Thanks pooch and bjornar. Great question Heron.

Here's a good one: Calling pat hands.

Is there a strategy/math or is it always read dependent? pot ratio? different in pot limit than limit? Call with at least JJJ+? Raising? Or always fold?

In my case, its solely read dependent. Also it depends on my history against an opponent. If I just showed a pat bluff or got caught in a pat bluff against him that influences the decision, specially if my notes on him do not describe him as a particularly good player. That being said, I probably call about 5%-10% of pat hands. Is this way too much? should I be raising at all ever?

Great subject. Im going to try that poker hands thingie to get a graph of my 5cd venture.

Yeah- I'd like to hear more about that too. The answer I come up with when I think about it in limit draw is likely wrong.

Here's what I came up with:

Assume you raise from EP with AAxxx and are 3-bet from the button and call. No other players. There are now 3 big bets into the pot. You draw three and button stands pat. You end up with AAxxx. Button bets. Do you call with 4:1 pot odds?

If he's pat-bluffing with less than 2pr more than one time in 4, then this is a call. So the first order question is: does the opponent pat-bluff more than once for every four time he has a legit pat hand?

The second order question is: how often does he 3-bet and pat a hand like aces up or tripps in order to make you try to 'catch' a pat-bluff with a hand like aces or a low 2-pr?

A legit pat hand will be dealt every 131 hands, or once out of ~22 times to someone at a full six handed table.

I would expect it to be reasonable for a thinking, aggressive, tricky opponent to pat-bluff only occasionally so that the tendancy isn't noticable or obvious. A reasonable tendancy would be once every 250 hands... would also expect same opponent to pat 'not-bluff' by drawing zero to a good 2-pair at about the same frequency.

So if this is true then it seems like if you have any read that an opponent is thinking, aggressive, bluffy, or tricky that you can't go far wrong by flipping a coin and calling when you can't beat a pat hand, but can call a bluff, on heads and folding on tails.

Would love to hear how far off this is...Game theory kinda suggests that a thinking opponent should be pat-bluffing much more than once every 250 hands, but do they really?

Do you ever play according to b) or c)? I think that is just plain awful! Waaaay too loose IMO, even if the button is a wacko.
a) on the other hand is sound and what people should be playing even against b)(but maybe not against c).

Im not sure I would say that a player that is "not good" is a good player to try and catch on a patbluff. People with low experience and skill with the game are more unlikely to try this then expert players IMO. Id rather take a note if I ever see a player do a patbluff that he is capable. That is alot more usefull information.

Personally I do tendency analysis more then read when I determine weather or not someone is on a pat bluff. Does the situation make it "possible" for the opposition to make such a play? Sometimes hands just doesnt add up. I see "many" bet the SB to steal and get called when they didnt expect/hope it and then pat. My usual thinking is, Oh, that was convenient.
I must warn people. People pat two pair all the time. Its hard to improve on two pair and making two pair medium into a bluff is often a good play. I cant do them anymore because Ive bluffed sooo much that people always call my pats. People patting trips is pretty uncommon and I think its an expert play and 110% read based. If you "know" your opponent have bigger trips then you and it makes sense for you to have a pat then it can be done. Usually I suggest people draw to trips and if behind try and suck out to win a big hand. No shame in folding trips folks!

Yes. Definitely been there.

No shame in folding trips is right. It takes discipline though! AAA and KKK are the only hands I cant get away from no matter what. Somewhat of a leak I know...

Pat bluff two medium pair sorta works ok for me. I try not to do it a lot.

Ok, on a diff subject, heres an example of a type of hand I have an issue with. Am I missing value by not betting the river?


PokerStars Game #3098826337: 5 Card Draw Limit ($1/$2)
Table 'Scutum' 6-max Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: Button ($33.75 in chips)
Seat 2: SB ($48 in chips)
Seat 3: BB ($56.25 in chips)
Seat 4: UTG ($26.50 in chips)
Seat 5: UTG+1 ($8.50 in chips)
Seat 6: Hero (CO) ($48.75 in chips)
SB: posts small blind $0.50
BB: posts big blind $1
*** DEALING HANDS ***
Dealt to Hero [5 A A 5 T]
UTG: folds
UTG+1: folds
Hero: raises $1 to $2
Button: folds
SB: calls $1.50
BB: calls $1
SB: discards 3 cards
BB: discards 1 card
Hero: discards 1 card [T]
Dealt to Hero [5 A A 5] [3]
SB: checks
BB: checks
Hero: checks
*** SHOW DOWN ***
SB: shows [T 2 K K 7] (a pair of Kings)
BB: shows [2 3 3 4 2] (two pair, Threes and Deuces)
Hero: shows [5 A A 5 3] (two pair, Aces and Fives)
Hero collected $5.75 from pot

Hello 5CD thread!
I've just started playing limit 5CD today for the first time ever and, after losing horrendously for the first hour, managed to claw things back to overall break-even for the day. One particular hand, though, I hadn't the slightest idea what I should draw to.
I was in the BB with QT998; the button limped, sb completed, I checked. SB discards 3.
What do I ditch?

Draw to 3 the 99 100% of the time.

Interesting. I think I was distracted by all the red cards and the four-to-a-straight and bright colours and whatnot and didn't consider keeping just the 99.

I love you guys

Pretty much never played this game but I hope to contribute once I get a bit of experience. Couple of questions to help get me nOObing:

I have Malmuth's and Zadeh's books. Totally useless for the new blind structure, or...?

I'm a little obsessed with trying to optimise my bankroll strategy, so I like to have some standard deviation numbers to play around with. Anyone got any data? Similar to O8?

Agreed. If you had a flush draw or an OESD, however, I would draw to that instead.

I would valuebet in that situation every time without hesitation. You've been checked to by both villains; odds say that you have the best hand even before you see them act, and after they both check to you it's even more probable that neither of them improved enough to beat aces up.

I was answering a technical question based on theory, not a practical one.

In practice, we'd almost never play according to b) or c) since nobody AFAIK would open that way. Clearly, b) could even be technically too tight against a player who opens on any pair or flush draw or straight draw or hands such as AKJTx so arguably 22 is worth defending with. Also, c) is arguably too aggressive since if the button is such a maniac, he will be often capping with air in which case it is better to have at least AK or a flush draw/decent straight draw when 3-betting; OTOH, c) can also be too tight if the button usually calls the 3-bet most of the time and doesn't pay off ( call or raise ) with AK or better postdraw; it's quite clear that the button must pay off with 22 postdraw when the pot is 6.5 small bets (otherwise he is exploitable); technically, c) is arguably too tight since the BB ought to be 3-betting with clearly more than 7/11 of his range ( that's the button's game-theoretical calling frequency) and equating that with "legitimate hands" would make AJ a theoretically adequate hand. For the analagous one street "toy game", the frequency will be (7/11)(9/7) = 9/11 which will be slightly too loose because the BB will be OOP, there is another betting round and it is the button that has the option of capping predraw; one could still make an argument for 3-betting with any ace and most king-high hands based on the "toy game". The answer I gave for c) was likely on the "tight" side given that the BB is OOP even if the BTN is playing close to optimally after his "straddle" and seems "maniacal" but bear in mind that optimal play sometimes appears that way (it's probably closer to "optimal" to 3-bet any AJ or better + any flush/straight draw).

Against a "wacko", probably b) is not too far from what works well in practice. In practice, a) works well against most opposition, but is technically on the tight side against a button that plays close to optimally.

You still dont answer what you play like( at least it doesnt feel like you answer that way).

As for the other hands mentioned recently in this thread:
Aces up is an instant valuebet in that spot.
99 is way too good to break against two limpers. Only an openended straightflushdraw would make me consider breaking it. 99 is likely to be the best hand predraw.

Anyone have thoughts or links to strat for Pot and NL 5CD?
What's the adjustment from Limit?
3xbb open standard like in Hold'em?
Changes in open/post-draw calling range?

I play almost only pot limit 5CD but if any site would have NL higher then NL50 I would definitely play that alot more. If your opening ranges in fixed limit are sound there is no reason to change that for PL or NL. The big difference is what to call reraises with because its sooo much more expensive then in limit. One small bet is so very often a mustcall in fixed. PL and NL also plays alot more readbased then fixed. Fixed is a more technical game were you can play according to a system and still be a winner. PL and NL can give you headaches because the calculations and reads you need to make are much more complex and challenging IMO.

Many thanks for the answers to my question about big blind defense. I was very happy with those.

But of course I have more questions for wise men to answer. For instance this one:

If an opponent stands pat and I trust him, what hand do I need to value bet?

Some days ago I had that problem. I just filled up to 222JJ by drawing two jacks. An opponent who had stood pat led out and I but called, in part because a second opponent who had drawn one card was to act behind me. I was lucky to get an overcall and the pat hand was only a flush. So I won a nice pot but I don't know whether my play was too weak and what's worse, I don't know how to analyse that situation.

As a first step I should find out how many pat hands are better than my 222JJ and how many are worse. I suck at math but I can write me a program that goes through all the pat hands and analyses and counts them. But what must I do then to solve my problem?

The median pat hand is a broadway straight, so I would certainly valueraise any full house postdraw.

As spedmonkey said, median pat dealt is TJQKA straight. From a purely technical standpoint a boat will always be a raise. But in practice that doesnt have to be the case. You called and got an overcall. Would you get called if you raise a pat hand after drawing two cards? Well. I wouldnt call you unless I had a sick read on you. The question is did you gain a bet by flatcalling or not? I think you gained a bet more often then you didnt here. Im not sure what stakes this is but people dont fold pats on some levels and that could have been the case here too. Besides, you might get a raise from a flush behind you to make one more bet. Oh, the dilemmas.

All in all. I think you played it fine but I would personally just raise. Im pretty sure I have the best hand.

Thanks again. It looks like I missed a clear value raise. True, by calling I got that overcall, but if I raise I'll almost certainly get that bet from the pat hand anyway.

As for my more general question I don't understand how I could ask that. At least this morning it seems pretty obvious to me that I have to value bet or raise heads up against a pat hand with the top 33%.

So I've been checking out my copy of Malmuth's Draw and Lowball book, and something that caught my eye was that on p. 364 he suggests that you could call a raise and draw 4 to an ace if you were sure that the opener had specifically JJ-KK, and that the pot was going to stay headsup. Clearly there is a world of difference between the modern game and the one where jacks are required to open and the opener has to act first after the draw, but, I wonder if there might be a scenario where we could defend the big blind with an ace vs a very wide opening range.

According to the table in the book the ace is a 2.7-1 dog versus JJxxx-KKxxx. Additionally the joker is in play but either hand could have that so the effect probably evens out somewhat. Also putting someone on specifically JJ-KK requires a 'live read' that they are weak, but if a very aggro player opens online they could have a lot less than jacks so that seems to balance out a bit as well.

The main problem I see with the play is that we will be out of position, because no way can we cold call in position with any great certainty that the blinds won't come along. However, I imagine many opponents will either pat-snow or draw one then bet 100% any time they start with an unpaired hand, so we might have a profitable bluffcatcher with A hi.

It's not that I'm trying to sell this play, just I was amazed to see that it was viable in the old game and I'm now intrigued to see if it might be in the new game too. Thoughts?

Without the "bug", this doesn't quite work even when in the BB HU against a SB that opens with a range of AK+ or better ( BB's pot equity is almost 0.25 ). Having one less ace to make a pair of aces is by far the biggest difference between "Gardena draw" and the bugless form. Now, suppose for some reason you posted one BB in the cutoff and everyone folded to the BB who now raised (say his range is AK+); now, you do have a slim call because of the SB's dead money (BTW, if you held AK you would call and draw three instead of four here). The other scenario where this might be okay is if you are the BB HU against a SB that open raises more than 2/3 of all hands; you have a slim call because the SB would be opening with more than just any come hand and AJ+.

AK is sometimes a clearcut call in the BB against a SB because drawing three is overall better than drawing four; in addition, with position, this becomes a bluffing hand to go along with the value betting hands ( which should be approximately KK+ ). Against a very loose button, defending with AK(suited) in the BB isn't as awful as what many people think; it even has about 0.267 pot equity against QQ. AK(suited) is usually better to draw to than 22 when heads up against the SB or a button that has limped in.

Thanks bigpooch . Given that this is a fairly GTO kind of game, I'm guessing we could come up with a concrete number for the required equity needed to defend the bb oop vs a specific range. I'm wondering if we could extrapolate from the recommendation given in Stoxtrader's LH book to defend with 35% equity or better, by assuming that the in position player's advantage is constant across betting rounds. What I mean is, let's take the difference between 35% and our immediate 3.5 to 1 odds (22.22%), and assign 2/5 of that to each of the big bet rounds, and the other 1/5 to the flop betting. Translating to the one big bet round of 5CD, the ip player's edge is 2/5 of (35-22.22), or 5.11%. Therefore we should defend with any hand that has at least 27.33% equity vs the opener's range. Does this seem reasonable?

That's only a very rough approximation. I'm afraid the best method is simply to run a highly modified Monte Carlo simulation using either close to optimal play for the players or some "models" of how typical players will play.
[ Also, clearly, LHE is quite a bit different compared to limit draw, but your "method" gives a "ballpark figure" to at least think about. ]

I would think the BB's minimum equity is less than 27% equity overall to profitably play. For example, if the button is opening with approximately 35% of his hands (IMHO, close to optimal), the vast majority of the time he will be drawing three to just a pair (or possibly AK). If the BB value bets all but his very worst two pair hands when both he and the button draw three, he will be playing close to optimally; clearly, the button will need to call with more than half of his unimproved one pair hands so as not to be exploited and as a result the BB gets some implied odds with some weak one pair hands that develop into a "bettable two pairs" or better. Of course, we'd also have to consider the BB's range of betting hands which depends on his range of hands to defend with ( and draw three cards to ) and how this range works overall versus the button's likely range, how often the button will call down with a better two pairs and how often the button will raise and even the button's optimal bluff raising range. A clear example where the BB doesn't have 27% equity and can play versus a cutoff raise (say range is about TTA+ and decent semibluffs) is a hand such as 6542Q: 12/47 ~ 0.2553 < 0.27 but this is a clear call ( and change the Q to either the A or 8 and I would argue a reraise would work out even better in the long run in practice ). There is a strong argument that a very good player in the BB should play a wider range versus a button that doesn't play well so as to take advantage of his better play postdraw; however, there are only two betting rounds and being OOP is a disadvantage, so how often the BB can defend can't be widened too much: e.g., defending with 22 is likely not better than defending with AK (suited) even though it's not uncommon for players at $10-20 or higher to defend with 33 or 22 ( and usually the equity for these hands won't be as high as 27% against a typical or slightly overaggressive button ).

one question,

are there some videos about 5CD, I really love videos more, sometiems you can read 10 books but one video helps you more.

Ive been thinking about making some but I suck at computers in general so I dont know how. And you need to listen to my strange english(or norwegian but who understands that?).

this would be good, here are two programs that are used by many poker video makers:


http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia.asp

http://www.bbsoftware.co.uk/BBFlashBack.aspx

just download the trials and you will see how easy it is if you dont want to speak then record just the video - i think you cant make good video for lets say holdem nl 6max without sound but 5cd is simpler and an average player will understand your moves without sound too, but on the other hand it would be nice to hear some comments from an experienced player.