A PRO POKER PLAYERS CALCULATION

[godofPOPOV]

sklansky talks about EV+ moves as well as multiple calculations just to figure out a bet size based on assumptions of hands you think your opponent has.
lots of math and guesswork to come to those calculations.

harrington talks about M and there are discussions about True M. - again more calulation.


the question is: how many pro poker players (for this discussion lets take big names like Ivey, Hellmuth, JChan, Ferguson, Matusow, Negreanu, etc.) make all those calculations on most hands everytime they play? <font color="red"> </font> <font color="red"> </font>


also not to mention the calculations about pot odds and then how many outs you have and dividing that by the remaining unseen cards subtracting one to get the odds of that happening. [ outs / unseen cards - 1 = odds of that happening ]




its a lot of math and i am dedicated to learning it all, but how many of the big pros run that much math through their heads on all the hands they play?????

[Cornell Fiji]

Most (and I am saying 'most' and not 'all' because once and a while you will run into a statistical outlier like DERB) long run winning players who play above micro stakes think about their hand's ev against their opponents range on every hand that they play. Not calculating your expected value against your opponents' range means that you are simply playing your own cards, which is a horribly losing proposition above micro stakes.

When you have played enough, calculating expected value against your opponents range becomes second nature and you should be able to do this relatively quickly.

In a tournament setting you should always know your stack size and the blinds and therefore you should know your M at all times.

Also, this post probably belongs in the Beginners forum and not NVG.

[lgas]

I imagine for most even moderately competent players, they only actually do calculations on a small percentage of all the hands they play. Most of they time they are familiar enough with the approximate math of the situation without having to actually work out the specific numbers.

On the other hand the way they got to the point where most of it is intuitive is by running the numbers on most of the hands they play either during or after the hand.

[PiquetteAces]

I dont want to answer for them, but just to have a general idea is usually fine. It won't make a difference if U take the decision to call because the odds that U get are 2.3 to 1, but ur wrong because the right odds are actually 2.28652865 to 1. Just an approximation is fine.



- jpp

[godofPOPOV]

okay so here is a quoted (from another members definition of EV from a different post) EV calculation

16:4 = 4:1 = .2 = 20%

You're asking for EV in a vacuum with some weird no implied odds, always fold when you're beat, etc., assumptions. Here it is:

5/46 = .108 = unseen cards that help you
41/46 = .891 = unseen cards that don't help you (so you lose)
0/46 = 0 = unseen cards that tie (there are no chopped pots here)

You now multiply the probability of an outcome by the value of the outcome, and the sum of the outcome values is your EV. So when you drag the pot, you win $16. When you lose, you lose your $4 bet.

.108(16) + .891(-4) = -1.84





is that something that you should be able to do at a table?
is there like a trick to multipling .891(-4) and .108(16) and then being able to add them?

because that is how you find out if your pot odds to outs odds are sufficient (obviously you add in implied odds, etc. ). but getting that initial number is important i feel....


any ideas?

[Doug Funnie II]

godofpopov-

In the example you give, no there's no easy trick to multiplying and adding those numbers. But in poker, you don't have to. Every good player that I know implicitly just calculates the tipping point, i.e where a play goes from positive to negative ev based on potodds, and compares that to the situation at hand. You don't really need to know how + or - the situation is exactly, just that it is or it isn't.

For example if I'm getting 4:1 meaning there's 300$ in the pot and my opponent shoves for another $100 so its $100 to call, I know I need 20% equity to make this a winning call in a vacuum. If there are 46 unseen cards, then I know that 9 outs is not enough to make this call because 9/45=.2 so 9/46&lt;.2, however 10 outs is enough. This is all pretty trivial however because without knowing my opponent's cards its impossible to know if my overcards are good, if the board pairing ruins my flush draw, etc so most people would probably want 12 outs or more to call here since lots of my outs could be "dirty."

[ocdscale]

I doubt any high stakes players do full calculations of hand v. range or range v. range.
But they all think about it, and from experience can get a good approximation.

They may not be thinking: "Okay, Villain has JJ+, AJs+ or air 5% of the time, my equity vs this range is..."
But they may think: "He's drawing to 2 outs x% of the time, I'm behind and drawing to 10 outs y% of the time, and I'm drawing to 3 outs z% of the time. Pot is a, need to call b..."

[johnnyrocket]

a good amount use them but not so frequently, they run into the same situations alot that they just have spots remembered