Cost of Royal Chasing (Limit)

[Richas]

Sklansky talks about how if you were to check and fold every time you had a Royal Flush this would be a terrible error but a cheap one because a Royal is so rare.

My problem though is chasing Royals. I have never hit one so I find myself calling when I am clearly behind even chasing runner runner or when my hand is two suited and I only have one of the potential Royal in the hole. I mostly play limit which makes the fault a bit cheaper. How can I estimate what this is likely to cost me? Clearly I must have a decent flush draw and playing suited broadway cards is not that bad a play. I can still draw out to win but I would like to work out an estimate of how expensive this habit is.

[_TKO_]

"Chasing" a 4-card flush draw on the flop is rarely a mistake. However, attempting to backdoor a flush often is.

You are about 22:1(?) to hit a backdoor flush, and most pots will nowhere near compensate you for these large odds. You are losing a lot of theoretical bets by calling with 3 to a royal on the flop in order to specifically hit a royal. However, it is also important to keep in mind that with 3 broadway cards, you will sometimes have other ways to win (backdoor straights, and possibly some pairs).

I don't have the math on the frequencies of the above situations, but if you feel you are making mistakes in this regard, I'd suggest posting a hand in the strategy forum to see what other think in the specific context of the hand.

[Gonso]

I might have a solution for you. Go deposit $100 at UB, and play a game there called "Royal Hold'Em." It's basically a shorthanded Hold'em game with a catch - all of the cards lower than tens are removed.

Play a little while, you'll get your royal flush, and you can concentrate on playing poker the right way.

[AKQJ10]

Good suggestion!

I was going to posit, only half smart-assedly, that it depends on the utility that the OP assigns to catching that royal. It's like debates over whether you tailor your tournament strategy to maximize expectation of monetary payoff or to maximize expectation of fame (which probably means taking more risks to win the whole thing).

Conceivably, if OP wanted to make a royal so badly that he was willing to lose money for it, calling with every backdoor draw would be +EV -- in utility, not in terms of money!

Incidentally, I don't think it was Sklansky who wrote that -- I think it comes from SSHE by Miller, Sklansky, and Malmuth, which to my understanding is mostly Miller's writing. Sklansky's writing wouldn't be so clear or so memorable.

[nuts]

have patience, play normally, call with odds or semibluff your flush hands. You'll get one eventually, as long as you play lots of hands.

[PokerProfile]

You don't mention if the site you are playing at has a Royal Flush bonus - surely this could change the EV of some of these marginal calls.

[Siegmund]

If you ARE playing somewhere that has a Royal Flush bonus or a high hand jackpot... remember in most cardrooms BOTH hole cards have to play to qualify for the bonus - so you ought to be able to at least lay down the hands with one royal card in the hole unless they are otherwise playable.