Hi Everyone,

I have been playing poker for a while, but i just started to focus on the math part, since I would like to become a winning player.

I have been reading and calculating a lot lately, but i am not sure if I understand the stuff correctly.
Here are my questions:

1) Is there a difference in Sklansky dollar and EV?
2) From what i read, sklansky dollars only count when there is an all in
Situation. Am i Correct in think that it is just the EV of the last call?
3) Wouldn't than give a wrong kind information? in this extreme example
Pl1 has 200 and PL2 also Player 1 bets 199 with 77 player 2 calls with 88
Flop 882 player 1 bets $1 player 2 Calls. Sklansky dollars for player 2 would be $400. but in reality would be around $320 since they basicly went allin preflop.

Thanks for explaining in advance.

I might not be expert enough to answer. But I'll try. EV and sklansly bucks are different things but work together. Sklansky bucks is a unit of measurement to show you what your EV is. Analogy: Length is to inches what EV is to sklansky bucks. My understanding is that our trackers show you the EV adjusted net (or what your roll looks like in sklansky bucks) only from all in situations. But that's only because that's the only time it has perfect information (opponents hole cards) in order to calculate it. In your example, you can still calculate EV (and therefore sklansky bucks) in hindsight for the preflop action. But you can't figure it out until you know the hole cards. So the tracker programs go by the all ins. This of course skews the information because of hands like the one you just mentioned.

EV and Sklanksy bucks are, to all intents and purposes, basically the same thing as far as I'm concerned.

EV (which is just the amount of profit or loss you expect when making a play) might be better understood by putting the mathematical equations into plain English.

At its most basic, EV equals (how much you win * how often you win) - (how much you lose * how often you lose it). When EV>0, it's a profitable play.

If the pot size is measured in dollars, your EV is measured in "Sklanky bucks". If you're adding up blinds or tourney chips, then your EV is measured in those instead.

It doesn't solely apply to calls, and certainly not just all in situations. Bluffs, semi-bluffs and value-bets have an EV too, and the math exists pre-flop as well as on the river. It's just harder (or almost impossible) to calculate the precise EV of a play on an early street when there are cards still to come, and money/chips still to be wagered.

EDIT: Regarding your hand example, EV calculations should be done at the point where the action occurs. You might say "basically all in", but the EV of the $1 call post-flop is completely different to the EV of the $199 call pre-flop.
i.e. It's complete madness to fold for $1 getting such ridiculous pot odds post-flop (it would be very -EV to fold), but it could be eminently sensible to fold pre-flop when you're faced with much worse pot odds.

Thanks for your quick replies.

In short correct me if i am wrong. Sklanskybucks is the same as ev in most situation. in the definition i read it said only at the all in point. would it be correct in my (extreme) example to calculate the EV (or sklansky bucks) adding the preflop and on flop ev. I see no reason why this wouldn't be correct. So in my example:
Preflop EV (0,823*398)-(0,166*398)=261,49
op de flop (1*2-(0*2)=2
So total ev 263,49.
Is this correct?

In short an would i be correct if I would play headsup and there is a showdown I would be able to calculate the EV perfectly, after the hand is played?

No, you can't "add" EV on multiple streets. The EV is relative to a specific decision (call all in, raise flop, fold turn, etc).

As for the difference between Sklansky bucks and EV: Sklansky is merely a measure relative to your equity in the pot and the size of the pot. This is different from your EV.

This will probably be clearer with implied odds hands. If I have 22 and am facing an UTG open, my equity is certainly very bad. But given that I have some implied odds, the EV of calling can very well be positive.

In most cases, the EV of a decision is actually something pretty abstract that can't be quantified. For example, to estimate your EV, you should take into account: table dynamics, reads, skill edge, positional advantage, etc.
Whereas Sklansky bucks only depend on your cards and villain's cards.

But hindside if i want to calculate what i won/list in a hand why can't I add the result of per flop and flop bets. In your example lets say I call with 22 against AA. Every time I don't hit a set on the flop I fold. And lose sixty percent of my bet in sklanksy dollars. But the hands where I flop a set I add sklanksy dollars I make on that flop and that should make it profitable over all, right?

To clarify, you actually could "add" streets. Thing is that you need to work out the whole branch of possibilities and multiply them by the frequency they occur. This is somewhat impossible to actually do but you could simplify a lot by grouping ranges and runouts and you can give a rough estimate of checkraising JTd on 782dd for example. Also this means you take predetermined lines with all (groups of) runouts and your opponent will respond predictably. For all practical purposes this isn't doable though

Agreed. Not really what op was trying to do though.


I don't really understand what you are saying, nor where the "sixty percent of my bet" comes from.
If you fold every time you don't hit a set or quads, then you fold ~88% of the time.

What I meant in my earlier post is that a purely sklansky bucks analysis will lead you to fold 22 because you are not given the correct immediate odds. However, you still have implied odds, and these are taken into account in your EV.

As for EV, Sklansky bucks should be calculated at a decision point. If we call a 3bb open with 22 vs AA on the BTN, we make the following amount of Sklansky dollars:
Equity * size of the pot - investment = 18% * 7.5 - 3 = -2.65 Sklansky dollars

If you now want to take into account how much you make on the flop when you hit, this is called implied odds and its part of the expectation value, it's not a Sklansky dollars equation.

Because EV calculations (or estimations) are by definition related to individual decisions.

In a pre-flop spot, faced with a raise, you estimate your expectation right there. You might call, because you believe it will turn out to be a profitable decision on average in the long run.

Once the flop is seen, you have a whole new decision. There is now some dead money in the pot that no longer belongs to you. You can't go back and change your decision or recalculate your EV pre-flop, because you've already made that call. Your next decision (on the flop) has a whole new EV calculation associated with it.

For example, if you called 3bb pre-flop and missed the flop, then you lost 3bb this time.
Let's say that the next time you went set-mining, you spiked your set and somehow won villain's entire stack, for a 100bb profit.

If these were the only two possibilities (lose 3bb or win 100bb) and each happened 50% of the time, then set-mining would be ridiculously profitable, because you'd be winning 100bb 50% of the time and losing 3bb 50% of the time.
The total EV would be (50% * 100) - (50% * 3) = 50 - 1.5 = 48.5bb

It would be wonderful if set-mining had an EV of 48.5bb, but set-mining isn't a 50/50 proposition, and you don't always win 100bb when you spike a set.

How much you win depends on what villain has, how the board runs out, and what action occurs.
You can't really "add up" the EV from multiple streets, unless you play an infinite number of hands, and experience an infinite number of board runouts and action sequences, in order to calculate the probabilities of all outcomes. Sometimes, for example, the flop will get checked through and you spike a set on the turn. Another time, you might flop a set, but lose to a bigger one, or a straight or a flush.

You can calculate a precise EV when the decision is all in, but even then you need to know exactly what a villain's hand (or range) is. In poker, you never know that, so you have to estimate it and use software tools to give you a feel for the maths.

You can look back after a hand and say "Oh, my call was good against that particular hand, because I had 40% equity and the pot required odds of 33% for me to break even", but you don't play against specific hands. You play against ranges of hands.
We could go on to talk about "Galfond bucks" here, but I think it will just add to the confusion. :/

Thanks artysmokes,

I am not really as confused as I might seem about EV. I understand the concept of ranges and g bucks.

To clarify I think there are (at least) 2 different ways to use EV one is where most poker players talk about to evaluate a decision to fold raise or call.

The second one is where I am focussing on right now is to see if my play regardless if they are good or not got me what I deserved. (If I am running bad or good). My opinion is that if I add up the EV of the money going in multiplied by my equity on each street will give me what I should earn over the long run. ( this will say nothing about the quality of my decision or that I would have to consider the money already in the pot ). I think this are sklanksy buck over whole hand. Which only purpose is to see if I should be winning over the long run. And if I am running good or bad.

I'm still not really sure what you are trying to do, but I'm still pretty sure that you are confused about what EV and equity are.

There's currently no way to accurately assess how lucky you are in poker, although it's possible for some specific spots, e.g. how often your draw hits, how often you hit your sets on the flop, all-in EV, etc.

But how do you intend to do this? I can replay a random hand from my database and evaluate my play pretty well. I can see spots where I probably should have called/folded/raised instead of what I actually chose to do, but - except for the all-in decisions - I can't get an accurate number for how much money I gained or lost in EV.

Ranges are too wide and villains too unpredictable to make accurate assessments of EV$.

Thanks Guys,

The EV stuff is a little clearer now, I will continue studying.