Q&A #113: No-Limit Games Really Can’t Be Too Loose

[...] Q&A #113: No-Limit Games Really Can’t Be Too Loose [...]

MTDog’s game sounds like heaven! If I understand correctly, assuming the blinds are $1-$2, you pay an average of $.30 per hand. One out of 221 of those are pocket Aces. Your expected profit is $100 every time you get Aces.

Put another way, you spend $66 in blinds waiting for Aces, and your share of the pot is $50. On average, you spend $116 to win $200 on a coin-toss.

Any game where you can go in with the strategy “I’m only playing AA, and nothing else” must be a great game.

And the profit margin should be even better if you are willing to play “marginal” hands like KK and QQ.

[...] Q&A #113: No-Limit Games Really Can’t Be Too Loose [...]

MTDog’s game sounds REALLY profitable, but MTDog (and Ed) are correct that it also sounds mind-numbingly boring.

And Montana lawmakers sound like idiots

Ed, i get that these games are very profitable.

if you were willing to give up some of that profit to reduce variance in a very loose game what adjustments mite a TAG (playing 100bb) make ?

thanks, tobori

Ed, Thanks for the response and examples. I will have to think about what you have said. I makes sense and I understand it just seems that MY results do not match the odds, Either I suck as player (which maybe the case) or I run worse than average. What I do know is my results are better when there are only one or two manics on the table.

Thanks again

Just a quick point about these types of “too loose” games that was mentioned briefly–the variance is through the roof! If you are playing 1-2 game and you normally are only willing to lose 3-5 hundred in a night, the game might be to loose for you. You could buy in for 100 instead of your standard 200, but losing 3-5 stacks (especially when, if you double up the first time, you’re still outstacked by a large % of the table and 1 hand could set you back to 0) is very possible. But if you do that, you’re sacrificing profits by the ability to give your opponents even worse odds to call. Additionally, if you start any shorter, (50-70) you just dont have enough $ to make any moves.

If you can’t handle the variability of your game at the prices that are needed to play it correctly, then the game IS to loose and/or too expensive for you.

Example: I was playing a 1-3 game the other night where the opposite end of the table would straddle every time around. 5-6 hands in a row when i would go from UTG+6 or 7 to UTG+1 would be straddled. Normally this is an extremely profitable place to sit, but I wasn’t willing to play through more then 2 buyins on the night. As almost every pot was costing 35+ a person to see a flop, the variance was to high for me. Not that the game wasn’t profitable, just that it wasn’t profitable for the way i was restricting myself to play…