pushbotting - what's it all about?

[jcm4ccc]

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First of all thanks for the charts. Just had a question, your loose calling range includes all Ax hands, but only KQs as far as other two broadway hands, do you think this is representative of a "loose" calling range. If I were generating such a chart I think I might include more two broadway hands i.e. KJs, KTs, QJs. I think the loose calling range used in the chart in NLHTAP includes more of these type of hands, but I'm not %100 on that.

[/ QUOTE ] I kept changing my mind as to what would be good ranges. Here's an earlier version of the chart which has looser ranges:

another chart

[RichC.]

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I tried the link and it's not working for me...anyone wanna hook a brother up [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

- JA

[/ QUOTE ] I had to re-upload it. This link should work:

pushbot charts

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I have been looking for these for a week now, so glad this came up. Especially after XDeucesX jumped onto me for a questionable (actually horrible push).

[zoobird]

I'm kind of disappointed by the responses to this thread so far. Not that they're wrong...just a little shallow for a pretty important and fairly complex topic. There are probably a thousand people who post here better qualified to do this than me (I play mostly low buy-in MTT turbo sngs), but I'll do my best to at least get some real discussion on some of the issues started.

1. From what I remember the charts someone referred to in NLTAP are not 'pushbot' charts in the traditional sense. They're Sklansky-Chubhokov rankings which basically show for each possible hand, how small your stack would need to be for a fold NEVER to be right, even if your opponents have optimal calling ranges. That doesn't mean you shouldn't often be pushing hands where your stack isn't small enough to meet the threshhold yet, and it doesn't mean that a push is always better than your other options. Just that in terms of cEV, a fold is always wrong.

2. What most people refer to as a 'pushbot chart' (which I have to admit I never use) is a guide to what hands to push from various positions given various calling ranges you attribute to the players left to bet. While a lot of people seem to believe that use of these charts eliminates the skill from small stack poker, this is - you still need to accurately assign calling ranges to your opponents or the data in these charts is worthless.

3. One of the big considerations is whether you think your opponents know what they're doing in small stack situations. If they do, then in theory there's a set of pushbot charts you could that guide your optimal play, assuming that your opponents adopt optimal calling ranges. If you play at lower buy-ins, this will rarely be the case, and you should be thinking about how to adapt your strategy to take advantage of opponents mistakes. My experience is that in the 18 man turbos, at least up to the $25+$2, most opponents don't know how to play short stack poker and I can steal much more aggressively than I optimally should. Even better, when I have a small, but not desperate stack (say 5<M<10) many of them will fold just as frequently to smaller raises as to pushes, and they'll only 'resteal' when they've got a strong hand. The single most important note I can make on an opponent in these tournaments is "doesn't know how to play short stack".

Anyway, I know all that is pretty basic stuff that a lot of people here know a lot better than me, but thought it was worth posting it in this thread to see if it can get some real discussion going.

And now, maybe its time for me to start memorizing those pushbot charts and playing around with ICM some more...

[0evg0]

i've never seen the chart and i just go on feel and experience. if youve played long enough to be a mod on this forum, i'd guess maybe there's a problem.

[diebitter]

Nice chart. Now I can blame you when I donk out [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

seriously, thanks.

[diebitter]

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It's a short section but they recommend you commit it to memory. Goes into calling ranges for defense of this strategy as well.

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The calling range against all-ins stuff is very good. Every time i use this reference book, I like it more.