I'll just use a recent hand as an example.

I flop an open ender and a backdoor flush draw. I put V on an overpair. He 3! shoves on flop offering me a tiny bit under 2 to 1 to call. Quick math in my head is I have 8 outs for the straight 2 times so about 32% + 4% for backdoor flush = 36% equity

So I am very confident I have like a 1-2% edge by calling his all in. I call, don't make it, and he shows the overpair.

I know mathematically its a good call but do the top players even make the call in this situation or just say "I know I can get better spots than calling a +1-2% edge when I know I am behind"?

I always have mixed feelings in this type of situation. I tell myself it was a good call but also think that in the long run I'm making like 1-2BB per instance that this comes up but could easily lose like 500BB+ in a row so is it worth it?

Simple call and stop fretting?

It's all about bankroll management on these tiny edges. If your roll is fine, call. If not, fold. It's perfectly fine to fold if you're playing thin. In a tourney, early stages, it's a fold. If you have a day job, call.

In cash game you should always make the call when it is +EV. And consider rake, it can make low +EV break even or minus.
In tournament calls that show small +EV may be bad. Talking about edge not about ICM. I mean sitting at table with poor players you are expected to win (longterm) more than is EV of the call. Nash simulation tools often can calculate with your edge, you set up the edge and ranges difer from the theoretical.

If you're on the table with half your roll, and will be out of siginificant action if you lose, then it becomes +EV to fold, assuming you're a winning player, because you'll miss out on action the next day, or the same day. If you're a losing player you should also call.

It's usually not smart to treat your roll like a tournament, but some people do it, and if you're one of those, then you may fold for the same reasons you'd fold in a tourney if you're a winning player. But, otherwise call.

I never agreed with the blindly following of +ev situations. It's +ev over the course of thousands of exact same situations... not exactly helpful in a situation for your tournament life or a big chunk of your roll

In tournaments the play that makes the most money should always be taken just like cash games. If you have a small bankroll then that's the problem in the first place and it will cost you money because you can't make the best plays.

In this case if you make 1BB in the hand that is 100BB/100 which is an insane winrate to give up. If you keep folding these every time because you think the edge is so small you cripple your winrate in the long run.

Just a note to OP.

Sometimes when I raise in spots with bluffs I size accordingly to have either easy folds or easy calls (depends). Consider changing your 2-raise sizing so you can have a good idea about how to react to a 3b shove.

let's just assume you could be completely sure your read was correct. For someone to try to tell you or for you to ask someone else to tell you if you "SHOULD" take the 1-2% edge is a silly premise.

Who is anyone to tell anyone else what edge they should be comfortable taking?

This is a personal decision. Only you can decide what edge you feel comfortable taking.

If you had the chance to put up $500 to flip a fair coin, heads you win and tails you lose, with the other player putting up $505. "Should you do it?"

That's up to you OP. No one can answer it for you.

We can tell you how we would make our decisions, but there is not logic based and objectively true answer to your question.

If you are a solid favorite in a game you can find better edges. If you "didn't drive to the casino to gamble" and you have good reason to believe you can find much bigger edges that the 1-2% edge you took in OP, then pass on it if you want.

I will caution that there are few players that should be passing up on any edge at all and if you are not a very very good player then you maybe should not play poker at all if you don't find the prospects of being a slight favorite in a big pot attractive.

But if you know you are able to crush a game and you don't feel like gambling, don't gamble.

But to answer your question, yes, a +EV spot is always +EV (just sometimes you have to decide between maxing your EV and reducing your variance, and that is an individual decision)

If you need 34% equity for fold and call to be the same EV and you have 36% equity then call is 2% equity more profitable of a play, and that 2% is off not just your stack but all the money in play.

So you will be freerolling for the pot that 2% of the time if you choose to call over fold. If its a 200BB pot then you are looking at 4BBs worth of equity. So folding in this spot will give you a -400BB/100 winrate lower than calling. Very ill advised.

Now look, you can make a case for folding here and continuing with 66 blinds in a super soft live game or if you are playing a tournament where your tourney life outweighs those 4BBs. But if you are frequently giving up "close"(not really close) spots like this because you are too scared to gamble and claim your 70 blinds of equity then you are leaking money.
Folding here also makes more sense if you are super deep, since this is a losing spot where your win rate is going to be negative no matter what. If you are 500BB super deep and you commit 33% of your stack in a bad spot and you don't want to commit the remaining 330 blinds with poor EV because it is so many blinds to win back. That logic makes some sense, even though mathematically it is a big mistake and even at 500BB deep you should call with a 2% edge(20BB edge in this 1k BB pot).

I think dead money and equity realization are more of a factor if the pot is bigger.

In addition think about your decisions preflop, if you are making -EV decisions preflop and wind up in this spot you can't always justify just calling etc... and you have to think about how u got in this spot.

---

When people talk about pushing small marginal edges/spots its def not this tho lol.

You can go either way in this spot it won't effect winrate much IMO...

Its not so much the size of the pot its all about the value of the decision, the bigger the pot the more it makes sense to fold actually. If you are playing a 100BB stack trying to contest a 200BB pot with your 36% equity looking to get that ~2% edge then your opponent cant really counter your strategy by having a nutted range. People will have a "wide" range for getting in a 100BB stack when comparing to a 300BB+ stack, risking this stack size your range would have to be more narrow so that you are not exploited. This is why its ok to stack off QQ with a 100BB stack, but at 300BB you would be leaving yourself vulnerable to getting called by only KK/AA. The reason being is that the high fold equity QQ would have at 100BB cant be countered by trying to have a better showdown value range. By trying to "catch"(trap) your opponent with AA/KK when he is shoving QQ+/AK+ you will have too many folds in your line trying to reach this resolution point. Once you finally do get the situation you were waiting for of getting AA/KK all in VS QQ+/AK (a low frequency occurrence) the value of your Equity in this 200BB pot will be less than the Fold Equity villain has acquired. However, if it were 300BB starting stacks then your pot equity for a 600BB all in would be enough to cover the cost of your folds.

This applies to this hand so the PSR of the hand is important. If the PSR is very high villains range is more nutted so this hand could be a fold then(ex. limped pot at 100BB or raised pot to 3bb at ~300BB). Makes sense to fold if you think villains range is only sets/2pairs which makes that 36% equity look more like 32%. If the PSR was lower (ex. 3bet pot) then you would have to commit with this hand for the same reasons as the QQ example.
With a high PSR pot villains all in range is more nutted, good approach because our fold equity is low because of the small pot size.
With a low PSR pot villain will have to fight for the pot and cant rely on trapping us because of our fold equity.
Always consider the PSR of the hand to figure out which hands to stack off with.


In addition think about your decisions preflop, if you are making -EV decisions preflop and wind up in this spot you can't always justify just calling etc

Yes its important to consider all streets everytime, especially when you are building a strategy but that type of analysis should be done off the table. Actually you can justify calling every time, just because this spot is -EV doesn't mean the hand wasn't played perfectly(not saying that it was but you cant base it off that). The best way to play a hand might be -EV at every decision point.

Lets say you are playing HU, with 78o in the BB. Villain raises to 2BB and you calculate that you have 33% equity vs his range, Villain is a better player than you and IP so you take away 5% of your equity to compensate for his advantage. So now you believe your hands true equity is 28%. You have 3 options, Fold/Call/Raise. You consider raising but you know Villain is an excellent player and that he will have a big edge over you, Raising has the value of -1.5BB. Now you consider folding at a value of -1BB. What about Call? 2BB investment for 28% equity in a 4BB pot # 2BB - 1.12BB = -0.88BB.
So I've got 3 options. Raise at an EV of -1.5BB, Fold with an EV of -1BB, or call with an EV of -0.88BB. Well all of these options seem pretty bad to me, but we are forced into picking one. Lets pick the lesser of 3 evils and call for a profit of -0.88BB.
The flop is T 8 5 with a flush draw, we check and villain bets pot. We can fold for -2BB, Raise which is a big losing play for -4BB, or call 4BB to play for an 8BB pot. We calculate our equity at 40% vs villains presumed range, he is still IP and a better player than us but we are closer to a resolution point so we give him a 4% advantage instead of 5% like before; therefore our true equity is 36%. 36%(8BB) = 2.88BB - 4BB = -1.12BB.
Turn is a 2, it goes check check.
River is a queen and you check to villain who bets half pot. You eliminate raising as the worst EV play. Fold gives u an EV of -4BB. Your hand is good to bluffcatch here 30% of the time, EVcall = 30%(16BB) = 4.8BB - 8BB = -3.2BB.

Looking at this you might think this line is a mistake because your EV went down street by street and you are compounding a mistake by calling. But that is looking at one possibility and not all possibilities. The river could have been a 4/3/2 giving us 55% equity and a +0.8BB call. The turn or river could have been an 8 or 7 giving us HUGE equity 70%+. etc.



With the original example of a 36% equity hand and a 34% equity Fold-Call Break-even EV point. You have two options EVfold= -0.5(pot) ; EVcall = EVfold + 2%(All In Pot). Notice how fold EV is for half pot before villains last raise, and call EV is for all the chips. Lets stick with 100BB poker as it is most common. Dead money from other players doesn't need to be considered as it is calculated into the pot odds you are getting. So your potential profit is 4BB if you call instead of fold. But that is assuming he is never bluffing, on a J T 5 board when you have KQs you can run into KQ, Q9, AK, AQ. If this player shows up with these bluffs 15% of the time then it would make fold that much worse, and how can you assume that he wont be bluffing with those hands sometimes? If he was our equity would be
Ecall = 200BB(0.45e)15% + 200BB(0.36e)85%
Ecall = 13.5 + 61.2 = 74.7 BB
Efold = 200BB(0.34e) = 68BB

So if villain is bluffing 15% of the time then calling is 6.7BB more profitable. If this spot comes up 1/300 hands then in 30k hands played you would have chosen the 6.7BB more losing option 100 times which adds up to 670 blinds.

670blinds / 30k hands = 0.0223 bb/hand = 2.23 BB /100 hands

This one spot is big enough of a leak to make you go from a winning 2bb/100 hands player to a losing one, rofl. This spot probably happens like 1/600 hands (+/-? idk) so that number is probably not 2.23 but close to 1 probably, still huge.