Teaching some poker basics - Pocket twos v ace king
No Limit Holdem
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Marcus Bateman /
17 January 2010 /
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'Riiiight...' she sighed, quickly followed by sarcastically saying 'So you would rather have the worse hand in a game that is all about having the best hand?...Makes perfect sense'.
Yesterday, I was trying to explain basic hand values to a friend of mine who has recently turned her attention to poker. I started off with what I thought was the simplest comparison in poker - pocket twos against ace king - the classic race scenario. I soon encountered problems.
The conversation went something like this: 'Right so pocket twos are a slight favourite over ace king?' she asked. 'Yes but you would always rather have ace king' I replied, not really thinking through the effect this detail would have on a beginner. 'Riiiight...' she sighed, quickly followed by sarcastically saying 'So you would rather have the worse hand in a game all about having the best hand?...Makes perfect sense'.
Just like many things in poker, I had made the classic mistake of failing to think about how things which seem obvious to regular players seem very alien to beginners. Although ace king is an underdog to pocket twos, in poker you don't compare your hand against specific hands, you compare it against probable ranges of hands, and against an opponent's likely range, ace king is a vastly superior hand than pocket twos.
Imagine we have an opponent who we believe will call us with any pair or any two cards above ten if we shove all in. If we Pokerstove ace king against this range we are a 59% favourite. However, if we Pokerstove pocket twos against this range, we have only 40% - a near twenty percent change in equity, taking us from a decent favourite to a substantial underdog.
This is because although pocket twos is a slight favourite over two over cards, it is a big dog to any pair, a fact that ace king avoids for all but two pairs - aces and kings (even against kings it still has reasonable amount of equity). As a result, although ace king is a dog to pocket twos, it is in fact a vastly better hand in hold'em, as against the range of hands your opponent is likely to have, it has vastly more equity. In fact, you have to go all the way up pocket tens to find a pair that has a similar equity as ace king against this range of likely hands, and this shows the key difference in power between these small pairs and ace king, despite the fact that small pairs are slight favourites against them.
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