Luckyjimm: so much for not hawking the club you work for eh :]

I don't love antes. They are pointless and an extra hassle. Just make the blinds slightly bigger - it's the same thing. The only time I can see it making much of a difference is when you have big differences between blind levels and fast clock (i.e. not this tournament), in order to make it less unfair on whoever gets clobbered first by the big blind after the level goes up, because the blinds are a proportionately smaller part of the pre-flop pot.

It's not the same thing. If you had 10k chips and the blinds were 1/2 and the antes were 1500, would you still defend your BB with the same range of hands as if the blinds were 500/1000 and the antes were 1?

Edit: That said, I wouldn't mind if antes were all paid by the button, but I guess that can be awkward with eliminations & gives you a wierd LP/Blind dynamic when the wrong players are short.

It shouldnt change the dynamic b/c there is the same dead money in the pot however like you said it could get awkward with players busting and table redraws, but then that happens with blinds aswell, it would increase the Hands/h b/c the dealers arnt collecting and reminding all the players every hand

It'd change the dynamic because UTG might have 12 BB left but knows he'll post BB then SB then BTN antes. That means he's posted 9/9 antes by the time he's in CO instead of the normal 3/9 over the next three hands. This might be a difference of 1 BB compared to normal ante rules.

Not that that's necessarily a bad thing, but it's different to 200bb ring games (like the PS Big Game) where you're so deep it doesn't matter.

It does change the dynamic a bit, but I don't really see why it's for the better.

But perhaps not that much anyway, since people tend to open for around a pot-sized raise.

Say you're 9-handed and blinds are 3/6, the button opens for a pot-sized raise to 21. Now the BB has to call 15 more with 30 already in the middle, so he's getting 2:1 on a call.

If instead, everyone posts an ante of 1 and the blinds are 0, now a pot-sized raise is to 9, so it's 9 for the BB to call with 18 in the middle, so he's still getting 2:1. He should be defending exactly the same range. (Well, actually, slightly wider, because effective stacks are deeper in the antes case.)

The effect, however, is that less money goes in pre-flop overall, which might give you more play. Also, more incentive to limp in late position with weak hands, which could be a good effect.

I suggested posting antes on the button as a way to make paying antes easier. I don't play many tournaments anyway, so don't care a lot.

Your argument literally boils down to "a pot sized bet is a pot sized bet". Well of course it is. Opening for pot is a bad idea when you are shallow. Most good players open for 2-2.5x bb.

Oh, and for Jimm - here's Negreanu talking about sizes of antes:

http://www.fullcontactpoker.com/poke...t_from=&ucat=&

anybody play regularly at international?! ive been playing cash during the day down there lately.

What is the best casino to start playing live ?

Anyone playing gukpt grand final tomorrow/day after?

If I were you I would find a small card room near where you live if you want to get used to playing live.

In a card room it will be easier for you to find the ropes and learn the customs than in a casino environment. Also card rooms have a smaller player base and a more personal feel to them so you can make friends easier and feel more comfortable while you build your confidence playing live.

If you want a casino though, try the Vic. They spread a wide range of games at varying limits as low as 1/1.

I agree with the smaller room - I learnt how to play live in 2002 at Russel Square, but practically nobody played those days so I guess people were friendlier. The smaller the pond, the nicer they tend to be to strangers.

I'd suggest joining a regular home game or going to a casino with a few friends, preferably that've played live before. You'd probably do alright just by saying in this thread "I'm gonna play on Friday, who else is there, I've not played live before"

Thanks guys for the advice, only just started playing poker for real and just looking to improve all areas of my game, definitely will get started on looking for a card room near me, i doubt i could find a home game near though.

does the fox spread regularly the dealer choice? and if any, what day and what stakes?
tks

The short answer is no. I've been there a lot and never seen it, though have often heard them trying to start up those games with little success. If they have a scheduled time to do this I'm not aware of it, email them and ask.

Yes because making it £6 with those AA to thin the field of a table of people who wont fold will work wonders.

Don't listen to this guy. There's nothing wrong with making it £12 pre at 1/2 in the Empire when you're most likely going to get called in at least 1-2 spots.

On some tables at the empire I was opening for £25, and getting more than 1 caller as expected. Even got the odd light 3-bet. Just never do this without the goods tho obv.

TBH you are right, the point i was trying to make is that you can get away with raising smaller than the standard open, I would never be opening to £6 with aces either and i think you could probably get away with opening your weaker hands smaller and your premiums larger against most players who don't even notice bet size patterns

yes, in live play you can definitely play 100% exploitatively against people who even if they do observe and remember your betting patterns, don't know what they mean. how many times have you heard someone say 'if you'd have bet bigger, i'd have thought it was more likely to be a bluff and would have called'?

I remember calling someone on the river (they won) and i said "if you had bet smaller i would have folded" and they could not understand wtf i was saying and kept asking me questions about the hand like "did you have bottom set" errrr no

If you rise to £6 and get 5 callers with AA it's better than if you raise to £11 and get 2 callers. In theory anyway.

I played at the Fox Club on Thursday and asides from getting drunk on an empty stomach, spent half my time telling people why I made a call or whatever. In, I hope, a non-table-captain kind of way. Like a guy pointedly looks exasperated, raises preflop. He bets the flop with a random stack of fives and makes a snort. He's a roulette player, it's so so so clear he has AA in a weak-means-strong kind of way. So I told him that after the hand (I folded AQ on AK3) when he showed it.

Or when a guy overbet bluffed the river with an obvious missed flush draw and I called with tpnk. He'd checked a small flush behind against me earlier so I know he's all or nothing there and his earlier streets didn't look much like he had all. I explained that to him too.

Tried explaining to the same guy why I spent ages trying to do maths when I open AQ to £15 over some limpers & he cold shoves for £100. (AQ vs. TT+, AQ+ is 34.4%). I figure I'm getting 38% pot odds so fold. Explaining what I was thinking was way beyond my drunken abilities by then though, so had to stop with the tips for the night. I'd got drunk enough that I couldn't work the calculator on my phone after the hand. Not a good sign.

It was pretty fun. I imagine everyone else hated me though.

Neither in theory nor in practice.

I was going to argue about hand ranges, but actually, I agree with you. Nevermind!

Table transfer here plz.

Does strategy change for 1/1 compared to 1/2 blind structure?