a genie offers you a deal

[BenA]

One more thing: If even once, you bluff a river against someone's unimproved A6o, and they decide to call you suspecting you are full of [censored], that's gonna make anyone paying attention more inclined to call you down, since at least online, your cards are automatically shown. And in live play, if you just open muck after someone's c/c, roughly the same effect will occur. Fold equity goes way down from a meta-game perspective.

If you are caught just ONCE with 32o on a high-card board, and somebody picks you off with A-high, you are really screwed. Even idiots are gonna go "wow, what a crazy bluffer. He raised PF with nothing, bet the flop, turn and river with nothing. I'm gonna have to show him down with even a pair."

[alphatmw]

first off, i said we could choose whatever game we wanted (full ring, heads up, limit, NL, SNGs, MTTs, whatever) and i thought it was implicitly obvious that no one would ever, ever want to play LIMIT in this situation.

secondly, why do you keep betting when people have pairs as if by giving them the pot, you're bleeding away money???

hand 1: raise preflop, fine, whatever. check fold flop. i lost, what 3xbb?
hand 2: great, lets assume the opponent is a complete moron who calls down large, consequtive bets with underpairs. this must be the first hand you played against him because why would you try to move him off a pair ever again? one time mistake, which even for the amount of fish in the game these days, must be rare.
hand 3: why am i raising into people with top pair when i know i ONLY have fold equity?? check fold the flop!

as i said earlier bena. if you're losing to people whose cards you can see, you're making huge mistakes. the above post validates that.

[BenA]

[ QUOTE ]
as i said earlier bena. if you're losing to people whose cards you can see, you're making huge mistakes. the above post validates that.

[/ QUOTE ]

Okay, then explain how you are making a profit when you can only buy small pots when no-one has a pair. Do you really think this is coming up often enough for you to be able to make up for all the blinds you have to pay, all the bluffs you have to give up, and all the 'suckouts' you are gonna see? They're not really ever suckouts, because everyone always holds a better hand than you.

Again, no one has made a legitimate counter-argument to my claim that never being able to win at showdown will destroy you. And like I said before, if your hand stayed fixed, it would be different, but since 32o mutates into the nut-low no matter what, all you HAVE is fold equity.

[ QUOTE ]
hand 3: why am i raising into people with top pair when i know i ONLY have fold equity?? check fold the flop!

[/ QUOTE ]

Um... with no showdown value, no pot equity, no implied odds and no chance of improving, expalin to me EXACTLY what value you EVER have other than fold equity??? The answer is, none. Fold equity is the only value you have in your hypothetical situation. If you want to argue with that, then explain how you can win at showdown?

[BenA]

[ QUOTE ]
and i thought it was implicitly obvious that no one would ever, ever want to play LIMIT in this situation

[/ QUOTE ]

Implicitly obvious? No. Try being explicitly obvious next time. You just said poker, and that you could choose your game. I'm a poker player, and I'm responding to your situation in a limit game. If you didn't want that to happen, then say so.

Obviously, I'd rather play NL, stud, or lowball with this setup, but I do find this interesting to try and apply to any game, and see if it works. I think that Draw would be my last choice for a game to choose.

Edit: Actually, it just occured to me that I'd rather not play any stud type games with this format either. Whether its low or high, having the nut low at all times means that you could never ever REPRESENT a good hand, since all your up cards would be crap too. Sure, you could represent rolled up somethings in high when you knew your opponent only held a medium pair, but you can't have that every time, and eventually they are gonna correctly 'suckout' against what you are representing, or more likely, figure out that you are full of crap. In lowball, its even harder, since all your exposed cards are gonna be high. Maybe NL is the only game, IMO, that this format would be profitable.

Very interesting question, and I'm glad you posted it.

[Stylite]

Interesting question.

BenA is right that this deal would be awful for Limit and 7 stud.

For NL tournaments, this deal would probably be very profitable if you used your knowledge of holecards mainly for steals and re-steals. Once the tourny got heads-up, you would have to press for a deal.

[alphatmw]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
as i said earlier bena. if you're losing to people whose cards you can see, you're making huge mistakes. the above post validates that.

[/ QUOTE ]

Okay, then explain how you are making a profit when you can only buy small pots when no-one has a pair. Do you really think this is coming up often enough for you to be able to make up for all the blinds you have to pay, all the bluffs you have to give up, and all the 'suckouts' you are gonna see? They're not really ever suckouts, because everyone always holds a better hand than you.

Again, no one has made a legitimate counter-argument to my claim that never being able to win at showdown will destroy you. And like I said before, if your hand stayed fixed, it would be different, but since 32o mutates into the nut-low no matter what, all you HAVE is fold equity.

[ QUOTE ]
hand 3: why am i raising into people with top pair when i know i ONLY have fold equity?? check fold the flop!

[/ QUOTE ]

Um... with no showdown value, no pot equity, no implied odds and no chance of improving, expalin to me EXACTLY what value you EVER have other than fold equity??? The answer is, none. Fold equity is the only value you have in your hypothetical situation. If you want to argue with that, then explain how you can win at showdown?

[/ QUOTE ] yes you ALWAYS only have fold equity. so why are we hoping that 2 people BOTH with top pair will fold?? why not wait until you're against ONE opponent who has bottom pair or worse? of course this deal is unprofitable if you play like you have to win every single pot.

[phish]

I think you can clean up with this deal, even assuming you can't play any split pot or low-only games.

I'd play NL HU or real short. Steal blinds when my opponents have total crap. Try to get in cheap when my opponent has mediocre hands, then checkraise him all-in when he bluffs with a complete miss. And fold anytime he has a decent hand. (Never try to play him off Ace high or any pair even on the river)

I think poker'd still be interesting, cause not all your plays will work. For example you may raise pre-flop when he has 72 but he may go all-in and you'd have to fold.
Or you may checkraise him all-in when he has JT and the board is A48 and he for some reason decides to call or misclicks.

There would still be variance and skill to the game. It'd just be of a different nature.

[Manup]

HU you could never win. You could settle for MTT finishing 2nd, but you'd never win. AND...since you'd have to live with the fact of being 2nd best and knowing you could never win poker would obviouly become a boring (all be it very profitable) hobby. so you'd have to ask yourself and your ego if the money is worth it because you'd never have a bracelel and people would eventually know that you're full of sheeet.

[alphatmw]

oooh one thing i didn't think of before is that you can never play in a televised tournament.

[icemanjmw]

Does your hand change even after it's been flipped? For example, one situation has us facing a preflop raiser who has AK and missed the flop of T 6 7 rainbow, he continuation bets and we raise all in. He calls thinking we're bluffing so we're forced to flip over 23. Now does the genie's wish make it impopssible for us to ever spike a 2 or 3 to actually win this pot?

Also, as someone stated what if you're on TV?