Shoving at the high blinds and the rake (HUSNG turbo)

[derosnec]

assume 1500 chip stacks at 50/100 blinds and we are in the SB.

we have 86o.

if villain only calls a push with roughly the top 22% of his hands for example, then the push is +EV to the tune of 13 chips.

But rake is 4.5% of 1500 chips, or 67.5 chips. so with respect to rake, and assuming my opponent's range is correct, that's a bad push, no?

trying to grasp the impact of rake on my decisions.

[jay_shark]

If you don't push , then folding is 0 ev . If you push then it adds 13 chips to your total . Clearly , you would rather add 13 chips compared to 0 chips .

Another way of thinking about it is that if you win 51% of your heads up matches , then it's slightly negative EV to play . On the other hand , if you decide after you've entered the game that you no longer wish to play , then you will lose your rake 100% of the time . You'd still rather choose the former because you lose less .

10*0.51-10*0.49 -0.5 = -0.3 >-0.5

[derosnec]

ok, i'm retarded (i think)

[TNixon]

[ QUOTE ]
Clearly , you would rather add 13 chips compared to 0 chips.

[/ QUOTE ]
I'm not sure this is actually true.

Since making this move every time the situation came up would lead to winning less than 51% of your matches (and losing money over the long run to the rake), it's pretty clearly -$EV.

Which means, quite obviously, that chip EV is not necessarily equal to $EV even in a winner-take-all situation, which throws yet another wrinkle into the cash vs husng variance question.

[img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Of course, this isn't a profitable move at cash, either, because you still have to beat the rake. A 5% rake on 3k chips is 150, so minus any figuring for a max rake, the 13 chips you win doesn't cover it, and you bleed out to the rake.

And this realization puts an interesting spin on coinflips and the idea of pushing small edges. I don't think I've ever seen anybody take the rake into account when discussing EV calculations, but there is some effect, because a shove with a 51% edge is clearly not profitable.

[jay_shark]

That's how these poker sites make their money . In fact , if all players started to play close to perfection , then your edge may not be enough to beat the rake .Another thing is that for every hand you play , you apply some kind of edge which over the course of the match becomes your aggregate Ev . For that particular hand , you've added 13 chips . Perhaps on a previous play you added another 50 chips and so on and so forth .

If prior to the match you know that you will only add 13 chips in expectation , then you would refrain from playing . But if you find yourself playing in a tight match , then clearly you have no choice but to minimize your losses , even though in retrospect it would have been better to avoid the game .

Also Cev=$Ev every single time .

[derosnec]

i got the calling range wrong, supposed to be 24%.

anyways, so, 76% of time we steal blinds

but 24% of the time we are going to showdown, where will we lose 67% of the time.

so, our equity when called (in real dollars, i.e., the buy-in+rake) is negative $20 for a $55 turbo.

so stealing the blinds the other 3/4s of the time makes up for this?

compare this to, say, a c-bet at the 10/20 blinds where we believe we have an EV of +13 chips. there's a difference, no? with c-bet we're not risking it all for a 50.00001% win rate (i made that % up but you get the idea).

[derosnec]

an example hand for the heck of it (not that it matters really)

villain's calling range is roughly 24%, so, chip-wise, this is a +EV shove (+74 chips)

so i should push this every time, right?


PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em Tourney, Big Blind is t100 (2 handed) Hand History Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com (Format: 2+2 Forums)

BB (t1385)
Hero (t1615)

Preflop: Hero is Button with 3[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img], A[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img].
<font color="#CC3333">Hero raises to t1615</font>

or is limping better because we have position? or minraising? so confused, because i'm such a by-the-book push bot.

[TNixon]

[ QUOTE ]
Also Cev=$Ev every single time .

[/ QUOTE ]
That can't possibly be true, if pushing 51% over and over leads to losing money in the long run.

Unless you ignore the rake in your $EV calculations, which everybody does, presumably because it simplifies the calculations to a managable level.

That doesn't make it correct though.

If $EV is supposed to represent the actual amount, in dollars, that you win or lose, then clearly the rake has to be taken into account for the calculation to be truly accurate.

If you don't take the rake into account, then you end up in a situation where you think it's +$EV to push where you have 51% equity. That move is +cEV, but definitely -$EV in a cash game, since you lose money in the long run, and probably -$EV in a tournament, although the effects are going to be a lot harder to describe. I'm guessing that a simulator would show that the move is -$EV over any significant run of hands though, and would leave you with a 51% winrate, which is clearly not profitable. Which is the whole point of comparing $EV to cEV in the first place, is it not? To recognize situations where moves that appear to be +ev but that really aren't?

It's a lot easier to figure the effect in cash game situations, since there's a rake on every pot, and I don't know how you'd even go about determining the effects of the rake on a tournament, since it's a flat fee, but there is some effect that ought to be considered, because a perpetual 51% push is unprofitable.

[omgwtfnoway]

derosnec and tnixon, try thinking of rake as something totally separate from the buyin. after all, since it's not part of the pot once the match starts, why would any equity calculations factor in money that neither player will ever see again?
you pay some amount to the pot and a different, smaller amount to the site. then you play for the pot. if you can't win the pot often enough to overcome the rake then it's a bad bet but the time to make that decision is BEFORE you're registered for the tourney, not after.

[TNixon]

Yay, we get to butt heads again! [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[ QUOTE ]
why would any equity calculations factor in money that neither player will ever see again?

[/ QUOTE ]
Because if you don't somehow *try* to take it into account, or at least keep it in mind, you will end up with the incorrect belief that very marginal moves can be profitable, when in fact they are not.

The example from this thread is an all-in move that is +cEV, but that only has about 51% equity. If you were to play a series of tournaments where you could make this move every hand, and know you had 51% equity every time, and you only took cEV into account, you would incorrectly determine that this move is profitable.

Which it is, if you only take tournament chips into account, but if you take actual dollars into account (which is the whole point of $EV in the first place, is it not?), it is clearly unprofitable, in the sense that you will eventually bleed your bankroll to nothing through the rake.

Don't get me wrong, I completely understand that it's going to be difficult, if not impossible, to account for the rake in EV calculations over a tournament.

But the example given in this thread shows that you can't completely ignore it in very marginal situations, and that cEV isn't *really* exactly equal to $EV.