I played my first session of NLO8 and saw guys ship allin for 100BB to no raise preflop a bunch of times. There would 3 BB in the pot and they stick in 100! I assume this is AA, but what is the point of this play? I assume its terrible, but maybe not, does it get called by worse ever?

I was playing 50/1 and 1/2.

standard

"Do you feel lucky? Well, do you?"

is this really standard on these games?

standard and profitable

From my experience YES, and I see this S*** at 2/4 quite often...

This is true. No matter how much I dislike it and think "learn to play after the flop", the amount of times I have seen someone with two aces get called by even worse than A2 or A3 hands makes it clearly a good play assuming you know your opponents will make these ghastly calls. Although most of the time you simply win the blinds, repeat the situation over and over and someone ends up calling and when they do the profit is (provided you win) very good. You just end up catching the occasional fella who thinks "F*ck it" and puts his money in with 2457 or KKxx or something! People gamble a lot in NLO8 in my opinion. The amount of money that can be made from doing this is enough to convince me to make the same play and I have done it several times (though yet to pick up a call).

yeah this pretty much boils down to the old saying, something about as long as there are worse people than you at the table it doesnt matter how good you are, lol

I just made this play with AAKQs in a $1/2 game for $200 in a $10 pot and got called by a full stack with AJJQs - I'll take my ~71% for stacks here once in a while and take the blinds + limpers the other times... unfortunately the guy ended up with quad jjjj

I still think going AI with AAxx might not be the best possible play at most tables. It's a profitable play for sure, but I'm not at all convinced it's the most profitable way to play these hands. I usually only push if there are several limpers already in or if my xx isn't worth much. Pushing AA23/AA34 etc all in preflop is generally a big mistake IMO, unless of course the pot has been raised already or if you have a bunch of maniacs at the table who are willing to call you with any 4.

As for calling all ins.... 4567 ds is almost a flip against AA2K (no suits) and is actually way ahead of AAKT rainbow..........................

Its perfect for the shortstacks to be doing this. They are more likely to get looked up by random a2 hands when they go in for 20bb, but when you're full it just doesnt make a whole lot of sense to bung it all in there praying for a misclick or a call from a better hand. While occasionally I see a random guy call one off with any a2 or a q367 for a full stack out of boredom or frustration, over 90% of the time it just winds up with the all in player picking up the blinds with a hand he could have made a lot more money on if he just played it normally. Once in a while someone else will have AA, usually a better one, and call it off, it mostly results in a split pot unless someones got the boss low, makes a flush, or trips or two pair with a their sidecards.

I guess i could see the wisdom in this if there are a lot of inexperienced players at your table, but when its just a couple fish and mostly regulars, it just doesnt make a whole lot of sense to me to be doing this. (even the regs who are pretty fishy in their own right). Anyone that has been around this game for any amount of time knows exactly what you have and will pitch anything but a usually better aa to this.
Its kind of like the early days of micro limit holdem where it wasnt such a bad idea to just shove in AA and KK preflop and get called by A9 or KQ enough to probably make this the optimal play. Yes, you could show a profit on these hands by still doing this, but wouldnt you make more if you just played the hands normally? I think
the level of play in omaha/8, while still in general pretty awful, has progressed to
this point as well.

Lately I have reduced my standards for calling these. There are just so many people shoving aa+2 high cards every time they get them that my calling range vs randoms has been reduced. I'd say my current range is probably aa6doublesuited, aa5 singlesuited, aa4 rainbow. The flush draws are important because each one pretty much adds a straight up 3-4% to your equity in the hand since you both have aa its unlikely for either of you to make a full house on the other, but having the best low draw and whether you have a backup card or not is the most important factor in how aa's match up against eachother.

Take notes on what the regs are doing this with if you play enough to where you repeatedly get to see what people are shoving with, and adjust your ranges accordingly if you see them incorporating this move with aa+highcard hands all the time then your crappy aces with a low draw start to look better.

any AA2/AA3/AA4/AA5/A23 shove will be profitable in long run- you think you're surprised at people making this play, wait until you see what other people call with.

Once you experience the joy of getting called by "monsters" like KQJT or KKxx, it's hard to stop shoving AA preflop.

^^wait until you get scooped a few times in a row, then it's really joyous

i shove my aces with little cards in certain situations, when i think a shortstack is about to stack off with any marginal hand, when a handful of people have limped in and i don't feel like making a regular sized raise from my sb/bb and playing oop postflop, etc., but the best way to take money off your opponents in nlo8 is through a strict regimen of mostly smallball and turn/river overbetting.

nlo8 is a great game and it should be introduced in all casinos across the planet

This practice pretty much keeps me on the pot limit tables. I hate that crap.

Terrible Bluff has it right - I'm just now learning about the overbetting turn and river plays and using them very effectively. What a cool game...

This still seems like an odd play to me. Of course we are way ahead when called:

AsAc2s3c vs top 10% of hands we are a 70/30 favorite

http://www.propokertools.com/simulat...25&h3=&h4=&h5=

Versus the top 20% of hands we are 73/27 favorite

http://www.propokertools.com/simulat...25&h3=&h4=&h5=

I cant imagine we are getting called by worse than the top 20% too often?


How often to we get called pushing 100B into 3BB?

One in ten?

I am not sure how to do the calculation, but how often do we need to get called to make this profitable?

If we are shipping our strongest hands all the time its seems like we are losing alot of equity and we will be VERY easy to play against. Even the least observant players will soon be onto us, no?

lol what are you talking about, you dont need to get called a certain amount of times before it becomes profitable, its a +ev play

edit: if youre shoving AA5 or better you are fine as far as equity is concerned, but you dont often have more than a 60/40 up to 2 to 1 edge so dont expect to make your living doing it

if you're shoving any AAxx then gl to you, that is not going to be profitable

Is this a level?


You do realize that EV is not black a white? Something is not either +ev or -ev. One play can be significantly more +ev than another, which is my point.

This post and thinking are WHY is is profitable to shove AI.

Agreed, but you have to take into account the fact that it is difficult (read: impossible) to play perfectly postflop. For every hand in which you're losing equity by merely taking down the limpers and blinds, you have to consider the hands in which you lose value by affording your opponents an opportunity to make mathematically correct decisions because they have more complete information after the flop. I'm not sure where the tipping point is, but for a marginal player like myself, I think I lose more value when I make incorrect plays postflop because I misjudge my opponents' ranges than I do by pushing preflop and occasionally getting a player to take the bait with "live" cards.

With the range of AA hands to which I limit my pushes, I am virtually never called by a hand that has proper odds to call. This is not the case once the flop is dealt, and I'm forced to proceed or fold based on a very broad estimate of the ranges I am up against.

i am aware that EV is not black and white, but something can be + or -. i'm not advocating doing it every single time you see one, but WHEN YOU DO decide to shove your aces with a good lo card, you can rest assured that when called, more often than not the guy wont have a better AALx (L<=5) and you will have an edge on him in equity, however slight it may be. so if you shove AALx 10000000 times, you should show a profit because you are favored over the range of calling hands.

i'm not saying you will show max profit, or that shoving preflop is more +ev than playing it out, in fact i believe i stated the contrary in a previous post, as well as when the times are that i prefer to make the play.

i thought i was pretty clear with my wording.

to put it in the simplest way i can, if i took every time i shoved a AALx out of my pto database and graphed it, the graph would show a positive number, i.e. the expected value is positive.

when i said that you dont have to do it a certain number of times, i meant that it could be profitable after 1 hand or if you get sucked out on the first couple you have then it could take 5 or 7 hands, who knows, there is no set number of times you have to do it before you ACTUALLY show a positive return, but in the long run you should run into an overall profit from it.

Excellent point! Seems like many get caught up in thinking about EV in absolute terms, when in fact it is a relative concept... And the game ought to be played, analyzed, and studied as a continues sequence, not discreet.