i made this thread in poker theory a while ago, but wanted to revisit it here.

you are given magic glasses in which you can see your opponent's hole cards. however, the cost of these glasses is that you will be dealt the hand that will become the nut low every single time. so you will usually have 23o, occasionally 34o, 24o, etc.

are you a winning player?
if so, do you just become an average winning player? do you become the biggest winner at every game? are you better than phil ivey in the big game?

if you played in the main event 1000 times, what would your average finish be? how often would you finish less than 2nd?

assume no one catches onto your powers.

does no one ever catch on to the fact that you never win a hand at showdown? seems too bizarre to comment upon if that is the case and trivial to comment upon if that is not the case.

any decent player will be able to avoid showdowns as much as possible and every time you are at a showdown, you muck or flip and sheepishly say you were bluffing.

how could this possibly be too bizarre to comment on? you've never heard of these hypotheticals before?

"how often would you win a 1000 man tournament if you could see your opponents hole cards?"
"90%"
"nah, 97% at least"
"too bizarre to comment on!!!"

without an extra stipulation this it seems like any decent player would peg you as a maniac pretty quickly. you could still be a winning player by playing short sessions.

even if you're pegged as a maniac, you still constantly put them in positions where they can't call your bluffs and you'll avoid every situation in which they think they finally got the hand to trap you. i don't see how a long session can't be won as well.

Games you should play in order of preference to win:

ANY deepstack NL game
ANY weak-tight NL game deepstack or not
shorthanded LHE games vs. tight players

I dunno enough about the ME to comment on that.

this doesn't apply to LHE. People will call you down with jack hi if they think you are totally FOS

I think your strategy at the main event would eventually have to be entirely preflop action. Pushing when nobody behind you has anything and the initial raiser will lay down, and stealing blinds from late position. Since it'll work every time, you'll accumulate money pretty well.
If your hand goes to postflop action, that means you're not all in yet, which means:
1)they might catch something good on the flop that'll keep them from folding, or
2)they might bluff all in first and force you to fold and lose the hand.

So it looks like it's gonna be an all in push fest.


edit: Actually, I can envision some situations where postflop play might be better. If your pushing causes the blinds/raisers to loosen up they're calling ranges, you'll be in situations where you can't get them to fold preflop anymore. But they might fold if they completely miss the flop and you push.

yes, yes, yes, yes, not sure about average but median would be second, less than half the time

If I have the low-nuts, then I would never win a tournament... but I would get 2nd most of the times.

I'd give the glasses to Phil Ivey and play him heads-up.

no.

median COULD be second, but if its less than half of the time, then median ISNT second.

I think it would be pretty close. It depends on a lot of things, including what game you are playing. In no limit, I would liek to think that I would be able ot play my opponent off there bluffs often enough to make a profit. In limit, I would like to think the same thing but I do not think it would work. I think you get caught bluffing often enough with 23 in limit that peeps start to call you down with almost anything.

2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 3 4. whats the median?

btw i meant to mention that this applies to NL only. obviously it would never be profitable in limit.

I'm gonna give my SWAG: I'm guessing your glasses give you a 50x advantage over any player. (This is probably way off.) So, with ~5000 players, you have 1/100th chance of finishing 2nd, 3rd, 4th ... Average finish = 50th place. You finish less than 2nd 99% of the time.

Duh, brain fart.

uh, if you finish less than second less than half the time, then the median is second.

IT would depend entirely on game selection and how you read people.

Since you have the nut low you cannot win a showdown. You must win by getting everyone else in the hand to fold.

You would know the exact strength of people's hands and thus you would not try to push them off of strong hands.

The key would be pegging who you could make lay down marignal hands in bigger pots heads up.

I'm probably too busy checking out the waitresses and the female dealers with these glasses to do too well at the table.

I remember Doyle says in his Super System that he can beat any home game consisting of mediocre players without looking at his cards, assuming that other player dont know he is not looking.
I dont think you can ever win a tournament though b/c even if you are a massive chip leader, the games becomes a pushbot fest once stacks get short so you have to keep folding to all in bets. Eventually at some point you get blinded out.

You will finish 2nd or worse 100% of the time. You cannot win a tournament without winning a showdown at least once.

With these glasses you'd prefer to get HU vs an opponent with a marginal holding, or a very good but vulnerable holding, and be deep. Also important is being able to put the last bet in (so opponents bluffing all in isn't really a viable option for them, and even if they do it they will do it at a point where you have little invested).

In rare instances: where both you and your opponent(s) are going to ultimately play the board (eg the final board will read AKQJT), would random hands like K8 or Q3 or AA appear? IF it is possible to get other holdings besides 23 24 etc in pending chop situations that is an automatic tipoff that the entire hand will be a chop and you can play accordingly to freeroll a pot size of your choosing.

You are certainly a big winning player. Your new game becomes "wait for good (lock) situations where people put moderate amounts of money in with hands they are very comfortable folding to huge bets from unknowns." Anytime someone bluffs at you, that is free money.

OP:
My guesstimate was 99% of the time. You'll place 2nd about 10 out of the 1000 WSOP events.

I'm thinking that you could finish ahead of 2nd place money if you negotiated once it got heads up. Also, I don't know whats allowed in the WSOP - but imagine if you were way ahead of a lone opponent and agreed to a 50/50 split of the 1st+2nd prize money if he would concede the bracelet (i.e., go all in with you and then fold).