mean that he is bluffing half the time. He could have improved every single time. To say he improves ~30% of the time certainly does not mean that in 10 hands he actually does improve 3 times. It could be 9 times, 5 times, or 0 times, thats why you want to observe many of these situations before assigning him labels of "bluffer" or "nit".

As flafishy said, how often does this exact situation come up (table folds to you guys, he neither folds nor raises, you have a hand to pop him with, you both draw 3, and he leads out). Not thats its once-in-a-blue-moon or anything, but it will take many many orbits before you can get a legit read on him. Of course, observing his play in other situations can give you an idea of his generaly tendancies.

Personally, my gameplan mirrors that of stripsqueez:
at the stakes i play (medium-low), against an unknown, my standard attack is to assume him to be honest at first, as that is the more common opponent. I'll be willing to fold AA the first few times, until my suspicion begins to grow. If he keeps doing it at a significantly greater frequency than expected, then i start calling. I feel this is optimal because like i say, the nit (its never a bluff) is a more frequent opponent at my stakes than the chronic bluffer. Remember, the manic/bluffer is not so inlined to be open completing from teh SB.

One last point. While i advocate giving him credit at first until you are obviously folding too much, as that is IMO optimal versus someone assumed to be playing Noob101 poker...it will take a LONG time before you actually see enough of his hands to know what he's really up to. So you are really going on faith at first, trusting your instincts. If you were instead to start out by calling unimproved every time to start off (until you get a line on him), you may get pwned a little at first, but you will learn his tendencies much quicker, as you can quickly learn how much he is bluffing. So if you are able to refine his betting range sooner, you could argue that in the medium term, you will be able to make better call/fold decisions against him. Overall though, if he is bluffing somewhere between never and always, then this isnt really a massive EV hit no matter how you play it. If i understand right, if he bluffs the GT amount, then it dont matter if you call or fold, you are EV neutral. But since we assume him to NOT be doing this, you should be able to determine if you best play is always calling (he bluffs too much) or always folding (he doesn't bluff enough).

And again, from my experience, if this is like .50/1, 1/2, even 2/4, its more likely he has just been catching cards.

[stripsqueez]

[ QUOTE ]
Well, then you simply didn't understand/read the OP

[/ QUOTE ]

your right i didnt read it closely enough - it explicitly requests the math answer

[ QUOTE ]
one would have to think that the SB RARELY
bluffs in that spot to fold AA since one will be raising
with not just AA when drawing three

[/ QUOTE ]

its not uncommon to find players who literally never bluff post draw so i wouldnt advocate always call as some form of compromise to the problem - compromise in any poker game is nearly always wrong and its common that the compromise has a math base as the justification - draw certainly lends itself to the kind of math rationale that appears in this post and i dont want to seem reluctant to accept its validity - its just that i dont like misplaced theory and thats what i often hear in these forums

what i really hate about folding in this spot is that its weak and thats not generally a useful image

stripsqueez - chickenhawk