New heads up poker game - best strategy?

[tmcdmck]

he could push pre anything and would probably be +ev. he could push any 8 out + draw and be +EV vs an overpair even if called with nothing in the pot. When he actually has a hand he has some serious power. and his bluffs become super effective. wow i would definitely choose to be him rather than you. did he have to call for half the amount you bet aswell by the way?

[cjk73]

never diss aces!

Text results appended to pokerstove.txt

1,851,000,624 games 0.016 secs 115,687,539,000 games/sec

Board:
Dead: Ah Ad Ac

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 81.649% 81.35% 00.30% 1505712632 5605188.17 { QcQd }
Hand 1: 18.351% 18.05% 00.30% 334077616 5605188.17 { random }


---

1,851,000,624 games 0.031 secs 59,709,697,548 games/sec

Board:
Dead: Ah Qh Qs

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 84.910% 84.69% 00.22% 1567666729 4015753.83 { AcAd }
Hand 1: 15.090% 14.87% 00.22% 275302387 4015753.83 { random }

[dfan]

[ QUOTE ]
he could push pre anything and would probably be +ev. he could push any 8 out + draw and be +EV vs an overpair even if called with nothing in the pot. When he actually has a hand he has some serious power. and his bluffs become super effective. wow i would definitely choose to be him rather than you. did he have to call for half the amount you bet aswell by the way?

[/ QUOTE ]

You are right that post-flop he was in a very powerful position. That's why my initial strategy of raising to around $7 pre didn't work out well. He called when he had good cards, and then if he bet the flop I pretty much had to fold unless I really hit the flop hard. If I folded to his bet I was already down $14.

The way we handled the 2-1 was to make regular bets and calls, but if he won the pot, I put in an additional 50% of the pot total.

But with $100 stacks, I still think I am the favorite using my revised strategy of larger preflop raises ($20-$25).

[dfan]

And what about
A,A,A,K,K,x,x,x?

(and remember, if the chips end up in the middle you aren't likely to be playing versus a random hand)

[cjk73]

On a different computer now that doesnt have poker stove, I'll check tomorrow.

That said, you will have to assume a random hand at the time you are choosing what to discard because no betting has occured yet.

[dfan]

Not true. You want to pick starting cards that will win you money, not that fare best vs a random hand. Specifically you prefer to keep cards that play well against hands that will play back at you (i.e., will call if you raise pre-flop, or are more likely to call your bets or raise after seeing the flop.)

[holdem2000]

[ QUOTE ]
And what about
A,A,A,K,K,x,x,x?

(and remember, if the chips end up in the middle you aren't likely to be playing versus a random hand)

[/ QUOTE ]

Even dealt AAAAQQ I take two of the aces. He doesn't call our opening raise with these stacks unless he has KK+ probably, maybe AK/QQ but even if he does those are unlikely vs. our holdings. So assuming we raise, the only time our cards matter is if he has KK (or possibly QQ 1/7th of the time). If I'm up against KK I'd sure rather have AA with no aces in the deck instead of QQ.

With AAAKK, KK is now the nuts preflop. Not only that, if he has AK, he can't pair the ace. Intuitively it seems to me we play KK. But I'm wrong [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]...

If villain is playing KK+ preflop then of course we play AA and the one hand in 861 that he actually plays back at our raise we have him crushed instead of flipping a coin. If instead he's playing QQ+, PokerStove confirms we play AA (an equity difference of almost 5%!)... that one hand in seven where the opponent has KK instead of QQ is enough that we prefer to have AA with less set outs. And if he plays QQ+ & AK then PokerStove confirms we again play AA, now by an even bigger margin over 8%.

Dealt AAAAKK it looks like we still take AA if his range is anywhere from KK+ to QQ+/AK

[cjk73]

[ QUOTE ]
Not true. You want to pick starting cards that will win you money, not that fare best vs a random hand. Specifically you prefer to keep cards that play well against hands that will play back at you (i.e., will call if you raise pre-flop, or are more likely to call your bets or raise after seeing the flop.)

[/ QUOTE ]

Well that may be the case when you are talking about choosing amongst a large population of starting hands....your scenario is AA or QQ given dead cards. In this situation you must evaluate against a random hand or just come right out and say that the opponent has KK in which case Aces are still the choice. Bottom line is AA is best regardless of whether it has one or two less outs to improve...equity-wise it doesnt need to against any other starting hand. You could of course come up with situation where you know enough dead cards but this would be only theoretical.