Poker Stars $10.00+$0.80 No Limit Hold'em Tournament - t50/t100 Blinds + t10 - 8 players
The Official 2+2 Hand Converter Powered By DeucesCracked.com

UTG: t1400 M = 6.09
UTG+1: t2795 M = 12.15
MP1: t860 M = 3.74
MP2: t1070 M = 4.65
Hero (CO): t3090 M = 13.43
BTN: t1585 M = 6.89
SB: t2290 M = 9.96
BB: t1910 M = 8.30

Pre Flop: (t230) Hero is CO with A A
2 folds, MP1 raises to t850 all in, 1 fold

So I assume the majority of you are going to say this is a snap call. If so, how big does villians stack need to be to fold here, or are you calling regardless. Conversely if any of you think this is fold, is there any size stack you think is profitable to call here.

Now this is tightness on a complete new level. Nice joke.

If his stack is 851 or more I'd say fold. But calling here is correct as you need every fraction of a chip in equity you can get. I mean, I'm assuming you're like all he other DoN players and are 50-tabling at 0.2% ROI, right?

I 20-30 table at 11% actually.

Either of you guys wanna explain in term of equity gained or lost how this is an easy fold.

i fired up sngwiz and ignored the trolls. obviously, if we change nothing, this is a clear push with qq+ (16.54 equity if we fold, 17.89 equity if we push). then i took 2000 chips from utg+1 and gave them to villain, and it is still a push with aa only (16.94 eqp, 16.73 eqf). then i took 500 chips from the small blind and gave them to utg+2 and this is a fold (eqp 16.44, eqf 16.81). so, if we make two more stacks small and we make initial raiser cover us, this becomes a fold. then, i made utg+2 and us have 3000 chips, and made everyone else have 1500 chips. its a push, (eqp 16.41, eqf 16.33). bottom line, you have to be the only other large stack in a sea of small stacks to think about mucking. this tournament is nowhere near over. in the initial setup, we are only cashing like 85% of the time.

Generally, I think when the table is still 8-handed there'd have to be very special circumstances to make AA a fold pre-flop, even in a DoN.

I think with 8 players left I am calling regardless with AA. Also I would make sure to shove to shut down any other callers so we end up heads up (where my aces dominate).

Reasons for calling this: 3K chips with 8 players still alive is not nearly enough to survive by folding. We are only at the 50/100 blinds level so the shorties can double up and by the 75/150+ levels we could go from chip leader to an average stack.

I believe by calling this and hopefully winning it we are pretty much assured ITM.

**Another thing, a lot of players start to panick when they get below 1K in chips and will start shoving with stuff like AJ , 88-JJ etc.

Sorry if I don't have any numbers to give but the math boys should be waking up soon enough to provide all kinds of wiz numbers etc.

Excellent analysis as always twisted, I also wanted to mention the highlighted part on your post just didn't want to do it w/o any actual numbers.

I agree here.

I would be folding if there were a few guys with <1 BB and we had 6 or 7 left, and we have about 4 BB's (ICM says fold), or if we have like 4800 and can fold out

i have 30 posts here and in all of them im suggesting fold, but this situations is a clerar push

The more I think about ICM, the more I think that it is inadequate to DONs. ICM works for reg formats, because all players have the same motivation and are playing for the same thing. A guy with 2k is trying to get chips just as much as a guy with 4k is. This is not the case in DONs. In DONs, as Ive said before, the chips move from the large stacks to the small stacks because small stacks are pushing before they lose fold equity and the large stacks are folding because they dont want to risk their stack and are hoping that someone else will. Boecause of this fact, I think that an average stack is the only stack that's actual equity is at what ICM says it is, (not accounting for skill level). The farther away you get above average, the lower your actual equity is than what ICM says. Conversely, the farther below average your stack gets, the higher your actual equity is than what ICM says. (until you get too low below and start to lose fold equity)

Ok so here's how I see the hand. 3k stack with 8 left I give myself around 85%. If I call and knock this dude out, I don't see myself gaining more than 5% equity. If I call and lose, I think I'm losing 18%. That makes the call we need around 3.4 to 1 or a little over 78%. We're at least 82% against villians range so I think we have a call, which I actually did in the tournament.
I just don't think it's as obvious as everyone makes it out to be, and if he'd had 500 more chips, I think this would become a fold. Now if you're starting from a point of average skill level (50% ITM in the beginning) I think this is a snap call, probably even if villian has you covered. I just wanted to post this hand because it shows how AA isn't always an obvious call, and it illustrates how as your stack gets bigger, chips lost cost you so much more equity than chips you win gain you.

How do you find 85%? sorry if its a newbe question

I start with ICM but then factor in my skill level and other factors. A lot of it is just the 1000s of these that I have played and remebering how often I cash when I'm in this position. It's not an exact science but I honeslty believe that it's a lot more accurate than an ICM calculator.

To excel at these you really need to get good at handicapping your current equity before any decision you're faced with.

8 handed, you have aces, you call, you stack him, 7 handed, you have +4k in chips and you can fold into the money for 95% of the time, you win 20$

I think Twister calculated this for him on a post above.

my noob question to OP is: How do you calculate your skill level? Are you just taking the number SS gives you or is this something you just make up after 1000's of games played?

It's a little of each I guess, but more of the latter. I know that I'm an above average player so I take the equity that an average person would have in this situation and adjust. I don't think you can say that because you have x% ROI so you can add x% to what average equity is. Like I said before, these numbers are not scientific and not exact, but I have a feeling if we could somehow do an experiment, my handicapped ICM at a certain point of of a tourney would be closer than the ICM calculation.

Was out while this whole thread happened, but interesting analysis of the "Folding AA preflop" theory, thanks for starting the thread.

I recall the beginnings of a debate in the old DON thread on the adequacy (or inadequacy) of ICM in these type of STTs, but I don't think it really got anywhere near any conclusions or alternatives.

Ruseman, it would be ridiculous to for anyone to attempt argue that your system (above) doesn't work for you, because your results definitely prove otherwise, so I wonder if other players may want to (or even be able to) use this model to develop their own sense of how they are doing in a particular game. If it were ever turned into some sort of concrete method rather than just instinctive feel, then instead of being calculated every time from a mathematical principle in the manner of ICM, perhaps such a system as yours would have a huge lookup database of actual results.

It would have to be some kind of multi-dimensional table though, considering stack size, relative stack size, strength of opposition, blind level, number of players. Some sort of colossal pivot table perhaps.

Might not be +$ev to spend time on it at the expense of actually playing though unless you could sell it at the end. I suppose there really is no substitute for experience.

Way too complex of explanations for this scenerio IMO, u wont find a pro out there that will fold AA pf under almost ANY circumstance. I understand Don's and all, but come on. Even if u get badbeat, it's only for about a quarter of ur stack. If u can't gamble w AA then I guess u just can't gamble at all. And in poker as we all know u have to gamble sometimes. Which hand would make u more comfortable to potentially knock out a player, and only risk about a quarter of ur stack?

if his stack is bigger than ours in this spot, we still have to snap call, fist pump, do a dance call, then sit out after u win, then collect your 10 bucks and buy a cheeseburger.

Wrong.

There are plenty of DoN pro's willing to fold AA. This is not the spot but it is correct to fold for the reasons already stated.

I hear this.

I get sometimes in DoNs it is totally correct to fold AA pre but i just feel this isn't one of those spots.

jeez. No offense but I think it's common sense that ICM is not optimal and that adjustments need to be made in certain situations. It's also common sense that most of the time we wan't a bigger edge when getting our chips in b/c of our skillz. So speaking of a "system" is a bit too much IMO.

back to OP, I make the call here as well but I agree that this is not an instafistpumpsnapcall like many might think. Oh an twistedbeats made a very good post, nh sir!

NH Twistedbeats