Originally posted by 177272
Morning,
Some time ago you offered to look at some problem HH for me, any chance you can give me some feedback on this one.
Background. The 45 man group I was working with have mainly moved to 6 max hypers and I have decided to have a little look at these as they could suit my current work situation. Given that I can fit an hour of these in every now and then and that I feel they are a good learning tool for constructing ranges and the like which will be useful for any format.
So I have no experience of them (or very little) and whilst reviewing some HH with the group this one came up for universal condemnation (a little strong I know but basically everybody hated my play:) )
Poker Stars, $1.40 Buy-in (50/100 blinds, 10 ante) No Limit Hold'em Tournament, 3 Players
Poker Tools Powered By Holdem Manager - The Ultimate Poker Software Suite.
SB: 1,471 (14.7 bb)
Hero (BB): 1,063 (10.6 bb)
BTN: 466 (4.7 bb)
Preflop: Hero is BB with 8
A
BTN folds, SB raises to 200, Hero raises to 1,053 and is all-in, SB calls 853
Flop: (2,136) 7 5
4 (2 players, 1 is all-in)
Turn: (2,136) J (2 players, 1 is all-in)
River: (2,136) T (2 players, 1 is all-in)
Results: 2,136 pot
Final Board: 7 5 4 J T
SB showed 7 7
and won 2,136 (1,073 net)
Hero showed 8 A and lost (-1,063 net)
My thought in game was, the big stack would raise me as 2nd stack with a fairly wide range and that a reshove would get through most of the time, if called was I always in too bad of a state? If my mistake was as big as the group think i need to get it in my head why it is if i am to learn from it. I think the general consensus was because we had a short stack ICM made it a fold? I would value your opinion. I am sure we can still play poker in these and that it is not all just push or fold.
Also what would you say are the fundamental differences between Turbo's and Hypers, is it predominantly Variance?
Keep well sir.
Steve
Morning Steve,
Of course you can post hands here, I will try to help you out anytime I can.
This particular hand can be very tricky but I will try to brake down my thinking process with questions for you that should help you come to answers on your own.
1) How much % do you think opponent is raising here?
2) Does he ever have raise folding range here for 10 and 5bb effective?
3) How much % of his range are Ax hands, how much PPs , how much Kx , how much others?
4) In vacuum without any reads, do you ever expect CL to have raise fold range here from button?
5) Do you have any specific reads on that CL? Is he aggressive, opening BTN wide in bubble not letting you play BVB vs SS? Or maybe this is 2nd BTN he opened in past 10 BTNs???
6) Is CL opponent who is ICM aware? What does he put you on when you 3 bet him as MID stack? Is he capable of making big folds and r/calling very tight vs you?
7) What does your FGS (future game simulation) look like in that game? Are you getting CL to fold BTNs; does he give you frequent walks BVB; does SS have super tight calling range BVB; is SS shoving every hand BVB into CL or is very passive? etc
We can start with vacuum and general expectations.
I never expect CL to have R/fold range here. Since we are in vacuum I don't expect opponent to open here Q10s 
I always expect any CL to have here Ax type of hands + PPs and maybe some Kx like K10+. When it comes to PPs I expect CL to r/call stronger PPs such as 77-88-99+ and the rest to do open shove with (capped range and predictable). Most likely he will do the same with smaller Ax (open shove) and only min raise with stronger ones.
Now when we know this vacuum range, we can try to answer next key questions - how much does the opponent fold to 3 bet vs MID stack? Is CL aware of ICM , your role as 2nd stack, does he understand your perceived 3 bet range and how will he act based on all this?
All this can be very tricky to answer because we are playing a guessing game! If we go and say its 1.5$ game, then by default we should say that opponents are pretty loose and not aware of ICM. This automatically means that those guys are not capable of raise/folding vs MID stack and that their gap between raising and folding practically doesn't exist.
Knowing these things, you should always 3 bet shove as MID stack here very tight!
How tight? Use Holdem Resources Calculator to check for 45 mans payout structure as it will influence the range a lot. You need to input 3 things only here!
1) What range do you think CL is min raising here?
2) What range is he raise/calling vs you and vs SS?
3) What range is SS over calling 3 way here (based on your expectation in vacuum if no reads) ?
HRC will give you the right answer. I don't play 45 mans so telling stuff like JJ+ AKs or 99+ AQs+ or 88+ AJ+ would not be correct.
I can tell you one thing. These spots I studied and analyzed in HRC a lot. Also I think a lot of regs in today's games even on higher limits make mistakes here as MID stack. So it is good to see that you had questions for interesting hand and very common spot that burns money for MID stacks.
Understanding dynamic of the bubble (3 players in 6 max is bubble in 45 man is different of course) is crucial to getting ITM. Thinking about how opponent plays from BTN, BVB, how he plays BB, how much do they defend to 3 bet, how much do they 3 bet nai, how much do they 3 bet all in, how much do they have fold pre flop vs BTN or BVB and finally what happens as number of blinds increase or decrease? If with all this you also have history with players you play, then it should be much easier to adjust to their tendencies. Without any reads or in vacuum it takes a lot of experience, HH analyzing and building ranges from actual games and live opponents.
Eventually it all clicks and you become very fluent in any spot and in any stack setup vs any type of opponent.
This is probably one of the hardest things that people who play SNGs have to learn and it takes them longest. Once this is in place, they can "relax" and get more ITM % regardless of card distribution.
Final things about this particular spot what I would do in future
- Always 3 bet shove super tight here as you have huge risk aversion from CL and have SS who is your enemy here
- If CL is crushing you in FGS simulation, only then you should look into extending your range. Here I prefer calling BVB CL wider and doubling up then messing it up with SB 3 bet vs his BTN min raise why - because CL will shove close to or ATC into BB so I can lower a bit my equity for the sake of doubling up and assuring myself to enter HU.
- If SS is crazy in calls BVB vs us the above becomes even more important!
Finally your question about 6 max hypers vs 6 max turbos differences:
- 6 max hypers have very shallow stacks and only couple blind depths
- 6 max turbo has 75bb , 50bb , 30bb , and 15bb or less blinds so in that sense you can do more post flop, more pre flop dynamics, more 3-4-5 bet, more learning about board structures vs your and opponents percieved range
- 6 max hypers have those micro stack ICM studies with ante
- 6 max turbos you will rarely get to bubble or 4 people where avg stack size is 7 or 8bb (so ICM is somewhat easier for turbos)
- 6 max hypers plays every wannabe SNE person who hopes to be BE and earn 100k $ a year , they also burn out very fast and their space for improvement hits sealing very quick when they eventually realize that table selecting for SNE is a dream cause every year new 10-15-30 regs infest their games and lower their expected win rate while they don't know/have where to look for edges
- 6 max turbos plays everyone and the advantages here are amazing - you learn to play properly pre flop understanding how to construct balance your ranges and understand all the opponents ranges and how they construct them; you learn post flop because you have space to do so; you learn SOLID ICM which since everybody plays turbos you already will have edge in ICM alone; you have space to exploit and crush opponents in bubble; finally you have space to play HU like HU hypers which leaves a lot of space for pre and post flop dominating instead of just getting it.
Overall my opinion is that 6 max turbos take far more to master then 6 max hypers but also once you master them you can expect to have huge edge over the field in any area. 6 max hypers don't allow you huge edge anywhere + there aren't many areas to begin with!
So if you ask me 6 max turbos or 6 max hypers - always 6 max turbo here!
And yes, variance is more brutal in 6 max hypers because of everything I already mentioned above!
Hope all this helped somewhat Steve.
Have to leave now but let me know if you got any extra questions!
Pedja
