It sounds like you are playing tournys/SNGs?

You will have to get used to coin flips so start learning now. At low stakes it's your bread and butter because villains will make a lot of bad shoves and bad calls to your shoves.

Villain can shove a wide range on the button because most of the time he gets folds from the SB and BB.

Therefore you can be damn sure you are ahead of his range with AKo and you call.

Versus most of his shoving hands you are ahead. AA and KK are unlikely because you are already holding one of each. If he turns up with either of those don't beat yourself up about it remember you made the right call and that's what matters long term.

If he has QQ, JJ etc yes you are behind but not by that much. You will still get you ace or king a good amount of the time.

Hope that helps.

Yeah it's tournaments! And when I get in control of myself, very low-stakes tournaments

Thank you - my question ended up morphing into more of a discussion of why calling like this was beneficial (rather than waiting till I 'knew' I was ahead, like hitting TPTK/a set/ TP etc).

As far as I now understand, just-over-flips are basically always calls because you should be going for the win, rather than conserving your stack and cashing up one or two places higher. It seemed counter-intuitive to me at first, but I can see the logic behind it. I like, where possible, knowing I've got money on a sure bet, so I would much rather have many small increases (betting a big sports team to beat a non-leaguer) than a 55-45 flipper. But I'm trying to think more and more that it is a good call, because the payjumps are so big at that point and over time it pays much better to call than fold. If I've misinterpreted, someone slap me down please

^^^ Also, taking these 'just over flips' is where your small edge will show over time, as long as you consistently take that 55-45 opportunity. Think long term! (as hard as it is to do when in a downswing)

Since I actually have no idea what he is openshoving since I assume he has a raise-call strategy as well but I've attempted to make a range that I think he might openjam to avoid having to call a shove. So that's basically a sklansky vs 15bb and 20bb which I don't know exactly actually.

Now you're looking at something like:

99-44, ATs-A2s, K9s+, QTs+, JTs, T9s, AJo-A7o, KJo+

You need to type this in equilab to visualize this but basically these are the hands that have enough equity to shove but aren't thrilled about raising and then calling for various reasons. Almost nobody jams TT-AA here because they want action. AKo has 65% against that so that's a pretty big edge. If you include pairs up to QQ the equity doesn't chance much because they're basically flips and it goes to 62,5%. Even if you also incude KK/AA you still have 61% because of all your blockers. I've excluded AJs+/AQo because that's a happy raise-call but if he happens to jam with it your equity goes up obviously.

Even if he plays some weird 22+/AQ+ only you have 47% which is still a call if accounted for blinds and antes.

1. VPIP is an acronym for Voluntarily Put (chips or money) In Pot. It basically tells what percentage of your hands you play. A tight amateur will typically play about 10% of his hands but, for a profit-maximizing pro it's usually around 20%, but those numbers can vary widely depending on the situation. If I'm in the middle of a limpfest where I'm getting good odds to limp with suited connectors, two broadways, suited aces or any other two decent cards, I sometimes play as many as 35% of my hands until the situation changes.

You can almost always find out whatever you need to know on Google. There are videos or posts on everything from how a HUD works to how to play suited connectors to how to fix a toilet. Here is a guide to the most commonly used HUD statistics:

http://www.pokerlistings.com/strateg...pponents-Stats


2. Yes, Black Friday is when the major poker sites available in the US were taken down. We can still play online but the sites aren't nearly as good. I was actually online when it happened and the FBI logo filled up my screen.

EDIT: In the US we can't access Party Poker, PokerStars, Full Tilt, or any of the other major sites. One of the sites that I play on has such low traffic that it's hard to find a tournament with 100 players.

https://www.pokernews.com/news/2016/...ater-24506.htm

Pretty sure I'm calling AJ in that spot, snip snap AK. New players often don't realize how strong AK is. Mess around with equilab for a while; you should definitely learn something.

Thanks guys. Yeah I wasn't sure if it was the VPIP acronym or another one that meant your PF activity (because 'VPIP' could mean donk bets or any sort of bets as well, if you take the acronym literally.) So many acronyms flying around here!!!

I'm gonna start trialling HUDs in March when I'm able to spend more time training and reading / thinking about poker. Tonnes of essays to write at the moment!

Yes, V(oluntarily)PIP means every time that you have a choice, in other words, everything you put in the pot other than the blinds.