Saturday, August 21, 2010

Tommy Angelo Strikes Again

I just had one of those moments where I had a choice to make and based my decision on a realization that had NEVER occurred to me before. In a sense, I had an "Aha!" moment, and I think I sorta owe it to Tommy Angelo. I'm listening to his video series on DC (8 Fold Path to Poker Enlightenment), and specifically yesterday I listened to the reciprocality episode. Here's what went down, and the concepts I used to make my decision.

So I'm in the 1 hole in a so-so 20/40 game. There are two notably bad players, positioned in seats 2 and 5. Obviously I am looking to change seats ASAP, as my seat is poor from both EV and comfort points of view. Seat 4 opens, and I instinctively reach for a chip to lock it up; the inbound player is also a fish, and getting position on him and the guy in 2 would be awesome. But A second later, and it really only took that long, I stand pat. Here's why.

Conventional wisdom, at least to me, is that seat selection should be solved greedily. If the open seat is better than yours, upgrade now. There seems to be no point in not changing seats because a better one might come along. What I realized today is that the above is not entirely true. Tommy's concept of reciprocality basically says that you should view all your decisions in light of what your opponents would have done. If you make a decision differently, be it betting, quitting, showing a hand, whatever, only then do you truly make money. You don't "win" just by dragging a pot with aces. If the guy who paid you off would have won just as much from you, had the situation been reversed, the hand is a tie.

Hmmmm....so what does that mean? I make money when I make decisions differently than my opponents would. And, in theory, I am good at doing so. Seat selection falls under this set of assumptions. All that's the easy part. What I realized is that if I "play good" in a certain aspect of the game, I want to raise the stakes. By not taking the open seat I would be allowing the creation of a sort of "uber Jesus" seat, putting the trio of fish in seats 2-5. I was in a must move game, so seats would come available; and most likely it would be me, not some other player, who would grab the 6 or 7 when it came open. In short I could create an extremely high variance situation, intentionally, and rely on my skills to capitalize on it.

The high level lesson, the "aha" moment, was simple. If you are an expert at solving a very specific aspect of a game, strive to create high variance (difficult) situations regarding that aspect of the game, then crush your opponents at it. I was in seat 6 fifteen minutes later (results oriented maybe) and proceeded to start typing this post.

6 comments:

Tyler said...

not to burst your bubble but I think you're over-thinking it on this one :-p and remind me to talk about tommy angelo and his contributions to the poker world with you sometime though. i think it could lead to an interesting conversation...

The blindman said...

But if you take the four now, wouldn't you still be able to move to an opened 6 later (with the fish in 1-5 instead of 2-5)?

Oren said...

If he takes the 4 now he will be putting one of the fish in 1 - and not in 4. So no 2-3-4-5 aquarium...

One related thing Tommy wrote in his book that sticks to me is: Each time a seat opens up you need to make a decision to stay in your seat (or move obv). Its not as trivial as it sounds.

jesse8888 said...

I realize this example wasn't exactly pristine, since as Tyler pointed out I could have just moved and it would have been almost as good eventually. The moment of clarity for me was that I specifically have an advantage in high variance situations (that do not involve actually betting money) over my opponents if I am more skilled at solving those situations.

The same would be true for a top notch software developer aiming to excel at his company. It would be in his best interest for his team to pursue challenging projects with aggressive deadlines because in such a difficult situation he would outshine his co-workers more clearly.

jesse8888 said...

Darn it hit publish too early I'll just make another comment.

So what I realized is not just that I had an advantage, but that in certain situations it's possible to actually generate those high variance situations. The software developer could push his team to take on more responsibility. I can give someone else the Zeus Seat temporarily, assuming I'll get it shortly. You can start 40/80 games HUHU with your fellow house players and wait for action :)

Captain R said...

So it sounds like the best play would be to convince your opponents into changing the game to Second Best Hold'em or Studugi, am I right?